Note: This is a bonus post. Hit “Previous” to see the scheduled post of the day.
The last time I tried to do a RP by Comment, I had to shut it down because I only had one player left and it wasn’t my husband, and I didn’t feel like I had the mental resources to devote to other people while my dude was having some particular issue at that time. Lesson learned – he is not invited this time. Also, I’m not going to post as rapidly, to save those precious mental resources for my lovin’ dude and other responsibilities.
I’m tempted to do this because it gives me something to write about when I can’t easily think of something else. In fact, if I’m rolling slowly enough, I can easily do this at the same time as I continue my one-queued-post-per-day thing. I’ll do my introduction post, we go a round or two of comments, and then tomorrow (assuming I have anyone playing at that time), I do a new post.
Here are the rules:
- Make up your character and introduce them in a comment on this post.
- The first three people to post are the adventuring party; nobody else is admitted unless one of those players taps out.
- You can tap out at any time, and when you do, decide whether your character lives or dies. I’ll help RP that or either you or I can “write them out the door.”
- If you stop responding without excusing yourself I’ll write your character into a “holding pattern” for three posts, and then if you still are not there, I’ll write them out of the story.
- If you annoy me, your character dies.
- If you really annoy me, you’re also banned and blocked from commenting on my blog.
- Try to abide my two commenting rules in le sidebar: don’t use “stupid,” “crazy,” or their synonyms in comments. Don’t be a doomer.
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Twas a bright and sunny morning in The City of Romance. Moss and vines glistened with dew, puffing in every cracked stone and trailing from every untended surface in great green boughs. The skyscrapers strained mightily into the blue sky, surrounded by more primitive buildings in varying states of decay, by layers of highway freeway tunnel and subway, dotted with parks full of homeless people and deeper crevices still – ruins that fell beneath the notice of the modern, of those focused only on the new and the lofty.
The City of Romance was so named because of its reputation, its storied history, and because the original rulers had named it something unpronounceable in the Elfish tongue. Now it was just another modern metropolis, inhabited mostly by humans, and ruled by a puppet regent from the neighboring human kingdom, centered in The City of Commerce.
On the highest hill of the city, where once the capitol building stood watch, the neighborhood had been overtaken by college campuses and hip boutique businesses that cater to them, and by further shady characters seeking drugs and other diversions. You didn’t do well enough in secondary school to go straight to the fanciest of the universities, no. Your lot in life is enrollment in the Ward Wizard Community College of Arms.
WWCCA is a good place to get a technical education, a quick and dirty primer for a job that needs special skills but not the most sophisticated and prestigious careers going. Courses in soldiering or constabling, nursing or accounting, video editing or helicopter piloting, etc. Alternately, you could train in the rudiments of more advanced careers, in preparation to transfer to a more prestigious college. WWCCA produced no small amount of acolytes and adepts in the magical arts, or disciples of the more mystically oriented martial arts – paladins and great knights, rangers and more.
While the city teemed with humans, the college campuses concentrated diversity. You might rub elbows there with the elves descended from the city’s original founders, or foreign elves and other international students. Animal-headed people, ogres, lamias, goblins, leprechauns, dwarves, gnomes, halflings, koneira, crowten, lizard madonnas, sileni, satyrs, nymphs, and more walk those halls. Of the schools of magic, all are represented to some extent or another in the course catalog: Elemental, Holy, Hexing, Wild, Body, Mind, Death, Binding, Drama, and Alchemy.
You and a few dozen others checked in at an office of plastic chairs and buzzing yellow lights, before being shown to an architecturally dull red brick plaza, wonderfully appointed with flowers and small trees in the planters. Returning students wander through endlessly, while you freshman mill about, waiting for the person who will conduct your orientation.
Who are you and what did you come to learn? First three answers below are in. If only one person bites, fuck it, we ball. If nobody bites within 24 hours, I guess I will not be game mastering…
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if you feel like u might want to participate but have questions, go ahead and ask.
As he so often was these days, Ilmardan Erenath was bored. A High Elf of impeccable breeding, his parents had presided over one of the nation’s most powerful mercantile concerns for over a thousand years. Ilmardan, however, as said parents never missed an opportunity to remind him, was lazy, feckless and absolutely could not stand the life of boardrooms, trade ledgers and other capitalistic whatnot that awaited him should he acquiesce to Lord and Lady Erenath’s offers of a place in the family firm. Relations were strained right now, but most young elves take a good century to find themselves, don’t they? So it wasn’t going to be too much of a PR issue for Vingilote International Trading if Ilmardan indulged his more unusual whims and fancies for a bit. He was only a couple of decades old, which was nothing to an elf, and besides, as far as anyone knew his ill-judged tryst with the heir apparent of House Tolendor had been successfully covered up and nobody need know about it. Bribes go a long way with the media, after all.
Why not the City of Romance? What could be more opposed to the stifling mundanity of coin and commerce than the pursuit of truth and beauty in a place like this? He had always had a bit of a talent for spellcasting, and maybe this time he might actually be able to focus for long enough to make something of it. Illusion magic, that looked interesting, maybe he could become a celebrated master of misdirection, or at least get a little better at covering up his frequent indiscretions and mishaps. He didn’t miss Firinthol Tolendor at all, he noted to himself. Well, not that much anyway. Illusion magic it was.
A willowy six foot three, with the delicately beautiful features and perfectly coifed hair of his people, he wasn’t quite sure what to expect from these humans he was now living among. He had made some small effort to adapt to human clothing styles – he now wore a shapeless black hoodie over the azure shimmersilk gown embroidered with gold stars, and battered trainers instead of smartly pointed elf boots. The silver circlet with its single dark ruby was non-negotiable, however, even if he had combed his locks forward to hide most of it from sight. With his cheap human backpack at his feet and Leaning against the embarrassingly expensive elven wizard’s staff he had been gifted with as a going-away present, Ilmardan squinted in the morning light, waiting to see what mischief would show up first.
a lizard madonna approached Ilmardan with great pains to not seem too eager in her step. by her clothes he could tell she had gothic pretensions. it would just be a pretense; something about the way they were all born from mothers caused them to have very similar appearances and personalities – obsequious and cheerful, on average. how well would this one affect gloomy reserve?
“i’m sorry, i have to know. is that staff what it looks like?” could be worse.
meanwhile, a human with a clipboard was shuffling papers, gearing up to start leading the tour…
Ilmardan blushed slightly, realising that he had drawn far too much attention to his wealthy background already. In truth, it made him very uncomfortable to admit to it, though not so uncomfortable that he was willing to give up all the finer things in life. Oh well, no point in lying about it now.
“Sun Oak heartwood with a dragon whisker inlay and shade opal chasing. Yes it is an authentic Sarellia Vandelir original. I’m guessing you don’t see a lot of the high-end models round here, what with the embargo and all that. But that’s me – staff nerd all the way through. Not that I’m anywhere near good enough to deserve something like this. Anyway, nice to meet someone else who appreciates a good magical focus…
… my name is Ilmardan, whereabouts are you from? Nice nail polish, by the way, err… scale polish? Is that what it’s called for Lizardfolk? I’m still getting used to human fashions, so forgive me when I mess up spectacularly on anything further afield. Not a hugely cosmopolitan place where I’m from, but I’m learning”.
“Makes sense that you aren’t from the city proper. If you’re a Romantic elf with that kind of money, they’ll assume you’re a collaborator… If you’ve got a provincial accent, you should play it up. I wouldn’t recognize the subtleties but an elf surely would.
… I’m Kaldonia Fitisti. Not as much a lizardfolk as a lizard madonna. My mothers were born and raised here. It’s a mess but it’s very cool. I could show you around–”
The clipboard-haver called it done. “Welcome to the Ward Wizard Community College of Arms, freshmen! I am Ms. Selber, and most of the time you will see me teaching AV and Gen Ed courses. I see some of you are already getting to know each other. That’s very good. Education is a group effort, and when the going gets more difficult, of course it’s good to have friends.
I’ve been tasked today with showing you the campus. We’re not as big as the University of Romance, so it should be possible to see everything today – but your feet may hurt by the end. Before we get moving, Let’s just talk about the neighborhood. You can’t see it from here but you saw it on the way in. The main thoroughfare out there is Bulia Terevelan, known to most as ‘The Boulevard.’ Lots of nice places to eat, and interesting little boutiques for clothes and books and more. Careful to avoid illegal business, however. Those things are bad for health and for education…”
Kaldonia rolled her lizard eyes. Lizard madonnas are on the cute end of reptilian appearance – smooth colorful scales, jewel-like eyes, slender form, near serpentine through the body and tail. They are fond of hats and head accessories but lack the tall dome of an elf, so the big lacy black bow and jewelled fascinator were bound to her head with a little loop around her chin.
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Ilmardan made a careful note of everything he was being told. Between stops he speculated on what he wasn’t being told. Clearly there was some kind of social tension in these parts, barely beneath the surface, of the sort people would acknowledge in passing but refuse to talk directly about. A spark of devilment rose in his mind as he considered asking awkward questions to make his hosts feel uncomfortable. He thought better of it – he could burn those bridges when he came to them, and he would probably need to keep everyone amenable if he was to get on in this place. Besides, an illusionist should always keep their intentions well hidden, or at least that’s what the illusionists in the TV dramas always seemed to say.
“Kaldonia”, he whispered quietly, while Ms. Selber was explaining a particularly picturesque cluster of cafes and second-hand grimoire shops, “what did she mean by “illegal business” back there? You’re from these parts – what exactly does go on in the shadows that we should be wary of?”
Kaldonia smiled. “Just drugs and sex stuff. The sex stuff is only technically illegal; they only bust famous people for it, for show. The drugs are more policed, but there’s so much it happens in plain sight all the time. But grown people should be able to do what they want with their bodies, don’t you think?”
Ilmardan pondered for a second. “Where I’m from it’s the rich and famous who get away with everything, and it’s the little guy they come down on like a tonne of bricks for show. I guess the authorities have their quirks everywhere. I’m not concerned in the slightest what people get up to in their spare time, though I’d rather not come face to face with whoever is running these… amusements. I came to this city to learn some magic and see the world, not get entangled with organised crime. I’ve had enough of that with my parents and their dealings.”
Kaldonia resisted the urge to pester. Gotta look cool. Gotta look cool…