TEST DRIVE MEME 004

[happyheartsstaff]

HAPPY HEARTS HOTEL

You wake up in a padded box. It rocks, gently, as though suspended in mid-air. You begin to stir, confusion or distress pushing you to try to sit up — and then the air begins to smell sweet, and you fall back asleep.

You wake up in a padded box. For a moment, you are beatifically calm. You don't know how you got here, or why, but that isn't really all that important. You don't need to know where you are. You're just... here. And here is a wonderful place to be.

But there is a niggling suspicion growing in the back of your mind. A suspicion that here is not somewhere you wanted to be. That it is not where you're supposed to be. You remember... chasing a white rabbit (or was it a person)? A mirror? Bright light, and green ivy crawling over your skin... Before you can worry too much, the box jolts, and then settles, and after a long moment the walls fall from around you to reveal —

A hotel lobby?

"Welcome to the Happy Hearts Hotel and Casino," says an attendant behind a desk. "We're so pleased you could join us. We have your room keys and Empathies here, please make an orderly line and we'll hand them out once we've confirmed identities. After that, feel free to explore the hotel! We highly recommend starting with the casino. Everyone's a winner here in Happy Hearts!"

Is this normal? It doesn't feel normal. And hey — you could swear you had shoes before!

I. TIME TO PARTY

What timing you have, to be arriving at Happy Hearts now! The hotel is bustling, filled to the brim with guests that don't bear the green mark denoting them as Oysters. Hotel staff are equally as busy, catering to the needs of their extra company on top of the Oysters. Musicians arrive in a flurry of fanfare, demanding the attention of everyone in their wake. If the hotel staff are a little more hurried, a little less friendly and accommodating to new Oysters, surely they can be excused, right?

No matter. There's a party to go tonight, the very one that the musicians are here to play at. They set up in the massive pool area, roping off some areas for dancing, others for tables lined with all manner of food and drink. Indulgence teas make an appearance throughout the night. Anyone who drinks one will find themselves with lowered impulse control, lack of restraint, a desire to partake of things they would normally be wary of, giving into their particular vices much more frequently, etc.

If you intended to miss the party, you may find it difficult to ignore. The celebrations spill out of the pool area and into the hotel lobby, the restaurants, the bars, even up onto the floors of the Oysters' rooms. The music is loud enough to be heard anywhere in the hotel, making sleep a difficulty. You might as well enjoy yourself, right? Or perhaps find someone else attempting to avoid the celebration to commiserate with. It will stop some time in the late hours, at least, and all signs of it will be gone the next day.

II. ATTRIBUTABLE TO HUMAN ERROR

Even after the hotel is no longer quite so full, hotel staff always seem in the middle of doing something or other when they're asked for something. There's just not enough time in the day, is there, for everything that must be done? Any Oysters who point out that there seems to be several other staff members mingling about with nothing to do will be met with silence.

But not to worry! All your needs will still be met. The hotel does have its automated customer service system, for times such as these! Computer screens are available at the counter of every store, at every table in the restaurants, at the bar and spa and gym. Calling for room service? Needing more towels at the pool? Want to book a service at the spa or get a drink at the bar? Simply place your request directly with the system, and whatever you desire will be delivered right to you!

There are still some bugs to be worked out, of course. Were those not the clothes you wanted? Oh, dear, perhaps someone else got yours by mistake. You can't even eat whatever type of food was served to you? Better double check the system — and look, what you have in front of you is exactly the order that was placed? Are you sure you're not the one who was mistaken?

A hotel staff member will eventually correct whatever went wrong, should Oysters not being able to sort out the mix up themselves.

III. WERE YOU LOOKING FOR SOMETHING?

Just when it felt like you were getting the layout of the hotel down — you were getting the layout of the hotel down, weren't you? If you thought so before, you may doubt it now. There was a night club here just last night, wasn't there? And a spa over there, a gym just beyond them? If there ever was, there's certainly no sign of them now. There's only a blank wall, a dead end.

Turning to go back the way you came will be of little help. There is no way you came, just another hallway. And another, and another, until you may find yourself quite hopelessly turned around. If you're lucky, it may not be too long before you run into a helpful member of the hotel staff.

They'll be happy to direct you anywhere you need, of course. "The spa?" they'll say. "Do we have a spa? That's news to me. Oh but we're always adding new amenities, of course, that's one of the joys of the Happy Hearts Hotel and Casino!"

Perhaps you'd like directions back to the lobby? Well, they can certainly provide that. You're not alone, are you? A shame. They're much too busy to escort you back themselves. It's a bit of a maze, during renovations, one always easier to navigate with a friend to keep an eye on things.

It won't take long to realize they mean that literally. The hallways don't move as long as someone's watching them, and it will be much easier to follow the staff's directions back to the hotel lobby with one person to look in front and one behind. Hopefully you'll find someone else just as lost as you are.

IV. WELCOME HOME

Maybe you just want to be alone — well, that's what you have your room key for! Oysters room on the second and third floors of the hotel, one to a room. You were assured your room would be exactly what you'd always wished for — and for some, that's right! It's exactly as you would have decorated it yourself. But for others, their rooms are totally wrong. A grizzled cowboy can't have a pink room! Hotel staff are firm, though: every room is exactly as its owner wants it to be. Search your feelings, Oyster. You know it to be true.

On each bed are the Oysters' personal effects, minus weapons, as well as a towel folded in the shape of a heart, and a single foil-wrapped chocolate. If eaten, the chocolate is delicious, and incites a feeling of tender warmth in Oysters — not lust, but a desire for closeness. Why spend time in your room, when you could go find a new friend in the casino?

All hotel amenities on the world info page are available except for the nightclub, the gym, and the hotel spa. Please direct any questions to the first comment on this page, and happy playing, Oysters!

PREMISE RULES FAQ TAKEN RESERVES APPLICATION MOD CONTACT HIATUS & DROPS WORLD INFO NPCS CALENDAR AC REWARDS

© tessisamess

Comments

[sadflutenoises]

If pointed accusations or thinly veiled hostility bothered him, Wei Wuxian would not have lasted long in the Jiang sect. He doesn't flinch, and just shrugs lightly instead, content to let the other man introduce himself first.

When he does, of course, it's like a punch to the gut. Nie Mingjue? Nie Mingjue?! He makes a startled sound that he tries to hide behind a cough. There's nothing of the braids and metal guan and... and facial hair he knows of the older Nie brother. Maybe he's from a much earlier time? But Wei Wuxian is already certain he's from the other world, the one where his soul-twin comes from. How else could he account for it?

"Ha... mm- well," he tries to start, fumbling at first, "I'll get to mine in a moment, ah- so you're Sect Leader Nie then? Right, that's- of course, of course."

Depending on what his last memories before arriving here are, this could prove more troublesome than he'd like. But at the very least, he could answer the man's questions.

"So many questions, where do I start?" he taps his chin, "imprisonment is probably the least worrisome, since we're already stuck here. It's just the size of the cell that changes. But for more egregious offenses, I'm told they go so far as beheading."

He'd been caught the first time, sure. The second, not at all, the third... well, they'd spotted him, but hadn't stopped him. Careful didn't exactly describe it, but he'd gotten less obvious, perhaps.

"I wouldn't say the consequences have stopped me, but I've still got my head, so I think that's a point to my credit, no?"

[shootthesun]

It's a poor effort the other makes, trying to hide his shock. It's obvious that his name is recognizable, even if his face isn't, and that isn't too grand a surprise, all things said and done. But it's interesting that he'd rather give up those answers he'd been so obstinate about than share his name, or any other details about himself.

"Yes, I'm Sect Leader Nie."

He'll let it go, for now. The information is more important than the deliverer -

and it's not like this is the first man to be nervous at the realization that he's come face to face with the famously temperamental Chifeng-zun, in a less than stellar mood.

Though, he at least had only ever beheaded one man, not made it a signature tactic for his enemies to take note of. His frown deepens as he listens.

"Told by the locals, or someone else trapped here?" He inclines his head, a nod of acknowledgement that yes, the man most certainly does have his head - "And has it been worth it, your defiance?"

[sadflutenoises]

Luckily Nie Mingjue's need for information is stronger than his curiosity about who is giving it, so Wei Wuxian is content to continue along that line of conversation for as long as he can. Besides, the more well-informed Oysters here, the better, he figures. Whether they were on opposing sides or not back in their respective worlds, surely they can unite against a common enemy.

"Ah... by the lingering spirits here, actually. Several have died in just that way," he explains. He's clearly not a Lan, to be able to speak with the dead using Inquiry, but it's definitely not the only way to speak to the resentful things that watch their every move.

As for the worth of it. It's hard to measure, really. What they've learned feels minimal, in comparison to the risk, but what choice do they have? He lets out a thoughtful sigh, rubbing lightly at the end of his nose,

"Taking risks is the only way to learn anything. We're at a huge disadvantage. This is a tiny rebellion against a much larger power. If we show our hand too quickly, we'll be crushed. We have been crushed, but it only stops being worth it if we give up."

[shootthesun]

Bold claims, but tactful and self-aware, ones that he understands all too well after the years leading up to and during the Sunshot Campaign. A small force against great odds will always need to act with tact and caution, to favor strategy over direct action. It wasn't Qinghe's preferred method, but it was an intelligent path, one he could respect.

"Quite right," he agrees, and then, bluntly, "I'd like to aid your rebellion, but I'll need to know who I'm aiding."

[sadflutenoises]

"Right, I'm leading up to that!" he insists, growing a bit more animated, the more he talks.

"But before I get there, there's something else you need to understand, hm?" this is always the hardest part for people to accept, he's found, but at least Nie Mingjue has been pretty matter-of-fact about the rest. So, best to just be straightforward, he supposes, and even manages a somewhat serious expression.

"The people who brought you and everyone else here," he explains, "they haven't just brought a number of people, from the same place. If you've seen the way the other people here look and dress, they're from completely different worlds and points in time. Like, say, what's the last thing you remember, before coming here?"

[shootthesun]

If this were the first he was hearing of it, the idea would sound utterly preposterous. But that girl, Amamoto, hadn't recognized Qinghe or the Nie, and he hadn't recognized the titles of her home either. If they were from different worlds -

but still.

"If they have the power to steal us from our worlds, why would they need to strip us of our own?"

He's doubtful, and - look. It doesn't make sense. None of this makes sense. Accepting things that make no sense on face value isn't something he can so easily accept, and yet - "The Sunshot Campaign ended less than a year ago. What's the last thing you remember before coming here?"

[sadflutenoises]

Every question more complicated than the last. It wasn't that he didn't have answers, but Nie Mingjue better appreciate just how high a cost this information had come at!

"Like everything else so far, this is going to sound strange. For whatever reason, I don't think people here have the same connection to emotions as most of us. They take our powers and abilities because it's easier to control us, and then... well I'm not sure how, but they siphon off our emotions and..." he trails off with a shrug. The more he says, the more unbelievable it sounds, but it boils down to being used like little more than livestock.

As for points in time and places they're from, hearing Nie Mingjue recalls the end of the Sunshot Campaign, and... great, a little less than a year after it. That would put it at... a very bad time to be Wei Wuxian.

"Ah... well, nothing you'd recognize, since my memories are close to sixteen years after that," he says honestly, and he's definitely considering how quick he can run down the hallway and whether or not it'll be faster than the sect leader, if he doesn't like what he hears.

"Oh, but I remember the Sunshot Campaign!"

[shootthesun]

"They... siphon off our emotions, and what, they consume them?"

It's a baffling, impossible to believe claim, and unfortunately he's going to have to do just that, until he hears a more reasonable explanation from a more trustworthy source, and it wasn't as if one of those was likely to be roaming the halls.

Siphoning off their emotions as if they were eggs gathered from unsuspecting hens, that was the purpose for this kidnapping? It was a fantastical thought. What creature lacked the ability do do something as simple as feel?

His confused scowl lowers dark brows, and it's only hearing that this man is sixteen years beyond his time that lifts them. Surprise softens his harsh face. "Sixteen years -"

A skilled cultivator wouldn't have aged at all in that time, but this man - who knows. If they are from the same world, he could be sixteen years older than whatever boy Nie Mingjue might have crossed paths with, or he could be one of hundreds of cultivators he had never shared a battlefield with.

"What Sect do you hail from?"

[sadflutenoises]

"They make teas out of them," he replies without hesitation, "most of the strange stuff here is centered around teas."

Not that he'd really call them teas, more like flavored drinks, but either way, if Nie Mingjue really doesn't believe that, Wei Wuxian is more than happy to let him test some of the emotion teas he's got up in his room. Experiencing it first-hand is pretty convincing, though Wei Wuxian would also prefer to be out of punching range when he does so.

Leaving his name out of the conversation clearly isn't a good long-term plan, and no matter how helpful the information he's given out is, he's not sure it's quite enough to save him any of the man's ire. And he really can't sully the name of Yunmeng Jiang any more than he already has by trying to claim he's a member of that sect, so...

He clears his throat, glancing aside.

"Look, there's no easy way to say this, but ah, would you believe I'm Wei Wuxian?"

[shootthesun]

"A... Wei Wuxian who did not attack at Qiongqi Pass?"

He's hazarding a guess, considering what he's just learned. If this is Wei Wuxian, and he's managed to live sixteen additional years, and he hasn't attempted to lash out, then surely the disasters at Qiongqi Pass and at Nightless City had simply not come to pass.

It's what makes sense, anyway.

He's cautious regardless, face set in hard lines (but when isn't it?) as he looks the other man over, his evasiveness taking on new meaning.

[sadflutenoises]

Okay, first of all, there's several things wrong with that statement, and he'd love to point out the many and complicated reasons why, but it seems a bit immaterial at the moment.

"Aah..." he stretches the word out, in a way that makes his answer clear before he says it, "well, no. That ah... still happened."

And honestly, that part he had little regret over, aside from not getting there sooner. He still felt it was the right thing to do, that there was no need to torment the downtrodded remnants of a defeated sect, especially when they were mostly women, men too old to hold swords, and a child.

"Most of the events remain the same, or similar, at least. I've been talking to Lan Zh- ah- Hanguang Jun, to compare notes, but..." he trails off, studying the Nie Sect Leader's face and offering a crooked half-smile in return.

"...oh, if you're remembering that I was ah... let's see, hated by most of the cultivation world, constantly under suspicion or outright attacks, and then died, I still definitely did all that."

[shootthesun]

It is intolerable, how much Wei Wuxian sounds like Huaisang in that moment, stretching out a syllable in a fruitless effort to scavenge for an answer that would not see him yelled at. Demonic cultivators who indiscriminately caused mass loss of life should not remind him of his troublesome little brother in any way.

He crosses his arms. Waits.

Eventually, more information comes. He likes... exactly none of what he hears, which means that it's almost certainly honest. Unfortunate.

"How did you come to be here if you died? For that matter, how did you come to be sixteen years in the future, if you died as I remember it?"

He hadn't seen the sight with his own eyes, fighting in the thick of a horde of fierce corpses as he had, but the grim tales of those who had - of a body torn to pieces by the fury of those same fierce corpses - certainly didn't lend itself to the man standing before him now.

Perhaps it would be rude to ask.

"The last you were seen, you were torn to pieces by your own fierce corpses. You don't look particularly torn to pieces, Wei Wuxian."

[sadflutenoises]

Well, he hadn't earned himself a new best friend, but Nie Mingjue also hadn't come for his throat just yet, too full of questions that Wei Wuxian had all the answers to.

"I can hardly be blamed because someone decided to call my soul back and give me their body," he replies. Okay, he had been the one to come up with the spell, but it was experimental at best! And it's not like he left it in hopes that someone would be desperate enough to use it, and not on him, of all the other options out there!

"Not like I asked them to anyway," he mumbles, considering the rest. The other Wei Wuxian had been... torn to pieces by his own fierce corpses? Another of those unsettling differences.

"And no, I'm not... torn to pieces, but that's not how I died."

He's not about to go into the details of his internal turmoil over losing everything, nor did he want to think about that day.

"I fell," he says vaguely, "from one of the cliffs in Nightless City. Does it really matter? I'm trying to help you here, and at the very least, you can acknowledge we have a common enemy in our captors."

[shootthesun]

"That does sound like something you could be blamed for creating," Nie Mingjue says, flat-voiced. He's amused, and irked for it, because this man should not be amusing in any way.

But when a situation is beyond ridiculous, is there any wonder that a point comes where all one can do is laugh, because to do otherwise would be to act in violence? Wei Wuxian is disrespectful, dangerous, a killer of the highest order, but he is also a prisoner here as well, and he has a fair point, to claim their common enemy.

He's not going to point out that when one dealt with a man whose power came in raising corpses, it was always crucial to be wary that one was not in danger of becoming that corpse. Wei Wuxian is powerless - or so he assumes - and if he not, he doesn't need to introduce the idea.

"No, it doesn't matter. You are the Wei Wuxian of another world, and this prison is not the place for grievances," he can agree with this logic. Your demonic cultivation - was it taken too?"

[sadflutenoises]

"Details," he waves a hand at the accusation, not denying it by any means, but it's not necessary to go into at the moment, not unless Nie Mingjue really wants to talk the nitty gritty details of how various aspects of demonic cultivation work and what spells he put into an array that could potentially do something like that.

Doesn't matter.

"Mm, any powers or abilities are taken away when you arrive here. It seems as though there are ways to get them back, but so far I haven't had anything very useful returned to me," he pulls Chenqing from his belt, but without his ability to cultivate resentful energy, it's just a flute. It doesn't even feel like a spiritual weapon, as he holds it out toward Nie Mingjue for inspection.

"But they're not gone, not completely," he explains, "among all the pointless and ridiculous teas here, some of them do return our abilities to us, or... ah, the abilities of others, though those tend to fade after a time."

His own ability to use his papermen was... well, it came in handy, but it was also not his most useful spell. Better than nothing, and good for sneaking around, he guessed.