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Phantasmal Rift Mods ([personal profile] phantasmods) wrote in [community profile] phantasmemes2018-04-12 11:09 pm
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TEST DRIVE 003

Hello, and welcome to the third test drive for Phantasmal Rift!

Test drive threads are assumed to be game canon for accepted characters unless otherwise noted, so don't feel like you'll have to introduce yourself a second time to everyone you meet! As an added bonus, participation in the test drive comes with the chance to earn up to two items of loot for your trouble! Characters who are accepted can earn one item for having a top level, and one for tagging out to someone else's top level! Your SWEET LOOT will be included with your acceptance notice.

Additionally, characters currently in game can earn themselves a piece of bonus loot for the dungeon by tagging people's top-levels on the test drive! Existing characters get their bonus loot along with the rest of their loot at the conclusion of the dungeon.

This test drive takes place in the Fissure known as Amesta Forest - a forest filled with silver mist and shrouded in eternal twilight, where your dreams become real! For a certain limited definition of real. This is significantly less awesome than it sounds. On the bright side, anyone within the mists will find themselves with no need to sleep, as though trapped in the same spring evening as the rest of the forest.

OPTION ONE: DREAM A LITTLE DREAM

This first option might happen to you just about anywhere. From the swirls of silver mist comes a shape - or perhaps more than one shape? Who knows, it's your dream -

Well, probably. It could also be someone else's.

Those who stay too long in any one part of the mist will find their subconscious minds influencing it into shapes - the exact sort of things that appear in their dreams. As with their real dreams, the details are sometimes strange - too much detail, or not enough, depending on where your focus is. The character who 'created' the dream specter will instantly understand what it's supposed to be, but other viewers might have some difficulty with it.

Fortunately for those of you prone to violent nightmares, these dream figures are incapable of doing harm - any blows struck by them simply leave behind the dampness of walking through thick mist. A hard enough blow will similarly disperse them - or, in most cases, you can simply move quickly and leave them behind.

OPTION TWO: THE MOVEMENTS OF THE TREES


A forest filled with mist is honestly a kind of spooky place, isn't it?

Well, it's about to get spookier, when you notice that there's a tree... somewhere there wasn't a tree, before. Or maybe it's that you were looking around and realized that a tree wasn't there here there was one before, instead leaving behind only a round, torn-up patch of earth from where the roots were buried.

Either way, there's only one conclusion to be drawn - the trees are moving.

Those who pay close attention will soon realize that it's only one kind of tree that moves - an absolutely unfamiliar kind, with mist-silver bark and thin, almost translucent leaves in large handlike shapes. They aren't very tall, and their branches split low to the ground, the structure something like a less crooked Japanese maple. The Wanderwoods seem prone to following specific people, usually only moving when out of sight, though you might catch them shuffling along if you have quick reflexes for looking over your shoulder.

What do they want? Well, nothing, really. They're just attracted to sapient beings and, especially, the way the mist forms into their dreams. So while they won't do anything in particular to the characters themselves, anyone with a dream-form hanging around them might find that manifestation suddenly papered in thin, grabbing leaves... and swallowed up.

OPTION THREE: WHAT NOW IS FOUND?


Not all of the forest is trapped in eternal spring. One part of it is held in exactly the opposite - a brilliantly colored autumn morning, just before dawn, with the trees overhead colored in brilliant reds and oranges. Leaves drift down in a slow breeze, and pile up in random places among the trees (which never seem to run out of leaves to drop), and silver pools of water gather at the bases of the trees and in any other depressions, their surfaces perfectly still mirrors.

The mist is quite a bit thinner here, too, which allows you to see... What is that familiar shape in the distance, between the trees?

While dream manifestations are uncommon in the region of Fall's Heart, it's not only dreams that manifest here. Instead, characters will see the figures of those they've lost - instantly recognizable, but unreachable and nearly impossible to catch, running through the trees heedless of how you call after them. It's impossible to catch up to them by mundane means, and those who use supernatural means to do so -

- will find that, at their touch, the vision crumbles into silvery mist-water, forming another of those perfect, reflective pools at their feet.
founderinglight: ([spooky placeholder])

[personal profile] founderinglight 2018-04-13 05:37 pm (UTC)(link)
[He doesn't even seem to hear her, or perhaps her words are simply lost in whatever he's hearing from the crowd as he frantically tries to push through.

It's a dream. And so no matter how far he goes and struggles, Izunia can't reach Ardyn before - ]


No! Stop, I beg you!

[ - the first torch is lit and thrown on the pyre.

In the manner of a nightmare that has reached its conclusion, the flames spark up instantly, almost hiding Ardyn from view entirely. Strangely, it doesn't seem that he's burning yet.]
induality: (pic#7681534)

[personal profile] induality 2018-04-13 06:01 pm (UTC)(link)
[She doesn't want to watch-- and yet that's exactly what she does, not willing to avert her eyes from the scene. They watch the fire catch and spread... and she watches the man in the crowd.

He's very good at yelling. Had he done so then? Did he struggle as he does now?

...Touko wonders.

Louder this time, she adds--
]

There's nothing you can do. It won't change anything.
founderinglight: (fanart erryday)

[personal profile] founderinglight 2018-04-13 06:07 pm (UTC)(link)
[Again, her voice doesn't seem to reach him. The noise of the crowd is picking up, too. Perhaps their words make sense to him.

Indeed, that seems to be the case, Izunia pressing a hand to his temple.]


No, stop, I know, but please -

[And then he looks back up.

It's a mistake.

You know that way that dreams have, of making everything hyperfocus on one image? Touko will feel that, even though it isn't her dream, when Ardyn lifts his head. His eyes are the yellow she knows at first, but as she watches, the sclera grow black, and some rancid-looking black fluid starts to drip from his eyes and mouth.

And his words, judging, angry, cut through the noise of the crowd clearly even as they vanish into Izunia's focus on his brother alone - ]


You did this.

[With a sob, Izunia collapses, and the vision begins to dissipate.]
induality: (pic#12061918)

[personal profile] induality 2018-04-13 07:08 pm (UTC)(link)
[Her heart nearly stops as the focus comes in. Watching this was a lot, even knowing the inevitability. This was a vision of the history she knows still torments Ardyn now.

...she's angry. She wants to lash out.

But as much as she wants to, she can't do that now. The image of him crumpling in on himself is enough to stop her short. After all-- she said it herself. It wouldn't change anything.

She steps over and places a hand on his head.
]

...it's over now.
founderinglight: ([spooky placeholder])

[personal profile] founderinglight 2018-04-13 07:17 pm (UTC)(link)
[He's curled up on himself until - the touch on his head makes it jerk up into her hand. The bonk would probably be nearly comedic if not for, you know, the everything.]

You're - not a dream.

[Sorry, that's as coherent as you get, he's uh. he's having a Day.]
induality: (pic#12011507)

[personal profile] induality 2018-04-13 07:27 pm (UTC)(link)
[Her sympathies don't reach far enough to feel bad for interrupting the moment. He shouldn't be left out here in this state anyway.

...maybe she's grown a little soft.
]

No, I'm not.
founderinglight: (Default)

[personal profile] founderinglight 2018-04-13 07:31 pm (UTC)(link)
[He pauses, and then presses his hands into his face, hard. Breathe deep, 'zunia.]

My apologies. You shouldn't have had to see that.
induality: (pic#10667026)

[personal profile] induality 2018-04-13 08:35 pm (UTC)(link)
[It sounds exactly like something Ardyn would say.]

You may have been responsible for that scene... but you're not responsible for it coming here.

...save your apologies for something you can do something about.
founderinglight: (Default)

[personal profile] founderinglight 2018-04-13 08:58 pm (UTC)(link)
There is very little I can do about anything, much of the time, at least the things that matter.

[He rubs at his face one more time and straightens up - he's not intending to tower over her, but, well, they're twins, they're the same height.]

It's not a pleasant thing to witness for anyone.