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DECEMBER EVENT/TDM
bulletin board updates
✽ There are several new points of interest at the bulletin board this month, most prominently a wooden box with the slit on the top just large enough to drop a sheet of paper inside. Above is an explanation of Secret Santa and a form to fill out for those interested in participating to write down their name, homeroom, and locker number. Sign-ups close on 12/5, and following assignments, gifts may be given in person or through one of the student council members if anonymous gifting is preferred (contact the mod to hire a stuco elf).
✽ Right next to this box is a poster with a large orange giraffe painted on it. The contents of the poster has nothing to do with giraffes, but rather, is an advertisement for student store commissions featuring quality work with quick turnarounds and a special discount for the month of December if you buy five or more commissions, or bring the shopkeep a warm drink and maybe a snack while they're working.
✽ To the side of the class roster and current ranks is a digital countdown, and scrawled on the bulletin board itself is the message "You're almost there! You can do it! One more push!" but it's unclear whether this message refers to the countdown to the new year, or to the long glass tube situated along the edge of the bulletin board next to it. Maybe both. The tube looks similar to a graduated cylinder, holding a total volume of 5000 ml and currently containing 4850 ml of dark red (presumably) blood, hot to the touch. It can not be broken or removed. The mod will be in contact if any character action this month causes the volume to change.
✽ A neatly typed notice, half buried under all the other announcements, contains a reminder that tuition will be due soon for those students continuing to study at Yogen. If tuition is not paid in full by the end of February, "compensation" will be taken instead.
✽ And finally, there is a notice from the student council that proof of club activity is once again due for submission to the student council by 12/24, otherwise the club will be dissolved and resources taken back. Please submit activity proof to the toplevel below.
✽ Right next to this box is a poster with a large orange giraffe painted on it. The contents of the poster has nothing to do with giraffes, but rather, is an advertisement for student store commissions featuring quality work with quick turnarounds and a special discount for the month of December if you buy five or more commissions, or bring the shopkeep a warm drink and maybe a snack while they're working.
✽ To the side of the class roster and current ranks is a digital countdown, and scrawled on the bulletin board itself is the message "You're almost there! You can do it! One more push!" but it's unclear whether this message refers to the countdown to the new year, or to the long glass tube situated along the edge of the bulletin board next to it. Maybe both. The tube looks similar to a graduated cylinder, holding a total volume of 5000 ml and currently containing 4850 ml of dark red (presumably) blood, hot to the touch. It can not be broken or removed. The mod will be in contact if any character action this month causes the volume to change.
✽ A neatly typed notice, half buried under all the other announcements, contains a reminder that tuition will be due soon for those students continuing to study at Yogen. If tuition is not paid in full by the end of February, "compensation" will be taken instead.
✽ And finally, there is a notice from the student council that proof of club activity is once again due for submission to the student council by 12/24, otherwise the club will be dissolved and resources taken back. Please submit activity proof to the toplevel below.
12/20 - 12/24 finals week
✽ The week before winter break is finals, with many students cramming as many math formulas and foreign country leaders into their heads as possible without it all spilling over, while other students have decided to chance the practicum instead. Those who have signed up for the practicum are asked to meet inside the auditorium after homeroom at the start of the day while test takers begin their written exams. Students are allowed to change their minds on which to take, up until the end of homeroom on Monday, after the bell rings and the doors close.
✽ For the test takers, finals last for five days, from 8AM until noon each day, after which students are allowed to go home, or have lunch and continue studying in their homerooms or in the library. At the end of finals on Friday, students are asked to remain in their homerooms over lunch break while their exams finish being graded, after which homeroom teachers will return and ask certain students to go with them to the faculty office. These are the failing students. Which the homeroom teachers themselves have the pleasure of executing for their failures. All other students are dismissed and wished a happy winter break.
✽ For those opting for the practicum, finals last for two days, from 8AM until noon on Monday and Tuesday. All students from all grades meet in the auditorium the first day and are told the very simple rules for this semester's practicum: in order to raise your failing grade, all you have to do is kill another student, upon which you take their points for yourself. At the start of both days, students first gather in the auditorium for a headcount and then are given a half hour no-killing grace period during which they are allowed to scatter and find the best sniping/ambushing/hiding spots. The hunt is limited to four hours each day and kills must be done on campus; any kills done outside of these parameters are just for fun and do not count towards their final grade. Points are given for kills involving students in the same grade level of different homerooms (e.g. third years only benefit from killing other third years) and points are revoked for kills involving other grade levels or test takers not participating in the practicum. They studied hard, leave them alone. Most students need only one or two kills to pass, but multiple kills stack and earn them extra credit that will carry over to the next semester. Students who end the second day with a still failing grade will be called to the faculty office. ... All remaining students are dismissed and wished a happy (early!) winter break.
✽ A winter storm starts to whip up around noon on the 24th, raging through the night before settling down come morning, blanketing the entire campus with several feet of snow.
✽ For the test takers, finals last for five days, from 8AM until noon each day, after which students are allowed to go home, or have lunch and continue studying in their homerooms or in the library. At the end of finals on Friday, students are asked to remain in their homerooms over lunch break while their exams finish being graded, after which homeroom teachers will return and ask certain students to go with them to the faculty office. These are the failing students. Which the homeroom teachers themselves have the pleasure of executing for their failures. All other students are dismissed and wished a happy winter break.
✽ For those opting for the practicum, finals last for two days, from 8AM until noon on Monday and Tuesday. All students from all grades meet in the auditorium the first day and are told the very simple rules for this semester's practicum: in order to raise your failing grade, all you have to do is kill another student, upon which you take their points for yourself. At the start of both days, students first gather in the auditorium for a headcount and then are given a half hour no-killing grace period during which they are allowed to scatter and find the best sniping/ambushing/hiding spots. The hunt is limited to four hours each day and kills must be done on campus; any kills done outside of these parameters are just for fun and do not count towards their final grade. Points are given for kills involving students in the same grade level of different homerooms (e.g. third years only benefit from killing other third years) and points are revoked for kills involving other grade levels or test takers not participating in the practicum. They studied hard, leave them alone. Most students need only one or two kills to pass, but multiple kills stack and earn them extra credit that will carry over to the next semester. Students who end the second day with a still failing grade will be called to the faculty office. ... All remaining students are dismissed and wished a happy (early!) winter break.
✽ A winter storm starts to whip up around noon on the 24th, raging through the night before settling down come morning, blanketing the entire campus with several feet of snow.
OOC
✽ PC faculty still have finals: they will either take written exams excluding that of their own subject, or they can take the practicum. Players with faculty characters are asked to reply to the toplevel below to indicate the number of failed students per class, but characters do NOT have to ICly be responsible for killing failed students. Unless they're cool with that, and if so, please let me know.
✽ This is a reminder that for any character that murders (again, please let me know), they will experience the same pain the following night and lose powers/abilities for one week. Two weeks after the murder, +1 tally and +100 merit points will be awarded for each kill.
✽ The void in the auditorium continues to grow, and (pending character interaction) by the end of the month will encompass the entire right wing of all floors, including the locker area but not the rooftop. Please mind the void, murderers.
✽ This is a reminder that for any character that murders (again, please let me know), they will experience the same pain the following night and lose powers/abilities for one week. Two weeks after the murder, +1 tally and +100 merit points will be awarded for each kill.
✽ The void in the auditorium continues to grow, and (pending character interaction) by the end of the month will encompass the entire right wing of all floors, including the locker area but not the rooftop. Please mind the void, murderers.
no subject
On the plus side, he ]
Yep. Everything here's below my level, so it's sorta boring... Well, I've been able to learn other things here though, so I guess it's not so bad.
[ It was interesting enough to learn about other people and their perspectives, not to mention this place. It was different. ]
You've been out of school for awhile, right? That mean you're playing catch up here?
[ That seems to be the case for a couple people here, though he thinks that most of them just refuse to apply themselves. That's not really his problem though. ]
no subject
[Wait, is Ranger a super genius? Her petty senses are tingling. If he's really good at schoolwork then he might outscore her in the exams... Is he in her grade level? She really needs to be scoping out the competition before declaring war on her classmates, huh... Is murder school really the place for these mundane concerns, satou?
Her petty mindset comes into focus when Ranger accidentally questions her intelligence. Satou puts a hand to her chest and grins the most smug of grins.]
Not at all! Magic is all about maths and sciences, so this'll be a cakewalk.
[Literature and history, on the other hand...]
no subject
He perks up at the mention of magic being about math and science though. ]
Ah, well, I worked in medicine and technology, so high school level stuff's pretty easy... But magic is about math and science, huh? How's that work?
[ He didn't think the two could intersect like that. ]
no subject
Mm! Magic is all about testing the limits of what science and math have set for normal people, you know? In order to be really good at it, you need to know a lot about the limits you're breaking and sort of... push them, I guess? Redefine them?
I wish I still had my magic. I'd show you... [Another reason for feeling so useless.]
no subject
[ It seems like people here tend to get their abilities back over time, after all, and he really is curious about the whole process. He seems genuinely curious about the entire thing, bordering on excitement, precisely because he loves both those topics and the idea of how they can be utilized. The idea of pushing and redefining them is exactly what humans are intended to do, after all.
He considers that for a moment, though. ]
So does that meant that to get better at magic, you have to learn both about the magic itself, and the forces behind them? Sounds tough.
[ Difficult, yet impressive for those who can manage it. ]
no subject
Yes, precisely like that. Magic is like... Art, maybe? You need to balance what you picture in your head with what your canvas can hold. The art being magic and the canvas being the laws of physics.
[She's soaking up the comment 'sounds tough,' because she takes it as 'you must be tough.' A compliment.]
Do you have magic back home, Ranger-san?
no subject
No, nothing like that. We just have science, though humans have done some miraculous things thanks to the advances we've made. For example, we have a salve that can expedite cellular repair, so minor cuts and injuries heal within a few minutes...
[ They could even create dolls that passed as human. ]
You could probably do more than that with magic though, right?
no subject
[Satou answers brightly and without hesitation. She isn't sure if those things exist in this school, but if they don't then her magic could provide them. But she's not telling Ranger the whole truth. If she needed to heal someone, she'd need for them to trust her. That can't happen if they know that Satou's magic doesn't heal injuries, but places them on her body instead.]
But you shouldn't count humans out. I'm pretty sure that anything I can do with magic, a human can do if they have enough willpower. My magic will just get there faster.
no subject
You're right about that. Humans have already done the impossible. We've managed to create salves that can heal wounds within seconds and minutes instead of days, and it's even possible to create a doll that's functionally human.
[ It occurs to him after saying this that people here wouldn't be familiar with the term. ]
You might call them "androids" or something similar. It's the same basic concept of a hyper advanced AI that's basically indistinguishable from a human.
[ He's thinking of the AIs based on the death game's participants rather than himself here, and so it doesn't quite occur to him that he himself appears to be nothing more or less than a somewhat quirky human. After all, it should be obvious, right? ]
no subject
[Calling them 'dolls' seems weird!]
That's amazing though. It sounds like your world has more advancements than mine. Where I'm from, the closet we've done with magic is to make magical familiars. But I don't actually know how to do that myself.
[There's some dramatic irony in how Satou thinks about the 'dolls' that Ranger has described. She does not yet know that her little sister is one of the 'magical familiars' she just mentioned. She doesn't realize that Sakura's doll-like charm is a result of Satou's own magical influence.]
With all of that, my magic seems pretty useless. Sounds like an ideal outcome, actually.
no subject
How odd. ]
You think so? It just sounds like a different way of accomplishing the same goal. I'm sure your magic can do things that we can't... [ Which is what makes it interesting - it's a different specialty, and one that likely has a different kind of potential. ] What are magical familiars?
no subject
[She'd like to be able to do something unique with her magic! ... if she ever gets it back.]
Ah, a familiar is like... Hm. I've never made one myself. But my friend Holly-chan makes them. She says you create a form out of magic and then you can attach a spirit to it. The spirits are kind of like... computers, I guess? I don't know how to explain something I've never made. Sorry.
no subject
Hm, so you're just constructing a body for a soul that you plucked outta the ether there, right?
[ It reminds him of catching fireflies in a jar. Familiars are close to dolls, then, but not the same - the former is a soul without a body, the latter is a body without a soul. ]
Why're they called familiars?