The Village Mod (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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villagememes2020-11-19 10:10 pm
villagemod) wrote in villagememes2020-11-19 10:10 pm
Entry tags:
test drive — winter
WINTER TEST DRIVE
Welcome to the test drive and thank you for your interest in The Village. This test drive is not game canon but will allow players the opportunity to experiment with game mechanics, the setting, and the flexibility of choice allowed by this game. The following prompts are examples of typical situations characters might face in the game. At least one thread from the TDM is required as part of the game's application process.
The setting details and locations are still being unveiled in the game, so prospective players are welcome to play with established locations or create their own within the general setting of Mathias.( Recommended listening: ♫ )
INTO THE ENDLESS
Winter has arrived in Mathias. Snow falls steadily, big puffy flakes that pile up quickly in drifts as the wind blows them around town. The trees in the forest are covered in it, the branches bending under the weight and shaking when the piles fall from them to the forest floor. The roofs of buildings become solid white and drifts form in doorways as the wind tries to rush inside anywhere it can.
New arrivals wake in the forest, with its winding paths twisting back on themselves as they branch in either direction. It isn't safe to stray from the path, there is a menacing fog that waits just a few yards inward in any direction, but for now, there is nothing impeding movement along those snow-covered paths that cut through the trees. Continue stumbling in one direction and you'll reach the small town, coming out near the mishmash of quaint houses that nestle beside crumbling ruins that used to be homes. But choose the other and you'll seem to stumble on forever, huddling against the wind until there seems to be a clearing up ahead—
And then nothing. The earth opens up before you in a ravine so deep that the bottom cannot be seen. The other side can be seen, tantalizingly out of reach, and there is the sense that safety is just beyond, if only you could get there. But with that sensation is also the knowledge that if you stay here, you will die. The edge seems unsteady, like getting too close would set it crumbling and send you tumbling into that dark endless nothing that waits below...
BODIES WITHOUT SOULS
Benedict Books is nestled quaintly on the square surrounding Mathias's Town Hall, a thick layer of dirt covering the front windows. Looking through those windows provides a much different view than looking directly into the shop through the doorway — vague shapes and forms of figures seem to be inside, though no details can be determined through the streaks of grime. Flickers that resemble flashlights can be seen passing along the windows from time to time, and on occasion there is even a muffled tapping sound that comes from behind the glass, as if someone is trying to get your attention. The same distorted figures can be seen looking through the windows from the inside outward, but moving from one side or the other reveals... nothing. There is nothing there, and perhaps it is all in your imagination.
A portrait hangs at the front of the store to illustrate the namesake of the little shop... that may, in fact, not be so little. Dust covers everything in sight and detritus litters the wooden floor, as if someone left the door open and allowed half the forest inside.
The books are mostly familiar titles from the 1990s and earlier, but close examination will reveal that key details seem to have been changed. They fill shelves in neat lines along the walls and rows in between, the building almost seeming to stretch on forever until, finally, a small office can be seen tucked away in the back. A glance back toward the front door gives the impression that the room isn't that big, after all. Strange that you previously thought so.
Prying the door open is the only way to get inside the small office; the hinges have rusted and are caked with dirt and grime. Search as you might, there are no interesting bits of information to be found here beyond a few inventory lists on the little desk. There is, however, a green and gold safe in the corner that, no matter how many times one turns the dial, simply clicks and clicks. Scratches around the safe indicate that someone tried to get in at one point, though there's no indication as to whether they succeeded.
THE END APPROACHES
Standing at the center of Mathias, the town hall is a modest two-story building that would be welcoming if not for the faded sign, chipped paint, and deafening silence within its empty halls. It's a typical government building, with a reception desk at the front and rows of identical offices within, the names half faded from each door. But what catches the attention is a large bulletin board on the main wall beside the reception desk, once meant to hold flyers or announcements for the community.
What it holds now is decidedly different. Tacked onto the board are scraps of paper covered in an assortment of handwriting styles — requests for supplies should anyone find them, pieces of information shared in the hopes of someone understanding the strange symbols and mathematical equations, notes about those missing or recently deceased. And over the center of the board, tacked on top of other papers, is a map discolored with age. Mathias Township can be read in the corner, a stretch of forest displayed beneath it, but everything else has been smeared to illegibility with red... ink? Upon close examination, a keen eye will realize that the ink is actually blood, though whether it is human is unknown. And scrawled across that forest, nearly covering the illustration of a clearing and a large house within, are the wordshe is coming
A number of tarnished metal pushpins are scattered around the edges of the board, waiting for future messages to be shared, and a stack of pristine white paper and pile of cheap ballpoint pens rest on one of three chairs beside the board. The chairs are clearly meant for those waiting for meetings and are covered in the same layer of grime as everything else in the building — everything except the pens, paper, and bulletin board.
Julia Wicker | The Magicians |Will match format
- into the
unknownendless -- bodies without souls -
- the end approaches -
- wildcard -
the end approaches
Today, she gets here when there's someone else. Someone else who is apparently looking through some piece of glass? It's not a magnifying glass. Ellie has no idea what it is, but she's willing to bet that this isn't nearly as fucking nuts as it appears at first glance.
"Uh, hey?" she calls out from a few feet away. "What are you doing?" She ends up sounding more accusatory than she means to be. She's genuinely curious, but she's just jaded about literally everything.
no subject
"It’s --" There’s a moment of mental scramble for an explanation, tempted to just kind of say 'fuck it' and throw her caution about exposure to the wind. Reason keeps her tongue in check, leaving some details out with her explanation. "It’s from my home. Another way of looking at something to see hidden… things and messages. But, I don’t think it works here."
Not a lie, but not the whole truth.
no subject
Then she glances from Julia's face back down to the glass thing in her hand. Of course she still has no clue what it is, but she's met more people that know how to do magic than don't by now, so...
"Wait, like it's magic or something?" There's skepticism in her voice because she comes from a world that doesn't have it. It's still hard to trust, hard to believe in. But she asks anyway.
"Someone told me that they think this place fucks with magic so it doesn't work well."
endless;
But as he tries to ignore it, something tugs at the corner of his mind. Did he actually see someone off through the snow, or is he falling victim to the forest? If he stays on the path, he'll be fine, he decides. Hauling his bag over his shoulder, Eliot starts to move in the direction he thinks he saw someone go. ]
- Jesus, it's just me.
[ Not that Eliot thinks the magic missile would work here, but he puts his hands up nonetheless. ]
And it's actually you.
no subject
And look, let her have this one illusion of protection for at least half a second. ]
Eliot. Oh thank god.
[ That relief is quickly replaced with confusion. ] Wait-- I watched you go to Fillory with Margo. How the fuck--
[ Answers would be great before the mental gymnastics she’s doing hurt her. ]
into the endless
[ Alice steps out from the woods and onto the path, hands up, no magic being used. ]
I was trying not to scare you by calling your name, but... [ She sighs and shrugs. ] There goes that.
But— are you okay? There's blood.
[ What a great fucking day this is turning out to be. How is she supposed to help Julia when she's not a healer, and even if she were, she can only cast one-handed? ]
lol you beat me to tagging you
Sorry, the wind. It's--
[ The longer she's out here, the weirder everything seems to get. Looking down at the words, her brows knit for a moment before remembering. ] It's not mine. It's Todd's. Timeline 17 -- the Brakebills hijacking.
[ Julia takes a step forward, quick eyes scanning Alice. ]
Are you okay?
i am speed
At least Julia is okay. Alice sighs, a little of the tension leaving her frame, even when the memories from that little adventure come back to her. ]
That feels like forever ago.
[ Apparently, her brain remembers that she went through the fake Library thing eighteen times before George Ball decided he'd had enough of the painless way.
Crossing her arms, Alice tucks her hands between her arms and her middle, her right hand gripping the fabric of her top tight, hidden from view. The cold is good cover. ]
Yeah. I've just... I'm from later in the timeline than you.
[ Which would be weird if she hadn't witnessed that time-share spell Mayakovsky came up with, and if she didn't remember traveling backwards through time as a niffin. Time travel is a lot to think about, and people being plucked from different points of the same timeline is simple by comparison. ]
I was gonna try walking the opposite way on the path. Maybe there's shelter somewhere.