∎ ETRAYA MODS ∎ (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
etrayamods) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
etrayamemes2025-03-28 09:16 am
etrayamods) wrote in etrayamemes2025-03-28 09:16 am
Entry tags:
TDM 007
content warnings for this TDM include: violence, potential death, body horror, physical transformation, loss of senses, loss of autonomy  ⏵ arrival⏴ Arrival does not happen as Aurora usually plans for it. New characters are introduced to the AI, then informed of a mission that they are required to participate in before they can return to their home base of Etraya. A world called Aphaia is falling apart, and while there is nothing they can do to resolve this broken world, they can participate in the Gamerunner's Stratagem. Their mission is simple: step through the glowing purple portal that Aurora creates once they've had time to listen to her, and survive until a similar portal reopens in front of them, allowing them to return to Etraya. The Gamerunner's Stratagem is something they have been working on building for quite some time. She informs all newcomers that they will not be present on this world that long: their exit will appear to them exactly when it's meant to, allowing them to meet the others who have been recruited to save their worlds. She provides each and every arrival with an earpiece, allowing them to communicate with the other Etrayans. Aurora suggests taking a bag full of supplies along with them, which she will fill with a few generic items as well as any specific items they may need: synthetic blood for vampires, protein bars for those who may burn through calories faster, medication for anyone who requires it.  ⏵ aphaia ⏴ Aphaia is a neon-lit, chaotic planet. Cameras are everywhere, every action and inaction is judged by the 'audience'. Towering holograms advertise upcoming events while flashing leader boards track the most "popular" players. Contestants are thrown into challenges, many of which are games of skill, survival, and deception all to keep the viewers entertained. Not participating is an option! However, avoiding playing along and not putting on a show will quickly cause participants' score to go down, and scores that reach zero? Well. Unfortunately, there are only so many resources left on Aphaia. Their wildlife has died off, their planet is falling apart, and most others in this galaxy were either destroyed from the inside out, or warring planets trying to gain control of remaining resources destroyed them to avoid others getting involved. Their natural resources are depleted, and only those who manage to keep their scores up are given the luxury of having any supplies. As soon as one steps foot on Aphaia, as soon as they breathe, they intake nanotechnology which tracks their oxygen consumption, their food, everything they do or need. As soon as their scores reach zero? They disappear. There one moment, and completely gone the next. Their communicators go offline, and while everything they were carrying will be left behind, no one will be able to find them. They are simply--gone, erased from existence. This is a death and counts as a death as outlined in the game FAQ! Please keep this in mind. "Points" that go towards their total score will be assigned to contestants from the moment they drop down on planet. This will be visible using the HUD on their earpiece, and will be randomized at the beginning. For the sake of the TDM, we ask that no one be assigned Paragon initially, but you're free to use other ranks! The possible rankings are: 100: PARAGON 99-80: LUMINARY 79-70: CHAMPION 69-50: CONTENDER 49-30: UNDERLING 30-0: SHADE Ranks may change daily, or even hourly depending on the kind of situation one has found themselves in. Are they having a very public break up in which it comes out that they wronged their ex? They may go from a Champion to a Shade before they can even blink. Did they save a defenseless reporter from the big bad villain of the week? They may find themselves quickly elevated up to Luminary and given all the benefits that comes with being upper class. The world is their oyster, they only need to figure out how they'd like to utilize it! Aphaia is broken up into four districts. The Colosseum is a dynamic battle arena where combatants fight for entertainment, with shifting environments controlled by the audience. Victories earn points, while losses depend on performance. The Symposium is a lavish social hub for top contestants, where alliances and betrayals are made under the audience’s watchful eye. The Agora is the public center of Aphaia, where contestants engage with the audience through polls, interviews, and challenges to maintain popularity. It also houses the contestants in high-rise apartments. And Backalleys provide hidden spaces with intentional blind spots for secret dealings, though the Gamerunner is always aware of what happens there.  ⏵ st★rlight soirée ⏴ Something special is happening in the Colosseum. Lights flicker as the arena shifts, rearranging itself into a grand, glittering ballroom - if a ballroom had stadium seating, paparazzi drones, and an ever-changing floor plan designed to disorient those within it. Silver chandeliers pulse with artificial starlight, their glow refracted through the crystalline floors. Music swells, but it sounds - unnatural. It thrums through your veins, setting your blood alight with the urge to dance. Why is the ballroom designed as if intentionally put together to throw off one's balance? Well, it's time for the Panopticon Prom, of course! The Panopticon Prom isn't just an adventure in dancing and impressing your most recent crush. It's a test of endurance, cunning, grace, and charm. The floor beneath your feet moves as if it has a mind of it's own, shifting to the beat like a living creature all of it's own. It tilts, undulates, even vanishing in sections to keep dancers on edge. After all, it's difficult to keep up one's pace if they're falling through a hole in the floor to the foam pit below. Drones zip through the air, catching every stumble, every misstep, and every attempt to throw off others on the dance floor. This is a competition, after all; and what fun is a dance battle without having the freedom to thwart someone else on their road to victory? The rules are simple:
 ⏵ casino royale ⏴ Out in the Agora, another popular quarterly event is being set up! The Casino Royale has been destroyed countless times, but it seems as if the Gamerunner just can't let it go - every time it gets knocked down, it gets rebuilt. There is one rule. One must take a turn at the revolving wheel just inside the door as their entry fee, and whatever the wheel lands on, they must maintain until they exit the building for the night. Sometimes, this is easier: an effect they have no control over and cannot undo even if they wanted to. Sometimes, this is more difficult: an assigned task they must complete. Failure to abide by the wheel once means receiving a penalty. Twice? Certain death if caught by any employee. The wheel's effects are as follows:
The casino is alive with the hum of conversation, the clink of glasses, and the steady whirl of the roulette wheels. Golden chandeliers cast a warm glow over velvet-lined tables, where fortunes are made and lost with the flick of a wrist. But something feels. . . off. The dealers never blink. The cards never seem random. And the house always wins - always. Maybe it's just paranoia, or maybe this casino is something more than just a den of chance. Tonight, you're not here just to play; you're here on a mission. You've arrived dressed to kill, blending into the sea of bodies filling the casino's floors. But you're not here to win points or boost your social standing - you're here to win intel. Somewhere in this casino is a single flash drive containing information on just how Aphaia maintains their system. The only problem? The House knows someone is coming for it. After all, they're well-aware of the game: whoever retrieves the flash drive will obtain information on how to flip the script, to change the rules of the game to fit their wants and needs, rather than following the current Gamerunner. After all, this is the Gamerunner's Stratagem that Aurora has sent them out on! Many apply for 'employment' within the Casino Royale in hopes of getting insider information on where the flash drive is hidden and what it looks like. However, it seems that even the employees have no clue where it has been hidden. This is an extension of our Aphaia Mission! We have included enough information in this post that catching up to current in game logs isn't necessary to play with it, but you are welcome to use any part of the Aphaia setting in your prompts as you'd like. Current players are also welcome to bring the events from this TDM into their in-game threads. This mission can happen outside of time as needed! Incoming characters will find themselves introduced to Aphaia as they arrive. Current characters may find Aurora calling on them to visit Aphaia after the current mission for the Gamerunner's Stratagem. Characters already in game are welcome to post to the TDM, too! Please mark them as current characters in your header. Threads can be kept as game canon as long as both characters get into the game! Please direct all questions relating to this log to our mod queries comment! All other questions can be directed to our FAQ. |
no subject
[ Ifrit had been vocal enough about his belief that Barnabas genuinely believed he walked the path of humanity's salvation. Misguided though it was, an earnest belief made sense of his actions, but Dion had no more insight than what such words could provide. Joshua is as ever more detailed in his speech, and Dion commits that perspective to memory.
He puffs out a tense breath, misliking the thought of being examined from such angles by some foreign entity. One that may, quite possibly, be capable of drawing them back from death's cold embrace. Whether it truly is this or something else entirely remains to be seen, so he puts the notion aside as best he's able. ]
...Regardless, he does appear willing to set other concerns aside for the sake of our world.
[ They do not agree on the shape of salvation back home, but in this place, those differences are rendered null. ]
no subject
[Joshua might be a little biased, though. Just a little.]
That is a blessing both encouraging and unsurprising. Never would the king allow any other god to remain in a place of higher importance or influence than Ultima. We are not obstacles to him here, but rather...I imagine he must see us as tools. Pawns, with no choice but to aid him in securing the fate of our world, that Ultima might reign once again. Nothing more.
[His tone dips slightly by the end of his musing about Barnabas, but it's back to normal when he moves on.]
But before we can act in defense of our own world, we must first survive this one. Look -
[He turns toward the dance floor and gestures toward the competition.]
This battle for dominance is not one of magic and blade, but of poise and rhythm. Whoever displays the finest dancing amid the perils and challenges designed to thwart them shall be granted enough points to ascend to Paragon status. Once there, we could use the reprieve to search for a way to rescue this world from destruction, as well.
no subject
Whether that is enough remains to be seen, but he and Odin had...tolerated one another.
Dion's eyes follow where Joshua's hand leads. Just as he says, competitors sweep through the room, some with more grace than others. It isn't the sort of battlefield Dion had expected to find, but he supposes that he's still dressed for the part after his time in the casino.
His gaze lingers on the dancers only long enough to observe that the floor itself, as well as those competing, serve as obstacles to victory. Yet as Joshua says, from a secure position they could attempt to find a way to aid these people.
Dion has heard it cannot be done, but the Phoenix doesn't accept impossible and inevitable. This he knows well. It's something he admires. ]
Poise, rhythm...and subterfuge.
[ He huffs a bemused breath. Well, this poses far less challenge or threat than what they have faced prior. ]
I should think this well within our capabilities. So then [ There is no need for the courtly manners they're both well familiar with, but Dion withdraws his hand and sweeps into a proper bow all the same before offering it anew. He isn't bereft of humor. ] may I have this dance?
no subject
It's strange to be on the receiving end of the kind of courtly manners that Joshua himself was taught. Strange, but from Dion - charming, as well. Blue eyes sparkling with a delighted mischief, he takes Dion's hand, matching him bow for bow, though Joshua's is just a bit deeper. Dion is still, after all, an imperial prince.]
That you may, Your Highness.
[The upward curve of his lips suggests that this time, using Dion's title is more playing along with their little courtly tableau than truly addressing him as such.]
no subject
He huffs out an amused breath at the use of his title, manners matched if not exceeded outright. In his eyes, Joshua had ever been possessed of greater grace, and that hasn't changed then. ]
By your leave then.
[ With their course decided, he guides their way out onto the dance floor. He cares not who leads; they're partners in engaging in a curious form of battle, but they both know how to dance as well as any, martial or otherwise. ]
no subject
With no reason to do otherwise as of yet, Joshua takes the lead position. He waits for the proper count and then starts them off, and at first it's just a simple dance. Despite the structured formality of it, Joshua's movements aren't stiff at all. One might almost imagine him to be enjoying himself, were one to engage in such observations.
Soon enough, though, they encounter the first peril to be overcome: a floor tile just ahead of them flips over to expose a surface full of sharp metal spikes.]
no subject
When they draw near enough, Dion simply scoops Joshua up and jumps across the treacherous expanse. They land lightly on safer ground, the leap hardly more than a hop from the perspective of a dragoon. Their reward is a withering glance from a couple that had overtly crowded them nearer to that trap moments prior, but Dion ignores them in favor of returning Joshua to his feet so they may continue on. ]
Those in power here certainly are...inventive.
[ His tone suggests his true opinion of the matter, despite the effort of employing a euphemism. ]
no subject
Their dance resumed, Joshua redoubles his vigilant watch on their surroundings, but the slight upward curve of his lips says that perhaps he is finding something to enjoy even now.]
Indeed. That was quite the gallant rescue - you have my thanks.
[When Dion stepping in to save him doesn't result in tragedy and grief, it's a lot more fun.]
no subject
It's ever the case, isn't it? ]
No thanks is necessary. We are partners, are we not?
[ As they may have been far sooner, had Dion's choices been different. But they're here now. Dion endeavors to mind their surroundings foremost, but he does notice Joshua's expression, and he somehow feels lighter for it. ]
no subject
[It's a lovely word, and it implies a few things that Joshua is more than fine with. For one, a certain...assumption that joining forces against Ultima's machinations was no mere temporary alliance of convenience, but only the beginning of something much warmer and more reliable. Closer.
Joshua, too, laments that their partnership was delayed as long as it was, but it is his own choices that he finds lacking. He could have acted sooner, pushed himself harder, stepped out of the shadows with more alacrity.
But they are here now, and Joshua is thankful for that, whether Dion thinks gratitude is necessary or not.]
no subject
It's a thought he holds to as dancers and obstacles shift around them in a flurry of light and movement. Dion suspects diversion is rather the point, but it doesn't stop him from spying a telltale glint of metal as another pair of dancers approach, despite an overt effort to conceal it. ]
The one in the burgundy dress has a blade.
[ His voice is quiet and controlled, soldier that he had been. There are any number of ways they might contend with that incoming problem. ]
no subject
Let us make certain that this shark scents no blood in the water here.
[He leads their steps not away from the oncoming threat, but toward it. Baiting their would-be attacker into making her move. It's successful enough - Joshua spots the blade as it flashes out of a burgundy sleeve, and only then does he act: he takes in a breath and then, upon exhaling, he lets go of Dion with one hand to bring up a shield of protective flames between them and the knife that's now scraping against it and throwing up sparks. For a moment, all eyes nearby are on them. Joshua raises his voice slightly to make it clear he's addressing them all, not just the one who tried to attack them.]
You cannot touch us. Better that you look to your own efforts than aspire to ruin ours.
[He snuffs out the shield with a little flourish, closing his fist around its embers.]
For we shall never be deterred. Not by blade, nor by word - and certainly not by such base treachery.
no subject
Joshua has a certain dramatic flare he can't help but appreciate. ]
Deftly handled.
[ Their onlookers range between bewilderment, unease, and a sharp form of wariness Dion has seen before. Even in faced with a sheer wall, there are always those foolhardy enough to view it as a challenge.
Moments pass before a ripple of resumed motion overtakes those around them as dancers return their focus to attempting to win. ]
I expect all but the foolhardy will heed your warning.
no subject
[And without setting anything on fire, too!]
Let the foolhardy do as they will - it was no mere boast to say they cannot touch us. Now that we are united in purpose and all the better for it, who could stand in our path?
no subject
Yours have never been empty words.
[ He knows this of him, even with a yawning gulf in years between their first meeting and the next. ]
I can think of none who'd manage such a feat.
no subject
Nor I. Shall we continue?
[And continue they do. The dancers' numbers dwindle bit by bit until Bahamut and the Phoenix are among a much smaller set of competitors. As time goes on, Joshua does begin to tire - his frail body was not built for endurance - but he doesn't let it slow him down a whit.
They defeat every obstacle and avoid every trap for a little while, working together seamlessly, until abruptly they are no longer on their feet. Not through any fault of their own, but because the area they're in has decided to simply give up on gravity entirely.
They're floating.]
Ah. Much as I enjoy flying, this is rather inconvenient.
no subject
They aim to eliminate many at once.
[ He concludes this easily, for none of them appear able to dance upon air. Yet he can see some distance away that a few pairs remain unaffected. Well then.
Seldom does Dion semi-prime, and only when strictly necessary. Conserving his power had ever been a concern, knowing as he does that his people relied on him. They rely on him still, in a new and bizarre way, as does Joshua in the moment.
It's a simple choice.
Dion twists their position ever so slightly to avoid hitting anyone, knowing well his own wingspan. It's the only form of warning there is before his wings manifest, broad and faintly luminous. He pulls Joshua a little closer as a precaution before his wings quickly propel them beyond that weightless bubble, cutting through the air to drop them on solid ground once more. ]
We'll not number among them.
[ His wings tuck in close, but they swiftly begin to demanifest now that they're no longer needed. ]
no subject
As, apparently, does the audience, as many of them applaud and cheer for the two of them as they land.]
We appear to have made quite a stir - and no few admirers. Shall we give them a grand finale?
[This sort of attention is nothing new to a couple of Dominants whose people have looked to them for inspiration since they were children, of course, but ever since the days when Clive would read to him aloud or perform scenes from popular plays to entertain him when he was bedridden, Joshua has always had a certain appreciation for the theatrical.
So in the final stretch of their dance, with only a few couples remaining, he pushes through his fatigue to lead with renewed vigor and flair. He even summons some iridescent wisps of flame to follow their movements. By the end, there's no question who's won this competition, as Joshua tries to catch his breath amidst the crowd's wild approval.]
We've done it!
no subject
The crowd erupting into cheers and applause nearly swallows up the sound of Joshua's voice at the end. Dion's brow creases with a given concern for just how out of breath the other man is, reminded just how long that competition truly had been. The time seemed to sweep by so quickly.
The expression smooths away in favor of a smile, though he doesn't move in case Joshua may find need to avail himself of the support while he catches up on air. ]
As you said we would.
[ Something about how none could stand in their way, wasn't it? They had overcome this contest as they'd aimed to, and with little difficulty. ]
What say you to finding a quieter place to plan our next move?
[ In the spirit of continued collaboration... And showing Joshua's taxed stamina some mercy. ]
end?
A fine idea. Lead on and I shall follow.
[Since Dion seems to know this place a bit better.]
🎀!
[ Dion will guide their way to somewhere more suitable for conversation, mindful that he keeps his strides unhurried. Joshua had done much to assure their success, and that places them in a more secure position to pursue their goals.
Along the way, Dion can apprise him of what he had seen and experienced so far... Like that run-in with a furry little fellow who brought an entire squadron of attackers straight to him.
Much to discuss. ]