TEST DRIVE - Part 3

[stigematize]

Maybe you've been here for a while, or maybe you just got here. Either way, you're all in the same situation - you've been turned into a magical gemstone and stranded in a foreign world! And all you've been left with is the clothes on your back, stripped of all powers except one.

Clearly, you’ll just have to make the best of it.

How this works:

☆ This is a test drive for cosmographia, which means you should get a little familiar with the setting and premise.

☆ Otherwise, this is just meant to help you feel out how you may play and serves mainly as a chill interest gathering and get together kind of post! No app necessary, and you don't need to play in this post to apply - or vice versa.

☆ Everybody is welcome! There are no character limitations; pg au oc canon pigeon whatever. Just toss up a topcomment and/or jump any threads that pique your interest.

☆ This post will remain open until it begins to approach 5000 comments! Then a new test-drive post will be made.

☆ Rules-wise: Be cool to yourself and others, and keep in mind the other game rules too.

☆ If you do apply to the game and are accepted, and you want to keep the CR, you may so long as what you did isn't setting breaking and everyone involved agrees.


YOUR OPTIONS:

☆ You find yourself in the Heart of a ruined temple. There is a large glowing gem that thrums with some kind of rhythm, and jewels scattered all over the room, kept in strange bubbles. At the very least, touching the large gem will give you a standard info-dump, but some of you might be a little cautious about touching weird luminescent gems. Good thing that there are other people there too!

☆ Or perhaps you already know everything there is to know, and are there in the Heart of the Ruined Temple to greet new arrivals. Or perhaps you simply had business there already, like storing away a corrupted gem from a monster, when someone new seemingly dropped in from no where.

☆ It's Farmer's Market day in the plaza of Waverly Bay! Perhaps you're there perusing the goods and strike up conversation, or accidentally bump into someone and get to know them that way. It's a fairly standard day.

☆ There's an event! You don't really know what else to call them - missions, perhaps? But something in the temple was triggered, and the glowy Heart gem has something new to "tell" you: If you want a new power, you should try telling other people two truths and a lie. Those who you interact with must try and divine the lie from your statements.

You have no idea how something this simple will get you a power, but hey.

Comments

[topgun_textiles]

[Just like nobody knew why all the faerie tale characters disappeared. Shit. What's with weird worlds and the "we dunno"s?! With an exasperated, short growl, he rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands.]

Great... why the hell would it ever be that easy, huh?

[Wait. Wait. The sudden cold spark flit in his stomach, and his hands lowered.]

Wait- how long have ya been here? Like, here here? I should go lookin' for somebody, but I wonder if you've seen 'er. She, uh-

[Okay, where should he start?]

She's short, kinda choppy blue hair, eyes match, and... uhhm... Damn it, what was she wearin' earlier-

She's kinda dressy. Kinduva rose motif?

[velvet_mystique]

.....Hmn. I can't say that I've seen anyone like that; however, I haven't exactly spent a lot of time socializing. You'd have to ask around.

[topgun_textiles]

[He frowned. That either meant she'd missed this little person - which was bad - or wasn't here at all. Which was worse. But his heart seemed to be beating okay and he didn't feel strange at all. Maybe that part of the story was wrong... god, he hoped it wouldn't happen here.]

Damn. Well if she rolls by, y'wanna let 'er know I'm lookin' around for her? I'm Kanji.

Or... the Prince, or... somethin'. I dunno if any'a that even matters here.

[velvet_mystique]

*Royalty? He doesn't quite look the part, despite his attire, but she knows full well that looks can be deceiving. So rather than comment, she merely nods.*

Very well, Sir Kanji. Does this young woman have a name I can address her by as well?

[topgun_textiles]

Oh- It's Naoto. [But as he folded his arms, his eyes turned away.]

C-cut it out with the 'Sir' stuff. S'too stuffy.

[Took him weeks to get the castle servants to quit calling him by all sorts of titles, but even yesterday they'd still slip. It was 'polite' and 'proper'.]

But I appreciate ya keepin' an eye out. S'bad enough gettin' stranded in one world, but two in a row...

[velvet_mystique]

Very well.

...So you have some more experience with world-hopping than this?

[topgun_textiles]

[He nodded, frowning thoughtfully.]

Every storybook character disappeared from this weird world, so Father Time started grabbin' people from all over to fill in their shoes. So we'd wind up with these weird books with our 'names' on the spine...

We had to finish the stories, or somethin' bad may happen to the story itself. Nobody knew what happened to the original characters. We were there for a couple months or so before I found that weird hole in the wall, and now I'm here.

[velvet_mystique]

...I see. How... odd.

[topgun_textiles]

Odd's a good way of puttin' it, yeah. But I had a ton of people callin' me Beast, whether I liked it or not. Or Your Highness, and all that other stuff.

They dressed me up... [He flipped back his half-cape, but then rubbed his shoulder.]

But it don't feel right to me. I don't even know what princes do, I mean...

Ah, damn it, forget it- I'm just spillin' my guts 'cause this place weirds me out.

[velvet_mystique]

Well, that's understandable. Being brought here seems to be a generally disorienting process, even without factoring in past experiences with being abducted such as your own. To escape one world and the demands it placed upon you, only to be dragged right into another with its own intentions...

*...How disturbing. To put it mildly.*

[topgun_textiles]

...Not to mention keepin' the damn curse. I look normal now, but if somethin' really gets me goin', things get bad.

[He blinked, realizing something.]

Ya seemed pretty unphased earlier. You're pretty brave for a little, uh... pix-pixie...?

[velvet_mystique]

*Shaking her head, she replies:* ...I suppose a proper way of phrasing it would be 'cosmic child'. I come from The Great Cosmos, which doesn't appear to be directly connected to this place. So I was already familiar with multiversal theory and such, though I'd never heard of worlds actively abducting random people before being brought here. To say nothing of being able to alter our forms...

But... to be perfectly honest, mostly I just find the whole situation rather irritating. Unfortunately, since nobody's discovered any ways to really change our current circumstances, the best we can do is adapt for now.

[topgun_textiles]

[He canted his head. Okay, normally, this whole cosmic child thing would be blowing his mind more than it was, but he'd been through quite a bit before coming here.]

Maybe 'cause space here might be way too unfamiliar to ya compared to your own Great Cosmos, huh?

Wait- So you're like an alien! That's awesome! Even as a kid I thought the whole 'we're the only ones in space' thing was bullshit!

[velvet_mystique]

Mmn. Yes. This is supposed to be Earth, and yet the stars don't seem quite right. Not to mention that our family's actually quite well known on 'our' Earth.

*His excitement draws out a smile, at least.*

That is a rather strange belief, isn't it? To presume that one's alone in the universe... what a lonely thought.

[topgun_textiles]

Yeah, it's kinda like 'the hell'd we do to live on the floating dirt ball that nobody else could'a done?'

[Scratching his head, he wasn't sure if he was ready for any detailed explanation on a big, complicated cosmic event that this person likely knew.]

But ya still come into caves like this, when ya got all of space to check out? I mean, it'd all be brand new space...

[velvet_mystique]

...Mn. In my case, it wasn't a cave, precisely. More like a strange, deep-looking impression on the side of an equally unusual meteoroid. One shaped exactly like myself when hovering. One moment I was inspecting the outline, wondering what could have caused it; the next...

...Well, I suppose gravity kicked in rather unexpectedly. As I had no intention of actually attempting to enter, and yet...

*She trails off, shrugging faintly.*

[topgun_textiles]

...It felt like somethin' grabbed right at the waist and pulled ya further in. Ya couldn't stop moving even if the thought entered your head, but even that was hard to do.

[He furrowed a brow.]

I think I liked waking up in a flower patch next to the town square's fountain better.

[velvet_mystique]

...More or less, yes.

*She folds her arms, frowning both at the memory and his own description. Sounds a bit too much like personal experience.*

Hard to say if it's meant to be so forceful, and yet...

[topgun_textiles]

Who knows, man? But I dunno, I guess I was glad for a way outta that whole storybook thing.

I mean, we hadta finish our stories. That meant people might need to die and turn to sea foam or some shit, for starters!

[velvet_mystique]

...Ah. The 'old school' versions, then.

[topgun_textiles]

Pretty much. I had to almost die, then marry somebody.

[velvet_mystique]

Miss Naoto, I presume?

[topgun_textiles]

[A choked sound, and his face burned.]

W-well, we didn't...! Y'don't just force two people to do it!

[velvet_mystique]

Of course not. Frankly, the fact this 'Father Time' presumed he could arrange such a thing speaks very poorly of him. Regardless of how noble he felt his intentions might have been, to summarily kidnap random people and force them into such roles... to say nothing of the ones that could lead to someone's demise...

[topgun_textiles]

Y-yeah! I mean... it's a bad enough time. The story talked about Beauty bein' gone for too long and the Beast was right on death's door when she got back, too!

So I got to thinkin'... the hell's that mean for me? What if Naoto goes to get a bottle of milk from the store or somethin'? Is it distance? What if she finds a way back to the castle, or I do?

This whole thing sucks. I hate feelin' like a... a, uh... glass puppy! Or somethin'.