[ti]dungeon[/ti]Round 2: Drink Till We're Offline

Round 2: Drink Till We're Offline
#Buzzedness #Winning #Badass

As the three players collect their cards, things...change. Alice! 's card appears normal, just letters on a shield. But as Finnegan Fjord and Tuesday look at theirs, strange lines, squiggles, and swirls are visible on the surface, as if some unseen hand has marked over the prompt with sharpie. 

The letters are clearly readable, but there is something more happening. Perhaps a code behind the letters. 

Details

• The house is still off-limits, as are the woods surrounding the mansion.
• You can post as many times as you want this round.
• You can only play Poké-Pong up to three times each round. Once per Pokemon you brought. 
• You can upgrade skill trees during this challenge, and if you started with less than 3 Pokemon you can catch more and add them to your team.
• Consuming alcohol in UNOVR prompts a health and safety warning, and (if the player is under 21) the drink is changed to a non-alcoholic beverage. 
• The forest beer on tap at this party has NO SUCH WARNING, and players can consume it regardless of age.
• Each round there will also be a Challenge Prompt hidden somewhere within the post. These will increase in difficulty and obscurity as the party progresses.

Round 2: Drink Till We're Offline
#Buzzedness #Winning #Badass

As drinks flow and cups fall like large, cup-shaped dominoes, the scoreboard clicks up. The keg pours fourth an unceasing stream of dark, delicious beer, and every cup downed leaves the drinker wanting another. 

Cups are refilled, but it's clear something is different. The keg feels warm to the touch, and with each beer poured, little flakes of dark soot crumble off, sticking to the partygoers' hands. 

One of the bros picks a maple leaf out of his beer, tossing it to the ground. 

• Finnegan Fjord   6 BUZ/8 WIN/2 BAD
• Tuesday   5 BUZ/7 WIN/4 BAD
• Furrlicity Purrfection 4 BUZ/1 WIN/0 BAD 
• orioncayge   5 BUZ/4 WIN/1 BAD
• Big Bee   9 BUZ/2 WIN/0 BAD
• h0lyn3v1l   5 BUZ/2 WIN/0 BAD
• Alice!   1 BUZ/5 WIN/3 BAD
• Ruby   3 BUZ/1 WIN/1 BAD
• Yggy Br00ks   7 BUZ/4 WIN/0 BAD
• Bergamot Gristleborg   8 BUZ/2 WIN/0 BAD
• Laguna   6 BUZ/4 WIN/0 BAD
• Moon Bunny   4 BUZ/2 WIN/0 BAD
• Kath Ulu   6 BUZ/0 WIN/0 BAD

And as the scores rise, more notifications follow.

SPOILER: Click to show

{Previous Notifications}
Players with 3+ Buzzedness see the following.

This beer sure is good! Time for another?

Players with 5+ Buzzedness get an additional notification.

Chug chug! Praise the keg!

Players with 3+ Winning see the following.

The shadows squirm, painting warnings on the walls.

BUZZEDNESS

Players with +8 Buzzedness see the following.

Share the party with your party!

A little dice rolls in the corner of Bergamot Gristleborg and Big Bee's UI. Faces with 1, 2, or 3 dots flash past in quick succession before rolling to a stop.

Bergamot Gristleborg: 1! Jack the Mudkip has been chosen!
Big Bee: 3! Jam the Groudon has been chosen!

No further information is displayed.

Players with +10 Buzzedness see the following.

Make an offering!

In the corner of his screen, Big Bee sees another dice roll.

2! Rian the Thwackey has been chosen!

Big Bee feels himself pulled to the keg, compelled to touch it. He drops his cup of beer and presses both hands against the hard, curved surface. It's warm to the touch, and as he makes contact with the keg a familiar popup appears.

> PRAY OR SACRIFICE?

WINNING

There is no UI popup for players reaching high levels of Winning. Instead, Alice!, Tuesday, and Finnegan Fjord see their world change.

The same dark miasma that shrouds the keg has spread, engulfing Bergamot Gristleborg's Mudkip and Big Bee's Thwackey and Baby Groudon. The darkness seeps into the Pokemon, and to the eyes of the trio they are changed.

Eyes open along Thwackey's body, blinking out of sync. Dozens of eyes the color of burning leaves. Mudkip's slick skin melts like hot tar, sloughing off and leaving puddles of burning ichor on the lawn. Groudon's movements grow stiff, wooden, and its ruby-red plates darken to a sooty black that cracks and flakes as it moves.

These changes are only visible to players with +5 WINNING.

The shadows at the edge of the party lengthen, stretching out from under the fence and the tables. Long-clawed stalkers with eyes the same color as Thwackey's edge closer to the party guests.

These monsters are only visible to players with +5 WINNING.

Finnegan Fjord notices something more. A whisper. Crackling words, almost lost in a flurry of broken leaves. But as he listens he picks out pieces of a rhyme. A story.

A no-eyed man on a moonless road
He walks forever, uncrossed, alone

The same old man, devoid of sight
Travels far on that moonless night
Another's path crosses with he
Fearful, he takes to the open sea

A moon blooms over the eyeless man
He finds himself quite far from land
He stops for food, 'fore break of day
And drops his line in a coral cay

His line withdrawn, there's fish to fry
He plucks from one a shining eye
With one fair shove it takes its place
Tears drip down his sighted face
Fresh life restored him, that's the key
His sits, and rests, and takes his tea

Sight half restored he wanders wide
In search of one more gleaming eye
A mountain trail rugged and wide
Cuts through two more, one either side
A crossroad built through pristine sky
He looks around and wonders. Why?

BADASS

Players with +3 BADASS see the following.

Sick moves! Keep it up!

As it happens, the only people who see this notification are Alice! and Tuesday, and as the popup blinks in their UI they notice something far more worrying.

The shadow creatures have stopped approaching the party guests, and have started to turn. One after another, pair after pair of burning eyes turn and fix on them.

Alice! and Tuesday are being WATCHED

Poké-Pong!

The board is still thick with tiles, the message underneath still tantalizingly covered. "Partastic moves out there!" Chadwick says, jogging over to Alice! with a new card. "You and Tuesday really tore it up! And Finnegan Fjord? Sick kegstand my man!" He offers a fist for you to pound, before bending down to offer the same to Alice's Chikorita. "Same goes for you little Brokémon! Leaf it to the brofessionals, amirite?" He stands up and offers the shield card to Alice.

Card 4: Hot Potato

This card is now a HOT POTATO! Hand it off to another player by any means necessary, just make sure you aren't holding it when the round ends!

To Alice!'s eyes, both the Hot Potato card and the Cowboy Dance card suddenly hold more than text. They are both marked with strange, ichorous symbols.

"Okay guys, enough 'Pong for now. I think we're all ready for the main event: The Scavenger Hunt!" 

The crowd cheers! Several bros finish their drinks, and there is a short-lived cheer of "Praise the Keg!" before attention falls back onto C0D13:Chadwick

"Did I say Scavenger Hunt? I actually meant Murder Mystery scavenger hunt," he said, a smile playing across his face. "That's right! Just like in Clue! I know my man Tripp knows what I'm talking about!"

"Woo!"

"Praise the Keg!"

"Right on! So, it's kinda like Clue, except you don't know the people or any of the possible murder weapons beforehand. All you know if the places!"

Chadwick opens the door, and a UI popup appears.

Bronstanton Manor is now Unlocked

Details

• The house is now accessible!
• You can post as many times as you want this round.
• You can still play Poké-Pong
• You can upgrade skill trees during this challenge, and if you started with less than 3 Pokemon you can catch more and add them to your team.

There will be a mid-round update in 48 hours

The round will end 6:00am 23rd of October (Eastern Time)

Apparently Alex had not chosen a great moment to take a pee break. Like most gamers, she preferred not having to close a game to do something that would take a couple minutes so she'd left her avatar idle after celebrating Stella's success with Poké-Pong. On her way back to the game, she'd taken another minute to chug some water (as if it would make a difference when she was plugged back into the WorldScreen) and finally enabled the deep-dive to get back into the game.

Someone had Gigantimaxed their Pikachu (which, Alice had to admit, was #Badass), there was a giant and delicious-looking pie, and Bergamot Gristleborg was just finishing a story she was sharing with herself and another pink-haired player. "True, but at least now there's no Focus Punch Line.'" Hating the idea of missing anything, she opened her user interface and scrolled through all the dialogue she'd missed, chiefly Morgana's utterly baffling story that she couldn't help but laugh belatedly at once she'd finished. By that point, of course, the player had already moved on to other things, so it probably looked like she was laughing at nothing at all.

"God, I'm so awkward," she sighed, just as a notification appeared for her titled Cowboy Dance. "Oh no." They weren't really going to make her dance, right? She was terrible at dancing. She was the kind of girl who watched everyone else dance at weddings because she didn't know what to do with her body. But she was going to have to figure it out momentarily, because she wasn't about to lose this challenge either.

"First things first," she muttered, her eyes zeroing in on the jello shots. This suited her better than the dank-tasting forest beers, and within a moment she'd knocked one back. It burned satisfyingly down her throat. As she grabbed another, she watched Finnegan Fjord's incredible kegstand and immediately started chanting, "CHUG, CHUG, CHUG!" which turned into "FINN! FINN! FINN!" until he finished it off. What a #Badass! She needed to stand up to her own challenge with an attitude like that! But she'd need another shot for that. "Where did..?" Oh. In her excitement, she'd launched her other jello shot straight into the air behind her and it'd spattered all over someone. "I am so sorry! Let me help you get cleaned up!"

She felt terrible. She wasn't even drunk yet, just pleasantly buzzed, and she was already this messy? Embarrassing. At the sound of her name though, she glanced around and upon finding the source was Tuesday, forgot all about helping her victim get cleaned up. "COMING!" she shouted, swiping another jello shot and hurrying to where she'd been summoned. "Oh, you already have a drink for me," she observed. "Let me just..." She swallowed the jello shot a little clumsily. "Now I'll take that," she said cheerfully, taking the other drink from Tuesday's hand and taking a nice big swallow. She must really be a lightweight or something because she had to be a bit past buzzed if the forest beer suddenly tasted pretty good.

Tuesday toasted their drinks with some #Badass rhyming, making Alice giggle every three seconds like a child. She'd always been a happy drinker, and with it came the sense that she actually could dance right now, if she tried. "Last chance. Let's dance." Tuesday's Cryogonal spun with a beautiful array of colors as its Aurora Beam activated.

Alice started with mimicking some of Tuesday's dance moves, since she obviously knew what she was doing, and once she had a sense of the movements began to try some footwork of her own. Had it been thirty seconds yet? She pulled up the notification again for the challenge. Oh shit! It specifically mentioned a partner! But it didn't specify the kind of partner... "Hey, Stella!" she yelled, intent on keeping her feet moving as she danced around looking for her mysteriously missing Chikorita. "Stella?" Had he ditched her? Oh forget it, if he didn't qualify as a partner for this challenge she needn't waste her time. "Tuesday... if I step on your feet, I'm so sorry!" Without further warning, she grabbed her by the arm to launch both of them into her best imitation of a fast-paced swing dance to the tune of the fiddling currently overwhelming her UI.

She only stopped when the fiddling had faded a little, which seemed to signal her time minimum for the challenge had been fulfilled. She sank to the ground, worn out from the combination of fancy footwork and forest beer/shots. "Phew... dance fever took me," she grinned at Tuesday. "I'm good now. Where'd my drink go?" Something nudged her on the side and she twisted to find one of Stella's vines had nudged her and was holding up her drink for her. "There you are! Hey, did you have some? I feel like there was a lot more in there."

"Some of it spilled when you dropped it," Stella explained, ever so patient as she took the beer from him and drank some more.

"Oh. Do you want some?"

"I think I'll pass." His red eyes flicked up and down his trainer.

"Woah, is that some judgement I'm sensing from you?"

Stella just smiled and began to back away.

"Wait, no! Poké-Pong!" she remembered. "The round must almost be over. Do the Poké-Pong for us, Stella! Get us another blue shield!"

Whether or not he judged her was still on the table, but at least he listened to her. He hopped over to the emptier-looking Poké-Pong table and used Magical Leaf as soon as Alice had gotten back to her feet to watch him.

f1_B|W|21-100
CHIKORITA | MAGICAL LEAF

STEEL (34) -1 buzz = 33 (SHIELD)
(what kind of insane luck)

She'd kind of said it as a bit of a joke, since it was honestly a marvel they'd hit the blue shield earlier, but to actually hit another... She was sufficiently stunned. "Stella, how are you doing this?!" Had she obtained the most pro Chikorita that'd ever lived?

As soon as she was given permission to sketch the Groudon as it was apparently called, Ruby got straight to work. Pulling out her notebook from her bag, she kneeled closer to get a better look.

"Jam... How marvelous you are." She spoke with a quiet sort of awe, like a scientist discovering a new species for the very first time. Of course, he had already been discovered. But it was the thought that counts!

She mumbled to herself as she drew, honestly forgetting about the party and the chaos going on around her for just a moment. Biology wasn't exactly her specific field of study, but she could hardly help herself. This world really did bring out the curiosity in her. "Interesting, it's built like a therapod, but it's armored almost akin to certain species from Ankylosauria, and-"

Midway through her drawing, the rather adorable water-bug Pokemon owned by orioncayge made its way beside them and her attention was briefly distracted. It was just as interesting! Its design reminded her of those bubble spiders and a bacteriophage. She couldn't help but wonder if this adorable thing evolved as well. Just how many of these pocket monsters evolved? Regardless, the bandana it wore only made it even more adorable. She smiled incredibly widely, reaching over to gently pat the bubble of the spider. "Hey there lil' one, I'll draw you next if you're still around when I finish up with Jam here."

As everyone else continued to play their game of Pokepong, Ruby decided enough was enough for her. No more drinking. That popup encouraging her to drink really only gave her bad feelings. It was like world-encouraged peer pressure. She could only imagine the mental side effects if someone had to log out now, despite being drunk within the game. Would their brain respond any differently, going from drunk to sober instantly?

Although, now that she had played at least once, she guessed that meant others could force her to take a drink if they won. Why couldn't it just be simple?

As Jam was pulled away briefly by Big Bee to take his turn at the game, Ruby finally couldn't help but look at the board. Almost instantly, her curious mind began to work once more as she recognized writing beneath the tiles. And then some of those words were altered by strange symbols. Curiouser, and curiouser.

"Shout... Huh?" It was the only word she could read easily on the board. She was partially tempted to ask Murmur to clear a tile themselves but decided against it. She had already decided she had more than enough drinking, after all. The Munna seemed content to just float by her side, lazily drifting in and out of sleep. She was definitely going to keep her eyes on that board though, something about it had her on edge.

Pausing in thought, she reached over to gently pat Jam's head regardless. A good boy deserved some good pats. "It's okay buddy, you'll get it next time. Just keep trying." With that, she'd just turn her notebook around to showcase her drawings to Jam themselves. These Pokemon were intelligent after all, she idly wondered what he'd think about his portrait.

Now this was how you got a party started! All the different kinds of music had her excited, quite literally grooving in place even as she watched everyone else take their turns at the Pokepong. Tuesday seemed to be doing alright, with a 4 winning score! Not half bad!

Turns out she wasn't that far behind either. With 2 winning score! And, only 4 buzzed? That seemed so low! It was time to crank that score high, and just get down and have a good time. Stepping back from the game for just a second, she took a moment to glance around at everything going on.

From the Meowth trying to sing along and get her attention, to the challenges from the shield tokens, to more plays at PokePong, it was a blast! She'd politely excuse herself from the game for just a second to grab another cold mug of beer from the keg directly, and down it right then and there! Might as well loosen up and have a little fun! It had been years since she got to drink like this without fear, why not just roll with it?

"Ahh, that hit the spot." Already buzzed, her eyes were wide with excitement as she outright tossed a second mug right at her Cryogonal. He caught it with one of his icy chains, only to tilt looking confused. "S'il vous plaît, tenez ça!" Laguna spoke French in response, simply waving at him with a thankful wave. "Er, hold that please!" She suddenly shouted afterward, unable to help but giggle like a drunken schoolgirl at her own mistake.

Even if she wasn't absolutely wasted yet, she was planning to be. It was time for nothing but kicking back and kicking butt at these games! Critical thinking? Language skills? Memory? What was that?

After all, English wasn't even her native language.

Luckily, Sir Hail was quite the polite Pokemon, even if he didn't quite understand what his trainer was saying at first, he held the mug rather dutifully as they slipped back over towards the PokePong table. Just in time to see Alice! strike the second shield in a row! What a totally #badass moment!

"Alright, uh- Glacia you beautiful Grelaçon you," Laguna spoke as she picked up her Bergmite into her arms, spinning in excitement. "It's time to use ice, I know you love jumping, but Fais-moi confiance."

Glacia absolutely did not understand the last words Laguna said, but she smiled happily anyways! Her eyes were just scanning the entire world, happy to help out no matter what!

"Berg! Berg!"

"That's my gal! Avalanche! Otarlette, Hexagel, Vent Glace!" Laguna shouted, practically tossing Glacia over towards her Brionne. One Pokemon balancing an iceberg on her nose, the other balancing a mug of ale as all kinds of shards of ice flew towards the PokePong board!

WdT|t2bv1d100 1d100 1d100
Bergmite Brionne Cryogonal

This time, it seemed Bergmite's ice-type attack struck true on a grass-type tile! Sure, her other Pokemon missed, but Glacia struck true! "See? I told you to trust me, dear!" Sure enough, she took the two drinks she owed from failing, almost right away, trying to down them as fast as she could. only to not only give herself a bit of a headache but make herself quite a bit dizzy. Her stomach certainly didn't like that, not one bit.

"Woah, Ok, ralentissez, Laguna. Ce n'est pas une compétition pour boire le plus." She spoke solely to herself, trying to keep her balance.

Despite being so distracted from the games, to just walking straight, she overheard something that immediately got her attention. h0lyn3v1l spoke some French! She gasped audibly, immediately slipping over towards his side. Too excited at the prospect of finally speaking with someone who also spoke her language in this game to really think things through, let alone the fact that he said like, two words. Especially if she'd be interrupting anything between him and Yggy Br00ks .

"Oooh, bonjour! Ça fait tellement longtemps que je n'ai pas eu un autre francophone avec qui discuter! Je viens d'avoir un coup, alors voici un verre pour toi, nouvel ami!" She had the genuine widest grin on her face, finally grabbing the perfectly chilled mug from her Cryogonal's chains and trying to hand it over towards h0lyn3v1l . Clearly trying to make him the one to drink for her victory. "Oh, désolé, je devrais dire mon nom d'abord! Regardez-moi, j'oublie mes bonnes manières! Mon nom est Laguna! Quel est le vôtre?"