phantasmemes | TEST DRIVE 005

Entry tags:

!test drive

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...

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[It's not hard to pick up on the sound of footsteps coming from further down the subway, off in one of the tunnels. Asch isn't carrying a light, so he has to pause and blink in the increased light of the station area for a moment before his eyes adjust.

So Sync is probably going to see him first - unmistakably Asch, but with a good portion of his outer uniform shed and abandoned, and his hair restrained in a bun with far too many spines from some kind of cactus. He wears a sword, as usual, and a heavy-looking pack of an unfamiliar material.

When his eyes adjust, he transparently stares at Sync for a moment... And then shakes his head slightly.]

Of all people...

[The sound of footsteps makes him look up, squinting into the darkness. Sync hasn't got much in the way of light either, having only been using the sparse light ball when he needed to. Light seemed dangerous down here. But he's never really needed it unless it was pitch black, which it isn't down here.

So he sees Asch. An Asch that seems oddly different to when Sync last saw him, and an Asch that is very much alive which is even more bizarre. But then, he himself is supposed to be dead. So maybe he shouldn't be so surprised after all.

When Asch notices him, he's already being glared back at in response, because Sync is rather unhappy to have to deal with the redhead, even if it's some sort of familiarity]

Trust me when I say it's not like I want to be here.

[He's snarling a little, but also doesn't bother getting up. Asch doesn't scare him. He doesn't see the other as any sort of threat]

Yeah, that sounds like you.

[Just... not even fussed, really. It's weird. Sync is the first truly familiar face he's seen since... Well, there was never anyone at the islands. Not even once.

He's not sure how he feels about seeing someone, here. Even less sure about how he feels about it being Sync.

...After a moment, he approaches, but settles into a similar seat a good distance away, far enough that even if they both reached out towards each other, they wouldn't touch.]

You haven't been here long, I take it.

[The distance is good. He's already tensing up as Asch approaches, but once the redhead sits down, Sync slowly relaxes again, as much as he ever can. He's still on guard though. While Asch is no threat, that doesn't mean Sync trusts him either.

He thinks for a moment before deciding there's no point in not answering]

A few hours. It was day when I got here.

[Short and to the point. It's the easiest way to deal with this situation right now]

[It's not as though Asch really trusts him, either. He trusts the other (former) God-General to not strike without some reason, and that's about as far as it goes.

At the response, he nods.]

It's the same for me... but I was somewhere else, first. A similar place to this one.

[He makes an unimpressed sound at that. It's a little disbelieving, but that's also not something that he voices. Because this place itself is impossible, so it's entirely possible right now that Asch is telling the truth]

Lucky you. I guess the universe just doesn't let people die anymore.

[There is so much bitterness in his voice]

[And aren't those words painfully familiar - enough to make Asch frown, thinking of someone else.]

It's not the first time I've heard that sentiment. ...Do you want the short version or not?

[Sync rolls his eyes a little, not caring for the first part of Asch's statement and ignoring it. As for the second...]

If you're going to be so generous and tell me, who am I to say no?

[The bitterness easily turns into sarcasm. But there's a small gleam of genuine interest, shown as Sync lifts his head a little. He can't say no to information. Information is knowledge, and knowledge is power. Sync has never been able to turn down information when he can get it, no matter how much he distrusts the source]

Short version is that this local area - probably the whole of the city - is part of a problem where this world's reality is unstable and pulls things in from other places. This one causes the city above to burn every night, as I'm sure you saw.

[The various descriptions he's gotten so far, and his own witnessing, have been largely consistent on those points. So he doesn't feel at all bad about presenting them as probably-fact.]

Other parts of this world are the same on the unstable reality front, which is why there were already people here before us.

Unstable reality...

[It sounds so impossibly stupid, but as his head tilts up, staring at the ceiling as he remembers the city starting to burn...it makes some sense. Better than any explanation that he could think of.

The universe really does hate him]

Just great... [A mutter] And let me guess. We're stuck here.

[Because with everything else, it would figure. Not that he has anything to go back to on Auldrant, but that isn't the point for Sync]

[Beats the tropical island he was stuck on before.]

Pretty much.

[Sorry, Sync, did you expect anything else? Asch isn't going to beat around the bush or soften the blow of that.]

[He wasn't expecting anything else, but it does make him sigh and lift a hand to rub his face all the same]

Great. Why did I expect anything else?

[Excuse him Asch, he's just going to sit here and fume for a little bit. Nothing unusual for Sync]

[No, not really. But what might seem unusual, to Sync, is that Asch watches him for a minute.

And then, after a bit of consideration, he slides the pack off his back... To roll one of those water bottles from the music festival above across the gap. It veers a little, but probably will still bump into Sync's leg if he doesn't grab it.]

[He doesn't notice Asch watching him. He's used to being left alone to fume, but when the bottle bumps into his leg, he glances down with some surprise. Sync glances up at Asch, suspicious for a moment, before deciding to take the water bottle, looking over it]

...why are you giving me this?

[Logically, he can't see the point in it. Water is an important resource, especially in a place like this. It would make more sense to hold onto it]

You don't have any supplies of your own.

[That's transparently obvious, Asch.]

If we're both going to be here, there's value in making sure that everyone is good enough condition to be able to fight. At least, based on the other place I was in before this.

[Asch gets a "state the obvious why don't you" look from Sync for those first words. The rest...makes him head-tilt]

And why would you assume that I'd be willing to fight to help anyone?

[His question isn't harsh, it's actually genuine. Because it's a very valid question when it comes to Sync. Tactically speaking, yes it's good to have allies, but...there's also value in knowing there's no point to fighting for someone else who might be dead weight, or for no reason. And with no purpose here, a reason to fight things isn't coming to mind right now]

[And Asch... just shrugs. It's a fair enough point, but - ]

It's not like I lose anything from giving it to you. I've got plenty of water.

...if you say so.

[Sync isn't sure what to make of that, so the easiest way to deal is to simply accept it. It's easier than trying to figure out what Asch is thinking. He kinda gave up with that about two weeks after first initially being told to keep an eye on the redhead.

Instead, he settles for watching Asch again, curiousity rising just a little] You said you were somewhere else before this place?

Yeah, a chain of weird islands. Half of them came and went as they pleased, they messed with people's heads, and they had tropical fruit growing in spite of near-freezing temperatures.

[By comparison, this place almost makes sense.]

[All of that basically gets a head-tilt in response because what]

I'd almost be glad to have been brought here instead of there if it wasn't for this city being stupid.

[Of all the places in this weird-ass world to get pulled into, it would be the city that sets itself on fire every night]

If nothing else, there's indoor plumbing.

[Priorities, he has them!]

And enough food for now, but who knows how long that's going to last.

[sync raises an eyebrow, before having to accept that point with a shrug. It might not have been something that came to mind for him, but eh. Asch has a point]

If reality is that unstable, I wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't for long. It would figure.

[He glances away, cursing his luck yet again. Sync's fairly sure he'll be doing that a lot, if he's going to be stuck here for any length of time. Why is he here...]

[Look, Sync, there's real buildings, he's a simple man at the moment.]

The people who've been here for a while didn't seem to be starving. So they probably have a decent food supply at their home base, if nothing else.

[He lifts a hand, resting his head on it as he thinks on that]

I guess. They'd have to have survived here somehow. Maybe some parts of the world are less unstable than others.

[Sync's mostly theorising out loud because it's the easiest way to distract himself from being annoyed at his life]

Or they have some way to minimize the instability, or even just an area where the effects are something less dangerous.

[It doesn't get much more dangerous than FIRE.]

Niiiiight

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject