TEST DRIVE MEME ( 029 )

[lifeaftr_mods]

Test Drive Meme #29

Hello, and welcome to LifeAftr! We're pleased that you're expressing an interest in the game. Here, you can test the waters, gauge how your character may fare in the world of LifeAftr, and even gain some in-game incentives, if you so choose.

Reserves and Applications are always open, and are processed every weekend.

Two important notes:

1. LifeAftr's test drives take place on the island of Mu, which exists apart from the real world and possesses a dream-like quality that characters are innately aware of from the moment they appear on its shores. No need to panic or fret. Dreams are odd things, after all - and anything can happen in them. Why would anyone question where their mind chooses to wander in its sleep?

2. Due to the nature of Mu, threads in our test drive can not only be accepted as thread samples in your application, but can be accepted as game canon as well. In fact, certain choices your character makes in Mu have the potential to bear in-game consequences, largely in the form of test drive reward items.

Hee Ho!
It's cold, wherever you are - in a world blanketed thickly with snow. Dense clusters of evergreens, their branches heavy with ice crystals, paired with skeletal deciduous trees, pepper the region. Overhead, scattered flakes of snow drift from the slate-gray sky. The forest is thickly wooded, but that's not terribly sufficient in the way of insulation from the cold. You should probably find somewhere warm, unless this is agreeable weather to you.

It's chilly enough for the proverbial Jack Frost to be nipping at your nose. Or maybe...not so proverbial. These woods are packed with all sorts of little creatures. Wait for long enough, and you might see one of them coming your way. Jack Frosts are snow demons that only appear in the wintertime, and revel in creating mischief. With bodies made of ice and snow and an alarmingly high constitution, Jack Frosts are generally not hostile, but they do enjoy causing all sorts of mischief. They're known to spit ice and freeze unsuspecting travelers, and use their deceptively cute appearance to lure their prey in. And these woods...well, these woods happen to be full of them.

The good news is that this fate only awaits you if you provoke them. It's even possible to befriend them. One of the best and easiest ways to do this is with gifts and offerings, such as clothing items. A pair of boots or a vest or a hat that will fit these cute little creatures will buy you a friend for a while! You can tell when you've managed to make friends with one, too. They're sure to leave you a little token of their appreciation...and it is extremely cuddly.

If you piss them off, on the other hand, they tend to react...poorly. They'll gust ice and snow your way in copious amounts, and even try to freeze you solid in blocks of ice or impale you on falling icicles. By and large, it's recommended that you play nice. Or, at the very least, have a reliable method of dealing with them if you choose not to. They probably melt very easily, after all.

Unearthly Delights
In the waking world, the harvest island of Nuidan has seen fit to shower adventurers with celebrations in full swing, and the island of Mu has seen fit to reflect such a joyous celebration. However, dreams are tricky things, and nothing carries over quite as it should.

Like the harvest festival in reality, Mu has provided tables laden full of food and drink alike. Unlike its more realistic counterpart, however, the food is just a little strange - in color, in texture, taste, or smell - and the drinks, no matter how much you pour to fill your cup, are seemingly bottomless. Maybe those vegetables are a few shades off, or maybe this sweet pudding tastes a little on the savory side. It's not outright revolting, in most cases, but it's definitely noticeably odd. Andhey smell strange, too; a little too sweet, a little too heady.

For those who are brave enough to sample these dreamed-up delicacies, however, they'll find the world proves to be exceptionally malleable. Partaking of the food and drink that comes from Mu's tables will make your emotions, whatever they may be, leak out into the dreaming world.

If you're feeling mellow and happy, for example, the world around you will change to suit; filling up with your favorite colours, your favorite smells, and anything else that you find cheerful and relaxing. It will manifest as shifting lights, textures, and sounds around you. Suddenly, the food and drink you're eating tastes, looks and feels just like your favorite things, even if they're not quite as you remember them.

If you're not feeling so positive, however...well, we'll leave that up to your imagination as to how the dream could shift. While nothing at this table will ever outright harm you, that doesn't mean your mind can't get creative about the things it might conjure in the meantime. Maybe the food and drink will turn to dust and ashes in your mouth. Maybe it'll start to look a little off, like the meat's gone bad, or the milk's started to sour. Maybe you'll be struck with a sensation of bitter melancholy.

All in all, it's better to try and enjoy yourself...for everyone's sakes.

Let's Have a Blast
In less pleasant news, the waking world has also been stricken with an influx of devilish creatures known only as creepers, and...yes, they're exactly what you thinking. With features frozen in a gaping grimace, a greenish complexion, and a hated proclivity to sneak up silently behind people and explode with only a sinister hiss as warning, creepers are the bane of any builder. And it's certainly not fun to have one blow up in your face, either - you try climbing out of the crater these things always leave behind while dealing with third degree burns.

Whereas the waking world only has the one type to deal with, you adventurers in Mu won't be nearly so lucky. For starters, Mu has dropped you in a thick, steaming jungle, and the dense vegetation can make it awful hard to pick out what's around you. It'd be bad enough trying to pick out ordinary creepers in this mess, thanks to their mottled green texture, but you're not dealing with just ordinary creepers in this dream-world. No, you're dealing with different species of them. In addition to your run-of-the-mill, "aw, man" style of creeper, you'll be able to encounter all sorts in what would ordinarily be a tropical paradise. Some of them are harmless, like the cookie creeper that does little besides shower you with soft, chewy confectionaries when it explodes, or the friendly creeper, which does little besides stick around and keep you company.

Most, however, aren't. Spider creepers tend to coat you with sticky webs and can even poison you if you get too close to them when they pop, and magma creepers carry with them the unfortunate possibility of starting a full-on forest fire if they explode in a place with thick enough vegetation. And, really, if it's on the list, if you can think of it, a variant of it probably exists. Mu doesn't discriminate; it's happy to let your imagination fill in the blanks of whatever variants of these explosive complications you can dream up!

The good news is that they can all be killed the same way. All creepers are vulnerable at a distance - they can be sniped or shot from a distance without exploding and spewing all of their mess everywhere. You can also deal with them up close, as long as you're fast on your feet and don't let them implode all over you. And, if you happen to have a cat nearby, you're in luck! They'll steer clear from you no matter what.

Just watch your back. These things are completely silent when they're creeping up on you. Oftentimes, you won't know that there's one right behind you until you hear it: the dreaded, telltale hsssssss...

---

LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Comments

[yakyuuman]

[ Oh, he knows some bit or two about karma, and that's because of Ichimatsu and his outworldly superstition which easily got Jyushimatsu hooked as well.

His sleeve plops over Ichi's head and starts rubbing it a bit energetically. Nii-san also deserves a bit of petting, like, it must be a bit shocking to be back here, right? ]

Ohhh, uhm, so...! [ He's dipping into memory lane while, on the outside, his pupils have enlargened to take over his eyes. ] Drifter and Ren-chan seemed to know you very well and were so kind to me! Ren-chan also had ESP Kitty with her, which really surprised me! She kept calling you Murasaki, and apparently I'm Asagi-chan to her!

[ Hum, hum! ] And then... then...! I met a badass woman called Beau who told me she punched lots of big lizards. A guy called Kravitz was such a tightass 'cause I was swinging my hatchet in the camp for baseball training, so he made me stab trees instead! Then there was a party, and I met this kid, Zidane - more like I half scared him to death, haha! And there was a golem called Ginko, Yukio the wallflower, Kiri who's a very good little bird and she can even talk a bit, some funny girl I talked with on the network called Rabbit, and...!

[ He speaks on and on, about all the interactions he had with other people. His CR is one thing he can hardly forget about. ]

[ichininyaanshi]

[This isn't their usual dynamic, but Ichimatsu absolutely won't say 'no' to a bit of reverse affection - especially from one of the few brothers he'd actually accept it from. He leans into the touch, some of the default lines around his eyes relaxing away. Is he purring? No. ... maybe.]

[More than that, though, his eyes light up when Jyushimatsu mentions the Drifter and Ren - especially when he brings up ESP Kitty. Not that he would've doubted her, but it's good to hear that she's been taking care of him all this time. Plus, it sounds like his friends carried on just fine without him. That's good.]

[There was a time when that would have made him feel lonely, jealous, forgotten. But he's not quite like that anymore.]

[Ichimatsu barely keeps up with the rest of Jyushimatsu's tale, an endless list of people he's met and befriended (or terrorized), but it doesn't shock him in the slightest that his brother has already made so many connections already. Again, that's just how Jyushimatsu is. Though pretty much none of the names stick with him this time, Ichimatsu makes a mental note to pay attention to who his brother is making friends with in the future... just in case.]

[And, well, assuming he actually shows back up in the archipelago.]

Ah... so you made a lot of friends, huh? That's good, Jyushimatsu. Thanks for finding Drifter and Ren-chan for me, too. [a pause.] I'm the one who told her to call you Asagi.

[yakyuuman]

[ When he runs out of names and situations that might be worth making stories about, Jyushimatsu relaxes in the embrace. His stay in the island was short but pretty eventful, and aside from his encounter with few monsters, it was a fun time all around. He knows his way around resources and getting the hatchet was extremely helpful.

But still, nothing is more enjoyable than having his brothers around to fuck shit up with.

A tilt of his head, after Ichimatsu's reveal that he agreed for Asagi to be his second name of sorts. ]

Well, I'm not complaining! Asagi is a cute-sounding name! Did you guys come up with all the names together?

[ichininyaanshi]

N-no, not exactly... it's just... [flushing a warm red, Ichimatsu glances away from his brother and scratches his cheek. The very atmosphere around them seems to pinken a bit, the air turning a few degrees hotter. Ichimatsu certainly doesn't notice it.]

No matter how many times I told her my name, she kept calling me Murasaki... it seems like colors are easier for her to remember, so I just used those whenever I talked about you guys.

[It's not only the cute names that embarrass him, but also the admission that he talked about his brothers to her enough in the first place to warrant picking certain shades for them all. Which he did. Easily.]

[yakyuuman]

[ Jyushimatsu does notice a shift in the temperature, and maybe his brother evidently blushing has something to do with it, but it only gives him some more but of motivation to snuggle with Ichimatsu - it's getting cold nowadays, and not having a space heater in the island would really suck in the long run. Better get warm while he can! ]

Hehehe, that's cute! Though, if we talk colors, I'm surprised you guys didn't come up with Kiiro for me!

[ It's the japanese word for yellow, which would seem normal if someone knew the colors each other indentifies with. ]

But it's fine! When you return we can all discuss that together!

[ It's not like Ren will be gone some time after, yeah? Right? ]

[ichininyaanshi]

[NO]

Ah... she probably wouldn't mind if you asked her to call you that instead. I-it's not like I thought about them too hard... I just figured she'd like cute names.

[He's very nearly in physical pain admitting this, which reminds him for the hundredth time that he's completely unsuited to nice, sweet kids like Ren. His whole family is. Seriously, Jyushimatsu is pretty much the sole pass on that morality test.]

Just so you know, though... I'll kill those other guys if they complain. Ren-chan doesn't deserve getting her head filled with their stupid shit.

[yakyuuman]

[ He laughs. Loud and raucous, just like the sort of Jyushimatsu he is. ]

Well, I'm gonna help if that's the case! No one's got the right to upset her! She's a sweet girl!

[ Any killing plot Ichimatsu might get into, Jyushimatsu will join! ... Not so indiscriminately, but a chance to use his fists is always a good chance. ]