The doctor's office is hardly the funnest place in the world to be. Children crying, adults bickering in hushed, stressed tones, the receptionist looking incredibly bored...
Wait. How did you get here? Weren't you watching a powerpoint a second ago (or enjoying your time in your cozy apartment in Cerealia)? Well, now you're in ViViD, and in an attempt to concentrate on healthy living, CERES has released a new level: Health and You: A New Way to be Healthy. Sure, you could log out at any time if you're a ViViD pro and used to this whole experience, but now that you're here, why not sit back and enjoy it? Indulge in some easy level grinding or something. Besides, it'll take a little while for the game to let you log out without calling you a spineless quitter, and who wants that added to their ViViD rep?
So instead, take a look around the tiled hospital. Visit the receptionist and say hello (she ignores you, go back to your seat). Pick up a snack at the vending machine (except every single one only has these gross things in stock). Maybe you should just test the truth of that old idiom, "An apple a day keeps the doctor away", especially with that weird doctor over there. Is he staring at you? He might be staring at you.
Seriously, go find an apple before he comes over here.
 Well,
well,
well...
isn't it time for your c h e c k - u p?
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PHASE I [ 08 00 ] If you're a new arrival to this fine city, you will find yourself waking up in a bed after suffering through that unfortunate powerpoint. The sun streams through the window, the bed is uncomfortable but not terrible, and everything is quiet and idyllic... wait. Where are your clothes? You'll suddenly find yourself dressed only in a medical gown (yes, complete with back open) and you seem to be... in a hospital? That's new.
If you take a look at the medical chart attached to the bed, you’ll even find your chart, name on it and everything. That can’t be right, can it? You're the picture of health! You're welcome to wait around for the doctor to dispute these claims but no one's showing up anytime soon (aside from the possible roommate you might have, in the same situation as you). There’s nothing stopping you from leaving the room or looking around at least (except for the lack of clothes), but it’s all hospital as far as the eye can see. Try and be careful what rooms you poke your head into; there are some strange aliens getting their check-ups in there. They don't seem like they want to be bothered.
If you’re not a newcomer, and go into ViViD searching for riches and grand prizes (or just stumble in there by happenstance), the receptionist will stop you and hand you a stethoscope, lab coat, and name tag. Congratulations, you’re a doctor now, and you have free reign over the hospital. Go nuts. Or don’t, because there are still those aliens waiting for their check-ups. Now it’s your turn to get dragged away by a frazzled nurse to administrate a tentacle massage to a patient, as she's now on break! Have fun and don't get the hospital sued.
PHASE II [ 1000 ] Just don’t end up in the basement.
If you end up in the basement by some weird twist of fate (or via trapdoor, which could happen because let's be honest, this is ViViD), you’ll find yourself in a long, empty, blindingly white hallway. The floors are white, the walls are white, the ceiling and the flickering lights are white, and you have the odd feeling you're being followed.
If you turn to see who it is, you’ll find that it’s your younger self. They’re not solid. They’re not real. You can stick a hand through them, and it will go right through. But they are you, whether age 4 or age 14 or anywhere in between, and they’re covered in blood and holding an equally bloody knife. Quietly, as they follow you, they'll mumble, over and over and over again, “It was you, you did it, you killed them, you’re the murderer.”
And they will follow you until you get out of that blindingly white hallway, and away from those blindingly white lights, and if you tried to touch them, there will be blood on your hands. The younger you won't respond to anything you say, just following behind you like the frightening apparition they are. At least nothing else is stopping you from returning to the main hospital, no matter how surreal this experience might be. Just find the stairs.
PHASE III [ 1200 ] As soon as you’ve managed to escape the clutches of that frazzled nurse who still refuses to come back from break, you’ll find that the atmosphere has turned very dark indeed. There’s rain pounding against the windows, and as lightning flashes and thunder booms (it’s all ambiance, you see), there’s the tell-tale Mwahahahaha of an evil, mad doctor at work. What a sinister guy.
Turning a corner will lead you right to his very, very evil doctor's office. He's repurposed one for his sinister deeds and some nurses are looking very put out about it. There's someone attached to the medical table who might need some help and of course, it could be one of your friends that he’s snagged. You might want to help them before that very evil mad doctor tries to add an extra limb or two to your poor friend. Honestly, who needs three elbows?
Or maybe it’s you who’s been grabbed by him and attached to the medical table by strong, metal restraints. Hopefully someone follows the “Mad Scientist: This Way” signs all over the hospital and saves you because really, three elbows?
PHASE IV [ 1400 ] Of course, while the ambiance is still dark, grim and creepy, and the rain still beats upon the glass of the windows, there is a murder...because why wouldn't there be?
The director of the hospital has been found murdered, slumped in a seat in his office, hand in hand with his secretary. Oh no! You’re welcome to investigate the crime scene if you want, but it’s not a very good one; there aren’t any clues, and the director and his secretary actually seem to be alive if you prod them hard enough. They're a bit put out by your interruptions and might ask you to "go solve this somewhere else" the more you bother them. How rude of you to muck up their death scene.
But there’s a new quest for you, and it says this: Pursue Justice or Pursue the Truth?
If you choose to pursue Justice, you will find yourself dropped into a new ViViD level, this one a straight hospital hallway with no doors and alternate routes. Some posters line the hallway but most of the detail is lost in the dim light. Not far ahead of you, The Suspect can be seen running away. (Naturally, you can tell that they are The Suspect by their poorly scribbled out face and black silhouette.) If you should follow them all the way to the end of the hallway (and it is a long, long, long hallway), you can grab The Suspect. Of course, that's if you make it there without falling through any of the trapdoors, tripping over medical supplies or stumbling into less fortunate player characters. If you're successful, you’ll hear a jaunty tune and you’ll receive a bonus of 50,000 ViViD points. Congratulations! You may now log out and continue with your daily life.
If you choose to pursue the Truth, you will find yourself dropped into another ViViD level. This level is a maze; there are filing cabinets stuffed full of papers making up the walls (though the papers are all blank) and they seem oddly impossible to move. You will need to find your way through the maze while avoiding more trapdoors, more scattered medical supplies, the occasional angry cthulhu patient and the occasional player character who has been grabbed by the occasional angry cthulhu patient. Eventually you will be able to find the end of the maze and there you will find a scrap of paper with a clue on it, signed Bellona Recreare. You may now log out and continue with your daily life.
Strangely enough, you can’t seem to access that quest again once you’ve completed it once. Oh well.
BONUS [ xxxx ] There are plenty of sexy nurses wandering the hospital (yes, everywhere) and they know your shots aren’t up to date. Should they manage to catch you and jab you with one of their needles, you’ll have some of the following side effects:
➟ Unstoppable urge to hug the nearest person
➟ Unstoppable urge to kiss the nearest person
➟ Unstoppable urge to dance with the nearest person
➟ Hiccups that last for 20 minutes
➟ Uncontrollable laughter that lasts for 20 minutes
➟ Hallucinations that everyone around you is dead, which also lasts for 20 minutes
You may pick and choose which effects happen at which times or if there is a combination of them. Have fun!
[ Remember to apply proper warnings on threads with sensitive or inappropriate material and do let a mod know if your thread careens off into maiming or canoodling so we can lock the log. ] |
Welcome to Cerealia's July intro log! For your convenience, we have compiled the characters' arrival experience here, and should you have any questions, feel free to ask them here! You can also check the FAQ for more general inquiries. Should this event log hit Captcha, there is an all-purpose overflow here.
Regarding phase IV, should your characters tackle the alternate ViViD levels and make it all the way through, please PM the mod account to let us know if they picked Justice or the Truth, as that will have an overall impact on the game! You will also receive your plot clue at that time, should your character have gone down the Truth path. Please PM the mod account by July 29th with the decision your character has made; the thread does not have to be completed, that just will allow us to tally up the choices for August's event.
Thank you! |
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oldbie but ota!
phase i
That is, until she sees one of the frazzled-looking nurses peeking around the corner of the hallway that Ciel had just come from.
Okay....she spreads the edges of the white doctor's coat she was handed a little wider, hiding more of him (and looking ridiculous but that doesn't bother her at all).]
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The nurses do give her a cursory glance, but clearly not enough to actually see Ciel as they continue on. He stays completely still, at least until they turn a corner, and it's only then that he relaxes. Somewhat. His face is still approximately tomato-colored. ]
...Thank you.
[ He at least gives his thanks politely, but the irony is starting to dawn on him, so he takes a quick step back. This was inappropriate too, wasn't it? ]
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You are welcome. Are you alright? Why were you running?
[She pauses, staring for a beat.]
And your face is very red.
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I— Don't worry about it.
[ He doesn't want to explain... ]
Thank you. I'd rather not be taken by those harpies again.
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iia
When it seems like he's done, she finally decides to speak up. ]
...Excuse me. Would you like to find a way out together? [ She has her own ghost following her too, a small child that looks to be only about five years old. The ghost's eyes are soulless as it quietly repeats how she's the reason her friends have died over and over again. ]
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His eyes fall on the little girl whose appearance so matches hers. He hasn't heard his own "self" speak yet, but the details being shared between the two is enough for his mouth to set into a thin line instead. He's still trembling (with fear or anger, it's hard to tell), but his voice comes out far calmer than that, even if it's completely cold and hard. ]
...Do you know the way?
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Mii... I don't. [ But they're in a basement, right? At least Rika is pretty sure they are, since she fell through a trapdoor herself. ] The should be stairs somewhere, right? We just need to find those.
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[ He at least seems to relax marginally, but he's also very much forcing himself to do so. He's not relaxed. At all. With a ghost from his past following him with an appearance that's so familiar, there's no way he can relax, but he's doing his best to ignore it. ]
Let's just go. If we can lose these damned things, then all the better.
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i.
However, his jumpiness regarding everything and sundry related to the medical field has most definitely carried over to this horrorshow of a world; he's about four times as angry and six times as terrified as he might have been had he not woken up to a crazy-ass powerpoint, a collection of scalpels, and a medical chart proclaiming - of all things! - that he had the dreaded swimmer's shoulder. Which he doesn't. He knows. He checked, about twelve times, and each time his shoulder was in better condition than the time before. Other than a leeching of color from his skin turning an even whiter white than usual, but that's par for the course, you know, when you're stuck in a goddamn creepy hospital and a creepy kid suddenly decides that you're food for the monsters. ]
What the hell — [ see, usually Rin has more of a tolerance when it comes to those younger than him; comes with the territory when things like growing-up and captainship are involved, but this. This is something else. This isn't apples and oranges, this is like a fucking h-bomb as compared to oranges, okay. ] What do I look like, some kind of human shield?
[ Because getting angry at a beansprout approximately the size of his pinky finger is obviously the productive thing to do in this situation. Right.
His ire gentles somewhat when he sees the terror on the kid's face, but he's still red-faced and out of breath himself, not doing anything to draw back the angry question he'd tossed out. ]
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[ Ciel hisses out his answer as if this is perfectly obvious, and there's much more vitriol in his voice than you'd really expect from a boy of his age. This is especially stupid considering this is also at simply being flustered rather than an actual reason to be angry, but. Ciel doesn't need much of an excuse to actually be angry. The nurses come around the corner from where Ciel had whipped around, and he immediately goes completely still, as if trying to minimize his presence so he won't be noticed.
So will Rin sacrifice his rude ass or actually listen? Ciel's fate is in your hands, Rin... ]
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A moment passes. Another.
And then he whirls around again, ready to pick up where he'd left off.
Except -- ]
Wait. [ He peers closer, still scowling. Is the kid feverish? No -- ] Are you blushing?
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His expression had been normal for about two seconds, but it's quick to turn back to a sour scowl. ]
I am not, thank you. [ Ciel will lie even when the evidence otherwise is right in front of you, yes. ]
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phase i...
Earl -- I-I mean, Ciel! Are you okay? [ wait, he said hold still, didn't he. Oops. In that case, there's definitely something weird going on. ] It's all right...! I-I'll [ hic ] hide you, so...!
[ oh, right. She got a shot, and though they're certainly the more noticeable side effect, the hiccups aren't all she got from it. Without even really thinking about it, Ada finds herself spreading her lab coat open to engulf Ciel in a big hug, protectively holding him against her chest.
sorry, you can't escape the breasts today ]
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But. Ciel cannot escape his fate.
He had only wanted her to hold still so that he could hide behind her, but her earnest desire to help was too much for Ciel to predict. When she turns, Ciel gives her a questioning look, but it quickly turns to muted horror as the lab coat encroaches upon him, and he's swallowed into his pillowy demise.
Ciel immediately freezes, as stiff as a board, because this is true fear. Seeing breasts was bad enough, but now his face is very much in them, and his face is so hot it feels like it's burning. He's engaged, he thinks, and if only the terror of what Lizzie would do if she saw this could make him paler, he would almost be grateful for removing the color. But unfortunately, he's still overwhelmed by the fact that this is a woman who is hugging him, and this is terribly, terribly inappropriate! At least he was used to Ranmao being indecent...!!
At the very least, Ciel will definitely go unnoticed as the nurses rush past to find the tiny, flustered doctor they had lost track of.
But at what cost. ]
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Only after the threat has passed does she realize what she's done. It's not like her to hug people at all, outside of her immediate family - and certainly not someone as proper as Ciel! What was she thinking?! After a delay of a few seconds, during which reality slowly dawns on her, she releases Ciel abruptly with a mortified yelp. ]
Uwaaaah...!! I-- I-- [ hic ] I'm sorry, Ciel!! I don't [ hic ] - I mean, I don't know [ hic ] what came over me!! I-I didn't [ hic ] mean to... to do that...!!
[ anxiety appears to be exacerbating the hiccups. Turning bright red, herself, she spins on her heel at once, covering he face with her hands in shame. ]
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iib!
Actually, this time, Oz doesn't get his dumb ass shot. The bullet whizzes by alarmingly close, but ricochets off of a nearby wall instead of clipping him.]
Ciel— [Is what he says, more or less in time with the bullet being fired off. OOPS. It takes him a second to realize it was Ciel's reaction to his own ghost rather than a reaction to himself, but he's quick to rush forward regardless of the fact that he really should have learned by now not to approach an upset and armed Ciel. BUT NOPE... More important things to focus on, after all.]
—Come on. Let's find the exit.
[He doesn't address the small specter that had just been shot at. Likewise, he ignores the much tinier version of himself that's been tailing him, too.]
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[ When someone else is suddenly there, Ciel's eye fixes on them instead, wild and definitely frightened, but his reaction is at least a sign that things have changed. He still hasn't quite accepted this as much as he would like to think, which is why this ghost of his past still unnerves him so much, but at least confronting this sort of demon had lead him towards a slightly more productive outcome, even if it was unhealthy in itself too.
He's not quite trapped in a vision of the past, after all. When his eye really focuses on Oz, it comes with a relaxing, and one of those rare, genuinely pained expressions. Where anyone else would have been met with much more coldness, even after Ciel had unintentionally tried to murder them, Ciel feels a sense of relief that it's Oz over anyone else. There was no new secret to be shared here. This was Ciel, but it's not hard to guess whose face Ciel is seeing in these features and with these details. ]
I— Sorry.
[ For, you know, almost shooting you. He still has a white-knuckled grip on his gun, but he lowers it further, no longer threatening, and he nods, keeping all of his focus on Oz instead of the other two guests they have. ]
Let's just go.
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But Oz steps his way through the hall quickly. His own hands are free of blood, indicating that he hasn't tried to touch his younger self yet, even though the apparition reaches out for him occasionally. He steps around the only marginally younger-looking reflection of Ciel, too - spares it a brief glance, but little else.
Once he's close enough, his hand reaches out, lightly touching Ciel's shoulder. That's all the contact for now, though; he's continuing on, expecting to be followed.]
It's all right. [WHY IS THAT ALWAYS HIS RESPONSE TO NEARLY BEING SHOT.] Just focus on finding the end of the level, okay? It should be around here somewhere.
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Phase IIb
As the bullet hits her chest she staggers back in pain before hitting the ground. It really hurt and she didn't expect it. In that moment her chain summons ready to kill the threat, teeth bared.
Sitting up she sees the blood on her chest as she coughs.]
What the hell was that about?!
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He'd gotten unnerved anyways.
Turning to shoot and actually hitting someone gets Ciel's stomach to feel like it suddenly drops, since guilt washes over him immediately. It's more blood on his hands, more childrens' blood, but it's also clear quickly enough to him that it isn't a child he's dealing with. The Chain and the fact that she's very much alive sends fear coursing through his veins instead, though his gaze is actually on the chain. His heart is thundering in his ears, but he keeps that gun ready to use once more instead of lowering it. ]
You— Stay back.
[ What will it even do? Part of him knows that there's no way another shot will do anything, considering the first hadn't, but he's not quite operating on logic at the moment. ]
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Lily watches as he stares at her chain panic. Quickly she sends the creature away and looks to the other.]
...What is wrong with you?
ii-b !
the memory is distracting and taunting and he expects nothing else, as the young shadow that follows him is more the Dog than him, all sharp grins and vicious reminders. it set him on edge, and it was giving him a ringing headache. he's rounding the corner with a scowl thrown carelessly back over at himself when the familiar cocking of a pistol stops him short.
the bullet more than grazes his hip even as he veers to the side, the shot sending his motions into instinctual drive and he almost lunges, though the sight of just who shot him binds him into place. it's a kid, single round eye wide and steeled and frightened all at once.
a few moments after the bullet hits, the wound is mending itself shut with greywhite smoke and an acrid hiss and it still hurts but it jolts heine enough to disregard the image trailing behind him like the hound he is. there's a serrated grin across sharp and pale features, distorted only by the transparency.
his sigh rasps against the back of his throat and his reaction would have been much sharper if he didn't see that the person - no, the child - shooting wasn't actually aiming at him.
still, goddamn kids shouldn't have guns ohmygod. ) Shooting it won't help, you know. ( it's not a helpful statement but he wasn't in a really helpful mood on account of being...shot. ) Ignoring the thing would be better. Just, as a thought - to avoid maiming someone else.
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Yet when he looks to see how bad the injury is and sees only wispy whorls of smoke, all of that innocence drains out of his expression in a startling instant. Ciel has seen this before, and the familiarity immediately turns him completely cold. It's how Sebastian heals his wounds as well, and the apology on his tongue almost turns to a curse instead. But to give such a thing would be too satisfying for a demon, he thinks. His grip on the gun doesn't lessen, since anyone that reminds him of Sebastian is something he shouldn't trust.
It makes his question incredibly rude, of course, but there's still that tense, visceral fear. It's just being masked with a cold that's not suited to Ciel's age. ]
What are you?
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vague understanding of frightened states of mind aside, it didn't curb his dropping mood. it didn't stop it from turning even worse when the boy's expression changes from guilt-like fright to something with much more steel and recognition in his single eye and it left heine even more confused. has he seen this sort of healing before?
the difference in his healing, not that he would know to elaborate, was that it still hurt, pinpricks of pain against torn skin.
the question starts him (what are you?), and his retort is bitten out dryly moreso to buy himself time to think on it. rude tbh ciel. ) Not typically something you say to a person you just shot.
( what are you hangs tense in the stale air and he doesn't really know the right answer. he isn't human, not the normal sort. he's more beast than man because that's how he was made to be. an attack dog turned disobedient? this is getting too existential for him. ) I'm - kind of human. ( with a Spine that makes him nearly impossible to kill and a metal collar to match so he's more saying it for the boy's benefit than for his own conviction; he doesn't believe it; he knows he's anything but. )
- it's nothing I can give a simple answer to, kid. ( you don't want to know would be more apt. ) I'm just someone stuck in the same shithole as you.
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