TEST DRIVE MEME ( 001 )

[lifeaftr_mods]

Test Drive Meme #1

Hello, and welcome to our very first test drive! 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.

Remember that Reserves will open on July 17th and that Applications will open on July 24th, in preparation for the game’s official opening on August 3rd!

But first, two important notes!

1. The island of Mu 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.

Shipwrecked
The white sand of the beach ridges the island’s edge, even if the clear water soon becomes murky the further out you look across the horizon until the turquoise gleam of the tide disappears in a coil of surrounding fog. Indeed, your best prospects may very well be to strike out among the trees or the crags looming out over the foam-capped waves. There’s lumber to be found and made from the palm-like trees, potentially fruit or edible tubers of some kind if you forage about some. The further you travel, however, the more of your surroundings will reveal themselves in a steady unspooling of curiosities.

One corner of Mu’s current construct drops away into a sheer cliff, initially too dangerous to brave for all but the more daredevilish, but if one starts to scan the sharp rocks below, you might catch sight of what appears to be sodden planks of wood - a wreckage tossed up against the rocks. And a little further...a bobbing, shattered wreck of a lifeboat’s remains, potentially bearing supplies that might yet be salvageable.

Fashion what you can from the wood and stone around you or scavenge from the ruin of the land, if you like. But you can’t simply stand around and wait forever. It’s going to get dark sometime - and if a creature of unknown terror doesn’t catch you, the elements surely will.

Storytime

There’s a sense of camaraderie in this cove, you think. As the sun hangs low over the horizon, the world cast into orange hues, long shadows dispersed by roaring fires that dot across the beach.

That’s right, folks: it’s storytime.

There’s no one to preside over this meeting of the minds in Mu. Call it a vague recreation of things to come, if you like, some vaguely fatidic dreamlike state where you may find yourself drawn to the heat and company that awaits you by the fire. And from there, compelled to default to that old instinct that most of intelligent civilization has revered since they were advanced enough to paint geometric shapes on cave walls.

You tell a story.

Perhaps it’s a tragedy, a tale of woe and of personal loss. Perhaps it’s the sort of thing you’d break out after a few rounds of your alcoholic beverage of choice, clapping hands to your knees as you try to bite back your mirth long enough to spill the punchline. Perhaps it’s an adventure of some sort, some unbelievable rendition of your past exploits. The only common thread to be had, as those gathered around the fire share their tales, is the fundamental rule of a ritualistic sharing of stories such as this: its truth.

But how one chooses to define "truth" is, in its own way, another story entirely...

Dance, Sucker, Dance!
The beat of your heart in your chest is difficult to ignore. It judders with a pulsing, rhythmic quality. If you’re one of those that lacks a heart, the beat is still omnipresent and all-encompassing, until your entire body is unwittingly bobbing in time to a metronomic tune that seems ingrained into your very soul. It’s inescapable. You can’t seem to move unless it’s in time to the rhythm that’s now singing in every atom of your being.

But rest assured, you’re not alone in this musical curse. Everything, from the swaying trees to the waves against the beach, jumps in time to the music. And so do the monsters approaching you, that - wait a minute.

Monsters?

Oh, yes. Did we mention those?


It seems you’ve encountered the wrath of the Boogieman, who curses you to only dance to his infernal beat. If you wish to best him, you’ll have to either evade or destroy the blobs of greenish slime that serve as his minions, all in time to the hard beat of the tune in your head. Clear the radius of his curse or risk an open confrontation, if you dare. Don’t worry if you look foolish; chances are anyone else caught in the Boogieman’s thrall feels just the same.

Mu isn’t pulling any punches to start with. It is a flighty creation, after all, and seems to revel in displacing people into new and uncomfortable situations.

---

LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Comments

[prettypurpleparlor]

[Well, she's impressed. She carefully spins out a long line of the same purple webbing she used to catch the Drifter, and calls out:]

I'm going to toss the line out to you, all right? Let me know once you've got it properly attached to the crate and I'll reel you both in.

[hyperlit]

[It's too far away for their sprite to project any words, but the Drifter nods. Throw it, lady spider. They'll try to ease their debt to you with some assistance, as needed.]

[prettypurpleparlor]

[And your help is much appreciated. Muffet sees the nod, eyes the distance carefully, and tosses the line out to where the Drifter can catch it.]

[hyperlit]

[And we're off. The Drifter plants one foot against the crate's rough "back," furthest from the beach, and catches the purple twine deftly before stooping to bind it about the crate's wood. And they salute, smartly.

Reel 'em in, cap'n.]

[prettypurpleparlor]

[Muffet smiles, and nods in understanding. She spins the thread back through her hands, making it vanish back to wherever it came from, and the line shortens, tugging the crate and its passenger along with it until they come aground.]

[hyperlit]

[The Drifter hops off their impromptu sea skiff as soon as it reaches the shore, stooping swiftly to help tug it along. Waterlogged wood scraping across wet sand does not make for a speedy return to dry land, and the Drifter is built for agility more than they are for brute strength, but they've a resolve to make up for it. They're breathing a bit heavily by the time the thing is finally heaved onto the white sand free from the tide's pull, but they straighten up at once.

The sprite buzzes as it projects their next query.]

open?
or get more?

Any ideas about what they should be finding in there?

[prettypurpleparlor]

Hmm...

[Muffet considers the crate thoughtfully.]

Let's open it first, see if we can get an idea of what we might expect to find inside the others. Do you have anything we can use to pry off the top?

gotcha covered ^_^

[hyperlit]

[The Drifter draws their sword. At first, it's little more than the red hilt. Then a bright, cyan streak of energy solidifies, humming faintly as the hard light compiles into the blade.

With one swift, clean arc, the Drifter slices the top from the box. The wood sizzles faintly from the heat of the blade, but it's already dissipating and slipped back into the folds of the Drifter's cloak.

They peer inside, and marvel at the slightly furry, round shells of fruit within.

The Drifter has evidently never seen coconuts before.]

Thank you :D

[prettypurpleparlor]

[Muffet looks thoughtfully at the blade, and is impressed by the Drifter's skill with it. She peers curiously into the box, and...]

Oh, coconuts. I've seen those before, although they didn't grow much up where we lived. Not the right climate. I think the way it works is that you crack open the hard bit on the outside, and inside there's juice and edible parts.

I'm not quite sure why they were in a crate, though...

[hyperlit]

[So food, then. The Drifter shrugs, apparently content to simply accept that this is what's been packed away. Food makes decent supplies, and as far as they're concerned, a worthy goal to set out to retrieve.

So they look back out across the seawater, eyeing the remaining crates lost in the spray.]

the rest?

[prettypurpleparlor]

Probably a good idea to bring them all in, yes.

Do you think that if I spun out a few lines and handed you the ends, you could carry them with you as you ran? That way, you could just make one trip instead of having to keep going in and out.

[hyperlit]

[A moment's contemplation as they flex their fingertips in and out, considering their strength. Then, at last, they nod shortly.]

they'll be lighter without the extra weight.

[The Drifter might not weigh much, but it might go a little ways if they don't force Muffet to rope them in along with the crates in question.]

[prettypurpleparlor]

I'm not too worried about the weight. I just thought if you already had the lines with you, then you could jump from crate to crate, attaching them as you go.

That way, I could reel them all back in at once.

...Although, now that I think about it, I suppose there's no reason why I couldn't just keep tossing the lines out to you while you do that instead of making you hold them.

[hyperlit]

[The Drifter shrugs; they're not picky. Their utility is the important part here, not the comfort of said utility while they carry out the work. They hold out their hand, palm up.

Load them up, miss.]

this is faster.

[prettypurpleparlor]

Well, you know yourself best.

[Muffet spins out a few more lines of purple webbing, enough for the rest of the crates, and holds them out for the Drifter to take.]

[hyperlit]

[They snatch them up and are up and away in a blink, dashing across the gaps between the crates to keep from plunging into the water within. They make short work of tying the line around each wooden box as they go.

At least they're fast at what they do.]

[prettypurpleparlor]

[Muffet watches carefully, reeling in each box after they've finished with it, making sure not to pull anything out from under them.]

[hyperlit]

[The Drifter makes it back to the beach soon after, plus several wooden crates being towed in with purple lengths of twine. They watch impassively as each box gets reeled in, before crouching swiftly to cleave the lid off the first of the latest haul.

Their eyes narrow slightly. There's nothing at all inside that one but scraps of some sort of long-decayed fabric.]

:\

[prettypurpleparlor]

Hm, that one's not terribly useful- I could weave better in my sleep. Still, it's worth checking the others. About how many did we haul in, again?

[hyperlit]

[They count them off, one by one.]

five.

[Not counting the one filled with coconuts. The Drifter wastes no time in sweeping the lid off a third crate, abandoning the useless tatters of spoiled cloth without a second thought.

The third contains several coils of rope, sturdy if soaked in seawater. The Drifter fishes one of them out, eyeing it appreciably.]

[prettypurpleparlor]

[Muffet eyes crate number four thoughtfully, nudging it to see how heavy it is so she can guess at what might be inside before they try to open it, and nods.]

You're welcome to keep all the rope, by the way. I'm more, er, naturally provided for on that front. The coconuts I'd like to divide evenly.

[hyperlit]

[After a moment's consideration, the Drifter shakes their head, new words punching out across their HUD.]

take all of them.

[prettypurpleparlor]

[Muffet blinks in surprise, and shakes her head.]

[Drifter. Drifter, no. You're trying to convince someone who bakes for a living that food isn't important to you. This is the kind of thing that leads to her hunting you down and making you try homemade spider-and-coconut cookies.]


I admit I don't know much about you, but I'm assuming you do need to eat. If we find some other kind of foodstuff in here that you'd prefer over coconuts, that's fine, but I'm not going to leave you without anything to eat.

[hyperlit]

owe you.

[They can find something else to eat in the meantime. They helped her uncover food and supplies, to an extent, and that's not nearly enough for saving their life but it's something. It's a start.]

[prettypurpleparlor]

Far be it from me to deny your admirable sense of responsibility, dearie, but you were about to fall off a cliff and it took me a couple moments of effort. A bit of my time is hardly too much to give.

At a certain point, not helping would have just been ridiculous.