Yes, yes, and yes.
Muds are not particularly resource intensive, as far as these things go. Especially on the client side.
Some IM protocols do have messages routed through a central server cluster, but many simply use the central server to dispatch contact information so that the IM clients can directly connect. An IRC server works almost exactly the same way as a mud server would, only it uses a simple protocol instead of plain text.
A plugin would basically mean a telnet client outputting its data to a window that's integrated with Trillian's UI. The backend processing would likely be exactly the same at a high level.
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