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☆ TDM: SEPTEMBER
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aefenglom's test drive! All threads can be considered game canon, should you choose to do so; regardless of if you pick specific threads to remain canon to the game, the prompts and test drive itself will be. This will be touched on later in-game, so it's fairly important to note! Aside from that, here are some quick reminders:• Reserves Open Today! If you're interested in securing a spot, put one in! We accept applications without reserves too, of course. Reserves will expire three days before the end of the application period, on the 27th.With that taken care of...
• Applications Open The 24th! These will last until the end of the month, the 30th, with the intro log going on up October 1st. The application page can be found here.
• If you have any questions about the game or the world, please refer to the FAQ page; if you still have questions, feel free to ask them! For questions specific to the test drive, please ask them on the appropriate thread.
• For the purposes of the test drive, your character will have access to all magics taught by the Coven if they're a Witch, and as much of their shifted form as you'd like if they're a Monster. Feel free to play around and experiment with each!
• Test drive threads can be used as samples for your applications!
You feel like you're floating. Around you, colors and sounds and smells swirl as if trapped in a whirlpool, vibrancy and hue ever shifting. The more you watch them, the less solid they are; they only become clear out of the corner of your eye. The area around you begins to feel more solid as well, until your feet are on the ground, the wind brushes playfully against your face -
and you know one thing, and one thing alone: this is a dream, and an incredibly realistic one at that.
The Wilde
For once, the forest that comes to view isn’t flecked with autumnal colors, with leaves that fall without the touch of wind. Each branch blossoms with life, flowers of all shades dotting their surfaces as spring rears its head, and you’re tugged from the edge, through a worn path, and deeper than ever before. The gentle laughter and chatter of living creatures filters in through petals that you brush past, hanging from flowering vines winding downward like delicate curtains.
There’s something new to this though, eyes that see and a growing excitement among the forests’ inhabitants: You’re more known to them than you might guess, it would seem.
 Outskirts The meadow where you find yourself is fresh and green, an explosion of color and the sweet scents of flowers and rain. Wildflowers dot the grass, all beginning to open, in sprays of purple and pink and orange. To one end, the stream flows clear over smooth river rocks into a small pond dotted with vibrant blue fish and turtle-shelled ducks floating without a care in the world. To the other, the forest begins with tall, white-barked trees and saplings in various stages of new growth, pushing out tender green leaves. It's pleasant, but strange, because... There is next to no sign of the Cwyld here in this idyllic patch of the Wilde, no blackened foliage or shadows hiding white-eyed Cwyldtid. The wildlife seem similarly unaffected, even thriving - watch out for the mama petalwolves with their brilliantly-colored floral coverings. Most of them camouflaging themselves in the thickets of wildflowers are followed by bushy, green-leafed cubs, and they're widely known to be aggressive when threatened. The most inspiring sight, however, is one not seen in the Wilde of Geardagas for many years, due to the wide spread of the Cwyld. A silvery, equine creature emerges from the treeline, trotting slowly toward the pond on iridescent hooves. A single white horn protrudes from its head, and its mane shimmers pearlescent in the morning sunlight. Following it is a smaller, clumsier unicorn with a gold-tinged coat, happy to be out and about. Unicorns are known to be exceedingly rare - to spot a foal in the Wilde is unheard of. You're all very lucky to see the way the forest is healing. While some may know that the Coven itself has a unicorn in its stables, this wild one is unused to the hands of humans and may hold her ground in protection of her baby, threatening with her horn and performing small feats of magic to that end -- illusion and physical enhancements are its more core offensives, though it can do healing and shields on the other side. The foal, for the most part, doesn’t seem to have a lick of self-preservation (perhaps it’s been living in safety for too long) and won’t mind bounding up to something, or someone, new and interesting, nickering in asking to play. |
 The Path Through Onward and inward, traveler. The healing forest is vast, but a particular route is clearly outlined to lead toward something. As you head past the treeline, more saplings of varying heights and ages shoot forth from the ground between the large-trunked trees that survived. Warm sunlight dapples the ground in an irregular pattern of light and shade, and shines off a series of mirrors, each about the size of a large hardcover book, hanging from the tree trunks to either side to form a path. No two mirrors are alike. Similar to the mirrors within the Looking-Glass House, each is framed in different decorations and different materials, with different engravings or embossings, but unlike the Looking-Glass House, all the mirrors' decorations are visible to passersby. They're well-cared for out here, polished to a shine and picked clean of leaf-litter and outdoor debris; distant, happy voices reveal that the area is far from abandoned. Each of these mirrors is placed in honor of a Mirrorbound, and all contain an enchantment that, when the surface of the glass is touched, causes it to display short, silent 'moving pictures' of that Mirrorbound's heroic deeds, in Aefenglom, in Dorchacht, or maybe even from the character's home, whatever they may have done to earn this high regard. Whether the retellings are true to life, or completely dramatized, it's clear that much care was put into remembering their individual stories and personalizing the frames of their mirrors. The path between the mirrors serves the dual purpose of memorializing, and leading the way deeper into the forest... |
 Within the Wilde ... Where the sound of creatures grow louder and more plentiful, shaping into actual words as characters step into a clearing, more familiar to those who’d dreamed the first dream than most: There may be no long tables set up with food and drink, but the sight of Fae flitting about and gossiping is certainly something all its own. They, along with Dryads, seem to be plentiful in comparison to the waking world, and once they’ve taken notice of the new faces... immediately begin to ask questions. From whence did they come? Were they filled with new magic power, or had they already begun to change? It’s exciting -- they haven’t had new connections to the world in some time, most of the old Bound having returned beyond their glass some time ago, and while it could mean there was trouble on the horizon they don’t seem too bothered by that fact. “Most” returned, it’s said, because there’s plenty of creatures who claim to have been descended from those who helped to restore the balance of the world, proudly claiming so to any who spend half a minute with them. While they can be spoken to in a sense, characters won’t get anything too crazy out of them -- they’re willing to speak on present happenings (or what’d be present for characters in game) and how that played out, such as how Dorchacht was far more free than it had been centuries hence in example. Anything more pressing, such as how it may have come about, is unable to be understood despite everything else being able to. They tease new dreamers that those of old were brought here, as far as the stories go, to help cleanse the world and return it to what it once was, and joke that they’d better prepare for the same trouble -- what a laugh, their Wilde as it is now, desecrated once more. But the Fae in particular are tricksy and prefer pranks to actual conversation, picking on anyone in sight to see how true it was that Mirrorbound -- you, apparently -- had powerful magic and amazing abilities as Monsters: Give it a shot, cast a spell or two, show off your more Monstrous talents, they’ll find it a genuine hoot. |
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The offering was certainly something odd, a realization that she had truthfully never wielded such a weapon. There's a quick, dismissive shake of her head. ]
I'm sorry, but I do not know how to use this. [ Her fingers were far too delicate for a blade, the hilt gripped onto as if she doubts ... well, her own doubts. It didn't seem difficult when she things of how wildly the woman had swung, but she doubts she would share the same prowess or skill.
Her words may have been dismissive of the idea, but she gulps a bit harder. ] You put faith in me I do not know I have in myself...
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I'm no swordsman, no one taught me the "right" way to wield a sword. Everything I learned about this thing, I learned by myself because I had to.
[It's her way of saying that skill isn't the be-all-end-all of power. If she can do it, this woman probably can too. In theory, anyway.]
I'm not going to force you to take it, but this trip will be a lot easier if we can both fight.
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[ Zero's words were heavy, blunt enough to make her finally grasp onto the hilt and let the weight of it fall towards the ground. She tests the weight, uneasy and clearly inexperienced. Her hand instinctively wants to use two hands to hoist it upwards but instead it just weighs there idly.
Dany glances to her, as if questioning if this was even proper. ]
I do hope I do not need to use this. [ Or attempt to. ] There should be a village somewhere through the wooded path – that was where I was attempting to go before I was driven off course.
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Yeah, I won't hold my breath on that, but-- sure would be nice.
[A walk through the woods that's not all about death and dying is something that she can't say she's had in a long time. Her last trip into the forests wasn't a pleasure cruise by any means. It was unpleasant from beginning to end.]
Alright. You can give it back when we get there.
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What may I call the woman who saved me from the maw of the beast?
[ The one who did look far more formidable than she ever would be, spear or sword. ]
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...you may call me "Zero".
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Zero? As the number? [ A small, inquisitive glance follows. ] I wonder if girls named after numbers is common... you are the second one to be named as such.
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Yeah, it's complicated. [...] Let me guess... mousey little brown haired girl?
[At least she didn't call her virgin.]
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[ She asks before she can catch the words from leaving her mouth. ]
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...yeah. The murderous one.
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[ The word hits her harshly. The discomfort she felt with Four had been more of pity, more of a loathing she can not save herself from feeling. Without the capacity to sum her courage, Four could not move forward.
Dany, truthfully, did not know how to process that. Her eyes grow focused. ]
Explain.
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[It is not spoken with a burning passion, not even a quiet regret— it is said with a tired acceptance.]
Creatures like us were never meant to exist.
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What are you, then? If not only sisters. What crimes did they commit for such an action?
[ Sorry, she's gonna process this a bit. ]
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It was my fault they were created in the first place-- so it was my responsibility to clean up the mess I made. While they call themselves my sisters, it's a hell of a lot more complicated than that. All I wanted was to get rid of the Intoners. All Intoners.
[Including first and foremost herself.]
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She feels tense, her heart racing quicker. ]
They're — ... they're people. They're living beings, what right did you have to slay them? [ She won't accuse, there's a plea in her voice. ] Please help me understand.
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[She's used to being questioned. About her choices. About her sisters. But back then she'd still had her mission in front of her. There wasn't time for talk. Now... well.]
It's not a great story, and I doubt hearing it will help you understand. But if you still want to hear it, then fine. It doesn't matter anymore anyway.
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[ Or, at the very least, they look like one. The softness in her eyes counteracts the harshness in her voice, the shock of hearing such a despondent response of mortality clear. ]
I... [ Was it her place? Was it her battle to defend Four and condemn this woman? ] ...She's alive here. If you killed her, truly, she is not in the state you left her.