this is Salem, a land filled with magic and maladies. It is a place where witches and their elemental familiars gather, a home to legend and
lore that predates time itself. Yet of all the wicked and wonderful stories the past can tell us of, the most magical are the ones yet to happen.
This is Salem - this is the start of your very own journey. Welcome to starfall
Starfall is an animaga witch roleplay set in mostly modern times. Members play as witches in a world plagued by monsters, where the only safe spots are walled cities. Starfall strives to be a character-driven roleplay with expansive lore and a highly interactive plotline. We want to allow members to
create and look back on a magical journey, and mold the site and its plot as their characters grow.
Zephyr had dropped out of Lux University after barely starting his second year. Amazingly enough, his leaving wasn't caused by breaking school rules, nor was it due to his grades. Traditional academia just wasn't his cup of tea.
What would he get from reading old tomes, writing up papers on history that was already known, and displaying the most learned spellcasting form? Prestige? A degree? A merely theoretical (or, at best, environmentally controlled) grasp of practical skills? He learned better by doing things in the real world, without safety nets or hand-crafted, convenient situations, and would rather prove himself by creating something new instead of fitting himself to the preconceived notion of what a witch should be able to do.
That said, the university wasn't entirely without value. It was a gathering place of knowledgeable professors and academics, many of whom were willing to discus theories of mana flow and containment with non-students like Zephyr. Today, he'd dropped in to show a few of his more supportive professors something that he thought could be the start of something much bigger: a little clockwork mouse that could used stored mana as a power source. It was a magical device that even non-magical persons could operate. He received mixed reviews, with the most prevalent doubts stemming from whether he could replicate and scale this invention.
He'd been heading home to take up this challenge, but was rudely interrupted by one of his legs locking in place and missing a step, causing him to tumble forwards and nearly fall on his face, had he not hastily lifted up a patch of earth to catch himself on. "Feisty little shit..." he muttered as the prosthetic unexpectedly swung forwards. These malfunctions were more common than he'd like, especially in areas of concentrated magic use like the university. He'd learned that it was generally best to just wait it out. As he held himself up on the levitating patch of ground, Spock, his familiar, kindly swung down from his shoulder to detach the wayward limb. "Thanks, babe," he said as it fell to the ground with an unceremonious thud.
With the one leg he had left, Zeph hopped over to sit on the wall of a raised flower bed, which he assumed was used to grow ingredients for alchemical potions. Before he was even fully seated, however, he heard someone else fall. Gaze darting to the source, he saw a person lying on the ground right where he'd left his leg and a hole in the ground. "Ah, sorry 'bout that!" he called over, expression an apologetic grimace, though he didn't make the effort to stand back up and hobble over to help, "You alright?"
Vera Lindt I'll make a real post template one day. one day...
Last Edit: May 13, 2017 13:46:59 GMT by Zephyr Hart
While the man had the common sense to somehow cushion his fall earlier, Vera was too preoccupied with the mess of opened scrolls she was currently carrying to even see the prosthetic limb lying innocently on the floor. Not to mention her fire magic would do little to soften any fall. If anything, it would just burn her. It was not uncommon for fire magic wielders to die upon a sudden outburst, either. A thought crosses her mind then, fickle: It would not hurt for the council to pass a regulation to prevent such cases.
The scrolls jump into the air, and for a moment they look pretty. Happy. Cheerful, like graduation caps being holstered up in cheer. Until gravity decides to do its wonders and they all fall on top of her. Vera yelps, lifting an arm to cover her face. At least they're not as hard as graduation caps would be, offers her familiar as he hurries to her fallen form. His big rodent ass and comparatively small and thin toes manage to successfully—unhelpfully?—pin her scrolls down. It's little comfort, but comfort nonetheless.
"You alright?" calls a voice from somewhere in their vicinity. It's funny, really. For a moment, Vera thinks it's her familiar, Fondue. They're so used to conversing via their mental link that she's forgotten how his voice sounds.
There was also the little detail of her being unable to pinpoint any other witches close enough to warrant their apologizing for her fall. "Yeah..." she begins, hesitant, until her eyes finally settle on a blond man sitting atop the marigold and motherwort she was meaning to pick up. Her first thought at this sight is to half-politely reprimand him for the damage he could be doing to the plants; but he was, after all, expecting an answer for his question. "Yes! I'm fine. Sorry—" And his missing leg, of course. Like any other missing limb, it was hard to miss.
She panics. Starts to blabber about how "Professor Periwinkle just gave me these scrolls and shooed me out of the classroom and didn't even give me time to properly order them, so I was hoping to do that once I got here. It has been giving me the biggest obsessive-compulsive thoughts, if I am to be honest. I'm not usually such a mess, I promise you. But oh." She stops only once she's comforted enough by the sound of her own talking to no longer feel awkward when she asks, "Are you all right?"
To anyone listening, it would sound like she's just noticed his own predicament, however.
[attr="class","gearcore"]Zeph had always thought that he talked a lot, but this girl beat him by a mile. After she said she was fine, Zeph didn't even know if her words were going in any particular direction, or if she was just spurting the first thing that came to mind. He tried to follow what she was saying, while Spock simply tilted her head with a perplexed expression.
When the flustered girl asks how he's doing, it's the first moment Zeph even has room to speak. "Oh, yeh, right as rain," he replies with a smile as if to prove he's unhurt, "Just waitin' out--" his detached prosthetic kicks a few times without warning before he even finishes "-- yeh, waitin' out that t' sort itself out. Bit of a hassle walkin' on disagreeable legs."
As Zephyr talks, Spock hops from his back to the short garden wall he's sitting on, then again from the wall to the ground. She makes her way over to the giant rodent sitting on all of the scrolls, pondering her chances of being able to pick one up without receiving lash-back. "Fuck ol' Peri, though. Least she could do is give ya a bag... So I guess this means she's still got students playin' messenger, eh?" Yet another reason Zeph dropped out: professors asking him to do absolutely meaningless simple tasks. He was of the firm opinion that if people wanted something done, they should do it themselves or at least offer compensation. "I've got one if ya need it... an' ya don't mind a bit o' wood an' metal shavin's bein' in there." He unhooked a leather bag of compact design from around his shoulder and held it up for her to see. It contained a few miscellaneous tools, scraps of blueprints, and a mechanical mouse -- nothing he'd miss too terribly if it were to get lost -- but was mostly empty in case he wandered across any potential parts he wanted to work with. This was a common enough occurrence for him to carry it around pretty much constantly. "Yours t' use as long as ya bring it back. I reckon I'll be here a while."
