♥ November Intro Mingle Log

[hugtopiamods]

November Intro Mingle Log
Welcome to Hugtopia, and to the city of Havenwell. This mingle is meant for new arrivals to get settled and meet the other inhabitants. New characters should be the only top-levels but everyone is free to tag around and make new friends. Who knows, you may find that Perfect Hug in here. You can use the prompts here, or create a wildcard of your own.

ICly, this takes place from the 2nd to around the 10th, with a proper event coming soon after applications are processed. The prompts below are optional, but are a way to get you started if you wish. To help you create your own prompts, please take a look through our Settings and FAQ. Click on each prompt's title to see the text.

If you have any questions, feel free to direct them to the FAQ or to the Mod Question thread below.

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❥ PROMPT I: Awakening

When you awaken, you're in the last outfit you remember wearing, (up to) three of your belongings laid nearby or your animal friend curled up by you, waking as you do. A stone slab is not the most comfortable place to sleep, but once you're awake, a humanoid-looking robot comes into the room and explains that you're in Havenwell, then leads you out of the room and into the main portion of the temple where a welcoming committee of similarly humanoid-looking robots hand over a clear smartphone-sized tablet, some starting funds, and explain their dilemma. Then they release you into Havenwell to pick your new home from free housing in the city and give you the chance to settle. It might be a bit disorienting, but thankfully there seem to be a lot of robots and even some non-robots around. Maybe ask them for help? Strike up a friendly conversation, get to know your neighbours! It seems as if you may be here for the long haul.

❥ PROMPT II: Buddy System

With all the changes and the fear of a secondary attack lingering, the natives are a lot more protective of their newest arrivals. When new characters begin to appear at the temples, they receive the welcome speech, get their communicators and the simple map of the city, and a warning to stay away from the walls. Then they get taken to the front of the temple by a helpful robotic priest. Rather than turn the newcomers loose right away, they pull someone seemingly at random off the street and push the two people together with a cheerful, "It's dangerous to go alone, so please show our newest resident around. Please be buddies!" They wait until they're certain the pair is going to be moving off together before going back inside.

They try to place a new arrival with one of those who previously arrived, but who can keep track of all that, right? Characters may find themselves thrown together with an actual veteran or with another new arrival who only came here a day or even just an hour before them! Good luck helping each other out, offworlders, and don't lose your buddy!

❥ PROMPT III: Virtual Research

After the attack, every part of the city is on repair duty and the means the Entertainment District as well. As new arrivals wander the city, they might be called into one of the numerous Virtual Reality cafes. These cafes vary in layout, but most have areas for the natives to plug directly into the machines and other areas which have older looking virtual reality helmets that allow flesh bodied people experience the games. For those who need assistance with their sensory inputs, basic options like audio descriptions of visual scenes, enhanced audio and descriptive speech, closed captions, and crude mobility chairs are available. A handful of cafes have other options like direct visual or audio cortex stimulation to simulate vision or hearing, or suspension tanks to allow simulated movement, but these are currently unavailable due to damage.

All of these facilities are, unfortunately, under repair. The direct plug-in systems are easier for the robot natives to fix because they can do the most important part of it - testing - by themselves. But for the helmets and other interface systems, they need your help. Naturally, they'll pay you for the work, but they need the offworlders to play the available games and record any areas where they find glitches. Playing with a partner increases your chances of finding and fixing any issues, so feel free to log in for free for once and test any of the following games:

• Big Bass Fishing
The beautiful lake has blue-green waters surrounded by forest and rocky, reedy shores. You and your companion are on a small single-motor fishing boat and you have fishing gear - two poles in the water. As the game starts up a read-out announces the objective: Catch the largest fish before the time limit ends. What's the time limit? ...Well, that's your first glitch because it reads as static. Might as well start fishing though, right? It doesn't take long to catch a few regular sized fish, nothing too exciting, and then? You get the big one - it bows your fishing rod nearly in half as you reel it up. The fish leaps into the air and you realize this is your next glitch because the fish hangs there - the size of a minivan - and yells, "BIG. BASS. FISHING. ATTACK." The fish slaps its fins and tails at the boat and now you and your fishing companion better fight this fish or you'll end up in the lake or worse.


• A (un)Familiar Experience
Jump into the life of the temple familiars and see life from their perspective! Choose the temple, any temple is fine, and be transformed into a fledgling rainbow dragon, a purple mouse, a white raven, or a blue feline. You're free to move about the virtual confines of the temples and, in fact, you can even interact with other familiars in their temples - who may be other players in this game. Play, climb, try to get your fledgling wings to fly, tumble about with the other mice, enjoy your simple life as an animal! --or you would if you weren't an insane size. Rather than being a small mouse, you're the size of a horse. That fledgling rainbow dragon? About the size of a fly. The building sizes are off, too - one might have door that's 30 feet tall, but a ceiling that's only 12. Everything else seems fine, but those sizes? Well, you better figure out how to get around that.


• Robot Crossing
Logging in with another character will net you a little farm and a variety of games to choose from:
1. Pick and harvest as many Aellyn vegetables and fruits as you can before the timer runs out! The more you pick, the better your score. Work together with your partner to clear the field in any way you can. Strangely, once you finish clearing a tree or a field row of their bounty, they seem to magically refill when you turn your back. Strangely, when the timer runs out? It flashes 00:00 and the game...doesn't? Stop? In fact, the fruits and vegetables just keep multiplying and multiplying and if you don't hurry up you might just get buried in them all!
   
2. With a partner, use the giant slingshot to launch comically large fruits into a garden patch of other colored fruits. Match a line of 3 or more similarly shaped fruits to clear it from the field. The more fruits you can clear, the higher your score - aka welcome to Fruit Crush. Stack lines of 6 or more to get shining clear diamond fruits that clear the entire row and snag yourself some bonus points. Or they should, but whenever you clear away a matching set, the fruits explode, sending fruit bits and juice everywhere - most notably on you and your partner. Still, the game is going on and it looks like it won't stop until you finish, so good thing it's all a computer game, right? Sure feels real though - reeeeeeally sticky.
   
3. You and your partner(s) are given a magical golden pumpkin and it's your job to grow it into the largest pumpkin possible. Why? There's a county fair of course and the largest pumpkin wins! But how do you grow this pumpkin? Well, for whatever reason? This pumpkin is already the size of a grizzly bear and it just won't stop growing! You and your partner better find a way to stop it from growing out of control or you might get (virtually) crushed! You could do a song and dance routine together to touch the pumpkin's soul to teach it moderation or calm its insane vegetable puberty. You could hold hands and share stories and entertain the pumpkin until it feels satisfied that it's grown enough. You could just hack and slash at it in an attempt to reduce its unwieldy bulk. The possibilities are endless and so is the pumpkin's growth, so you better hurry!

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Comments

[iustaegis]

[ Deftly, she continues her approach, soon taking a seat beside him. ]

I said... you seem rather tired. [ She repeats softly, albeit just a tad playfully. ] Like you're about to fall asleep. [ Glancing at him from where she sits now, she then taps her lap. ] You can rest your head here, if you'd like.

A humble chuckle bubbles with her words. ] I imagine it's a little more comfortable.

[carbungle]

[???? what

He blinks a bit blearily, eyes widening. That was... incredibly forward.]

Uh, sorry? I think you might've gotten me mixed up with someone else. I don't know who you are.

[iustaegis]

[ Her head cants; for a moment, she appears as if she is puzzled by his apology.

Then: ] My name is Pyra. [ A beat passes as her eyes remain on his. ] Is there something wrong?

[carbungle]

No, just... I'm not used to people being so forward with-

[He gestures vaguely towards her... lap... and then backpedals, recognizing how that must look. Good grief.]

...I'm Noctis.

[iustaegis]

[ When he motions to her lap, she looks at her lap; when he speaks again, she looks back at him. ]

Forward with... [ She repeats slowly, carefully. Then, as if piecing something together, she questions: ] ...honoring the ritual of touch here, to help this world... and to lend you a place to rest?

[ She shakes her head, it seems she's found something curious. ] My name is Pyra, Noctis, and I would be happy to help with either.

[carbungle]

[Oh. Oh, wow, she really does not see a problem with this, huh. That's new.

He exhales a heavy breath, then offers his hand out to her.]

How about one out of two?

[He really does not need to endure whatever grief he'd get if someone caught him not only napping in public again but napping in the lap of some strange girl he's only just met. He's still technically engaged!]

1/2

[iustaegis]

[ She lifts her hand to place it into his offered palm. Slowly, her fingers curl into his until secure, all the while looking down at their hands as these motions happen as if fascinated by it.

Her touch is notably warm. ]

[iustaegis]

[ Raising her gaze, her eyes seem to carry a new light that hadn't been there before. Her smile comes more easily.

One out of two, he says. ]

Fifty percent isn't a passing grade. [ She jests lightly. ] But... I think you deserve some extra points for sacrificing sleep.

[carbungle]

Is this the School of Hugs now?

[He can't even say it with a straight face. The idea is too absurd.]

I guess I'll take the extra credit, though.

1/2

[iustaegis]

[ She covers her lips with her free hand as she giggles. ]

[iustaegis]

[ Then tipping her head at him, her smile turns coy, and her tone turns playfully chiding. ] Noctis.

Are you trying to pass off hand-holding as a hug? [ For shame! ] That's minus five points instead!

[carbungle]

What? Come on!

[Suddenly this fake grade is a MATTER OF PRIDE.]

They can be related. Sometimes one ends up as the other.

[iustaegis]

[ She only chuckles softly. ] Mmm, I won't know that until I receive a hug from you, won't I?

[ Said as if... she is of the authority to give hugs at all. Whether that is true or not, who knows. At present, she wags a finger at him, then leans in, lowering her voice. ] There are ways to increase your points with just handholding, though. It all depends on the technique.

[carbungle]

[He's just. Gonna shyly and quietly ignore that first part.]

Technique?

[The confusion is clear on his expression. What kind of techniques can you have for handholding? He can't see how it would be more complicated than what they're doing now.]

[iustaegis]

[ There is... literally no technique in handholding. This is all just her being playful. But, oh, he looks so serious, almost as serious as the one who shares his face, and she can't help but continue on. ]

Behold. [ She murmurs as she begins, closing her eyes reverently to make this seem as grave as the passing grade he aspires to achieve.

Her other hand lifts to join his, first cupping his one in the both of hers. Carefully, she lifts their joined hands upward... and then moves them towards him. With both of her hands, she presses the back of his to his own chest, over his heart. ] ...This is so we might both feel your heart, together.

[carbungle]

[what the heeeeeeeck, he just stares back at her, wide eyed, pink racing across his cheeks. So forward...! And that heartbeat's definitely picking up along with his nerves.]

R-right... yeah, never tried that one...

1/3

[iustaegis]

[ Her eyes open to meet his, taking in his expression, the color that dusts his cheeks, the way he seems surprised.

She wonders. ]

[iustaegis]

[ She wonders.

For longer than she remembers, she had no body of which to speak, no way in which to feel— physical or otherwise. A right all humans have is that touch and those emotions, and it baffles her that there are those do not engage in it more often... or those like him, who seem shy about it. ]

[iustaegis]

[ With a gracious dip of her head, she pulls his hand back to be between them. Calloused, strong. He must be accustomed to a weapon, too, like that man, and she’s sorry that the both of them have seen battle. ]

A warrior’s hands.... [ She remarks, and then she opens his hand with the two of hers. For now, she has the grace to move away from making him more flustered. ]

May I ask, for how long have you been fighting?

[carbungle]

[He'd be lying if he tried to deny that it's a relief when she draws back a little, and he follows her gaze to their joined hands. It's been so long since he thought about the state of his hands- the hands of a soldier or a king aren't meant to be soft. His father's hands had been harsh and weathered his whole life, and those were the strongest hands he'd known, up until closer to the end.]

I started when I was a kid, so... ten years, I guess? It was mostly only training until the last year, though.

[iustaegis]

[ Ten years ago... he must have been, what, seven? Eight? He looks so young.

Only training until last year-- her gaze flicks up to him before resuming her search in his palms, as if discerning something. ] You carry no sword with you... [ A finger runs over his lifeline that cuts adjacent to his palm. She recalls, briefly, that the some humans in her world believe that futures can be read through such methods... How whimsical, truly. ]

Did you lose interest in training, to stop a year ago?

[carbungle]

[Ten, but she's pretty close. He furrows his brow as he watches her, curious and confused as she examines him. He's never seen anyone so focused on the small details like this.]

No, I just started fighting for real. A few months ago I left home, and training's over as soon as you leave the city limits- it's too dangerous to not take it seriously.

[iustaegis]

[ The motions with her hands are quiet and subtle, but never quite idle. There is purpose in her touch.... whether or not that makes a difference to whatever sort of contact the gods need.

His answer gains her attention. ]

Dangerous, as in... like the wild-storm beyond the walls of this city? [ She questions. ]

[carbungle]

[Whatever she's doing is curious but clearly with purpose, so he just... puts up with it, basically. He's trying not to stare, though. It's very strange.]

Oh, you saw that? Yeah, it's rough. Eos isn't that bad yet, but it's starting to get there. Mostly at night- there's daemons that come out in the dark.

[iustaegis]

[ "Eos". "Daemons". They come out after dark-- nocturnal. They come out after dark-- the sun must be their weakness. They come out after dark-- there is something mystical about them, perhaps, for the workings of darkness and night is something many would weave into the lore of a creature. ]

Daemons?

[ The surprised look is there to encourage him to elaborate. ] ...And you fight them outside your home? [ Uh. O n n nnnnn his own. This scrawny kid? ]