Mod Account for Diatu Magicademy ([personal profile] magicademymods) wrote in [community profile] diatuooc2021-07-23 03:56 pm
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Test Drive Reloaded! #1


Test Drive #1




Welcome to Diatu (I Like Swords)

The Arrival Hall is all aflurry with activity! No one had expected so many Sundered to suddenly pop up, the staff find themselves desperately scrambling to keep up with the influx, and a bunch of new arrivals find themselves hanging out in the Hall lobby, waiting to be seen, sent home if possible, or counseled and prepared for student life if not. Rumors run like wildfire: some people believe they've been kidnapped by aliens, a worryingly persistent suggestion that this is a setup for a murder-tournament keeps circulating, and one or two nutcases insist that a dragon tinkered with the rules of magic and now they have to study at a magic school to survive. Pie stocks are grievously low, and thought Headmaster Birony herself appeared and began violating the rules of space and time to summon pies from the future, a second Headmaster Birony with an eyepatch, several war scars, and a wild hairdo appeared and promptly yelled at the first Headmaster for stealing her pies. A pie fight erupted. Pie stocks are even more grievously low now.

Still, here's your chance to talk to your fellow arrivals. Or aggressively attack the nearest target in an outrage (they set up a target dummy and labeled it VENT AGGRESSION HERE, and are trusting you guys on the honor system). Staff don't have time to talk, but they promise they'll get to you soon!

A Day In The Life

The sun is bright, the air is warm, a cool breeze blows across Anastara, clouds keep drifting directly through the island and engulfing people... it's summer on Ascelion, and the day is ripe for learning. Or as ripe as Diatu Magicademy ever can be -- though no one would trade the character and charm of the lively campus for some stodgy, regimented school more interested in forcing students into the mold than encouraging them to be their best, sometimes conditions in the Magicademy are a little inconvenient.

A toilet in Kedrigan Hall keeps clamping onto the butts of those who attempt to use it. Thus far, half a dozen students have been freed from its clutches by their friends, while reports of singed buttocks have increased twofold. (Yes, only twofold. Think about that for a minute.) Staff are on the lookout for a prankster rather than a commode, so as of yet the treacherous toilet has gone unpunished...

Not far away, a group of cleaning golems has occupied the promenade as part of an ongoing strike. As they possess only rudimentary intelligence, they believe this involves seizing objects from anyone who passes nearby and hurling them at a set of bowling pins. Meliandre Tomekin, Head of Groundskeeping, has set up shop across the Promenade; any student who wanders too close gets a big block of ice shoved into their hands, along with instructions to hold it still while she shows those reprobates what-for...

In the Great Hall proper, school clubs and activities have, as was inevitable, escalated competition for new students to yet another level which only isn't a war crime because it isn't part of a treaty yet: they've conscripted geese. Horrible geese, to be precise, who dispense flyers for various clubs with less subtlety than a nuclear holocaust. Some of them fight for dominance, others have teamed up to pin down innocent students and stuff leaflets down their throat, and one has a wand and is somehow casting Discovery spells?!

A Forgery!

"I tried a mass-Forging technique," the older student says, showing off the briefcase full of identical wands and a sign that says 'FOR $ALE CHEAP'. "Some of them are exactly what I intended, they self-correct runes, but the rest, well.. . I don't know, I can't tell, and I'm not really interested in finding out one by one, so... you buying?"

All sales final. No refunds. Caveat emptor. As for what the wands do, well... there's a reason he answered with an ellipsis when asked. On the other hand, maybe the effect isn't too terrible? Maybe it's even beneficial! Maybe the wand shoots out rainbows and muffins! Or maybe it just animates and strikes you vigorously about the head and shoulders...

Three Dragon War

Someone, we're not naming names, canons, or the color of eyes and the dragon to which they belong that forms said person's obsession, may or may not be indirectly responsible for the latest game craze sweeping Anastara: Three Dragon War, a collectible card game that features players as dragons, deploying spells, creatures, and Sundered against each other to destroy each and avoid the machinations of the Third Dragon. The awesome thing about the game is that the Third Dragon comes in all different forms: classic bundled-with-the-starter-pack Ire, super-rare Anastara Diatu, suspiciously-rare Cam Birony, ultra-common Large Eagull, and more. The concept of an outside force adding randomness to the battle and being manipulated in turn by cards means Three Dragon War is the hottest card game that's come along since the last card game that was the hottest that had come along came along.

Face-to-face, you find yourself in a duel over these cards and the magical images they summon. Can this untested deck come through if you believe in it? Or are statistics and probability actual things that actually happen? Dragon Battle! Jiao Long Fu!

There's One in Every Test Drive

Not every magical disaster is caused by some wayward student you don't know. Many of them are caused by you instead. To wit: you're on the spot in one of the magical labs, being called on to demonstrate a technique more advanced than others you've mastered so far. Failure is expected, and the wards should prevent any injury to others from a miscast spell. But will the sparks of your magic just sputter out and die? Or will you inadvertently mispronounce, misform, misshape, or miscalculate in a way that brings chaos to you and your lab partner?

(You could also manage to succeed in casting the spell, but that isn't very fun.)
sizedoesntmatter: (RRUX48A)

There's one in every test drive.

[personal profile] sizedoesntmatter 2021-07-27 11:54 am (UTC)(link)
"I mean... could be worse. Could of had lightening bolts."

Probably not the best idea to potentially jinx things, but at least he was looking at the positives. Yugi himself had been trying to do the spell for the past ten minutes and so far nothing much had come from it. Quite literally. He didn't actually know what he was doing wrong.

"The magic does seem a little hard to do."
schoolingfish: (Default)

[personal profile] schoolingfish 2021-07-27 11:24 pm (UTC)(link)
"Yeah, at least I avoided that." The rain and clouds start to dissipate. "And at least the spell didn't hold up too long. I mean, I could see how something like that could be useful so I might want to remember how I did that...but I could also see how it could be a disaster so I really need to figure out how to cast the right thing."

Which he doesn't have down at all yet. He'd like to help Yugi with his difficulties trying to cast anything at all, but Luca's not sure if his advice would be the best considering that while he's figured out how to cast a spell, the effects seem to be unpredictable at best.
sizedoesntmatter: (233)

[personal profile] sizedoesntmatter 2021-07-30 01:12 pm (UTC)(link)
"That is also a positive. Who knows what could have happened if it didn't vanish at all." Probably flooding if there was a lot of it at once. So this really was only minor compared to what could have happened.

But Yugi soon looked forward. It was meant to be his turn to do the spell, but currently he really didn't want to get it wrong, even though he knew full well he was going to. But after a reminder that it could always be worse he looked back over.

"I think maybe taking a few steps back might be wise."
schoolingfish: (Default)

[personal profile] schoolingfish 2021-07-31 01:43 am (UTC)(link)
Luca nods, moving back and waiting to see what would happen. He offers a small, encouraging smile. Sure, Yugi was probably not going to get the spell right, but at least since absolutely no one in the class had done anything even resembling the correct spell so far, it's not like anyone would judge him for it.
sizedoesntmatter: (87)

[personal profile] sizedoesntmatter 2021-07-31 02:46 pm (UTC)(link)
He took a small breath before he started the spell, but it was soon quickly realised that yes he didn't do it correctly and at this time it was perhaps going to be even more wet.

But Yugi kept as calm as he could for the time being.

"Well... Could have been..." Worse he was about to say when the sound of thunder occurred and they were maybe standing in on a wet floor. That was perhaps not a great combo.

"We should get off the floor. Now. I don't want to know what being hit by lightening feels like."
schoolingfish: (Nervous seamonster)

[personal profile] schoolingfish 2021-07-31 06:39 pm (UTC)(link)
When it rains even more, Luca figures it isn't a big deal. Everything's already wet, why not make it wetter? It's when he hears the thunder that he begins to worry.

"Oh, carp!" He scrambles onto one of the desks to get out of the water, only... "You know, somehow getting higher up and closer to the cloud doesn't seem like a much better idea."
sizedoesntmatter: (82)

[personal profile] sizedoesntmatter 2021-08-02 09:29 am (UTC)(link)
Yugi had gone to climb up just as the lightening hit thr ground. Shocked, but really relieved at getting up in time.

"I mean yeah, but you can get shocked from the water on thr ground as well. So we'd to maybe move further away whenever the lightening hit the ground and move after that."