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phantasmemes2018-07-12 11:56 pm
phantasmods) wrote in phantasmemes2018-07-12 11:56 pm
Entry tags:
TEST DRIVE 005
Hello and welcome to the fifth 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 time, the Test Drive takes place in Incendia - a less-ruined-than-expected city that has been abandoned for over a century, due to the magical effects of the Fissure (unstable reality region) that have made it impossible to live in. What effects are these, you ask?
Well...
BY DAY
By day, the city is lovely, if oddly empty. The sun shines down, and magical lights along the sidewalk - the equivalent of power lines - flow energy throughout the city. It's possible to think that the little sparks you sometimes see at the corner of your vision are related. After all, there's a great deal of magic in the air...
But in spite of this, the city lies abandoned, for no immediately apparent reason. You might have found yourself in a wide-open shipping yard, where large metal containers levitate about, moving without any help or oversight from human hands. Be careful; these containers changing positions make it easy to get lost for quite a long time, since few of them have much in the way of identifying traits over than color. Didn't you already pass that arrangement of two red ones on top of a blue one before...?
Or perhaps you're in the massive park in the center of town, with its blatantly magical fountain (a half-dome of water just hanging in the air) and the tents of an abandoned festival. Two stages and a long line of street food booths stand empty - surely no one will mind if you use them for something, right?
Or perhaps you're just suddenly on the streets, among stalled-out taxis and cars that go nowhere and lack the familiar smell of gasoline. There's apartments and shops all around, with little gardens spilling out over balconies... Maybe if you go knock on some doors, you'll find people.
Wherever it is you are, surely there's got to be someone around who can tell you what's going on, right...?
BY DUSK
As night falls, rather than dropping the way you might expect, the temperature begins to rise. And then the sparks in the edges of your vision are very much more than simply at the edges of your vision. They catch first on the plants, the papers stuck to the now-lit magical streetlights, the trash cans... And then, increasingly so, on the buildings proper, the shops, the skyscrapers, the cars in the street.
Within half an hour, an inferno is starting to build, and it's clear that there's not going to be anywhere above ground safe from it. But fortunately, there's safety beneath the level of the streets - if you can make your way fast enough to an underground station.
BY NIGHT
In the remains of these subway tunnels, lit mostly by the dim glow of magical energy lines, you're at least safe from the inferno above. Unlike the aboveground parts of the city, however, the tunnels are in an obvious state of disrepair, with broken concrete, rot, and mildew. The stations might have once been clean, but they quite transparently are not now, and the tunnels themselves are as bad or worse.
Thankfully, no trains run anymore, so you're not at risk of being run down on the broken tracks. There's also not any full-on collapses blocking the way, and the tunnels seem well-enough made that there's probably not risk of a cave-in.
Less pleasantly, you aren't the only thing taking shelter in the tunnels from the firestorm above. And the magic of that flame has touched the feral dogs that rove the tunnels, turning them into barking, howling creatures of as much flame as flesh themselves. And then there's the occasional patch of mold, mildew, and slime in the darkest parts of the tunnels, where even the magical circuits have gone out, that moves to douse any light that comes near it...
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 time, the Test Drive takes place in Incendia - a less-ruined-than-expected city that has been abandoned for over a century, due to the magical effects of the Fissure (unstable reality region) that have made it impossible to live in. What effects are these, you ask?
Well...
BY DAY
By day, the city is lovely, if oddly empty. The sun shines down, and magical lights along the sidewalk - the equivalent of power lines - flow energy throughout the city. It's possible to think that the little sparks you sometimes see at the corner of your vision are related. After all, there's a great deal of magic in the air...
But in spite of this, the city lies abandoned, for no immediately apparent reason. You might have found yourself in a wide-open shipping yard, where large metal containers levitate about, moving without any help or oversight from human hands. Be careful; these containers changing positions make it easy to get lost for quite a long time, since few of them have much in the way of identifying traits over than color. Didn't you already pass that arrangement of two red ones on top of a blue one before...?
Or perhaps you're in the massive park in the center of town, with its blatantly magical fountain (a half-dome of water just hanging in the air) and the tents of an abandoned festival. Two stages and a long line of street food booths stand empty - surely no one will mind if you use them for something, right?
Or perhaps you're just suddenly on the streets, among stalled-out taxis and cars that go nowhere and lack the familiar smell of gasoline. There's apartments and shops all around, with little gardens spilling out over balconies... Maybe if you go knock on some doors, you'll find people.
Wherever it is you are, surely there's got to be someone around who can tell you what's going on, right...?
BY DUSK
As night falls, rather than dropping the way you might expect, the temperature begins to rise. And then the sparks in the edges of your vision are very much more than simply at the edges of your vision. They catch first on the plants, the papers stuck to the now-lit magical streetlights, the trash cans... And then, increasingly so, on the buildings proper, the shops, the skyscrapers, the cars in the street.
Within half an hour, an inferno is starting to build, and it's clear that there's not going to be anywhere above ground safe from it. But fortunately, there's safety beneath the level of the streets - if you can make your way fast enough to an underground station.
BY NIGHT
In the remains of these subway tunnels, lit mostly by the dim glow of magical energy lines, you're at least safe from the inferno above. Unlike the aboveground parts of the city, however, the tunnels are in an obvious state of disrepair, with broken concrete, rot, and mildew. The stations might have once been clean, but they quite transparently are not now, and the tunnels themselves are as bad or worse.
Thankfully, no trains run anymore, so you're not at risk of being run down on the broken tracks. There's also not any full-on collapses blocking the way, and the tunnels seem well-enough made that there's probably not risk of a cave-in.
Less pleasantly, you aren't the only thing taking shelter in the tunnels from the firestorm above. And the magic of that flame has touched the feral dogs that rove the tunnels, turning them into barking, howling creatures of as much flame as flesh themselves. And then there's the occasional patch of mold, mildew, and slime in the darkest parts of the tunnels, where even the magical circuits have gone out, that moves to douse any light that comes near it...
1
[ Apparently that's how we're announcing ourselves today. Because when Erina comes sidling over, drawn by the smell of food like any good teenager, instead of an introduction she just leans on the side of the cart like an obnoxious asshole and s n i f f s appreciatively. ]
Holy shit, where did these come from? Actually, I don't care, oh my God, feed me.
[ ... hello, Asch. ]
no subject
And then just. Piles a couple skewers on a paper plate and slides it over to where she's leaning.]
Help yourself.
[Hope you like mango.]
no subject
[ and she goes!! to!! town!! eating with a gusto that makes it clear that Erina might be passingly acquainted with the concept of table manners but they are certainly not on a first name basis. ]
Where the hell is this, anyway? [ she talks with her mouth full because she's a fucking goblin!! ]
no subject
No idea. I just woke up here a couple hours ago.
[And immediately set about making lunch, apparently?]
no subject
You see anybody else around or is it just us sadsacks?
no subject
[Hence the food thing. It draws all the hungry folks to the yard.]
This isn't the first time I've suddenly found myself in another world, though. Unless we're very unlucky, there will be someone around with at least some idea what's going on.
no subject
[ he said 'world' not 'planet' you fucking dipshit ]
This place looks pretty Earth-y to me, dude.
no subject
[Beat.]
And for the record, my planet's called Auldrant.
1/3
no subject
no subject
[ THANKS ERINA YOUR CONTRIBUTION WAS COMPLETELY MEANINGLESS ]
no subject
[And on that note he's gonna eat a skewer himself.]
no subject
[ Says Erina Estival, protagonist of a shitty scifi story. ]
no subject
[And this is, you know, pretty clearly Summer happening here.]
no subject
[ She sounds... passingly sympathetic, at least. ]
Aren't you gonna pass out like that? It's not gonna kill you to lose a layer.
no subject
[He's? fine??]
no subject
So, like, Canada?
no subject
[Beat, wherein Asch takes a chunk of meat off one of the skewers with his teeth, chews and swallows it.]
Baticul, technically, which you've likewise probably never heard of.
no subject
[ So, no, she hasn't. ]
So how long's it usually take for people in the know to show up around here, anyways?
no subject
[He waves his skewer at the grill.]
I figured that would draw at least some people out.
no subject
[ HUNGRY HUNGRY SYNCHRONIC ]
Guess I might as well hang around the food til someone turns up, then.
no subject
[Erina please introduce this hopeless fool to the concept of concerts.]
no subject
Looks like a music festival? [ close enough ] That's probably what the big-ass stages are for, anyways.
no subject
...That'd make sense, but I don't see any instruments, even aside from the lack of people.