wildermemes | TEST DRIVE ※ 2

Entry tags:

test drive meme

TEST DRIVE ※ 2

TEST DRIVE ※ 2
The spirit of the Green needs defenders but the game of fate it must play makes it so that its plans are like a garden, always in need of careful pruning. Only certain individuals are capable of living a life of adventure -- and even many who are capable may not be the heroes the Wilderlands needs.

The only way for the Green to be sure is by providing a test -- and as far as tests go, this one's a doozy, because the situation is real. There are countless conflicts all over the Wilderlands that are in need of intervention, so the Green tosses you head first into one of them with no warning or explanation. During it, you may perhaps run into others like yourself, thrown in over their heads -- or into others that came to the Wilderlands before you. Either way, your only chance of getting through it is to work together with whatever other unfortunates you find.

Welcome to the wilds, hero. Good luck with that whole 'deadly peril' thing.

MICKEY, YOU HAD ONE JOB!
A powerful Sorcerer left his apprentice in charge of his lair, but the apprentice has made a mess of things. He enchanted a broom and animated it to do some of his chores, like filling a basin with buckets of water. After the broom went out of control and overfilled the basin, he was forced to destroy it, but the shards only turned into more anthropomorphic brooms.

Now, hundreds of brooms are pouring water into the Sorcerer's lair, the Sorcerer's apprentice has run away (and magically locked the door, because he's a coward) and you're stuck in the middle of it all as the brooms keep pouring more and more water down the stairs into the Sorcerers' stronghold.

This room is filled with the requisite wizarding accouterments (like a stuffed alligator hanging from the ceiling) and most of it is just replaceable magical tchotchkes, but some of the books here are priceless and one of a kind. The Sorcerer is a force for good and his careless apprentice has made it so important ancient books may be destroyed before he returns, ones that could help turn the tide against evil in the Wilderlands.

The Green whispers to you that the brooms must be stopped and the books must be saved. The voices tell you that the magic in them is needed to save lives.

Also, you kinda need to not drown. Because the water's up to your knees and drowning's definitely a thing that might be happening if this keeps carrying on. The door is magically locked and the windows are magically warded so that while water can be poured out through them, people can't travel in or out of them. You're trapped.

Time to start bailing water and working together. Things are starting to look a little damp.

STUFF YOU CAN DO
A. FIGHT A HOUSEHOLD CLEANING IMPLEMENT

The brooms can probably be destroyed permanently! Maybe. Possibly.

It's worth a shot, right? Aside from the destructive magic you might find yourself now possessing (or superpowers or magic weapons...) The Sorcerer seems to have been doing some experimentation with gunpowder, among other things. The lair has firewood, flint and other firemaking supplies. Also axes and other tools.

The brooms can potentially reproduce from the shards if destroyed but if burned to ash or if the pieces are fine enough it may be possible to stop them once and for all. But if you fail, well, you may find your problem multiplying.

B. MESS WITH MAGIC

The Sorcerer has a lot of interesting-looking books on magic. Maybe you can find something useful within one of them that can stop the brooms and help make some of the water disappear?

Or you may just accidentally curse yourself. Good luck with that.

(OOC: All magic within the books can potentially help somewhat but only a little. Otherwise, characters can god any kind of curse effects they like for their character that occur from reading the books or trying to cast magic: legs turning to jelly, their voices turning squeaky, characters shrinking, characters growing in height, etc. etc. Feel free to get creative!)

C. BAIL A BUDDY OUT

Sometimes the best thing to do is push up your sleeves, grab a bucket, and get to work. While you can't climb out the warded windows, the water can be poured out of them and there are plenty of buckets to use to bail water. Grab a new friend and try to form a bucket brigade for a very work-intensive and awkward first introduction.

D. THE FLOOR IS LAVA

Well, not necessarily lava, but as the room starts filling with water, the floating furniture might be the only thing keeping you and the people around you alive. Help the people around you perch on furniture and stay afloat. Save the important books if you can, too, but you may want to make not drowning and preventing others from drowning a priority until the crisis is over.

G. FREESTYLE

The situation is pretty silly, with wild magic, gunpowder, anthropomorphic brooms, and flooding going on. Feel free to make something up! It's a big lair with a lot going on.

OOC INFO
✦ This TDM is open to everyone. However, top-levels should be made for potential new characters only. Characters currently in the game should only tag top-levels.

✦ Potential players may use test drive threads as their log samples. However, at least one post in their thread must fit the requirements for apps, both in length (200 words) and in quality. If you do plan on using a thread as a sample, please make sure the writing throughout your threads is a good example of your writing skills and has some solid examples of the character's voice.

✦ Current players can count TDMs towards AC. They can only count towards comment-based AC proofs.

✦ Potential players can opt to keep these threads as game canon when they app in, or start over fresh, based on preference. The magic bringing them to the game universe can fog their memories, if players don't want their character to remember TDM threads when introing into the game.

✦ Apps open: 4/1/18

✦ The game has limited slots. Please keep this in mind! We've had a lot of replurks in the announcement plurk, but the game is meant to be a very small game, with only 25 slots total, and many of these were already filled in the game's beta test round. There may be only around 10 or so open slots when apps open to everyone. The game will have a wait queue if the game hits cap during the app round but please be prepared for potential disappointment if we happen to hit cap you wind up not getting a player slot immediately. It's not personal; we'd love to accommodate everyone but the nature of the kind of campaign we're trying to run wouldn't work with a larger game.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

1.

[Sure, he has a moment of panic at first. This is more actual action than he's used to being involved in directly, and his field means he's unfortunately very informed about what an awful way to die drowning is. Breaking the brooms doesn't work, he's not willing to risk an attempt at burning them (what if every particle of ash could turns into another broom?), and haphazaedly attempting magic out of any of these books seems just as risky when magic didn't even exist to him until like this shit went down.

But panic doesn't help, and he's got to be able to do something before someone's dead for once. So he forces himself to clear his head and stands on a table above the rushing waters to observe the whole scene. People trying to stop or fight the brooms, scrambling to save the books, bailing the water out...

Oh.]

Relax! The room physically can't flood all the way at this rate.

[And as long as no one makes the situation much, much worse, that shouldn't change. He just has to hope people will just listen.]

2.

[People did not listen, and the rate of water rising has gotten worse, so now there's reason to panic.

Of all the available options, a haphazard attempt at magic is somehow the one that seems the least risky. How is this his life? How has shit gotten more ridiculous than a murdergame run by a robotic bear? This shouldn't even be possible.

But that's what's happening, so he's kneeling atop a table floating in the rising waters, feeling a lttle seasick and flipping quickly through one of the magic books. The table rocks severely in the tumultuous flooding, and he has to grip the edges of the table to keep himself steady. One page catches his interest and he pauses.]

Ah, what about--

[The table suddenly lurches drastically with a large wave. He staggers, catching himself with his grip on the table, but the page slips out of his grip as the book slides towards the table edge. God, please help.]

I concur. Our current circumstances aren't ideal, but we're not at risk of drowning instantaneously. We need to remain calm and avoid needless provocation of the situation.

[The green alien looks slightly out of place surrounded by all this fantasy stuff. His tattered poncho gives him the air of some kind of planetary wanderer. He scans the room with a handheld computer, simply sidestepping the brooms as they walk by, rather than trying to fight them. ]

[It's no good to just rush in and start taking action when it might make the situation worse.]

This is magic, after all -- a highly unpredictable and dangerous force to contend with. We need to approach this situation carefully, lest we make it worse or do something that causes us to, I don't know, grow tails or something. [He briefly arches a brow] It happened to one of my teammates once.

[He's trying really hard not to stare at the green alien. Is aliens definitely being a thing weirder than the magic broomstick flooding situation? He's still deciding.]

I...don't really want to think about that.

[Shuichi looks unnerved. Spontaneous growth of new appendages wasn't even a potential concern before this moment, but now here it is. Fuck. He shakes his head, trying to keep a cool head.]

We aren't at risk of drowning at all, if everyone can swim or just hold onto something. [That isn't asking too much, right? Please, just one incident that doesn't end with someone dying is all he asks.] The water can move through the windows even if we can't. Once the water level reaches the windows, it'll just overflow out through them if we leave them open. As long as the water isn't rising faster than he water can escape, we'll be fine. The room won't fill completely.

[People need to just not break too many more brooms. How hard can that be? Not doing something should be easier than doing it, right?

Yeah, not gonna linger too long on that thought. He just careully lowers himself back to the ground, still at least able to stand in the rising waters. It's only up to his upper thighs so far. But ugh, wet clothes are awful and he grimaces at the sensation before moving to grab anything that looks important from lower sheves.]

[ Well, this is a monstrosity of a situation. It might be more tolerable and maybe even cool without the incessant chaos, the sudden overwhelming new amount of information to pick through, and especially the flooding. He's not really worried about dying here, because he's not going to (god, that would be pathetic), but he really doesn't want to get wet. At all.

Thus, Ouma's claimed the nicer looking armchair to float around on until this nightmare is over with, arms crossed over the back top rail of it for optimal balance as he's also situated on his knees. He doesn't take up much space or weight, which is in his favor since he's got a few books he's handpicked that caught his interest stacked next to him.

At some point, he'll notice the familiar face struggling over there with a book of his own. Ouma blinks curiously, wondering if that means everyone else (the ones still alive and kicking, anyway) are here somewhere. But he hadn't caught sight of his particular weirdos in this sea of weirdos -- they're pretty noticeable, too. Shuichi, at least, is an understandable miss because he's just so damn plain. At least that's what Ouma would tell him, instead of something about how he was AWOL getting pissed off at being unable to pick the lock in here before shit got worse.

If the detective is getting into something though, Ouma's interested in knowing what it is. He didn't plan it at all (because most of this is out of his control, which is very annoying), but it's a convenient break for him when the sudden wave that dismantles Shuichi's grip and sends the book sliding is the same wave that lurches his chair closer.

He thinks fast, ultimately moving even faster when he leans just as much as he can without capsizing (it's risky business) to swipe the book off the edge of the table just before it meets an untimely, soggy end. ]

-- Aaand, yoink! [ He grins, proud of pulling that stunt off. ] ...This better have something good, Saihara-chan.

[He's quickly leaning to try to catch the book, dangerously uncautious on the rocking tabletop but shit.. His hand just barely misses the edge of the book and his heart just about stops and it continues on sliding towards the edge when someone else catches it.

A familiar someone else.

Shuichi freezes, gaping. The polite thing to do would be offering thanks, or a hello, or something like that, but politeness has kind of been overridden by the surprise of a familiar face here of all places. Like, there's an alien and an anthropomorphic bear here. What are the odds of this?]

Ouma-kun--

[Whatever he was going to finally say is abruptly cut off, however, as the table lurches again and, this time without that firm grip to steady him, he's unceremoniously toppled into the water.

Whoops.]

[ no more fucking bears pls

Ouma holds the book up sideways initially by it's open pages, straightening it out in his hands carefully when he shifts his weight back into the best spot on the chair so he doesn't--

--Ah. Do what Shuichi just did.

Ouma momentarily flinches at the backsplash happening here, but it's thankfully not too bad and mostly misses him. Which is good, since it would've been pretty irritating to have what he just saved get soggy. He peers down where Shuichi just fell in with a blank face for a hot second, like he can't believe that just happened.

But then he laughs. Is it because it's funny, sad, or just the cherry on how ridiculous this is? Whatever it is, he's resigned to being amused by it. So thanks for that, Shuichi. ]

Ah-haha! Wooow, nice one. I sure hope you can swim.

[ Great help, Ouma. ]

[ ~~yes please don't fuck the bears~~

Shuichi, forunately, can swim. So with the book saved, the only bad thing really happening here is him being completely soaked. Which, y'know, kinda sucks. But it could be worse.

He surfaces with an inelegant bit of sputtering, coughing up a mouthful of water. The rocking waves have carried the table back out of immediate reach, so he grabs at the arm of Ouma's chair instead for now, clinging on while he catches his breath. Hope you don't mind sharing, dude.

Once he's recovered a bit, he looks up at Ouma, still a little stunned.]

Uh. Thanks. [He's going a little out of order here, huh?] Hi.

[ ~~he'll fuck bears over but that's all~~

Ouma kind of gives Shuichi a skeptical look when he grabs the arm of his chair like that, although he'll lean his own weight away to accompany the new addition. Shuichi isn't exactly inspiring confidence here after his little episode with the table, okay. ]

Hmm... I was kinda hoping you'd just drown.

[ He mutters this, like he's talking to himself, although it's intentionally loud enough for Shuichi to hear. ]

Well, whatever. You can thank me by not capsizing me, by the way.

[ Ouma takes a seat in the corner of his chair (since Shuichi's weight is actually keeping the thing more balanced for him to do so), crossing his legs and setting the book down open in his lap so he can see what Shuichi was looking at earlier -- is this a spell?? ]

[Shuichi is...mostly sure that's a lie. Ouma basically stage-whispering it is enough evidence of that on its own. But that doesn't make it pleasant to hear, and Shuichi angles a mildly annoyed look up at his classmate before sighing.

He could just let go and paddle back to the table instead, but the way Ouma's repositioned himself means Shuichi can't really do that without letting Ouma unbalance and take a dip himself. It'd probably be deserved, but Shuichi doesn't have it in him to be that mean.

Besides, Ouma has the book, and the thing's only just barely avoided being destroyed in the flooding as it is.]

It's a spellbook, I think.

[That feels kind of embarassing to say, but clearly they're a bit beyond debates about magic being real here. His cheeks tinge just faintly pink regardless, and he adjusts his grip on the arm of the chair so he can push his wet hair out of his face and conveniently hide behind his hand for a moment.]

I thought something that might stop or slow down the brooms would be safer than trying to destroy them, so...

[Magic. Awesome.]

[ Ouma looks up from the book, observing their present situation with a sigh. ]

Maaan... How come we're the ones stuck cleaning up after a bunch of brooms? I mean, how backwards is that?!

[ No comment on the magic. That's apparently a truth here... Whether or not it's always been a truth concealed by some very good liars that are able trick everyone, he's not one to say, but if that's the case then he's super jealous!!

Ouma wonders if it's true that they can use these spells themselves, though. That would be exciting and useful, but he's not sure if he wants to fuck with that himself yet.

...He looks at Shuichi with sudden interest. ]

Well, since it's your idea, I'll let you try it out first!

[ Look, he'll even hold the book up and open in his lap, turning it around so that it's on display for Shuichi. He grins expectantly. ]

Edited 2018-03-30 05:48 (UTC)

It's definitely ironic...

[Congrats, Ouma, you got a weak little smile out of him. It fades pretty quickly as he's basically told to go ahead and try out some random magic -- he's not exactly thrilled to fuck with this stuff himself -- but hey, take the little victories where you can get them.

Frankly, he's not even sure what the language in the book is. He can read the letters and generally tell how everything should be pronounced (he hopes), but the exact meaning of it all is lost on him. But he'd been looking through books in a hurry trying to find one that might be helpful, and this one was formatted less like pages of prose and more like sets of instructions. And there were lots of pictures. He'd figured that could be useful for figuring out what the writings on each page were about.

The page Ouma's holding up has one such illustration on it, an elegant-looking depiction of ice and frost. He'd been kinda grasping at straws here, okay? But it could maybe do something to stop the brooms, or at least slow them.

Or it could freeze all the water in the room and all the others here still trying to work in it. Or it could give someone horrible frostbite and cost them a limb. Or it could do nothing at all. He's got no idea how it's supposed to work, but he suspects it isn't anything that usually done while hanging off the side of an armchair in the middle of a flood. All these thoughts really aren't making him any more confident here. Frowning uneasily, he leans in to peer at the page more closely.]

Just...give me a second, okay? I don't know how this is supposed to work. I'm not Yumeno-san.

[ Thank hell he didn't run into Yumeno in a place where magic actually exists because that would be so extra. Then again, she might also be able to do things a little faster for them. Figures she's not around when they need her!! ]

O-kay! Do your best, Saihara-chan.

[ Ouma does see the hesitation written all over his face, though. He can tell he's probably assuming the worst, especially with being told to try it first. Shuichi is definitely a piece of work, but he's not stupid. Ouma likes him for that. ]

...Oh yeah, you heard it too, right? The creepy voice saying this magic was gonna be used to save lives? So...I don't think anything too nasty will happen if you use it.

[ Like death. That'd be counterproductive. All this assuming it works for them, of course.

Anyway, don't mind Ouma -- he's probably just rambling!! ]

But using magic for good... Talk about boring! Don't they know who I am?!

Ah...right.

[Is Ouma trying to reassure him here, or just goad him into doing something stupid? Either seems possible. Understanding Ouma is a tall task at the calmest of moments, so Shuichi really doubts he's going to be able to work out his motivations at a time like this.

Still, it's encouraging nonetheless.]

Right. Just...don't laugh.

[He draws a breath, drops his eyes to the page, and just...starts reading it out loud. It sounds like nonsense coming out of his mouth, stilted and awkward, and he colors slightly knowing he has an audience watching him fumble through this.

It doesn't feel like anything at first, just meaningless words. There's no tingly feeling or surge of power or whatever. He's pretty convinced he's fucking it up and nothing will happen at all until it feels like something just clicks, and---

And nothing appears to have happened for a moment, until he feels the slightest tap of cold, and then another, and then sees a snowflake flutter down onto the page in front of him.

Indoor snow. Awesome. Shuichi sighs heavily, dropping his head onto the arm of the chair. He can't even dredge up at satisfaction at any kind of effect at all, as worn out from the built-up anticipation as he feels.]

Don't worry, I would never laugh at you!

[ He says his bullshit cheerily.

It is pretty amusing watching Shuichi trying to cast a stupid-sounding spell, and while Ouma doesn't laugh, he maintains a wide smile throughout witnessing this all happen. If nothing else, at least this is boosting his mood a bit.

...But then he feels something cold hit the back of his hand. Ouma blinks, wide-eyed and with a puzzled expression as he immediately looks up only for another cold snowflake to hit his cheek. ]

[ ...He grimaces, looking back down with discontent written all over him. ]

Eeehhh... This is pretty useless. You can go ahead and make it stop, already.

[ He talks like Shuichi should obviously know how to do that or something.

They don't need a Titanic situation in here, okay. ]

[It's absolutely bullshit and Ouma is definitely taking amusement in this nonsense, but...well, he really didn't laugh. At least there's that. All Shuichi can do right now is cling to the little victories.]

I obviously don't know how to do that.

[Obviously. Give him a break. Shuichi lifts his head wearily, prepared even still to go back to hunting through the book for some kind of solution, but belatedly remembers as he lifts his hand that he's completely soaked. Water drips off his fingers and he frowns, trying vainly to wipe them dry on the armchair's upholstery, but it makes for a pretty shitty towel. He probably shouldn't try touching the pages like this.

But hey, luckily there's someone completely dry right here. Shuichi gives Ouma a dry look.]

Why don't you look for something?

Ugh... So you're gonna make me freeze and fix your mess? That's so mean...

[ His life is so hard right now, even though he stops sounding dejected almost as soon as he flips the book back around in his lap to search the pages more thoroughly.

This is so out of his league... For all of his messing around, he's silent for a minute as he concentrates on the book, brow furrowing. Some of these pages look sketchier than others, with less cute pictures of snowflakes. Ouma's not exactly an expert in other languages, but he knows a few things -- enough that some of these look like they're packing a warning with their recipes. Hm. ]

Hey, hey-- Just to check... You still feel like, super ordinary and stuff, right? All of your fingers accounted for?! Without any extras, either.

["Super ordinary," wow. Just go ahead and lowkey drag him, Ouma.]

H-huh?

[Why would you make him worry about that? For a moment Shuichi looks intensely nervous, glancing down at his fingers as if to check that there really haven't been any sudden additions or subtractions. It's only after that initial panic that he forces himself to calm down. If anything weird like that happened he would definitely feel it, right? Right?]

Y-you're just messing with me. Come on, this is serious...

[ At least it wasn't a nasty highkey drag. ✨Friendship fragment obtained.✨

Ouma does look a little more amused again when Shuichi legitimately takes the time to check his damn fingers, grinning as he rests his elbow on the book. ]

I'm totally not! But phew, that's a relief... It'd be waaay too gross to have to watch you cut off an extra finger or something.

[ He moves to flip over a large portion of pages altogether, skipping a whole section in the book. ]

...So yeah, I don't think these spells are safe for me at all!

[Shuichi grimaces a little at that description, but otherwise he just sighs exasperatedly. Yep. This is definitely the real Ouma, no weird magic shenanigans going on here. Just the person you'd want to be stuck in a flooding room with.]

But they're safe for me?

[More Ouma bullshitting, obviously. But jeeze, you make him want to try again with the magic shit less and less. Drowning is sounding like a more viable option with every passing second.]

Well, duh! You just used one, didn't you? And you're still in tiptop shape!

[ That's 100% how it works. ]

But I'm kinda getting seasick, so you should be my motor right now instead. See those stairs all the way over there?

[ Ouma points an index finger in the direction of where a shit ton of brooms are gathered and dumping water from -- the water level isn't too much better and it's definitely crowded with magical brooms, but it's higher ground that's yet to be eliminated. ]

[The flattest look possible.]

You could just swim...

[But he isn't really inclined to try the magic shit again -- even if nothing disastrous had happened, the snow certainly didn't help, and if anything it's just speeding up the flooding if just by a fraction of a second. Hell, maybe they'd avoid anything truly awful only through sheer luck.

So he sighs, slides back a bit more in the water, grips the side of the chair and starts kicking. You're damn lucky this chair is floating, dude, because these noodly detective arms would be completely useless if he was supposed to be moving the armchair normally.]

Do you have an idea?

Shuichi Saihara | Danganronpa v3

1

no subject

2

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

1/2

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

2

no subject

no subject