𝔄 𝔐𝔦𝔡𝔴𝔦𝔫𝔱𝔢𝔯 𝔑𝔦𝔤𝔥𝔱'𝔰 𝔇𝔯𝔢𝔞𝔪𝔦𝔫𝔤 𑁍 [WINTER TDM]

[gorelord]

Welcome to the Test Drive!

The TDM is welcome to current players and anyone who wants to play in the setting and is encouraged to be used by prospective players. If you are interested in joining the game, you will need to obtain invite from the mod or through an existing member.

For information on the game premise, setting etc, please utilize the navigation pages below. Questions specific to the TDM prompts or the setting can go to the comment thread. Anything else relating to game mechanics can go in the FAQ.

Events in this TDM are considered game canon and occurs immediately after the Chapter II eclipse event between chapters II and III. Any threads in TDM are considered canon as long as both parties agree.

Please make sure to identify in your top levels as either current or new player/characters.

GAME PAGES

premise
setting
faq
rules
glossary

i.
rise:
A Dream's Beginning

(cw:nsfwl; ritual sex, mood altering substances )

It begins with a nightmare, the details of which have slipped through your fingers. Only the curling echo of its dread lingers in your chest. Something has snapped you out of a catatonic state: a gust of icy wind whistling through the crack of a window, the soft beating of drums under the melody of strings, the cold kiss of fat snowflakes catching on your eyelashes, the smell of spiced wine and evergreen.

A few things become clear: You are not where you were, and you are not alone.

Feast for Saints

Tonight is a night of celebration for the Lonely Fortress. The horrors have been set aside, replaced with the warm mirth and grace of being alive. Whether this is your first night in the Crucible or your fortieth, all are welcome to partake in this renewing fete under the silver light of a full buttery moon. Snow dances like flower petals in a lazy array, leaving a shallow blanket of white. The fire roars in the hearth of the Great Hall, spreading its warmth throughout its adjacent parlors. Despite murmurings of a recent catastrophic eclipse cleaving the castle twain, its halls and buildings show no sign of decay. The Egregore has been cleansed, balance has been restored. Spirits are high, people are at ease.

If you choose to partake, there are a few select locations where people have gathered to celebrate:

𑁍The Great Hall is open for feasting and dancing. The fortress stores have provided a wintertime feast of roasted meats & vegetables, pies, fresh and aged cheeses, dried fruits, candied nuts, and seeded cakes. The hall smells of spiced honey wine and mulled cider, both packed with a warm and buzzing inebriation that creeps on unexpectedly. A makeshift band of strings and drums plays lively music for people to dance to.

𑁍The Velvet Parlor is a smaller hall branched off of the main festivities for those looking for softer and more intimate comforts under the candlelight. Tonight, its guests pay tribute to celebrate the passion of life and to beckon the sun to rise in a ritualistic tangling of bodies. Here is the place to become a true eater of sin. All furniture has been nudged to line the walls, making way for a sea of cushions and pillows for celebrants to laze upon as they imbibe in strong, distilled spirits, as the air above them swirls with a sweet, toasty incense imbuing a mellow calm and stirs carnal appetites. A masked man plucks away a sultry tune on his lute in a corner as the night gradually gives way to passionate bodies tangled among the pillows.

𑁍The Courtyard brings a breath of fresh, brisk air as snow falls playfully overhead. Large braziers line the yard offer meager warmth from their roaring fires as exiles partake in snow fights and release wishing lanterns bearing your inner most desires into the sky. Steam rolls off the yard's central fountain, which has been fitted to disperse heated water to provide a makeshift heated pool, a perfect place to thaw chilly hands or feet (or just go all in if ye be bold enough.)

A Colder Path

If instead you choose to abstain, it becomes apparent every dream has its limits.

The castle beyond the festivities is cold, dim, and abandoned. Behind every door, a drab and empty room (if the handle isn't locked or broken). The keep's gates are closed, the sunken village beyond a frozen wasteland. The further one strays from the warmth and merriment, the colder and darker it becomes.

Isolation breeds madness, too much time spent away from others may lead to paranoia. Figures shift in the dark, a breath tickles the nape of your neck. You may see familiar faces, hear familiar voices, beckoning you to stray further from your path towards uncertain doom: a crooked nail sticking out of the floorboards, a hurried shove off the top of the stairs, a door that opens over the edge of a rocky cliff.

As determined as you may be, the only way out of this dream is through.

ii.
revel:
Trials of Merciful Holly

(cw:potential for dubcon/noncon, mood-altering.)

As the midwinter evening persists, a visitor long awaited comes knocking at the Great Hall's doors. A tall man emerges with a body molded out of braided wood, bearing thorn-tarnished armor and a tattered crimson cloak. With every step forward, thorned vines that stitch across the walls and floors, blooming with plum purple leaves and small budding flowers.

"The Briar Lord," one exile gasps. "Gregor's returned," another praises tearfully. With a bow, he treats the celebrants of the Lonely Fortress with the innocence of a festive game.

"O' eaters of sin, indulge me in this friendly Midwinter game. Ye have survived a harrowing and for that ye shall be rewarded for purging of thy wickedness. I ask thee this final offering to purge this winter and beget a new spring. Give me thy blood and affection with honor and I shall see this cold vanquished. What I am given, I will return what was given me. Then, in trust and friendship, we shall part."

Bats and Lashes

The Lord's game is a simple marital task held out in the frost covered garden: a duel of branches. Each competitor will be given handful of briar as their weapon. The aim of the game is to whip each other until the thorns of the briar's branches draw blood. The first to draw blood from the opponent is the victor and the blood price paid.

Yet, not all these branches are created equal. A fortunate competitor may be given a Bewitching Branch. Those whipped by this branch will become utterly obsessed and infatuated to whom they've been struck by for a short period of time after, beholden to their branch master until the sting of thorns wane.

Tithe of the Mistle

If you choose not to partake in the Lord's game, the Lord warns that his winter's briar will collect a tithing of affection. The vines that bloomed with his arrival grow rampant behind seeing eyes. Buds turn into flowers, petals shed as they mature into plump white mistle berries that release the sweetest scent to draw you in.

Either you have accidentally stumbled upon the mistle, or it has decidedly grown itself above you without your noticing, but you become bewitched by its scent. As the tricksy bramble coils around your ankles, giving the gentlest of biting from its thorns, it becomes clear that you will be consumed if you do not pay the mistle its tithing. For some, it only takes a kiss, for others, the mistle will demand more. Give it something meaningful. Give it something real, and you will be released.

iii.
respite:
Midwinter Mourning

All good dreams must come to an end. The following morning paints a different picture of the Lonely Fortress witnessed in the night's collective dreaming. The Crucible sits under a thick blanket of snow, the waters surrounding the keep have frozen solid. None of the warmth of the night remains; it feels as though the world has died. The whole of the Crucible feels cold, quiet, abandoned.

Every hearth has burned out, every brazier snuffed under the snow, every candle smothered. It's quiet, empty, dark. Daylight may have come, but a thick layer of storm clouds casts a foreboding shadow. If the desire remains to leave, it quickly becomes apparent there is nowhere else to go.

Warm Winter's Kiss

With luck, you have woken in a bed under a pile of old furs to keep some semblance of warmth with you. With even better luck, you've woken next to company to keep each other warm throughout a cruel cold morning. Without proper protection, the cold is biting against exposed skin. Joints and limbs become stiff and numb, making it difficult to move around without constant tending if one lacks gloves.

While hearths can be re-lit and heated baths can be drawn, the true comfort from freezing can only be found in the close company of other living creatures. Exiles on this cruel morning keep each other warm through sharing heated breaths and pressing bodies. Expressions of passion and compassion help the warmth to linger just a bit longer for those who cultivate it together, granting brief autonomy of movement before finding another's heat is needed again.

Breakfast is served, but it's nothing remotely glamorous to the feasting offered by the Midwinter dream: simple porridge that leaves a stale taste that coats the tongue, nuts and fruits that are half rancid, boiled wine that's been watered down to detract from how far along it's turned into vinegar. Its only promise is to fill an empty stomach until more food can be found.

Outside, the snow begins to fall again. An omen that this winter is here to stay. Welcome to the real Martyr's Crucible.

Comments

[babysitters]

( well, this is what he gets for waffling. sometimes he wishes brain messages were like walkies. that he could just turn them off if he's not ready to listen. Steve contemplates ignoring, just — just long enough to get the knife! it won't take him long, right? except for the part, maybe that thing is still there, maybe it's still hungry, maybe some part of him is still down there, too —

nope. it's a bad idea. the knife is just a distraction from everything else. he can't fix the fact two people had to listen to him being eaten alive by showing up with a borrowed knife. and ignoring Cellar would just make things worse. he can kinda feel tinge of anxiety in the connection, just in a couple words. )

Yeah. Hi. ( it's anticlimactic. but what do you say in this situation? so, I died. but I'm cool now. don't be sad. Steve is at least smart enough to know he can't tell her not to be sad, that's not how feelings work. he just wishes she wouldn't be, because he hates this part. everybody being sad and guilty and mad and all sorts of complicated, ugly, painful things after a trial, and that's normal. he just wishes it didn't have to be normal for somebody who hasn't felt it before. )

[longlegs]

[ Imagine holding a wave still, just as it's about to crash, towering, suspended, ready to swallow the coastline whole. Imagine two anti-climactic words being enough to open the hand and let it go, washing Cellar with relief and —

— not happiness. Every moment that built up to this one is too tainted. It hurts too much, and she doesn't get to feel happy when she failed Steve so utterly. Relief it is, and she's lucky she even gets to have that much. ]

Can I see you?

[ The only way she can think of asking where are you without it coming off as a demand. ]

Please?

[babysitters]

( he gets this part. that a voice is not enough, that seeing and feeling is the only evidence concrete enough to really believe it. Steve still needed that physical reminder people are back, especially when it's Nancy or Jonathan, even after all his time in the fog. he doesn't really have it in him to say no.

sometimes, everyone in the castle running on the same brain connection freaks him out. it's very upside-down hive-mindy, when he thinks about it too much. but right now, it's handy, because he can just show Cellar exactly where he is. an image from his brain to hers. he's pretty far removed from the party, lingering at the first step on the path they'd traveled together. it'll be familiar. )

I'm okay. I've done this before. ( will that make her feel better? like, just a little? this was not baby's first self sacrifice, is the point. he's had ... well, yeah, worse, even though your most recent death is usually your least favorite until you go ahead and die again. )

[longlegs]

[ It still catches her by surprise — she never got used to having images planted in her mind's eye back home and may never get used to it here. It's convenient, though, when there are no phones and directions would probably only get her lost. ]

I'll find you.

[ She says it, lacking the courage to say what do you mean, minutes passing before she spots his figure and comes over to stop in front of him. The current debate is whether she even has the right to ask, ]

Can I hug you? Promise it'll be real quick.

[babysitters]

( Steve doesn't make himself hard to find. he lingers exactly where her minds eye said he'd be. Steve doesn't quite know what to do with himself in the meantime, leaning against the door he can't quite find the willpower to go through. occasionally thunking the back of his skull against the wood. it's stupid. it's so stupid. right? he's died hundreds, thousands of times. it shouldn't bother him to go back to where it happened at this point. how can dying still cling to his senses, paint his thoughts bloody red, when he's died in practically every way imaginable at this point? at what point do you just get over it, huh??? for Cellar's sake, he'd like it to be right now.

it's not right now. so he's gonna have to fake it until he makes it. at least Steve can say he's cool, even if he doesn't really feel it. but if he's not cool, that just makes it worse for everybody involved. and a part of the everybody is en route, right now, so he needs to Get His Shit Together.

Cellar goes from en route to there quick, too. or maybe he was just so in his head, the minutes blurred together. Steve surfaces from wherever his head was at when he sees her. feels bad all over again. stands up instead of slouching against the overly ornate carved wood. she asks to hug. asks. that's different. kinda cute though. Steve huffs a laugh, because he's not sure anybody has ever asked him that before?

hugging is cool. Steve likes hugs. he's probably not supposed to say it out loud, but that doesn't make it not true. so he opens his arms. hug away, Cellar. ) Does it have to be quick? ( is that cute and flirty or just sad and pathetic? maybe it's best not to answer that question. )

[longlegs]

[ She laughs like he just took a huge weight off her chest, practically leaping when permission's granted. Cellar hugs Steve with the gratitude of seeing him alive and the guilt of her inability to spare him from death. Sloth already told Cellar it wasn't her fault, but it was, and there's not a lot that can change her mind.

Steve's return softens the barbed wire that had coiled around her heart, though, and it turns out the hug was never going to be quick at all. When Cellar finally pulls back, she keeps her hands on his arms, then punctuates the moment with a peck on his cheek. ]

How are you feeling? Do you need anything?

[babysitters]

( the hug is nice. Cellar is warm, solid. smells nice. feels nice. it's lower stakes than the hugs Steve is used to lately, because usually he only gets them when someone is about to die. or already did. #JustFogThings

Steve hugs back. lets the hug be over when Cellar is ready for it to be over. he's not expecting the kiss, but it drags out a shadow of a smile. that was nice too. he puts a hand on her hip for a moment when he peels back to his paces, saying something without words. saying what exactly, well, not even Steve is entirely sure. )

I dunno. Fine. ( right. because him dissociating in front of this door for the last fifteen minutes in front of this door really implies that he's just peachy. ) Weird, I guess. Do you feel weird? Or is it just a dead guy thing.

[longlegs]

[ They hug, reunited after the worst case scenario, and Cellar feels selfish — for wanting Steve back after failing him, for hugging him like she's the one who needs the comfort. A selfish happiness, bracing for the part where she was responsible for the ugly reason why they even had to reunite in the first place.

Then there's the hand on her hip, shifting reality for a moment. The only change is in her mind, seeing Steve and wondering if he's seeing her differently too. Nothing that can't be brushed past easily, tucking hair behind her ear. ]

I don't know. I think I just feel happy to see you right now.

[ She reaches down, taking his hand in hers, like she's ready to show him a hideout, her favorite spot in town — or their favorite place, if they had one. ]

There's food again. The nice kind. And they're playing music, and feeling — good.

[ Does he want to be with them? ]

[babysitters]

( well. that's cute. really cute. he wishes he were closer to being actually fine, because eating and vibing and partying with Cellar sounds great on paper! but he's not actually that fine. that's why he's over here being a downer by himself. stuck on why he doesn't have a knife that isn't even his, and too scared to actually go out and do something about it. so much for being cool and unbothered about his horrific death, huh? he's already completely bombing on that front and they've been talking about 60 seconds, tops. )

No, that's... I'm okay. ( clearly, right? here he is, totally peachy... haunting this door... he's totally good, despite all that he said about feeling weird! maybe they could just forget that part! and since Steve doesn't believe himself, it is hard to expect Cellar to believe it, so he tries to double down. ) I've done this before, so. It's okay.

( IS IT, STEVE??? no matter how you slice it, that is a poor reassurance to a girl that seems upset that you got murdered. but in his sad little fog traumatized brain, it makes perfect sense. it's not like this is the first time he's ever died. he's practically an expert at dying horribly! and he didn't even stay dead. so nobody has to feel bad about what happened, they can just forget all about it. please. )

[longlegs]

[ Her expression says everything she won't: a sad it's not okay, because it's never okay. People at the blood pact would sometimes be killed, and Raíz would bring them back, but that never negated what it was like to die. She thinks that even if she were to die many times, it'd only get worse every time. So no, she doesn't believe him, but that doesn't mean he's lying to her. If anything, he must be lying to himself. Doing everything to protect others, even now, even though she's the one who couldn't protect him. ]

I'll just stay here with you, then.

[babysitters]

( she does not need to call his number like this. look at him like that. because his earnest desire to pretend everything is copacetic is not just for Cellar's benefit. Steve himself does not like letting things get heavy and hard. ignoring it does not make it go away, but you know what else doesn't make it go away? dwelling in it and chewing on it and letting it take you over. so, might as well shove it under a metaphorical rug.

Steve deflates. just a little. he does not want Cellar stuck out here on the outskirts of the party just because he can't handle it. part of him thinks he should just man up and deal with it. it's not like partying is some kind of hardship. but the rest is still stuck on the same thing that it has been all night. )

I lost your knife. I don't remember what I did with it. I wouldn't just leave it. ( it just Feels Weird. how could he forget it? he wouldn't forget it. but he ostensibly did, because here he is, without it. Steve keeps trying to remember, and he can't, and that just makes everything feel worse. the only thing he can manage to remember is awful, and gets him no closer to remembering what he did with her knife. it's a vicious cycle, turns out. )

[longlegs]

Oh my god, [ It's her fault Steve feels the need to even say that (signed, Cellar Spider), so Cellar reaches to put her hand on his shoulder, slide it down to his arm, loose fingers doing their very best not to squeeze, let that be enough to smother him with a tiny gesture of comfort. ]

Steve, I don't care about the knife. It - [ It's a billion times more important that he's here. ] It can wait. You're all that matters to me.