westwhere | the house of manouk

the house of manouk | test drive meme

Hello, hello! Our latest event — doubling as a test drive meme and stretching until 12 August — is a one-off incursion in an uncharted time pocket dimension — the House of Manouk.

Anyone can hit up the test drive meme, but you will need an invite from an existing player to apply on 5 August. Have fun!

THE HOUSE OF MANOUK

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THE TERRACE

Old or new, you wake up on a white-stone terrace dominated by a twisting hedge maze that houses great columns, tattered statues, ponds, rivers, gazebos and pergolas — and high looming walls of thickly bound ivy, bloomed roses or thorny vines. Walking the Terrace somehow always brings you deeper into the maze, while a flushed, sunless sky stares down, unblinking.

You experience no thirst, hunger or language barriers here. Old translation & communication pendants can nevertheless be found scattered across the Terrace and Grounds.

New arrivals encounter the sorceress Karsa, who explains you were likely summoned by one of the undead lords who seeks control of Akhuras — and reached, along with the party she leads, a pocket dimension outside of time. Karsa’s associate, the Merchant, instructed to exit the time dimension by finding Ellethian waypoints — typically stone tokens engraved with the carvings of an eye with a sun for a pupil. Karsa may activate them for you to leave this place.

Your mission is to search the House and find the waypoints of Ellethia or of the rival Dawn’s Reach Trade Company without attracting the ire of the local exiled overlord(s).

■ Some of the statues you discover on the Terrace seem crudely carved, gaining the features of your loved ones, the longer you stare at them. Some seek to throttle. Escape them by having someone else stare at them, becoming their new target, or by leading them in a crowd of other statues.

■ Beware getting pricked by thorns: covetous vines can quickly ensnare and pull you into the maze’s green walls, or bind your hand to that of your companion.

■ The maze’s weather often mimics your mood: nice and balmy for contentment, cold for fear, torrential rain for sadness and a heatwave to answer anger. Smile.

■ Every now and then, you hear screams from other parts of the maze. Run, and you might find pairs of steel manacles or rusted chain on bloodied grounds, from where fresh rose bushes quickly rise up. Investigate.

■ Go deeper in the maze, and you find a heap of small stone tablets. Most list names, ages, occupations and include loving remarks, such as the finest husband or she smiled ever bright. Alarmingly, when your companion’s back is turned, you find tablets engraved with your handwriting, saying, don’t turn your back to them, blood reeks strong on them and that’s not their name. There are no waypoint tokens here.

■ Spend enough time in the maze, and you discover an old, red-eyed, white-haired and hunchbacked man with two chainless shackles on his wrists. He ignores you, muttering to himself about how the House must keep moving, moving. The House doesn’t like you. The House is awake. The House should sleep. The old man hits or trips you with his cane, or you might wake to find him hovering very closely over you. Engage him.

■ Now and then, he seems suddenly alert, if not outright fearful, shrieking that he comes and rushing to tinker with pulleys and stone mechanisms hidden within the maze vine walls. The maze’s architecture abruptly changes, with the ground quaking, walls shifting, while old plants wilt and fresh ones rise up within heartbeats. As the House changes, you might spot a long, spiralling staircase at short distance. Go down into…

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THE GROUNDS

The ground level of the House is splintered in dozens of decaying rooms, many locked. There are no windows here, dust thick in every corner, while faint scratches and canine footprints mar the floors — the marks of dozens of great skeletal hounds that haunt the corridors.

The dogs lead, chase or drag you towards a shuttered hall room, where a middle-aged, red-eyed and white-haired man furiously searches through haphazard mounds of tousled tomes. He too wears shackles. His manner is perfunctorily polite, as he calls back his dogs.

”…not from around here, are you? Must have broken time. Hooligan. Well, you’ve travelled centuries to be disappointed. There are no mysteries here, no epiphanies. All the great wells of myth and magic? Some other pigs have drunk them dry. Blame your luck, for bringing you to the shambling hut of — …the fine House of Manouk. Taravast’s greatest necromancer, til his mind turned to slaughter.

I was his disciple. Lisanther. Must’ve come from high on, did you? These cursed shackles… he senses everyone in his House through them. If he feels us on his scent, he works his little screws and wheels and moves the House stairs. Impressed? Don’t be. He’s a wreck, who feasts on time echoes of the anguished. That’s him. Paints a picture, doesn’t he? Stay out of his sights, or you’ll wear his chains soon too. Same as me, same as the dog he keeps in the dungeons. Dragged back every time he wanders.

If you want to make yourself useful, help me. I traded fairly with a caravan of the Dawn’s Reach Trade Company. They say they left behind scrolls in these grounds, with the words to free me. They overcharge, but they don’t lie. Help me find them. Break my chains, and I’ll break us out. I can. I swear it. ”

Deeper into the claustrophobic Grounds, you find specters of men and women, chained just like Lisanther — their skin translucent, their gazes lethargic. They feel neither dead nor alive to the magically sensitive. They are either very present in the moment or barely recall their whereabouts. If asked about tokens, they say the Dawn’s Reach Trade Company left scrolls in the Grounds main quarters:

▶ Bathing quarters

At times pristine and delightful, at others blood-marked and torn. The waters abruptly run very hot, cold or silty. The spectre of a wo/man might appear in the tub, staring unblinkingly or murmuring that people do all sorts of wickedness in this bathroom: they have even witnessed stabbings, treasures being hidden beneath tile boards, and even a birthing!

▶ Kitchens

Sprawling and soot-laden, bursting with supplies of stale wheat, eccentric cakes, exotic fruit and spice jars, these kitchens were built for long service. A heavy cauldron bubbles and boils a green broth in a cold fireplace, where ash and stone drown wood. A circle of spectres troubleshoots how to improve the meal — just as the kitchens’ doors slam shut, and they cordially invite you to do the legwork for their recipe. They instruct you to chop, clean and prepare the most unusual ingredients: hair of a dog, salt, moulded thyme, arsenic, one of your finest love stories… they’ll tire of their creation and release you within the hour. Don’t dine, dash.

▶ Sleeping chambers

There’s rest for the wicked in these deserted sleeping quarters, which boast exceptionally well-stuffed cushions and pillows, blankets and ‘reading materials’ — torn pages from books of history and magic. Some speak of the desperate attempts of the rulers of Taravast to flee death. Others talk of using spells, the elements and even mass sacrifice to achieve immortality. Enjoy your rest, only perturbed by occasional distant screams —

…or perhaps by a large, feral white bear that bursts in to briefly chase you, before disappearing. Veteran travellers may recognise him as the creature of Anurr.

Some of the chain-breaking scrolls of the Dawn’s Reach Trade Company can be found in each of the main rooms, along with some of the Company’s talismans, marked as waypoints, which should be brought to Karsa. See what your character finds.

Finish up here, or meander down a final stairwell to —

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THE DUNGEONS

Cold, deteriorating, crumbling — difficult to say if this is a tightly bound knot of underground tunnels, or a torturous weave of lost dungeons. Parts of the floor crumble to reveal abyssal depths below — or suddenly appear beneath your feet, to help your progress. Emptied, creaking bookcases abound. Here and there, you see your reflection in shattered wall-length mirrors, moving differently than you, or just slightly older or younger than you are.

■ Revived skeletons patrol the corridors, scantily armed with base blades, stones and torches. They largely ignore you, only blocking your path if you near a magically-locked stone door in the back of the Dungeons, from where you hear… human pleas.

■ Door engravings instruct to speak out the three truths of each day. Nearby, you find a mound of crumbled stone tablets, along with three golden ones raised on pedestals that read:

▶ with morning, my body is a weapon, sun-seeking, righteousness-bound

▶ by midday, my flesh has bent and battered, a shield of justice for young life to come

▶ come evening, I am blood and bone, a humble house to hope eternal

■ Tip bookcases into the narrow corridors to prevent the skeletal guards from reaching you, as you search diligently through the stone debris beneath the golden pedestals. You might even find Ellethian waypoint tokens: palm-wide, marked with a sun pupil. Take them to Karsa immediately… or open the now unlocked dungeon door as a man calls out.

■ Enter, and you discover an dimly lit dungeon alcove, with animate skeletal heads hanging on each wall. They cackle, Mind your step. Heed them and look for holes in the floor tiles — needle-thin spikes emerge from there periodically.

■ Go deeper, and you discover a large bare stone room, scantly livened by torches bearing green fire. A small hole — barely enough to fit a grown man standing and lying down — has been dug into one of the walls and secured. This inhumane prison’s bars crackle and sizzle with magical electricity. A skeletal hound waits by, with a set of keys fastened to its collar.

■ A white-haired, red-eyed twenty-something young man sprawls haphazardly in the prison: battered, swathed in rags, shackled and wild. He holds out his blood-tipped hand between the bars, but fails to lure the dog close — and calls out to you, instead:

”You must be mad to come to me. The old man sent you? Finally? Good. How wonderful. I’ll spit on you, and I’ll spit on his grave. He left me here to die. And now he’s remembered me? What does he want? …no. It doesn’t matter. Rip the keys off that mutt and get me out of here. ”

You can engage or release him, if you coax the key from the recalcitrant dog. Or leave him be and see Karsa with your waypoint token.

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NOTES:

■ There are multiple waypoint tokens to leave the time dimension: the Dawn’s Reach Trade Company talismans, hidden in the Ground rooms, and the Ellethian tokens, found in the dungeons. Bring whichever one you discover to Karsa.

■ You can optionally solve the mystery of Lisanther, the prisoner, Manouk and the spectres.

■ The House’s layout changes periodically, but characters can find the stairs to travel across the three levels every few hours.

■ Mention in your top level if you play an old timer or a test driving tourist. TDMers can make both logs and network prompts here!

■ QUESTIONS & NPC INBOX!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

i. THE TERRACE

[ It's difficult to say what hour of the day it is, with no sun in the sky to mark the passage of time. Hardly the most unusual thing about this circumstance, or the most troubling, but it's what sticks out to him most as he makes his way slowly and quietly through the maze of green.

Sometimes, it feels like he's been wandering these paths for days.

Still, patience maintains. He doesn't rush ahead, pausing at intersections to gaze beyond before taking those first steps down a new path. As he goes, he pauses to kneel, pulling a small knife from his belt and etching a small arrow into the earth. Perhaps if he winds up circling back on himself, he'll be able to find these small markers along the way and right himself.

But the paths wind on, as his frustration and confusion rise, so does a thick, humid mist, as soupy and bewildering as his state of mind. One hand lifts to brush his bangs from his face, squinting against the sudden creeping fog. Seeing ahead becomes more difficult, and as he encounters more of those odd, crumbling statues--

There. For a moment he could have sworn he'd seen his father's face, in that one, and his heart goes still. But before he has the chance to dwell on it, there's the noise of rapidly shifting foliage, the swift zzzzzzzp! that almost sounds like ropes being drawn against one another, and sounds of a struggle up ahead.

Drawing Shalamayne from his back, the young king forgets the growing ache in his legs, and darts forward in search of the source of the noises. If someone needs help, then these trinkets they're supposedly looking for can wait just a little longer. ]

iii. THE GROUNDS

[ There is something heartbreaking about the number of ghostly figures that haunt these halls. Though he's encountered undead more than a few times in his life -- generally in opposition, but not always -- there is something decidedly odd about the presences he finds here. Alive and dead at once, hovering in this strange in-between that the Light does not touch.

He feels for them, and if there were a way to free them from this place? He would. No one deserves this fate, not to his mind. But the most he can do for now is leave them to their wanderings and continue his search.

At least one of the apparitions does seem aware enough to point him in a general direction, and through the halls Anduin finds himself in an ornate and pristine bathing room. Glancing around to see if there are signs that anyone has already checked this area, he sees what he thinks might be a loose tile near the base of the tub.

It's hard to kneel in his armor, but he manages, gloved fingers running over the uneven surface before movement catches his eye--

A ghostly woman's face, peering back at him out of the tub, as if she'd been there the whole time and he'd just intruded upon her.

With a startled noise he jerks back, nearly falling to the floor and only just catching himself. ]

By the Light--

[ As Anduin moves through the maze, the weather changes.

Hot, somehow, yet with progressively heavy rain and thunder. It's strange, how he hasn't gone far at all, and yet he has? He must have, for the thunder rumbles deep.

Wrathion is furious, and miserable, and tired. ]

Let go of me --

[ Fire erupts out from his feet, and the vines only wrap up him further. Up his leg, middle, around his arm. ]

Cease these games! I will --

[ Only there are footsteps, swift. He looks up, brow drawn in irritation, hair plastered wet, ready to unleash his ire on someone new --

Then for a moment just blinks. ]

Anduin?

[ Only it can't be, and he's been tricked before. Ghosts, cruelly mocking him with Anduin's kind face. He snarls. ]

I tire of being toyed with. Release me!

[ Only even as Wrathion tries to rip them off, more vines are snaking across the ground -- and no longer just aiming for him. ]

[ It can't be--

As the mist turns to a stormy downpour, sheets of rain just as obstructive to his vision as the fog had been, Anduin can hear that familiar voice cracking over the thunder. Something sour and tight twists in his stomach as those flame-red eyes meet his, his own gaze hardening. ]

...Wrathion?

[ Of course. Of course Wrathion would be here, as well. Why wouldn't he be? It would hardly be his first time causing chaos in other worlds and unwittingly dragging Anduin into the consequences. Admittedly, the thought is an unfair one, but his grip tightens on his sword all the same as Wrathion struggles.

He almost misses the vines slithering like serpents across the ground until they're nearly around his ankles. With a cry he turns, slashing at the thick tendrils and sending plant matter scattering across the wet soil. Without pausing, the young king turns back towards the struggling figure being pulled into the maze's walls, raising the blade over his head and bringing it down, severing several of the vines at once.

But it doesn't quite cut through all of them, and in the blink of an eye more are lashing forward to bind around the hilt of the sword, and Anduin's wrist along with it. ]

[ Well that reaction is --

Different. He was half expecting this to be a new game where Anduin toyed with him, taunted him, reminded him of his failures. Instead, the figure wearing Anduin's face looks... angry.

Which wouldn't be the first time.

He snaps back to attention as Anduin goes down, struggling, and Wrathion growls in irritation again -- low, beastial. ]

Aren't you a priest --

[ Yet here he still is, wielding an oversized blade. Wrathion lashes out again with fire, burning through more vines, and one grabs him and begins trying to drag him closer to Anduin. ]

Oh yes, very amusing, I believe I read a lurid tale like this once before.

[ Honestly! At least they aren't tentacles. ]

[ He really hopes Wrathion can see him glaring at him through the downpour, his fair blond hair plastered against his cheeks. ]

Is now really the time?

[ All efforts to pull free are proving increasingly futile, it seems, but that isn't stopping him from attempting to tear free and away, with all the strength he can muster. He can feel his boots starting to sink into the mud, the flashes of heat against his skin as Wrathion's magic singes and scorches the surrounding foliage.

Anduin's teeth grit as another boom of thunder cracks around them, but he can't deny that the vines do seem to have a plan for the two of them: dragging them closer together, vines wind around one another, thorns hooking against each other and locking into place. ]

I'm open to suggestions.

[ He squints up into the rain, shakes his hair roughly like a wet dog as water runs down his face and neck. It's unpleasant, makes him feel cold even despite the otherwise warm air. Irritated, he looks down and tries to burn through another patch of vine. The heavy rain is making it difficult, slowing the catch of the flame.

At least, he supposes, he isn't at risk of burning them both too much.

His boots slide in the mud, and Wrathion frowns -- tries to think. He's not keen on being bound, not keen on sinking into mud, and not keen on being swallowed by a hedge either. The vines are, however, persistent. ]

This may be the time for drastic measures.

[ He isn't wrong. At least not this time.

As the rain continues to batter them both, Anduin takes a breath. He closes his eyes against the chaos, seeking that spark of calm and serenity at his core. The presence threaded through him, ever-present.

As he grasps it, the Light blossoms forth, extending around them like a protective bubble. Warmth washes away the cold and damp, and their section of the maze is briefly illuminated by the glow. The majority of the attacking vines seem to be pushed back by the spell of sanctuary, singed and retreating back into the wall of the maze.

All except for one tendril, now firmly locked around their wrists, no longer wriggling but rigid as steel, binding them together. ]

[ Usually, when drastic measures are called for, Wrathion is the one enacting them. He'd begun to brace himself, even as Anduin had closed his eyes, trying to decide. Should he take his true form? He could absolutely break all the vines that way --

A wave of magic washes over him. Warm, reassuring, and recognisably Anduin. Something about the Light always makes it hard to stay in a bad mood. Manipulative, but begrudgingly he cannot be annoyed about it right now. He looks up as the the bubble extends, watching the vines as they are burned back, and his expression brightens.

In a total coincidence, the storm begins to ease too. The rain begins to abate, and the oppressive heat to ease. ]

Excellent work! I knew you had it in you.

[ Well done, sidekick. Wrathion, naturally the main character of life, takes stock of the situation. One problem down, what next? ]

Now to get out of this maze --

[ He turns to move, and immediately finds his wrist... has additional weight. ]

Titans, now what?

[ He begins digging in his coat for something... suitably small to try and cut through the vine with. It's an awkward process, one handed. ]

anduin wrynn | warcraft | tourist

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........I kept rereading to make sure I hadn't missed ii. lmf | the grounds!

whooo typos

pinches Anduin's cheek!!!

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