𝔄𝔩𝔩 𝔦𝔰 𝔴𝔢𝔩𝔩 𝔦𝔫 𝔱𝔥𝔢 𝔠𝔬𝔲𝔯𝔱 𝔬𝔣 𝔥𝔢𝔩𝔩 𑁍 [FALL 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.

Threads in this post can be considered game canon as long as both parties agree. This TDM event occurs in between chapters I and II.

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

GAME PAGES

premise
setting
faq
rules
glossary

i.
arise:
Hell is empty, and all the deovels are here.

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: the shudder of thunder that claps like the hoofbeat of warhorses, a cold chill running down your spine, the call of your name through an empty hall. Whatever it may be that brings you back to your senses, you find yourself in an old, moldering estate lost to a bygone time. Every chamber empty, leading to more locked and broken doors. Rain pours softly out windows jammed shut, pushing you on a path deeper and deeper into the labyrinth of the fortress. Farther and farther, you descend to darkness, following the sound of revelry murmuring behind closed doors.

You are not alone.

The giggle of a woman leaps over your shoulder and you feel the tightening of a ribbon around your skull and the heaviness of a mask presses flush against the meat of your cheeks. A woman with a mask the shape of a moth spins around you, smelling of the sweetness of roses and rot, as she slips away into the flush crowd.

No longer do you stand in a decaying ruin; you find yourself amidst a dark masquerade. For this one night, the Lonely Fortress has been restored to the state of its former glory— or some echoed version of it. The devils have come to roost for a night in the Martyr's Crucible. It is now up to you and your fellow exiles to make host with them in their celebration of the spirits.

What are you supposed to be? A New Kid on the Block?

(cw:mood alteration, master/servant dynamics, potential elements of dubcon/noncon.)

Do not fret if you were spirited away in your plain clothes; this illusion has graced you with the finest courtly attire of an older time. Gauzy silks, satins, and velvets in dark and brooding colors. Your mask fits snugly to your face, double-knotted to uphold the most raucous of partying (or determined tugging).

If you are lucky, you were assigned a 𑁍 Voyeur's mask. This mask has no discernable decoration beyond disguising your features, allowing you to blend in with the crowd at no cost to yourself. You are allowed to spectate the events of this night, and none expect you to take part of it.

If you are potentially unlucky, the mask you receive plays a role, and with it bequeaths a strange effect upon its wearer and treatment throughout the masque as a whole:

𑁍 The Sacrifice: You represent the maiden, fair and pure. A gift worthy of giving to the gods. Tonight, you are chosen, and this celebration is for you. Your mask takes on the shape of the lamb, deer, dove, or unicorn. Unlike the rest of the unholy court, your pale colored garments leave you feeling targeted throughout every room you enter.

Those in the presence of the Sacrificed will feel an inexplicable attraction and devotion towards the mask wearer. Enamored by their perceived perfection, their presence creates a genuine, yet terrifying, devotion in others.

𑁍 The Justiciar: You represent the lord and master, strength and dominion. This is a celebration for the spirits, and you are here to see devotion is paid. Your mask takes on the shape of a lion, bear, bull, or dragon.

Those in the presence of the Justiciar will feel compelled to serve and obey their every command. Those under another's control are still limited by their physical and intellectual limitations.

𑁍 The Devourer: You represent the vices, unbidden from chasing your desires. Tonight, you are here to consume the revelry and become a true eater of sin. For the glory of the spirits, you will live a life unleashed for the entertainment of our guest. Your mask takes on the shape of a hound, boar, rat, or hare.

Those with the Devourer's mask will find their pleasure in the service of others . They hunt the party, feeding vicariously on the pleasure and pain brought by their hand. Sweeter than any tonic, the more they taste, the more they want.

𑁍 The Temptation: A representation of the devil themselves, here to pull others into the dance with the macabre. Your mask takes on the shape of a goat, bat, serpent, or vulture.

Those with the Temptation's mask can corrupt others by their touch to feel waves of bliss, catatonia, arousal, or agony. The effects of which only last as long as the temptation is touching them, building and building the longer they remain.

Drop the Act

Removing your mask is possible, but it doesn't come without consequences. The illusion of this night resides in the mask. When it is removed, the uninvited courtiers appear like corpses of moldering flesh and open wounds. Uncovering the truth will not go well for you. Those who are caught going "faceless" will incur dissent against them by the undead courtiers. Either put the mask back on or they will designate you a better one.

Those who dissent but are incapable of running are given a new mask, made to spend the rest of their night at the mercy of monstrous courtiers.

𑁍 The Wretch You now represent the fool, left to the mercy of all other courtiers to entertain through profound humiliation. A metal mask moulded as the face of a gargoyle. A bridle bit fits into your mouth to prevent from speaking. This mask comes with a bell and collar, drawing the attention of others who relish in the wretch's humiliation.

Those with the Wretch's mask will feel compelled to obey any command the other masks give them or incur the heat of the metal mask sear into their flesh when they refuse.

Those who escape are of the lucky few to break away from the echo's thrall. The hellish courtiers will continually hunt for faceless to punish until the festivities subside.

It's a wise time to keep out of sight and keep moving, but escaping the fortress is easier said than done. The corridors have gotten all turned around, windows and doors jammed shut. Some paths, which should inevitably lead away from the festivities, somehow end up looping back into the festivities from another side. Take heed, for every risk you take elevates your chances of being marked a Wretch.

ii.
revel:
Maggoty Malfeasence.

The festivities seem inviting, tempting easily to get swept up into its fray. Those with a strong gut may sense the underlying foulness of deceit and malice that runs under current of it all. Perhaps you let yourself get carried away by the magic of the night, perhaps you play along for your own safety. After all, how often do you find yourself at a ball fit for a court of the damned?

Dance! Dance until you die!

(cw:nsfw, bdsm, potential for cannibalism.)

The celebrations have spread its festivities across the heart of the Lonely Fortress. Each hall feeds a different vice, drenched in a different color. All are welcome to and from hall to hall, dared to delve deeper and deeper into their depravities until the night's final hour. Each hall is full and brimming with laughter and life, men and women who don masks of every shape possible.

𑁍 Great Hall: For dancing and fanfare. The candle's flame bathes all in a merry golden light. Players and singers have been forced onto the tables and the chandeliers to drum up a sleazy tune and a beat to dance to. Stacked flagons and casks wheel out seemingly endless amounts of wine that penetrate even the deepest of inhibitions. The energy in this room is infectious; some who begin to dance may find themselves unable to stop.

𑁍 Banquet Hall: The light in the banquet hall appears almost violet, sucking the color out of most of the food. Everything that can be found on the table tastes decadent: the rich cakes, succulent meats, sweet fruits. Your fellow exiles may be spotted being used as platters and furniture here, trussed up for display and entertainment as the hungry pick cakes and caviar off their bare skin. So long as the food they serve doesn't run out, no forks or knives will be turned against them.

𑁍 Velvet Parlor: For those looking for a place to feed carnal appetites, they will find a large parlor room draped entirely in lush pillows and heavy velvet curtains. Tonight, the room glows under a deep crimson light as courtiers slake their lusts in a garden of intertwined bodies. The heat of arousal is palpable through the diffusion of the egregore, a symphony of moans echoing from one end of the parlor to the other.

𑁍 Long Gallery: If it's a dangerous sport you crave, look no further than the long gallery — a wall of windows on one side let in a dusty blue light of the moon. Up and down the corridor, courtiers race each other riding on the backs of Wretches, swatting their hinds with makeshift crops. Others are made as pedestals to hold apple targets for knives and axes to be thrown at them. A crowd gathers around a game of knives, waiting to see who draws first blood. The iron of blood seethes into the air here, chasing after the play of pain.

Eyes Wide Shut

(cw:human/ritual sacrifice.)

In the dark before the dawn, the festivities slowly begin to turn sour. Activities grow more violent and vicious. The illusions start to fade on their own as the courtiers become gradually more and more bedraggled. The sweetness of rot grows stronger, attracting the buzzing of flies. Their façade slips away to reveal the legion of undead carousing among the living.

One masked lord rises above all in a toast to announce the culmination of the night's celebrations.

"Now cometh our rise," drones the gold devil's mask. "Our tribute to the Sleeping One, our venerable host, shall be paid in blood."

The deovels roar, their frenzy rising with the heat of the room. If you possess the Sacrificed mask, the blood tribute is...well you. After a long night of salivating, it's now the deovels' turn to come for you. You are hunted to be thrust atop a makeshift palanquin, jeering as you are carried to the fortress's lonely chapel as a living sacrifice.

Those under the spell of other masks may be urged to lend your aid in fetching, tormenting, and processing of these sacrifices. With any luck, you can free your compatriots, or perhaps bloodlust urges you to participate in their dark rituals. Dissenters will face the risk of being sacrificed themselves or placed in the mask of the wretch to do as they're told. In the chaos, escape is possible, but not all will be fortunate enough to make their bid for freedom.

Courtiers drone in their infernal chanting. Fresh blood is used to carve runes and sigils into the stone. An opening in the floor unfurls into a giant pit lined with jagged edges like a lamprey's mouth. One by one, each remaining sacrifice is urged to jump into the maw and down the throat of the hell itself.

For most, this is the end.

For the few, surviving your fall into the stomach will land you in the Undercroft; corrupted by vines of blood and sinew that run along the stone walls. The tunnels under the fortress is a labyrinth of its own, may you wander the dark until the exit can be found. You are not alone down here, for the lost servitors of the keep meander in the dark for their next meal, but hunted by the deovels no more until you can find your way out.

iii.
respite:
It's just a bunch of hocus pocus!

With the breaking of the dawn, the terror of the night is swept away as light fills in the shadows. The hellish court and its massacre are gone within the blink of an eye, leaving the Lonely Fortress back in its regressive state of damp and dark solitude. No trace of dark ritual or aggressor remains. The echo has come and gone, leaving the fortress in a dead and uneasy silence compared to the raucous frenzy that had possessed it a blink before.

The spirits have come and filled their bellies. Where did you end up?

Another Glorious Morning

If you survived the night: Wherever you are, whatever you had been doing by the end of the night, it matters not. Just like that, you jolt awake from a long and restless sleep. The morning light pierces through old, musty curtains in another hazy day in the Crucible. No traces of your courtly garments or mask remain; the events of the night echo in your body, groaning like a hangover. You may find you are tucked away perfectly into bed, fully dressed and in dirtied boots...or you may have woken to missing clothes altogether. Any injuries accrued at the hand of other exiles remain, lending to some part of the night being grounded in truth.

If you are lucky, you have awoken in a room assigned to you, but that may not always be the case. Sleepwalking is a common affliction to exiles old and new, so lets hope any unanticipated bedpartners are forgiving of the company— they too are in need of recuperation. Relish in this moment. You survived.

Deep asleep in thy wormy bed

If you had died at any part of the night: You will not have woken in any bed (unless you were slain in one), but instead rise in the part of the castle where you fell; not a trace of injuries left, only the discomforting memory of death the strangeness of your awakening.

You may be questioning if the night's events were real at all. The sourness of death, blood and bile, lingers as a bitter taste in your mouth. Additionally, you are missing memory. A cut on your palm, but no memory of its accrual, suggests something was bargained for your return. Any trace of such a devil's deal escapes your memory.

Breakfast is served for those who still hold an appetite, but the dining table remains uncomfortably quiet beyond the scraping of forks. The food tastes dull compared to the decadence of the masque, even duller for those who made their brush with death.

Rest now, relish in your continued survival, for who knows what awaits at the next turning of a moon.

Comments

Birdie Lewis | OC | Vampire: The Masquerade | new

[acaseofyou]

  arise;

option a: the voyuer
[ She's disoriented, but she's lucky. For a certain value of luck, she supposes. On a scale of Denver to Nothing Bad Ever Happens Again and All War is Over, it's firmly in the middle. The fact that she's pulled into a masquerade is kind of laughable, like a great big universal pun. It feels a bit like out of one frying pan and into a toaster. No less dangerous, but similar in how it can hurt. She's not naive enough to think otherwise.

Birdie takes it in stride, with the dress she's got on and things to see. Not like she hasn't woken up to weirder situations, though usually those came with less pomp than this. Unfortunately, for a few different reasons, observing one thing at the moment means she's lost to noticing anything else, Fugue playing in her head and music in the room around her. Incredibly easy to sneak up on her in other masks with other roles to play out through the night. ]

option b: the temptation (snake) - cw: coercion, manipulation
[ Not that surprising, the snake thing. Maybe it's because she spent so much time with the Followers of Set in Vegas, singing with snakes both literal and figurative, that this is what she gets instead of the equally amusingly appropriate dove, her dress a deep green to match. That feels appropriate, too. Hard to tell the difference, at a glance and with untrained eyes, between a harmless green snake and a boomslang. Birdie hardly even notices the change it brings, subtle as it is compared to her convention of normal. That urge to go out and touch and feel. To make others feel.

It's what most of her nights are made of, anyway. How is this so different? Beyond not being on a stage to sing emotion into a crowd, nudging and coaxing them this way and that. And she'd always had a habit, a knack, for finding the quiet ones in a party, the introverts and the shy, to pull them back into enjoying themselves.

Maybe that's you, off to the side, keeping to yourself. Birdie sidles (slithers) up beside, easy as anything. The touch of her hand, if she reaches out, feels like her bite. A small pinch of pain and then perfect elation. ]

What's got you hiding over here?

  revel (velvet parlor) - cw: biting, blood drinking;

[ No matter which mask she's wearing, she still needs to feed. It's an impulse completely separate from anything else going on, though maybe harder to ignore in light of it all.

It's the Velvet Parlor that seems the best place for it. Everyone there already engaged, the room warm and inviting. Dark. One could observe her wandering through, kissing some, her mouth on another person's neck. She doesn't linger long with any of them, and none are left heaps when she moves on. They all move on in their own turn, back to affections and comfort with others, not even a wound left on their body wherever her fangs had been.

The process isn't much different if you get bit yourself. Her approach is slow and inviting, even without the snake mask. ] Come sit with me a second. [ It takes longer than that, but she likes to start small and easy. Nothing to worry about here except having a good time. ]

  respite (deep asleep in thy wormy bed);

[ Whatever happened in the night, Birdie wakes up again the next evening at sunset somewhere below the fortress, unsure of how she got there or how the night ended.

Anyone else still down there at this time will hear her wandering, followed occasionally by a shout: ]

Where's the goddamn stairs here?

[ To be fair, she's probably passed by them a few times now. It's fine, she'll get it eventually. ]

  ooc;

There's info & permissions & a bite opt in/out post!

your ubereats has arrived! (sorry for a bit of period related homophobia...)

[babysitters]

( Steve should have cleared out ages ago. accidentally fooling around with a dragon prince should have indicated to him that he cannot be trusted in a hanky panky parlor. but maybe that's why the girl inviting him over is absolutely not something he can ignore. because he needs to prove to himself that is what he really wants, despite all this boy kissing that keeps happening to him. no need to self reflect when he could just kiss a girl and make himself feel better. remind himself that he is definitely straight, and a little gay shit could happen to anybody in a spooky castle.

so when she asks him to sit a second, he obligingly stops bisexually leaning nearby to join her. hard to really see her face with the mask on, but she has a nice smile. a nice mouth, really. a snake and a snake, I'm sure nothing could go wrong with this combination! ) Just sit? ( he asks, somewhat disappointed. look, he's not expecting her to strip and for them to fuck on the spot. but they are in the horny room. so maybe they could make out a little. )

[acaseofyou]

[ Really, can anyone be trusted in a hanky panky parlor? A question for the ages. Not one to be answered right now, though. He's young, though everyone at this point is young to her. And maybe she saw him and his fooling around earlier, between other things. Noticed him lingering after like a lost puppy. She's been around all kinds of blocks, so soothing a little insecurity isn't new.

He sits, and she tilts her head, that nice smile going lopsided and wry. ] I mean, hard to do this-- [ Birdie reaches out, cups the jaw exposed under his own mask, and the touch alone has her sighing. And look, it's not like she's unfamiliar with snake-on-snake action, after living a couple years with a hedonistic vampire snake cult, but this is definitely a different kind of slither. Takes her a second, too, to pick up that train of thought where she'd left it. ] Hard to do when I don't wanna stand up.

I AM SO SORRY believe it or not i was sick for a week and then got sick again IMMEDIATELY after 😭

[babysitters]

( well, if any person can be, that person isn't Steve Harrington, and certainly not when he's got guilt and gay shit to forcibly repress. he would DEEPLY RESENT the implication he's young, doesn't fog time mean anything to ANYBODY around here??? but at least present company is flirty and didn't send a frenchman to his room to babysit him, so, for the time being she can get away with it.

because she really does have a nice smile. and she's so pretty. and kinda handsy. these are delightful adjectives, as far as he's concerned. seriously, he can't remember the last time he got to just fool around for the fun of it, and that's especially shameful because he probably could have if he'd even attempted to get back in the game after Bullshitgate. he's got so much lost time to make up for here. )

Me neither, ( his voice is as languid as his posture. after all, now that he's down here with her, he can't begin to fathom what he was doing standing around in the first place. the couch is so comfortable and she's so delightful, what was he even thinking? ) What else do you wanna do? ( is putting a hand on her leg leading? maybe. but that's the point. he really wants to put the let's fool around vibes out there. )

OH NO!!! i hope you're finally feeling better!

[acaseofyou]

[ To be fair, Birdie has no idea what fog time is, and would assume it's weed-adjacent. Which, all told, a weed-adjacent fog sounds like it'd be great right about now. Really help with the vibes of whatever the hell this place has going on with it. She can't fully enjoy it, but she never had a bad time hotboxing.

Never had a bad time doing this, either. If his hand on her leg is leading, she's got no problem following. ]

Oh, all sorts of things. [ She's not gonna list them off or anything, that'd be crass! But she does use her hand on his jaw to nudge his face towards hers so she can kiss him, firm and smiling. ]

tw: kinda gross & tbh im worried it is a sinus infection now but at least my brain is back!

[babysitters]

( it's fine. he doesn't actually want to talk about his fog time anyway. it involved a lot of dying, continually failing to save his friends, visceral understanding of the smell of human skin as acid melts it off a skull, and Bubba Sawyer from the Chainsaw massacre. and maybe he wildly hallucinated the whole thing? it genuinely makes him feel like a complete nutcase to talk or even think about it at this point. so how about they don't talk about it. how about they don't talk about anything? how about they skip over that part for something more simple. straight forward.

and for Steve, this is definitely straight forward. he is smiling when she closes the distance, like the cat that the cream. because he is that smug fucking cat, he got exactly what he wanted out of exactly 10 seconds of flirting. and whoever said the chase is better than the game was kinda full of it, because only the latter actually involves getting to fool around.

if Birdie thought he was a shy wallflower, well, the easy heady way he keens into sweet smiling kisses might disparage that idea a little bit. he has done a lot of brainless kissing with faceless pretty girls at parties. literally, in this case! so it's like riding a bicycle. there is no need to warm up, because he never really forgot. he leans into her, hand sneaking higher up her leg. touching more of her and leaning close to properly give off the vibe she's welcome to return the favor. because she is. he'd like her to touch him more, a lot more. in fact, he is so eager for it, it is making him a little stupid. he would like anything she has to offer, please, because she is so delightfully tempting and feels so good and at some point a guy really does hit his limit of feeling bad. )

those are the worst! glad about your brain, and if you need tips let me know.

[acaseofyou]

[ Not like she's in a similar boat. There's plenty she's not talking about, that she won't unless she absolutely has to. There's a reason she came here to the hanky panky parlor rather than the room that smelled strongly of blood, or the dancefloor, or ran around trying to find a way out. Sometimes there's a reason the easy path is easy.

Also, as a point, it's much more enjoyable. Better than all the pain and confusion and rot happening everywhere else. This is comfort, this is, against most reason, safer.

He's good, too. At kissing, regardless of any wallflowering lost puppy lingering he might've been up to or comparisons to bike riding going on. Touching, too. Her hand stays where it is on his jaw, but the other one snakes (ha!) around his middle as she scoots closer to him, deepens the kiss with a little noise at the back of her throat that melts into all the other pleased noises happening around them. Pulling away from it isn't something she has to do, but she does eventually. Just enough to drag her mouth down across the other side of his jaw, aiming for his neck.

That part will be pretty enjoyable, too. ]

i am completely canonblind i confess but she may munch!! have at him 💕

[babysitters]

( getting lost in somebody else used to be one of his favorite ways to turn his brain off. he did it a lot. too much, probably. okay, fine, definitely. because you don't build up a reputation for being a shitty player only interested in sex if it only happened a couple times. and he's been on this whole personal growth journey, so, maybe it is a bad idea to get stupid and indulge in fleeting carnal vices?

but like most bad ideas, it does seem like a perfectly fine idea in the moment. he's into it, she's into it, so what exactly is the problem? she tastes so good, and he really likes that noise she just made, and her lips feel like heaven. she slinks closer and his spare hand lands on her other leg, to help her along. because closer is still not close enough. directly on top of him would be better. and once he's got her in his lap his touch almost seems leisurely. enjoying the shape of her body, the weight of her against him, the slide of her tongue. instead of escalating, he seems downright greedy. like he has all the time in the world to taste as much of her as he wants.

it's a good kiss. great even. but the problem with feeding temptation is the hunger it leaves behind. more and more, only it's never enough. which explains the whine when she departs from his mouth for her lips to travel elsewhere. his grip on her tightens, a mix of frustration and approval. because her mouth feels good still, even as it wanders, even if he isn't entirely sure he was ready to be done kissing yet. )