December 2025-January 2026 Test Drive Meme

[folkie]

December 2025-January 2026 TDM

Introduction

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This Test Drive meme is open to all.
Welcome to Folkmore's monthly Test Drive Meme! Please feel free to test drive any and all characters regardless of your intent to apply or whether you have an invite or not.

All TDMs are game canon and work like "mini-events". For new players and characters, you can choose to have your TDM thread be your introduction thread upon acceptance or start fresh. Current players are also allowed to have in-game characters post to the TDM so long as they mark their top levels ‘Current Character.’

TDM threads can be used for spoon spending at any time by characters accepted into the game.

Playing and interacting with the TDMs will allow characters to immediately obtain a canon item from home, especially weapons or other things they may have had on their person when they were pulled from their worlds! There will always be a prompt that provides some sort of "reward" to characters who complete certain tasks.

Current players are always encouraged to tag new people on the TDM!


🦊 New Star Children meet the Fox still in their worlds, and she brings them into the new realm of Folkmore. As you follow her, your body begins to change and new characteristics emerge. These may stay for a while, or perhaps they will hide away after. And during all of this, the Fox explains to you where you will be going: to Folkmore.

and then... you fall like a shooting star, falling to the land in a burst of starlight.


🦊 Experienced Star Children are already familiar with this time of the month. There are shooting stars all across the sky, and some fall to the land, which means the Fox has brought new arrivals. These newly arrived Star Children will face some tests, but Thirteen wants the more seasoned residents to participate as well.

Perhaps you follow the falling stars on your own, or perhaps the Fox simply teleports you there, but it appears you too will be part of this.

[ Prompt One ★ Prompt Two]

Get Some Fire in Your Blood . ★

Content Warnings: Potential violence, potential outfit change (can be rejected)

While sand-filled deserts are known for scorching daytime heat, Cruel Summer is freezing. The means to get and stay warm is proving an awfully hot commodity this winter. (Pun absolutely intended.)

There are bright points to all of this! Little desert bushes have caught fire and burn merrily away without pause or fuel. Sadly, they're not transplantable, or movable, at all. Any interference puts the fire out, and quenched bushes stubbornly refuse to relight, even in the face of arson.

There's also an absolutely massive blaze going on at Agrona Academy: With a base a hundred feet wide, the flames stretch high enough to be seen from anywhere in the desert. Blessedly, while the scale continues for distance, it doesn't include intensity. The heat of the blaze covers a diameter twice the size of the campus but is never hotter than a standard bonfire from ten feet away. No flesh-melting intensity here!

If the direct heat of flames doesn't appeal, there are other ways to keep warm: anything that gets the blood pumping, as participant or spectator. This is Cruel Summer! That means that the fighting pits are open day and night, as the regularly-occurring matches put fire in the blood of fighters and spectators alike. There's always the more intimate route; the emotional equivalent of bundling-up-together-for-warmth seems to be working even better than the old standard two-bodies-one-sleeping-bag. Opening up to others about the people and ideals that inspire each person to keep going, even when things seem impossible, brings a welcome thaw to the immediate environment.

A good thing, too, because most of the trailers at Puca Park have no means of staying heated–so everyone's stuck bunching up at, or cramming into, the few true houses, no matter how small they might be. Going back to the trailers for very brief visits isn't really any worse than visiting any other arctic outhouse, though, so hopefully the lines for the bathrooms won't get out of hand. If they do, well… there's another chance to talk to the other people waiting in line, right?

When it's time to escape the intermittent bursts of cold wind blasting sand across every exposed surface, the flickering lights of spirit-tended bonfires beckon one and all closer. Camps throughout Cruel Summer feature wind-sheltered firepits and a collection of tents surrounding them. These normal bonfires carry the risk of the discomfort of extremes: a scorching heat from the fire, and the bitter cold of any body part not directly facing it. Perhaps a toasty-warm drink will help or snacking on the delicious fire-roasted foods that never get a chance to grow cold?

Those inappropriately dressed for the weather will get directed to one of the warm tents, where it's possible to get a winter outfit. There's a catch, of course. Those entering the tents don't get to design or pick their winter makeover. Instead, the choice will be theirs whether to accept the clothes or not—with the understanding that acceptance means wearing them for twenty-four hours. The outfit will be theirs to keep permanently along with a gift from home (or another world). The gift may even be a weapon or magical item.

Which world? The designer's world. See, across Folkmore there's a new app front-and-center on everyone's relics: Fox Couture. Design an outfit or two or ten to suit winter fashion in one's own home world. Fancy and formal, everyday basic, or walking-the-dog-at-three-in-the-morning… Whatever appeals, the app will find a suitable option to add to the little mannequin's display! Don’t take too long to complete an outfit, though. That's another of Folkmore's residents getting dressed up in what's selected. Once the outfit is marked complete, the maker and the model will be given each other's names and contact information. Gulp. Hope they liked it.

Nothing prevents coming back for future dressing-up sessions, and there's no requirement to accept the outfit. One's original clothing, no matter how poorly suited to the weather, is still available piled up neatly on the bench behind that folding screen over there. So spin that wheel as many times as one wants. Come in, get warm, get dressed up, and let the designer know exactly what you think about their selections.

• Cruel Summer is cold.
• Bushes burn in the desert, unless messed with, and Agrona Academy has an enormous bonfire.
• Emotional intimacy or physical combat (participation or spectation) can keep people warm.
• Spirits man bonfires & tents around Cruel Summer with free food and drink.
• Enter a tent to get free winter clothes, which just so happen to be designed by a Star Child via a fashion app on their relics. Accept the clothes, and both parties find out who the other is.
• Accept & wear outfits for 24 hours to keep them permanently. One time, Star Children will also get a gift from home or the designer's home.

A War of Land Itself . ★

Content Warnings: Potential violence, potential stalking (by monsters), potential forced transformation, potential forced emotional change/compulsion

The regional borders have shifted between Cruel Summer and Exile, so that the desert now encroaches to the bank of the northwestern fork of the Encantado. The river has a sandy shore, and between the old borders and new are a great deal of dead plants, downed trees, and other signs of Exile foliage that has given up the ghost. Further plants and soil can be discovered underneath all the sand. It's fine. It's desert now.

As prominent and easily found in this new area of Cruel Summer are weapons. From swords, axes, and halberds to bows, crossbows, and guns, they can all be found sticking out of the sand, free for the taking. They are plain, unadorned, and old. However, they're in good shape and ready to be used without needing to be sharpened or cleaned. Everyone who picks up a weapon will gain a feeling of being watched or stalked. This feeling carries with them no matter where they go, whether they head into Exile or deeper into Cruel Summer or even to another region of Folkmore altogether. Anywhere from 12-24 hours later, somewhere in Folkmore, a creature from Exile will attack them. These creatures vary, but they are all intelligent, dangerous predators. Therefore, they are more likely to attack once their prey has set down their weapon and is unarmed.

These weapons may find use more quickly because the border region of Cruel Summer and Exile has grown especially dangerous. The monsters of both regions have begun fighting each other over the territory. Exile's creatures clearly still see the land as theirs, while those of Cruel Summer come to claim ownership. Star Children may find themselves in the middle of a fight they don't mean or want to be in. Exile creatures will attack Star Children as invaders as readily as Cruel Summer creatures. However, those from Cruel Summer will not go out of their way to attack Star Children.

For those who aren't inclined to combat, beautiful (and naked) humanoid spirits in Encantado's waters will invite Star Children to take refuge with them in the river. Friendly dolphins may squirt Star Children with water, but nothing will attack Star Children there. The danger is more insidious. Star Children who stay in the river too long will transform into dolphins and forget who they are in delirium. Anyone who sees this happen or otherwise figures out that some of these dolphins are Star Children may want to rescue them! Star Children can be saved a couple of ways. They can be ushered down the river to Nereid on the coast or they can be brought home (or wherever else) to be set in some water in a pool, bath, or other large container of a Star Child's choice. In both cases, an hour or two in non-enchanted water will see them return to themselves. Memories of being a dolphin may be fuzzy or like an extremely strange dream.

Oases surrounded by shrubs, bushes, and trees pop up around Cruel Summer, creating new sources of fresh water. The soil near these oases are saturated with water, such that these small miracles may appear to be quite the blessing to those arriving in Cruel Summer. The water is cool and satisfies whatever thirst Star Children have. However, melancholy or other negative moods follow consuming it. These moods may be overwhelming or simply background. Unignorable is the compulsion to head toward Exile and the Swamp of Sorrows in particular. Star Children will head in that direction, regardless of wherever they think they are trying to go. Should they reach the swamp, they will find themselves stuck, lacking the will to leave, until they are rescued or die.

Fortunately for these compelled souls, all paths toward Exile will take them through Puca Park. That gives them a decent chance to run into someone before meeting their slow sad fate. Other Star Children may easily figure out something is wrong, and they have a couple ways to break the compulsion and the imposed negative moods. The first is to use words, conversation, to reach people. Get a compelled Star Children to talk through their negative mood and what in their life experience has caused them to feel that way before will set them free. Even better, the more Star Children open up about their own negative feelings and experiences, the more a compelled Star Child will feel like talking, even if they usually don't. The second is to use fists or other forms of physical force to knock the compelled Star Child out. Specially, Star Children must knock the compelled Star Child out with physical effort, not magic, sleeping pills, or other means. Nothing like a good hard knock to the head to reset.

Perhaps none of this should be a surprise. Agrona is the iteration who leads the fighting school, and Cruel Summer is a place that physically tests those who enter it.

• Cruel Summer has taken over Exile until it reaches the Encantado River.
• Weapons can be found freely throughout the new desert. Picking one up will lead to being stalked by an Exile monster and attacked 12-24 hours later wherever in Folkmore one goes.
• Monsters from each region fight each other in the new desert area. Might need those weapons if you get stuck in the middle!
• Naked beautiful spirits invite Star Children to escape the violence in the Encantado River. Stay too long and turn into a dolphin and forget yourself.
• Save a dolphin-ed Star Child by getting them to non-enchanted water, either down to the sea or take them home.
• Oases pop up in Cruel Summer, providing water to all who need it. Those who drink the water feel negative moods and are compelled toward the Swamp of Sorrows in Exile.
• All compelled Star Children pass through Puca Park. Other Star Children may save them by getting them to talk about their emotions (easier if you talk about yours) or by knocking them out with physical force. Bonk.

Comments

1.

[whowillmourn]

The cold does not bother Mayerling the way it does humans, as his existence without the gifts he's received here in Folkmore revolves around night and the dark. Temperatures naturally drop at night, so that even in places with pleasant comfortable days, the night bites and gnaws at those who venture out within its realm. The northernmost reaches of Folkmore are like that, but here in the desert where it often remains warmer than the rest of Folkmore, the cold bites all the harder. The fire? The fire presses against that cold without burning. A strange fire indeed.

"I put its behavior down to our host," Mayerling says, "though I admit she is known more for her chaotic nature than her orderly imposition. So whilst I understand why it behaves, it also strikes me as unsettling as to why she'd make it behave. Tis a generous warmth, but when she brings the cold, the generosity rings hollow."

In short, he agrees and can neither settle down nor entirely remain alert. His greater than human senses help, should danger come, but the schools have always been places of safety. They should be safe here as well as warm.

[elsecall]

Her attention slides to the side — eyeing the stranger, more curiosity than hostility. No one she's met thus far has merited much more than careful scrutiny. Still, can't be too careful! Jasnah is a paranoid creature at heart.

"Is it common for her to inflict the problem while she also provides the solution?"

Asked like a true newbie in these parts.

[whowillmourn]

Familiar with his neighbors and beyond that many of the other Star Children seen during trials and other instances, Mayerling suspects this person is new to Folkmore. The question as well suggests it. He's glad more people arrive, though he hopes they also get something out of being here, the way he does.

"She sets trials to help us achieve our potential," Mayerling says, "As such she frequently presents problems, puzzles, or situations we must find our ways out. She often provides hints or tools, but in the end, the path is our own. Some, we may choose to partake in. Others are in the environment. And still others we are drawn into, whether we would partake in them or not."

Mayerling considers the chill. "Usually, I would not consider the weather itself a challenge, with an exception for the time that the realm went wild, so that weather was less a phenomenon than an event."

[elsecall]

The corners of her mouth lift into a near-sneer. Brief, but potent. Yes, to a certain degree, Jasnah had agreed to come here — she's got an agenda, and a goal to fulfill. But it's a bit galling to have ones potential measured by this distant she. The Fox. Back home, Jasnah had made oaths to reach her potential: personal, private, individualized. And she'd made them in a way that bound her to one particular being. The set-up of this place seems to spit in the face of that kind of intimacy.

Anyways. With a soft clearing of her throat, she focuses instead on what the man explains. She can accept; she can adapt.

"—The realm went wild?" She echoes. "Elaborate."

[whowillmourn]

It's no surprise that someone views this testing and growing of their potential with disdain or doubt. Even Mayerling has gone through periods of disagreement with Thirteen or with particular trials of hers. They are not all suited to everyone, perhaps a consequence of how many Star Children are in Folkmore. However, they've helped him enough that he's grown tolerant to some degree of the disruption to their lives here. It's certainly worthwhile to him, both because he has the person he loves here and because of simple matters like this. Sitting outside during the daytime with everyone else. It's remarkable (and not entirely due to Thirteen, but without Thirteen's allowance, he would be stuck indoors all day, as he had in Trench).

"There are some here who were trapped outside the safety of the school Thirteen gathered most of us in, and they have first hand experience, whereas I mostly can only tell you what they testified, those who were lost outside and those who went inside Baba Yaga to search and to rescue those left behind. However, we all saw the aftermath and helped clean up after it.

"Magic, it seems, went beyond Thirteen's control. Exactly how it played out differed by region. Here, in Cruel Summer, the Encantado River, a place of respite and coolness in the hot desert, became a river of ghosts that sought to pull under all those who came too close. Epiphany flooded, and Willow experienced time at an accelerated rate, such that things aged and fell apart before you. None of the Star Children were so aged, but it made survival more difficult, surely.

"It lasted for six weeks, after which our host had tamed the realm once more. Everywhere was debris that needed to be cleaned up and put somewhere. A giant turtle spirit from the ocean had everyone bring it to her, and that is where Turtle Island came from. It remains off the coast of Cruel Summer."

Mayerling lets the explanation be, for a moment. "It reminded me of home, in a way. The Frontier is a dangerous and fickle land."

[elsecall]

The explanation is a long one, but her attention doesn't tire. Doesn't drift. Barely even flickers, except to register brief bouts of surprise and not-quite-belief. But not-quite-disbelief, either. Her brows knit deepest when he describes what happened in Willow.

Now, more than ever, she's convinced that this Thirteen is a Shard. And this, Cruel Summer and beyond, is her world. Her domain, like how Odium and Honor and Cultivation squabble over Roshar. Jasnah's teeth rake her lower lip, thoughtful, and she wonders (not for the first time) if there might be some way to snag Wit's attention.

"What a home you must come from," she comments idly — asking for more without asking for more, "if such chaos reminds you of it."

[whowillmourn]

Mayerling's smile at the comment is sad. His home it is, but it's far from the height of anything, whether that's technological progress or social progress. It's in the early stages, not the heights, of where humanity can take the world. He believes they can and they will make it. They'll survive and thrive and make the world a wondrous place better than he's ever seen before. If he's fortunate, he'll live to see it.

"Vampiric society has fallen, and in its fall, my peers made it as dangerous as possible for those who would survive and hopefully surpass them," Mayerling says, "The world would be a wasteland as it recovers from the wars either way, but it is more dangerous than it need have been. It's a hard life, but life carries forward, despite the hardships, and over time humanity works toward the future it wants though none of them will live long enough to see it."

His love of humanity is bright and clear, even as he's excluded himself from them. Even as he will always be apart from their societies. For all the bright future he foresees, it does not include a tolerance for vampires. Those on all sides have done too much for him to believe in that.

[elsecall]

There's an echo of something familiar in what he says. Isn't it her life's work? To see progress carry onward, toward a future she'll never see — but perhaps can shape, bending it gently (and sometimes not so gently) towards good.

Still, something in his phrasing catches her attention.

"—Vampiric society? What's that?"

[whowillmourn]

Ah, someone from a world without vampires or media about vampires. It is always curious to meet such people who have no connotations with his kind, good or bad. They all uncover new things while here, but this one is especially personal to him.

"Society as built by vampires, my species. Though we look similar, we are not human. We can live much longer, but we depend on blood, real or synthetic, to maintain ourselves," Mayerling explains. In his world, for his kind of vampire, the need for blood is a mental one and something vampires would drop in a heartbeat were it possible. However, it is not recommended for vampires to go without, not for their own sake or that of those around them.

It's no issue in Folkmore. He could source human blood ethically, but Mayerling does not. He continues to consume the synthetic blood an ancestor invented as a substitute for the real thing in hopes it would help vampires and humans alike. It did not end up that way, not exactly.

[elsecall]

Huh. Is this a good time or a bad time to mention that she's got the ability to soulcast any liquid into blood? Provided she's got access to stormlight, of course. So perhaps it's not as helpful as it could be. Either way, the idea of synthetic blood might perhaps be the most normal part of that sentence. Like, her thoughts are already leaping ahead to understand precisely why she shouldn't worry about a man forthrightly telling her that he depends on blood. His body language isn't threatening, to boot.

Still, her teeth scrape her bottom lip in that time-old thoughtful expression. Processing, considering, organizing her thoughts into a neat little compartments.

"For sustenance, you mean?"

Maintain ourselves is almost euphemistic. Like the man's trying to avoid saying that it's food-stuff.

"Fascinating," she hums.

[whowillmourn]

"Yes," Mayerling says plainly. It's something that makes many people uncomfortable. Despite the way Folkmore provides for everyone, people get nervous when they find out the precious liquid in their body is what he needs to live. Even if it did not provide his sustenance so easily, as Trench did not, he found ways to survive that do not harm people. With Thirteen's help, his bloodlust is well and fully under his control so that he can socialize as freely as anyone else. It is a good place, in many regards.

"There are many variations between worlds, for the vampires I have met here, but that characteristic remains universally to my knowledge. Nor are there so many vampires here as there once was," Mayerling says. He's sad about the latter, for he enjoyed bonding with and getting to know his vampiric peers. They were all much younger than him, so he felt responsible to look after them, but that was a pleasure and an honor, not a burden.

"Have you anything of similar in your world?"

[elsecall]

"No," she says — with certainty and a shake of her head. "There are those who can also live much longer, but I wouldn't call them native to my world."

— For the most part, she believes, they're all from somewhere else. But they don't really need anything for sustenance, except for Investiture. And Investiture is a far, far cry from blood. But perhaps no less necessary for life to thrive.

"And there are those who aren't human, but they eat the same things we eat. No vampires. None that I know of. Admittedly, I can't speak for the greater Cosmere."