Event || Custom Fit

[eternitymods]

Who: All
When: September 10th to September 30th
Where: Curti Center and mines around the world
What: Characters assist Ganeshan in developing Custom Jobs.
Warnings/Notes: OOC Post

A. The Lab

As much as Ganeshan requires supplies to create Custom Jobs, he need help at home base. With the large number of potential applicants, outworlders and Curti Center employees are invited to help out in the lab, not only with testing transfer of Jobs to crystals, but in developing the abilities and running safety tests.

Easier said than done when all of these cats aren't roaming throughout the center and claiming everything to be their sitting spot. The interns are trying their best to catherd to little avail.

B. Job Development

The break room contains formal submission papers and pamphlets describing the steps required to develop a Custom Job. Senior employees are available to help characters workshop the abilities, but they mostly want to remain in the break rooms to avoid Ganeshan's constant Job mania. His booming voice is muffled through the doors, interspersed with allergic sneezing.

A room has been prepared for those to practice using their basic job abilities, primarily in making sure they're stable yet not too weak. There is a chance that an improper ability extraction can go wrong and hurt the user, so Ganeshan has group of White Mages are on standby in case things go south.

For those that would rather have all the fun without the work, there is the Ability Simulation and Modeling Room, where characters can design their abilities on the computer and see them play out on the screen before them. There's no limit here, and since Jessie is too busy to keep an eye on everyone, the outfits and visual effects have the potential to get...very, very silly.

C. Heigh-Ho

It's off to work you go. Those crystals won't mine themselves, and anyone strong enough must enter the mine in search of the necessary material. It's tedious, difficult work, and some of these are embedded so deeply in the rock that they might be more trouble than they're worth. Not to mention those gross bugs might not like their homes to be disturbed.

There's also the fact that monsters have a tendency to wander inside and attack, so they'll need some reliable body guards.

There should be more crystals deeper inside, but someone else will have to scout the area...

D. Explore the Dungeon

Which is where this team comes in. All the good stuff is deep in this mine, and reliable navigators are necessary to map out the tunnels without getting lost. There's also the fact that the previous owners of a time long ago didn't want opportunists to take their precious resources and outfitted the rooms with puzzles.

Door Locks are puzzles. Pressure plates activate traps. It's the ultimate test of critical thinking. Some of these don't make sense if you think for too long. Why did they go through all the trouble to program time-based puzzles with falling blocks and symbols? The Pupu are strange. At least the bats here are easy to fight, and the mine cart rides are fun.

Comments

[einspine]

His eye sockets go wide, and he blinks a few times. That's... quite the change. Very, very interesting, but hrm. He begins rubbing his chin, quiet at first as he tries to piece this together. That's a very different kind of temporal manipulation than what he's used to.

Granted, what he's used to mostly comes from secondhand account sand monitoring spikes. But still...

"THAT SOUNDS... VERY DISORIENTING. COOL, BUT CONFUSING.

BUT IT'S DIFFERENT FROM THE NORMAL RESET ANTICS, I PRESUME? SINCE... WELL, MY UNDERSTANDING IS LIMITED, BUT I ALWAYS GOT THE IMPRESSION THAT THEY WERE RATHER LIMITED IN SCOPE."

[sassafrisk]

Frisk nods, face twisted up in an expression of contemplation. They found it kind of odd themself, but it kind of made sense. If this world was ran on JRPG cliches, it only made sense for their limit break to be something more traditionally kickass. Granted, some games lived and breathed on messing with meta stuff, but reloading a save file as a limit break was just kinda weird. But there was another, less genre-aware option that probably made more sense. "Yeah, I've been thinking about it too, and I think I kind of have an answer?

"So, if have the metaphor of saving and loading like a videogame, we might as well extend it further. Some other people have figured out how to do similar things; stuff that they could do back home, primarily. It's like... when we came through the Dream Width, we were imported into a 'new game,' one with different rules. And these melodies or whatever that people can use are the bonuses we get from importing saves from our old games into this one." Frisk takes a deep breath, twiddling their hands. "But my abilities aren't really... abilities, per se. It's more like I was, well, saving and loading game files back in the Underground. Not really something that makes sense in the context of this 'game' we're in right now as an in-game ability, which is what these melodies are supposed to be. So when it tried to import my save data, it ended up getting corrupted and changing to something else. Does that make sense?"

[einspine]

Ah, gaming metaphors! Papyrus nods along. Yes, that makes sense. Every game had its own rules. Its limitations. You couldn't start up a platform adventure expecting the same logic as one of those RPGs. Nor could you expect a block puzzle game to involve epic battles against giant robots. But everyone here- they came from different worlds with their own internal logic, forced to conform to Vaikuntha's jobs and spells and all manner of things.

"AH, YES. THAT MAKES SENSE! ALTHOUGH, WHEN YOU PUT IT THAT WAY... DOES THIS MEAN I COULD USE MY BONES AGAIN?!?!"

He perks up at the thought. Sure, these custom jobs are likely to help in that regard, but who knows how long that'll take to develop? Is there an easier way to get started? Wowie, what a thought!

[sassafrisk]

"Maybe?" Frisk shrugs. Really, they were completely talking straight out of their behind here. The way they viewed it as a videogame was just another way of coping with the dangerous, insane situation they were all in. Because, seriously, what kind of JRPG let the protagonists fail before the apoc-- wait. Wait. No. Don't answer that. Okay, back to the conversation.

"Lots of people, including me, just sorta stumbled a- butt-backwards into it. I figured it out when Chara had me on the ropes during our first sparring match. We made lots of anime jokes afterwards."

[einspine]

Frisk.

Frisk, you should be very afraid, because the moment anime comes up in the conversation, there is a glint in those eye sockets. y'know, despite his lack of pupils. A very sly smile spreads across his skull. He lets out a little HMMMMMMM and strokes his chin.

"BONDING OVER ANIME AND COMBAT?" He leans forward. Again, Frisk, be very afraid. "NYEH HEH HEH... COULD IT BE THAT YOU'VE BEEN STRUCK BY AN ARROW TO THE HEART?!"

Look, his frame of reference is Undyne. Who likes fighting. And anime. This was inevitable.

[sassafrisk]

Frisk stares at Papyrus, bewildered. That... what... how... Wait. What were they thinking. This was Papyrus. Of course he would've somehow made an weird connection between fights, anime, and ro- Ah, yes. That made sense.

They finally break out of their confusion to giggle uncontrollably, holding a fist to their mouth as they laugh. It was tempting to roll with it, but the last time they did that they ended up getting rickrolled by Sans. "Oh my god, Papyrus, I know I flirt with every living thing and their mothers, but just because we're both total nerds doesn't mean that we're head-over-heels for each other. I mean, they are pretty cute, but..." Frisk's eyes widen as they realize their fatal mistake. Crap. There was no avoiding date shenanigans now.

Papyrus was going to do it, man. Papyrus was going to make it hapen. And there was nothing they could do about it.

[einspine]

Famous last words, Frisk. That cute remark earns another loud HMMMMMMMMMMMM. And he's beaming. Clutching his hands together. Snickering just a bit. Oh, Frisk. Oh, you sneaky human, you! You think you can fool love detective Papyrus?!

He points dramatically. "AHA!!! YOU THINK THEY'RE CUTE! CLEARLY, YOU HARBOR A DEEP PASSION BENEATH THAT... FRISK-LIKE FACADE! NYEH-HEH... BUT I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, AM NOT SO EASILY FOOLED!!!"


But he doesn't stop there. Oh no. He firmly clasps their shoulder, gesturing outward. "BUT FEAR NOT, FRISK! I WILL SUPPORT YOU IN YOUR ENDEAVORS AS YOUR SUPER COOL FRIEND AND WINGMAN!!! AGAIN!"

[sassafrisk]

There was no escaping their fate now. Somehow, Frisk was going to be set up on a date with Chara. It wasn't a matter of if as it was of when. Papyrus could do almost anything when he put his mind to it, and if if sensed a nonexistent crush in the romantic water, he wasn't going to stop until he did something about it.

Frisk opens their mouth to protest, but closes it before they say anything. It was pointless. There was no escaping now. Hanging their head, Frisk mutters, "Okay. You're obviously not going to take no for an answer, so fine. Just, please... don't go too over the top?" Asking that was probably a futile endeavor considering who they were talking to, but it couldn't hurt to at least try.

[einspine]

He pauses, folding his arms and frowning. "WELL, I CERTAINLY DON'T WANT TO MAKE THINGS TOO AWKWARD. OR UNCOMFORTABLE." That reaction is enough to at least simmer him down just a teensy bit. "BUT. BUT!!! YOU DESERVE TO BE HAPPY. AND I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, WANT TO HELP YOU REACH THAT POINT!"

So it's really just a case of good intentions being a bit... misguided? Impulsive? Whatever the case, he seems to at least be giving Frisk a chance to set up boundaries.

[sassafrisk]

Frisk takes a moment to run down all the Most Papyrus Cases possible in their head. They take a deep breath. "Okay," they say, and begins counting what's off limits on their fingers. "No kidnapping, no arson (including flame-based puzzles), no spikes, nothing that could malfunction in a disastrous but hilarious manner, nothing that could malfunction in just a plain disastrous manner, no Rube Goldberg machines, nothing related to powerlevels, and no spears. Other than that, you're free to run wild."

[einspine]

Oh wow. Such thorough instructions! Still, he nods. That all sounds perfectly fair. Good to keep in mind, really. "WELL... IN THAT CASE, I'LL JUST FOCUS ON THE MORE TRADITIONALLY ROMANTIC FLOURISHES! HEARTS. FLOWERS! CANDLELIT SPAGHETTI DINNERS! PERHAPS I CAN EVEN PROCURE AN ACCORDION..."

This... is going to be so silly. So very, very silly. Not that Pap will admit it.

[sassafrisk]

Frisk chuckles imagining the shenanigans, half out of fear, half out of genuine humor. There was no way this wasn't going to go horribly wrong. By all laws of romantic comedies and fake dates, it was going to turn into a cascading series of hilarious failures and miscommunications, and somehow they and Chara would end up riding a decorated donkey through the town square tied to each other with a literal ball and chain. They just knew it. "Alright. Well, I'll leave you to the planning."