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Who: CERES & you
When: IC: 10/04 | OOC: 11/15
Where: ViViD & McCERES
What: Intro Log
Rating/Warning: PG-13 | slightly nsfw

//event005.EXE

Learning is Fundamental! Let's play CERESLearn

ViViD's usual worlds are unfortunately down for maintenance. While CERES' programmers work on getting it back up and running, all new entrees this round will be going through a different level than usual. Only a single world is accessible at the moment, a simple one entitled 'CERESLearn.' "What the $%@& is this?" you must be thinking. Well, it's simple!

It's a study program, of course! CERES' advanced AI technology is here to make sure you learn and that you learn sexily. Whether or not you pay attention to the actual content is up to you, the player. Please enjoy it while it lasts. They're here to teach you a variety of subjects and also to make you feel vaguely uncomfortable all over.

New arrivals and those logging into ViViD will first find themselves in a classroom with a new operator greeting them rather than Vidia.

"Greetings and welcome to Cerealia! It's nice of you to join us at last. As you can see, we're just about to get started!

Here are the instructions:

♥ Choose your subject of choice. They include things like medicine, math, CERES economics, CERES history, fun facts about Julius, engineering, and science!
♥ Choose your tutor. You can hire Astor, Hilda, or UN-Zippy
♥ They'll teach you slowly, deliberately, sensually. Then after that, they'll drill you hard and without stopping.
♥ Just when you think you've had enough, they'll quiz you all over until you're sweating and panting.
♥ For those of you who pass, you'll be welcomed well into Cerealia and be given a free voucher for a McCERES Mildly Content meal. Please enjoy!"

//SCENARIOS.EXE

PHASE I

[ xxxx ] Once you choose your lesson and your tutor, you will be transported to a classroom where you and a few other players who decide to choose the same lesson will sit with your tutor after school, getting knowledge taught to you by someone who seems more intent on learning what's under your clothes than filling your head with knowledge. They will be awkwardly stretching, dropping pencils by 'accident' on the floor, and bending down slowly to pick them up. Certain things might be spilling out of their clothes. Awkward things. They will breathe down your neck and make sure you are well-versed in their anatomy by the end of the lesson.

Fortunately, it won't last long as their bodies start to flicker erratically.

PHASE II

[ xxxx ] Just as things begin to escalate, the flickering will grow intense until your tutor will start to morph before your eyes. What takes their place is something that is anything but friendly. And yes, it will continue to breathe down your neck and speak in a sweet, soft, alluring voice while reaching out with its 'hands' to try and touch you.

This will be your cue to run through the halls of the school while That Thing chases you in every single direction imaginable. There will be others joining you as everyone starts bolting out of their classrooms.

PHASE III

[ xxxx ] Feeling tired already? Well, don't stop and rest now! For those who successfully murder their own tutor, they will get their food voucher and a lovely welcome into CERES. You've officially passed! Everyone will be allowed to mingle around the game room in the CERES Research Tower before being directed into McCERES just across the street. For those who were already in the colony, you will also receive a voucher and directions to McCERES at the end of the game in case you want to go meet up with the newcomers there or just eat some artery-killing fast food.

PHASE IV

[ xxxx ] For those who get eaten by That Thing or don't pass their quizzes and upset their tutors, they will be forced to endure the Price of Failure. This means being sent to the gym with the other 'failures' to endure a painfully slow and erotic striptease by UN-Zippy. Once that is over, they will then be logged out and allowed to have their complimentary McCERES voucher.

BONUS

[ whyo'clock ] Congratulations on surviving CERESLearn! Here's your complimentary voucher for a free Mildly Content Meal at McCERES. This month's special is also the McKnight Burger. Characters are immediately invited to take a load off and enjoy some good ol' fashion fast food of questionable origin. Those who decide to order and eat here will also get a special toy included inside their Mildly Content Meals.

[ Remember to apply proper warnings on threads with trigger-y or inappropriate material and do let a mod know if your thread careens off into maiming or canoodling so we can lock the log. ]

//RUN.EXE

Welcome to CEREALIA's latest intro post. For your convenience, we have compiled a post detailing everyone's usual arrival experience (which is not entirely applicable this round for reasons stated above^) and a FAQ that should explain everything in more detail. Please read them thoroughly before playing. Thank you!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Please, don't. [ He says this with a smile. ] Pay it forward to someone else who may need help, too.

[ The question doesn't fall exactly out of expectation, but it is rather hard to explain. In addition to his standard repertoire, he had also gained some other skills through his time in Hinoto-Ri. ]

I am not a sorcerer, merely a strategist. However, I do have some skills in the realm of magic. Not much, though.

[ Should he explain his Persona? Perhaps not now... ]

I can do that! [A nod! Though he'll probably still keep this guy in mind and appear like a month later with a gift basket or something in thanks...]

I know someone like that. [A strategist with randomass weird vaguely magical abilities that are never explained!!] But it seemed like a really uncommon thing.

Magic is rare in my homeworld, too. [ And from what he had heard, extinct in modernity. ] Not only does it require innate skill, it also needs years of training. Many with the potential never awaken to it. I was lucky enough to have a good mentor.

[ And a good tool, too. His spellbook is a family heirloom, unused for generations. It took lots of study for him to learn how to control it. ]

May I know the name of your homeland?

Ah, that's more complex than I thought. [But he's nodding along anyway, clearly interested. There are a lot of worlds out there with interesting quirks and people that he'd like to get to know, honestly.]

—Sure! I come from Reveille. It's in- [insert name of country here THANKS VAGUE CANON. But it definitely isn't one from Earth...] -but I don't think that anyone else I've met has heard of it.

It is. It died out a few centuries later, but perhaps it was for the best. Magic can be dangerous in the hands of those with malicious intent. [ Coupled with how difficult it was to learn magic, living without it didn't seem so bad. ]

I'm afraid I haven't, either. [ And that's saying something, considering that he had lived in a nexus point for about three years. ] It seems a pleasant land, if that helps.

[Not knowing how magic works in other worlds means Oz doesn't have much room for opinion, so he just makes a noncommittal humming noise. He could definitely see how magic could become a problem if used on a wider scale, though...

As for their homelands, it's a much easier topic to parse and he smiles accordingly.]

It is! I've never really lived anywhere else, but I like it there. [His head inclines forward a little, curious.] What about yours?

[ Ah. That is a complicated question.

Takakage aligns his fingertips together, looking thoughtful for a moment before speaking. ] It is a beautiful land, too. The people live in castles protected by daimyo and go about their daily life in safety. There are mountains and rivers gifted with scenery, and the wildlife is charming, too.

[ He will forever hold fond memories of his home. After all, it's all that he has left. ]

In the far future, the people build trains traversing vast distances in short times, and they fly across oceans in large metal birds called aeroplanes. With the advent of science and medicine, illnesses are better treated, and the children can learn about the world without fear. I haven't seen this future with mine own eyes, but I have spoken to those who call it home.

[ He is very proud of them. Knowing all this, and the promise of a hopeful future - it's almost enough reassurance. ]

[He's heard a little bit about that - airplanes, and the distant future that he can hardly imagine, even though he at least has trains where he comes from. He may be far behind, but he's not quite as behind as some.]

It sounds nice — both, I mean! Your time in the present and what happens in the future... Both of them sound like nice places to be.

[Safety and protection and freedom. It's the kind of world that he hopes his own can be one day, too.]

What was it called again? The Land of the Rising Sun? It has a good name, too.

It is known as Japan in the future, but it's just a shorter name for the same thing.

[ He sighs a little wistfully. ]

Perhaps when all this is over, you could visit it someday. [ That is, if they manage to somehow fix the worlds with CERES' help. ]

[He looks intrigued by the idea, at least! Traveling outside of his own country isn't something he's done, really, so all of this sudden interdimensional traveling sure is A Thing.]

I wouldn't mind if I was able to do something like that. [But it probably won't be possible in the end, since his own world needs to be tended to first.]

Yes. Though we will need to find a way how. I have visited other planes, but only with the aid and guidance of transdimensional beings. [ How best to explain Philemon... ] Since CERES pulled us from the code, perhaps they can also access different worlds, too.

[ And maybe he could find a way to receive news of his homeworld. Not being able to renturn is a problem. ]

That might be the case.

[But that has him thinking about another issue entirely and he shifts where he stands, glancing over his shoulder briefly. It's not clear what he's looking for, or who.]

—Do you believe that, anyway? What they've said about... this code, and our own worlds.

Not exactly. They have provided us too little evidence to form a conclusion one way or another.

[ That's something that has been bothering him, too. ]

For now, all we can do is wait and see, to bide our time. And not to rely too much on their technology. If it does indeed prove to be the contrary, we will have to fend for ourselves on our own.

[That's the possibility that he'd honestly prefer, but he keeps silent for the time being, nodding.]

It's better to start working on plans just in case, probably... Does anyone have anything like that in the works yet?

Not that we know of, though that is for good reason. Such things are best kept under wraps, and they may have to be done alone. One cannot predict when circumstances will catch one unawares.

[ But enough about such gloomy things. ] How are you finding the colony so far? If the technology is hard to understand, I can assist you with that.

[ It's important to know how to deal with robots, after all. ]

[Oz, on the other hand, thinks an organized and larger movement might be better, but he also doesn't know the situation as well as Takakage and thus remains silent on the topic. Once it's shifted, he goes along with the change with ease.]

It's... a lot to take in, to be honest. [This said with a light laugh.] I haven't been here long enough to know for sure, but everything seems different. [After a second of thought, he adds:] But I was in a place that was more modern than what I was used to before this, so not everything is foreign to me.

It's good that most of the functions on the appliances are coded in clear, succinct words, though the more advanced functions might take a little to get used to. [ For him, he had experience in Hinoto-Ri, and thus had more knowledge than one would expect of his background.

Oz's next sentence is something very interesting, though. ] You have been to other worlds?

[ It might be Hinoto-Ri, but the existence of other nexus points would not be surprising. ]

I'll have to take a look soon, then! I haven't been able to yet. [Understandably so, considering he's been fairly distracted by Bughilda and then free sketchy food...

At the question, he hesitates for a second before nodding.]

I think that it was a different one, anyway. It wasn't home and it isn't the same as this place.

Alright. You can contact me, if you need assistance. [ Helping new people get accustomed to technology is always interesting. Plus, it may turn out more new knowledge about how things functioned here. ]

I see. [ That makes sense. ] I have had the same experience. May I ask the name of this other world?

Thanks! I will. [Since he will probably Struggle™ with his CereVice when the time comes...

But he lapses into momentary silence at the question, since there isn't really an answer he can give.]

Mm... I don't really know what the world was called. We didn't see much of it - just an amusement park called Dreamland and an abandoned warehouse a few miles away from it.

[ ... that's definitely not Hinoto-Ri, then. ]

I see. I have never heard of it, my apologies. [ There are many other worlds besides the ones he has visited, after all. ] I did visit a nexus point between worlds, too - but I doubt it is the same as yours. [ Oz could have appeared outside the dome, but it's highly unlikely. ]

Such places do give us many opportunities to learn about other cultures.

It's fine! That's better - it's better if you haven't.

[Because if he had, he probably went through the same thing, and that's an experience Oz wouldn't even wish on Jack. BUT, he'd much rather focus on the good rather than the overwhelming bad, like the friends that he managed to make and as Takakage has said, the different learning opportunities.]

I learned a lot of things while I was there, it's true. Things like TVs and music videos and movies and Blue Velvet... Oh— and cell phones! Was it the same for you?

[ Hmm. That is something worth noting. Of course, it isn't polite to ask, so he just files it away for later investigation. It does make sense if a malicious force was able to cross barriers between worlds, like how Philemon did.

He covers up the slight lapse with a nod. ] Likewise. I met those of the future, and they showed me many things that had been created since I passed on.

[ And he's smiling now, thinking about all the time he's spent reading and catching up. ]

After all that time, there are still people who hold books in high regard. It's wonderful.

I'm glad for that, too! [He is, after all, a fairly avid reader. To know that there are still kids years down the road enjoying different stories in the same way... There's something nice about that.]

I guess no matter how many things might change, there will always be a few that stay the same. It's comforting, isn't it? No matter how much of the world becomes unrecognizable, those little pieces will still exist.

Yes. [ He says this with a smile. ] And it is through these things that the human spirit still continues through the ages.

[ But back to books. ]

Do you like books, Oz? [ Dear lord there better be people who can still appreciate the beauty of literature in this place. ]

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