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

Great Hall;;

[shuffling]

[ Xanthippe doesn't know when her cup ran dry, and is surprised herself when she smiles at the young man filling it. She's seen him around, pulling people to dance, his body language denoting comfort, but most importantly, experience. And that means answers, which she desperately needs. ]

Oh, thanks. You– you didn't have to. [ And she takes a tiny sip, perhaps out of some misguided sense of responsibility, like she owed him at least that much. ]

I think– I think it could get crazier if I'm not. Um, sober.

[ She isn't even buzzed yet, she's comfortable, which is weird in its own way. All Xanthippe knows is that it will do her no good to lose herself in the moment, at least until she knows more about the moment in question. ]

I've been told I'm not a very fun drunk, anyways.

[pharmacy]

Okay, but like--what does that mean? [ She's sipping, he's sipping. That's fair, right? He tops up his cup after hers so she isn't alone, at least. As he drinks, he stills for the first time in a good twenty minutes to take her in. His gaze is intense, but not lurid. They get all kinds around here.

[ He swallows hard. Maybe it's more than sipping. ] Like, is it a with wine comes truth kind of thing? Or more like a tequila makes her clothes fall off thing? 

[shuffling]

[ That actually makes her laugh, and she takes another sip. Xanthippe isn't innocent enough to not know she's attractive, and she has had to suffer more than her fair share of guys hitting on her; she has seen a myriad of techniques, approaches and strategies, but in most of the cases they were so transparently trying to sleep with her for bragging rights that it didn't even matter some of them were genuinely handsome, or even funny and smart. Worst still, had some of them been more direct, she would've probably seen it as a mutally beneficiary situation.

Still, his approach is brash, unapologetic and he might not even find her pretty, but it does enough to relax her some. Or is that the drink? She can't tell. ]

I get naggy. And clingy, and maybe the things you said too. [ Still, she clinks her cup against his before taking a proper drink now. ]

I'm just trying to understand, you know, all of this. [ Her free hand makes a wide motion encompassing the entire room. The entire everything, really. ]

Whose party am I even getting drunk at? How much trouble will I get into if in an hour or so I'm on top of a table badly singing Taylor Swift songs? Where can I go looking for my top if it really comes out? Can you teach me how to dance whatever this is? Lots of important questions.

[ So she might have a soft spot for brash and direct guys, sue her. ]

[pharmacy]

[ Naggy, she says, clingy, and he works hard not to laugh. The noise doesn't come out, but he doesn't do a good job of scraping the amusement off his face. Still, he nods along--lots of very important questions. ] 

Okay, well. [ He straightens up, smooths his shirt down as he does to look his most serious. ] I'm gonna say your top will probably land in the parlor over...there. [ The roiling orgy tucked away...but not that far away. ] You won't get into trouble unless you pick a fight if anyone tries to get you off the table. The party is the Briar Lord's, I can teach you the basics of that dance over there, but I can point out better teachers, and... 

[ He offers his hand, a little dopey because even direct guys get nervous. ] ...I'm Quentin. So you don't have to ask. 

[shuffling]

[ And bossy, and probably bold in a way she would definitely find embarrassing later on, Xanthippe isn't going to give him more ammunition, and she certainly doesn't want to appear "easy" as it seems to have been understood by some in the past. Her eyes follow the direction to the parlor, which she hasn't explored yet; her face would be permanently tomato red had she had seen what's going on in there. Still, that was the one question she hopes she didn't need an answer to; she'd like to keep her top right where it is. The mention of the Briar Lord, whoever he might be, gives her pause; that would be the one that brought them all here, or so she hopes. And she will take him on his dancing lessons if he offers, because why not? So far he's been way cooler than what he might give himself credit for. ]

If I get to the point I want to climb on a table, then I might try to fight anyone. Just do me a favor and stop me if I even try.

[ And then he offers her his hand? Her smile grows as she extends her own to hold hands, a delighted laugh ringing clear as she gives Quentin a solid shake. Eye contact, one shake, pressure. She has had to master the perfect handshake, mainly because way too many people just try to go for a kiss to her liking.

She won't let go if he doesn't though. And her cup is empty again. When did that happen? ]

Xanthippe, because it would be unpolite not to share as well. Xan is fine, too, if you find it a mouthful.

[pharmacy]

[ During his first fete, Quentin suffered with wrapping his pronunciation around Lestat de Lioncourt and Chevalier du Lorraine. So naturally, he's...not at all prepared for her name. He makes it all the way to a clumsy xanf before she concedes a nickname, thank god. ] 

Xan. Welcome to the Crucible. [ Her hand lingers on his, which he takes as the sign: she doesn't want to wander. His fingers turn in her palm so that they're holding hands regularly, like a couple or like kids, and nods towards the exit out to the courtyard. ] Did you see the lanterns yet? Come on. 

Is this your first universe hop? 

[shuffling]

[ About 90% of the people calls her Xan, which is better than the people that constantly mess the pronunciation; the amount of times they add or remove letters makes no sense to her. Besides, Xan sounds way cuter, if you ask her. She can almost imagine being someone else.

Xan's fingers curl around Quentin's hand in a delicate but certain grip. She's not letting go. ]

The Crucible.

[ Names, it's always "the" something or other, capital leters reminding you of its importance. She shakes her head excitedly as she let him pull her, following suit with shiny eyes. Lanterns? She wants to see lanterns. Then, he talks about something else, something both bizarre and unfortunately more in line to the life she had been forced to adopt these past few months. ]

Ah, yes. We– well, as far as I can tell my, um, people have a hearty dislike and disinterest for peeking outside of our universe; something about having more than enough to do on our own, you know. And also, horrors beyond human comprehension. [ Her nose crinkles as she remembers something she would rather not. ] Can't forget about those.

Is this not yours then? Your first time. Hopping universes.