Test Drive Meme #0

[coboservice]

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Legend has it that the god Henir endured Ragnarok, and afterwards created a place where there is no limitation of time and space. Here, she is able to see the rise and fall of the world. Should you reach this place, by Henir's force, you are bound to face the enemies you have met in the past and those you are destined to meet in the future.

Henir's Time And Space

You awake into darkness, surrounded by impossible geometry and an unnerving thrum that fills the cold air. Strange shapes move in the distance, drifting between labyrinthine paths that bend and twist into an endless, senseless maze. Gravity seems to be merely a suggestion, and you'll quickly find that any surface is fine for walking on—sideways, upsidedown, it doesn't matter as long as you're not thinking too hard about it. In a world of raw chaos, the only rule that matters is your willingness to press on. Just don't step too carelessly—one wrong move, and you could end up spinning down (up?) into an endless abyss, lost forever in time and space.

The air is cold, and the longer you stay here the more it feels like that chill will never leave... this isn't a place where mortals should be. Regardless of how you arrived in this place, you'd best make your way back out soon.


... but you're not alone in this alien world. There are others here like yourself, and it never hurts to have a few allies in a strange place like this.

There are also a number of strange... objects? Creatures? Monsters? Whatever you want to call them, they're not terribly friendly and "speak" only in terrifying, unnatural screeches. They seem territorial, which is a problem in a world where space itself follows no logical sense. At least they seem to lose interest once a target it out of their sights(?), and they can be killed(??) if you hit them enough times with something sharp or heavy... if you can't defend yourself, it's better to just keep your distance. There's a lot of sharp edges on those weird things, they seem to be fully aware of that fact.


Somewhere off in the distance you can hear a whale-like cry, followed by a giant shadow that flies past too quickly to see... that one, you probably shouldn't try to fight.

Walking In Circles, Squares And Triangles

No matter which way you go, you never seem to make any progress in finding a way out... and eventually, even the senseless scenery starts to look familiar again. You're not going to get anywhere just by looking around.

But it's on this second pass through that you finally stumble upon something new. Seated comfortably in the middle of the path is a strange man in an iron mask, bound in rusted chains. He is holding... a very dainty tea cup, which appears to be completely empty. He looks up as you approach, waving in a friendly manner.

Mysterious Masked Man

Ah, there you are! I was starting to wonder if you'd died already. Come, come, take a seat. You must be tired from all that running around!

You're an adventurer, aren't you? Yes? No? Ah, well, it's never too late to start! Don't worry about the details. Hmm, let me try a different question... you want to leave this place, don't you? Henir's Time and Space isn't exactly friendly to ones like yourself. Besides, it's starting to get a little... crowded, one might say. I think it'd be beneficial to all of us if you and your little friends went somewhere else, don't you agree?

Kukuku, that's more like it. Why don't we make a deal? You do something for me, and I'll see to it that you can escape this place in one piece. That's fair, don't you think?

Hmm? Who am I? Oh, no one important! Not anymore, that is. You can call me Glave. Come find me again when you're ready. I'll gladly put you to work.

Introduce yourself to the locals!

"You see those shape-like creatures over there? They're not the best for conversation, but you could say they're the natives of this world. The long ones are called Chaos Triangle, and the ones that spin in place are Chaos Circle and Chaos Square. Why don't you start by introducing yourself? Of course, they respond best to acts of extreme violence, so you'd best go in prepared. When you're done playing, bring me back the core of each one and I'll give you something good." • Defeat Chaos Triangle, Chaos Circle and Chaos Square. • They're not the toughest of enemies to fight... but they can still smack you pretty hard, they have sharp edges, and they don't like strangers. You can't reason with them and they don't seem to understand speech. Also, the Triangles skitter. It's kind of creepy. • After striking the final blow, the Chaos creatures will collapse into their polygonal components and leave behind their core (a sphere, cube, or pyramid). Bring back one of each to Glave to complete this quest.

I didn't lose my marbles, but...

"You're not much of a fighter, are you? Or maybe you're just pretending so you can get the easier job... kukuku, who am I to judge? Very well, not everything requires brute force to accomplish. Let's see... well, I did happen to drop something earlier. A pair of blue cubes, about an inch across each side. I think it was somewhere... oh, maybe over there? I'm busy at the moment, so how about you find them for me?" • Find Glave's two missing cubes. • His directions are awful to the point of being useless, and they blend in with all the other glowing blue surfaces around here. This might actually be impossible, but try your best. • Was this a trick to make you go away while he bothered someone else? ... maybe! But hey, it wouldn't hurt to try, right? There's tons of blue cubes just floating around, so maybe you can just find a pair that's almost the same...

To submit quest results, please leave a comment here.

Lamp Oil? Rope? Bombs?

Glave's offer is tempting, if suspicious, but he's not the only one who seems familiar with this place. Somewhere deeper in the endless maze is another such person, standing at the centre of a wide platform bereft of monsters or chaos-creatures... a rest area, if you will. The woman smiles, checking something off on the long scroll in her hands.

Mysterious Woman

Welcome! I'm Helen. We sell necessities for travellers... oh, I'm sorry. Normally I only sell items for ED, but these are trying times. It's alright, let me see what you have and we'll work something out.

Leaving this place? I'm afraid that's outside of my control. I'm just a simple travelling merchant. You'd be better off trying to convince someone like Glave. He can be a bit troublesome, but he's not so bad once you get to know him.

Who would say no to free samples?

"Since you're helping Glave, why don't you take a couple of my potions? It's bad for business if my customers get hurt. If you give one of them to someone else, I'll consider that a favour to myself. Let me know how it goes, and I'll see what I can do to make Glave see reason." • Find a traveller in need and give them a healing potion! It tastes like Tylenol, but it sure does work. • Or just lie. Drink both of them yourself! What's the worst that could happen? • Show Helen that everyone is working hard to escape and she'll knock some sense into Glave.

You can't go to Elrios without a bit of whaling.

"Actually... there is something else you could help me with. I run a fishing business on the side, you see, and I've heard tales of a great Leviathan that roams this space. I've always wondered if other fish might've ended up here as well. I'll let you have this rod, and if you find anything that looks like a fish, let me know." • Go fishing... in space!! • There is no water here, it only kind of looks stupid. • If you keep at it for long enough, you might actually fish something up... or maybe you'll just hook one of the Chaos creatures. Try not to get killed! • What is that whale sound, anyway? Maybe you can bait it out...?

To submit quest results, please leave a comment here.

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[lightsider]

Arrival
The falling sensation lasted forever, jolting her awake as she finally hit the ground, her lightsabres spinning away from her. She used the Force to pull them back to her, remaining crouched and confused, her bright blue eyes unfocused only able to make out bright shapes. There was life all around her, she could see that through the Force. After a moment, she worked her way up to standing, finding her balance shakily. Getting her bearings seemed impossible, but with the Force, she'd be able to get used to this place. She knew that much.

"Hello?" she called, and though her voice was soft, it carried. "Is anyone else out there?"

Polygon Fighting
She'd been tasked to fight and it was with heavy use of the Force that she did so. Her lightsabres flashed gold, sparking as she worked to take down a polygon, and then another, until she had all the cores requested. She could hear someone else fighting them, though and called out.

"Need any help?"

She'd definitely help anyone who needed it, helping was second nature to her as a Jedi. Arha stepped forward toward the sound of battle, her lightsabres igniting.

Quieter Moments
Finding a merchant was a boon, even if she didn't take any of the currency Arha had on her. They talked for a little while and Arha obtained two potions. She tucked them away and nodded. She'd find someone to give the other potion to, that didn't seem like it'd be a problem. She found a nice place to sit and meditate for a while, gathering her strength for the next adventure.

"You can sit with me if you want," she said, hearing a noise nearby and glancing up and toward it. She smiled and patted the ground next to her. "I don't mind sharing. It's nice to see another face, so to speak."

Quieter Moments!

[connixation]

Denif isn't overly-injured; he has a few scrapes here and there, patches where the scales on his cheeks have been scraped away by one of those obnoxious void creatures and fine cuts along the skin on his hands, but nothing serious. Yet he looks exhausted anyway, despite the fact he knows he reasonably shouldn't be.

He'd come to check up on the figure resting to make sure she's, well, alive, and when she speaks to him he offers a thin-yet-polite smile. He's relieved, to be honest. Ordinarily, he wouldn't rest, but perhaps a short break is in order.

"Thank you for the offer. I'll take you up on it," he says softly as he sits, tucking a draconic tail underneath himself to keep it out of the way. "Are you injured?"

Re: Quieter Moments!

[lightsider]

"Nothing serious, mostly scratches," she says with a cheerful smile. "I'm Arha, it's nice to meet you. Honestly, it's good to meet someone else in all of this. You look like you could use one of these, mm?"

She offers a potion to him.

"If just for the scrapes and scratches."

[connixation]

"Denif. A pleasure, Arha."

How anyone can be so cheerful in this situation is beyond him, but then again, compartmentalizing is a thing. For his part, he tries (and somewhat fails) to not let his exhaustion show through. Honestly, all Denif wanted was a quiet day, and now he's here.

He hesitates for a moment before taking the potion. He won't need to imbibe all of it to close such shallow wounds, but he's grateful nonetheless. "Thank you. One of the creatures within this space caught me unawares, as I'm sure you can see." Uncorking the bottle, he takes a sip, and he knows it's been a while since he's had one of these because the taste is so unpalatable. Oof.

[lightsider]

"Most welcome." At his expression, she shook her head lightly. "Medicine never tastes good no matter where you find yourself," she noted, the corners of her eyes crinkling with good humour. "There seem to be many things that bite and scratch, here. Hopefully, they'll calm down so we can find a path to a town or village of some sort. I'd hate to interrupt the life cycle of so many things just to get from one place to another. But if we have no other choice, I suppose we'll have to do something."

[connixation]

"Creatures of Henir, as far as I'm aware, have no 'life cycle'." Denif hates to be the bearer of bad news, but from what he knows about this space, it's the truth. He could be wrong, of course; everyone has that capability. Perhaps this is good news, in a way. No need to feel bad for killing creatures. "By nature, they're simply borne of the primordial chaos. The space is infinite besides, if memory serves, so thinning their numbers will do naught but temporarily quell the tides."

He looks up toward the black... hm, "sky" may be the best word here. A clawed hand brushes over his cheek where the cut from earlier has healed over and, satisfied with that much, Denif looks forward again with a shake of his head. "To leave, we would have to find a dimensional rift, though who knows where that may spit us out."

[lightsider]

"Well, if that's the truth, then I guess there's no issue with passing through them with violence, though I generally dislike doing such things. Shall we look around and see what our options are, then? Surely there has to be a place people have settled to make a home for themselves. We've already found someone who trades. Perhaps they, or someone else, would be able to give us more information?"

She rises to her feet, smiling. Arha's not very tall at all, only four feet and eleven inches, really, but she makes up for that with sheer presence.

[connixation]

It's a rare day indeed when someone is shorter than Denif is; he's about five feet tall exactly, maybe five foot three with the horns. For a dragon, he does not cut a very intimidating figure. They really are just two small people with large presences, it seems. It would do them well if they were somewhere with more sentient creatures that could actually be intimidated or what-have-you, but the angry polygons are set to "murder" at all times and do not care one whit about negotiations.

"I would be surprised if people made a home here, but you do have a point." However Helen goes where she goes will always remain a mystery to Denif. "We'll make a point in avoiding trouble along the way. Expending our strength unnecessarily will likely spell our downfall."

[lightsider]

"Mm, indeed," she nods thoughtfully, her fingers brushing the lightsabres clipped at her belt. Hopefully, they'd be able to avoid the worst of the fighting by being cautious. "We know that someone has to travel through here and Helen there seems to do so often enough that she has potions available and wares, so someone must be buying them."

Her eyes were still fuzzy from cryosleep, so she'd been using the Force to fight and 'see', but it isn't too hampering. Her sight was already getting better, though Denif was still a touch fuzzy. It would get better in time, hours if she was lucky.

"Where should we go now?" she asked softly. "We can't just stay here."

[connixation]

"I honestly don't know how Helen does it..." Denif just shakes his head. Is she secretly just really good at fighting or do merchants have some sort of anti-mob spray or what? He'll ask her another time.

He scans the horizon, ever-changing as it is, watching as platforms rearrange themselves into bridges and simulacra of roadways. Some cubes move slower than others, some snap back and forth, some seem to blink out of place and reappear elsewhere. Denif thinks he might have come in from a rift around the general direction of where he's looking, and with a sigh, he points to it. "Let's try that way and hope it's within our best interests to do so."

[lightsider]

She nods and begins walking with Denif. If they can find a way out of here that would certainly be nice. Her rift had come from too high up, she thought, and not even using the Force was going to get her jumping back into it.

Arha watches the sky for a moment's pause.

"I've never been anywhere like this before," she murmurs. "It was quite a surprise."

[connixation]

"Nor have I. Most people are lucky enough to avoid this place." Denif's tail lashes for a single moment. This shouldn't be happening, and yet... "If I may, do you recall your approximate location before you arrived here? What you were doing or where you were standing, the works. I'm trying to ascertain the scope of this."

polygon fighting

[leapyear]

"Oh, yeah! That would be great!"

The voice that answers back sounds cheerful enough, despite its owner being totally surrounded by triangle-worms. The young man waves his arms enthusiastically.

... maybe, uh, desperately? He is unarmed and does not look to be having a great time down here. Please god he has died enough times for stupider reasons, he would like to survive this day.

Re: polygon fighting

[lightsider]

"Oh my, those don't look too friendly, do they?" she murmurs, charging in to scatter them and then take a few of them down. "We'll get this taken care of, no worries. Are you hurt at all?" Her lightsabres will make short work of the worms, that's for certain.

arrival

[illicium]

Hello!

[ She wouldn't need to use the Force to sense Chiaki with how well her voice carries in the emptiness of wherever this is. Also because she's standing there with both arms above her head waving at Arha. ]

Hi! I'm over here!

Re: arrival

[lightsider]

With her eyes not adjusted after crysosleep, the Force is all that Arha has to go on, but she sees the other person and smiles, waving back. To her everything is made up of the Force, all living organisms.

"Hello there," she says brightly. "I see we're definitely not where we're supposed to be, which is a little startling, I must admit. I'm Arha, it's lovely to meet you."

[illicium]

Oh. You're not from around here.

[ She was happy to meet someone new, but that was two seconds ago when she'd just assumed Arha lived here, or that maybe she was part of a rescue committee or something. ]

Well, whatever. My name's Chiaki. What do you mean by "not where we're supposed to be"?

[lightsider]

"This isn't where I last was, that's for sure," she said with a soft laugh. "And I'm definitely not from around here. It's nice to meet you, Chiaki. Are you from around here? I confess, I'm not sure where here even is. I remember feeling as if I were falling from a great height and then I landed somewhat unceremoniously here."

[illicium]

Me? No, I just got lost on the way to class. It happens sometimes.

[ Sometimes you open the door and find yourself in a closet, sometimes it's the Void, sometimes a forest, it's a surprise each time and honestly? she's used to it to the point of being tired of it.

There's always a quick and easy way to get back, though.

...

She stares at Arha's lightsabers. ]

How do these work?

[lightsider]

It happens sometimes. Goodness. That must be irritating. Arha knew it'd be inconvenient to her if getting lost meant getting lost between universes, which is sure what looked like was the case right now. Her eyebrows arched a little.

"My lightsabres? They have a button on them that activates them. And they are only to be held by someone trained in their use," she added carefully, knowing the next question might be in the vein of 'can I see one?' The answer to that unasked question was a definitive no and certainly not by young universe-hopping girls.

[illicium]

Then it's a good thing you have two! You can train me with the other one!

[ wow she is SO lucky to have run into Arha ]

[lightsider]

"Sorry to disappoint you, young one, but I cannot train you," Arha said with a soft laugh. "I use both of them when I fight. A Jedi's weapon is their life, so I cannot let you borrow one of mine to train with. You would have to make your own and since the crystals they use are only in my universe that task would be impossible."

[illicium]

[ Too soon to say Arha can trust Chiaki with her life, huh? She pouts a little at this, but doesn't keep insisting on it. ]

Are you sure they can't be made with something else? What about those things roaming around here? They're shiny, and look kind of like crystals.

[lightsider]

"Perhaps something similar could be made with the cores, if one had the technology for it," Arha said thoughtfully, "but it wouldn't be exactly the same. The crystals in my lightsabers have a certain resonance that Force-sensitive people in my universe can feel and react to — and they take years of practise to work with effectively. They aren't, well, just weapons and they certainly aren't toys to be played with."

Lightsabers were serious business. If held wrong they could result in severe injury, even the amputation of limbs, or death if you didn't know what you were doing with them. The fact that the blade part of the weapon was so light was a huge factor in accidents. There was a very careful style and method one had to learn when it came to wielding a lightsaber. It was why Younglings studied so hard with special training lightsabers before they were allowed to train with regular ones.

"Designing a weapon like a lightsaber could certainly work, though, on a theoretical basis. But I would have to work in safeguards for training. For now, I haven't seen anything to support such a design. Perhaps somewhere else, we'll have access to more technology."

[illicium]

Hmmm...

[ Hmmmmmmmmmm /:
Well, nothing she can do about any of that, even if she claims that she's great at baseball and a laser sword is almost the same thing. ]

Well, you go work on that, then. I'm looking for a way out of here. Can you tell anything more about this place?