phantasmemes | TEST DRIVE 003

Entry tags:

!test drive

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.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Mostly make our day-to-day lives as well as we can, with what we have. There are some movies and video games around, plus a lab for studying magic, and, of course, people to talk to. Every now and then, we go on missions into unstable areas like this one, in an attempt to stabilize them.

It's honestly not too different from being a Phantom Thief, just without the secrecy making it necessary to return to our normal lives every evening.

How do you stabilize a place like this?

[Daily life is all well and good, and he'll probably be interested in that once they get back to the station..... but he's more interested in the job before them right now. He can't just laze around in a place like this forever! He has to get back to exploring Mementos and reclaiming his humanity!]

With these.

[He draws from his inventory an object that looks...honestly, a lot like a 3' long, robotic bacteriophage, once he unfolds the legs. And since he's got it out, he might as well set it up, planting it on the flattest patch of ground he can find before activating it.]

It takes about an hour to calibrate, and then it suppresses the magic of this area so that it becomes normal terrain. Unfortunately, it doesn't let us go home through them, but it should be easier to study the Fissures when they're not active and dangerous.

Interesting.....

[Excuse him while he examines this weird contraption literally as big as he is. So this is their best hope of getting home? Some kind of magic suppression devices? A good first step, but from the sound of things, they'd need to build something more like a magic harnessing device to really get anywhere else.....]

Isn't it? You should talk to Up-san if you want to know more, they're the resident expert on these devices.

[And now that that's set...he's going to sit back down next to lunch, and produce a cup of coffee from nowhere while he's at it.]

Speaking of which, the Station is run by androids, rather than humans. They're the only natives of this world that I've seen.

Well, someone must have built the androids..... but I can't say I'm eager to find out what happened to them.

[Somehow, he suspects it's not a tale that ends with a Happily Ever After. Once he's satisfied his curiosity, he'll go join Akechi for more food; this is practically an invitation to freeload, right? ~~Besides, he has to indulge while he can. The Curse of Never Getting Sushi has been lifted! Sashimi totally counts!~~]

That was...a long time ago. I haven't asked, but I think the kindest option is that they just didn't have any children, under the circumstances.

[He doesn't seem to mind Mona joining him for lunch, at least. He's the kind of person who thinks of meals as a time to socialize, and sometimes that includes sharing, right?]

The Station has a vault full of samples of native plants that the androids used to start a food garden, so we at least know it's unlikely that they starved.

Let's hope they did take the kind path..... Those androids sound awfully welcoming, though.

[That's..... lucky for them, honestly. Lucky that the one space they can use for shelter has obliging masters, ones that want to help them survive. What's the catch? Since when does anything go that smoothly for them with people in positions of power?]

They have been very nice to us. They even let us keep what we find in the Fissures, out of gratitude for us helping them stabilize their reality. I think they're also grateful for having something new, considering they seem to have the same degree of personality and intelligence as humans.

[If he got lonely after twelve years of only superficial contact with other people, he can only imagine how bad it must have been for them, with as long as it's been just the six of them here...]

What a terrible fate.....

[Maybe the catch really is just that they're victims, too? Maybe that's all there is to it. Maybe they just..... don't want to be alone anymore. But then, what would happen to the androids once they all figured out how to go home? Would they follow someone to their world?]

It is. I honestly feel bad for them...especially since they seem well-meaning. I'd even consider one of them something like a friend.

Or, well...as much as I can consider someone that way when they don't yet know the truth about me. I...realize this might be asking a bit much, but would you be willing to keep what you know about my history to yourself? I'd rather tell individual people in my own time than have it possibly be the first thing they find out about me.

[Mona looks down at the fish in his paws, suddenly awkward; what is he supposed to say to a request like that? Akechi's sacrifice is still raw and recent in his mind--both the terrible crimes he'd inflicted on others, and just how deeply he had suffered. Akechi is a dangerous boy..... but he doesn't lash out unprovoked, and all his plans amount to nothing, in a place like this.

Besides..... Mona can't sense any malice from him. He wants to believe that Akechi has changed, that he can be the person they saw in Sae's Palace.

He wants to believe in Crow, his fleeting teammate and friend.]

Do what you feel is right. I won't say a word.

[He gives an awkward smile and lightly pats Mona on the head.]

Thank you, Mona. Ah, there's...one more thing.

[If Mona was awkward a second ago, Crow is now incredibly awkward.]

The events I went through, that led to Akira teaching me how to recruit new Personas...they also changed our relationship dramatically. We're...roommates now. [Possibly something more, since he's blushing enough that the edge of it is visible under his mask.] I thought it might be best to let you know ahead of time, instead of surprising you with the idea of us sharing a room.

Roommates, huh?

[Why would he blush over something like that? Something smells fishy here, and it's not just the sashimi..... Mona gives Crow a searching look.]

Well..... I guess that's alright. I mean, someone has to keep an eye on that guy, and I did show up late.

[He'd better not be kicked off the bed, though! That's his spot!]

And he does have a tendency to not sleep when Kurama and I leave him alone.

[...Yeah, about that.]

I should also warn you that we're... [Just say it, Crow. It's not like the cat's going to jump to the same sorts of conclusions someone like Futaba might.] Romantically involved.

He'd stay up all night if I let him. You really can''t leave that guy to his own devices..... It makes me wonder how he managed before we met.

[Just a little bit smug, maybe; he is Akira's self-proclaimed mentor, after all. ~~Even if Akira takes care of him just as much if not moreso.~~

His ears twitch in some confusion at the unfamiliar name, though, and the completely unexpected admission. At least Crow can be assured that his mind is on a significantly different track than Futaba's?]

You're dating after only a month? That seems a little--wait, who's Kurama?

Ah, well...things were simplified a little, by my not remembering I had been ordered to kill him, and him not remembering I was to betray him. Once we got all of our memories back, it wasn't as if I could take my confession back.

[Running a hand through his hair and tugging at it a bit. He is the most awkward bird right now.]

Kurama is someone from another world. We met him during the same events that changed my mind about betraying the Phantom Thieves. He's...um...our other boyfriend.

[You thought he was blushing before, now his whole face is as red as his mask.]

There's more?

["Someone from another world" doesn't exactly tell him much. Who is this guy, exactly? What's he like? What kind of person is he? How did they get together? Boy, Crow is blushing a lot now; maybe they should start calling him Cardinal, instead?

He's not entirely sure how to go about asking all of that, though, so he just..... approaches it from the same way Crow had approached the subject of the initial relationship, for now. Roommates.]

Is your room really big enough for four people?

There's an incredibly large number of worlds out there. Remind me to teach you about multiverse theory later.

[For now, if he were a literal bird, his feathers would be puffing up. As is, he's definitely giving Mona the stink eye.]

There's enough room for the three of us, since we have a double room, but I don't think adding a fourth would be a good idea.

[They kind of like their privacy, thanks...]

Right. Too bad for Kurama, then.

[Have a mischievous little kitty smirk in return. He's always with Akira, day and night, remember? He has seniority over both of you; Akira's room is his territory. And, given that Crow has already talked about sharing a room with him..... well, Kurama not fitting is the obvious solution, right?

~~It's not like the obvious solution is him not counting as a fourth person because he's a cat, or something ridiculous like that, geez.~~]

That's not going to work, either. We had the room modified just so one of us wouldn't have to spend their nights alone.

[Sheesh Morgana, quit trying to catblock him.]

Well, I'm sure we'll make it work somehow~ I don't take up nearly as much space as guys your size, after all.

[The smile lingers; he's not even remotely considering the possibility that he might be kicked out. Akira's room is where he lives, plain and simple. Thus, catblocking is in full effect until Akechi can either figure out a subtle solution to the privacy issue, or overcome how embarrassing it'll be to tell Morgana exactly what they need the privacy for. ~~Considering this is the guy who thought S&M referred to shoe sizes, you'll probably need to be pretty explicit if you plan on sexiling him, Akechi.~~]

It's...not just about that. There are times we'd prefer to have moments to ourselves.

[...Please just take it at that and agree to let them have some privacy? He's already blushing again.]

I can just take a walk when you want a little time to yourselves.

[That's what he does for Confidant stuff, after all. That's a great compromise, right? ~~Except for the part where you have to shoo him off preemptively literally every time you want some intimacy.~~]

Ugh...Akira, Kurama, and I will...talk about it.

[Why thiiiiiiis.]

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Oh Morgana...

Shhhhh <.< >.>

Too innocent for this.

If you don't want innocent, you should tell Futaba instead of him X3

He's going to die when it comes time for that...

HAVE FUN 8D

He's already dead, yet he's going to die again.