
You're probably woken up by the explosion first. A loud, deafening boom comes from behind the walls of the residential district. When you look outside your window towards the darker, more secretive area of the city, you might see the structure around it... crumbling, the land falling in on itself slowly but surely. That might be what wakes you up first. If it doesn't, you may be awoken instead by the sudden jerking feeling behind your navel pulling you from where you are to somewhere... else.
It's dark. The first thing you notice is that it's dark -- and then come the scrabbling sounds of creatures in the dark, like metal being dragged across metal, a chilling, sharp sound. The first thing that becomes clear, as your vision adjusts, is that you're on a rickety pathway, metal and rusting and frail, above what appears to be yawning blackness. Far, far below, there's the faint sound of rushing water, a ways away.
The second thing that becomes clear is that you are very much not alone. Something is out there with you, and from the screeching metallic noises that come ever closer, it seems to be stalking you.
Thankfully, you're not alone -- right?  ...
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PHASE I [ ??? ] It’s drafty here. You’re below ground, that’s for certain from the echoes of the wind in the darkness. If you continue on forwards along the rickety, metal railing that serves as a walkway, the skittering noises of creatures in the dark follow -- but they don’t appear.
It seems everyone has been dumped along this pathway at random; you may be with friends, with enemies or with someone you’ve never met before, but either way, it soon becomes clear. There are only two ways to go along this path: up or down.
If you choose to take the path that follows a gradual slope down, the sounds of water lapping against a surface increase bit by bit, the air growing heavier and danker, until finally, the metallic platform gives way very suddenly (watch your step!) to a muddy bank. Down here, everything is darker, and not far away there’s the water. It’s cold and frigid and there are unfriendly creatures that await if you choose to delve into it. However, if you brave those creatures, and dive deeply enough, there is a mask. It rests half-buried by silt and rocks, but it’s there, and can be found by any intrepid explorers.
Somehow, it feels a little familiar.
And if you carry on in the cave system underground, eventually you will come across what appears to be an altar. There is blood on it -- not fresh, but not more than a month old -- and pieces of trinkets. Old bits of cloth, locks of hair, and some of them may even be familiar. Any dropped character who has a reasonably large amount of spiritual or magical power may have left scraps, such as pieces of clothing, trinkets, hair, or the sort behind at the altar.
Maybe that's why they weren't in the Nexus Code.
PHASE II [ ??? ] If you go up, you will eventually make your way above ground. It takes some time, and some luck -- you’ll have to avoid rusty railing and pathways, the path crumbling under you and that creeping sensation that something is following and watching you -- and then you’ll suddenly be in fresh air.
Well. It’s not so fresh, really.
The landscape is broken down and crumbled. It may have once been part of the city of Cerealia, but now it is in utter disrepair and decay. Buildings have crumbled, and debris is everywhere. There are signs of the same level of technology that Cerealia has -- but it is all broken down and utterly inaccessible.
And you’re not alone.
It seems the technology and metal and broken down destruction has gained sentience over its time sitting alone, waiting. And it is not happy to be disturbed. The creatures are made of pieces of everything around them, and when cut down, they’ll just slowly rebuild themselves from the debris.
It might be time to run.
They aren't happy about being disturbed, and you're in their way.
PHASE III [ ??? ] Above ground, there are a lot of broken down buildings.
Some can’t be accessed at all; some are too broken, too reduced to rubble. For those looking for shelter, they'll be able to find buildings where the doors can be forced open and they can camp out on the inside to various degrees of stability. Though the ceiling may cave in or the floor fall out from under you at a moment's notice, it's better than being out there. Be careful, because none of the architecture here can be trusted anymore.
And other buildings... are even less trustworthy than that.
There is a series of buildings in the midst of the wasteland, somehow still standing. They stand there silently, towering over the rest of the rubble in their two-story glory, and if the doors are forced open, it soon becomes clear that the building itself is full of mirrors.
Once, the mirrors had perhaps covered the walls and ceiling. Once, this building might have been akin to something of a ballet studio, somewhere to express yourself creatively. But now the mirrors are shattered and broken into pieces and the building lacks the joy it might have once held. Shards of mirror cover the floor, some big, some not so big, but they still hang from the walls as well and everywhere you look, you can see yourself.
And then, the reflection changes. From one blink to the next, you see a memory playing in the mirrors. Your memory. You’ll see a glimpse of one of your most traumatic or life-changing moments, broken up but clear in the shards. Blink and look away, and it’s gone, only to show up again in the next mirror a few moments later. Surely it’s just a trick of the light, right?
Except if someone else is with you, they’ll see it too -- and you might end up seeing a bit of their own past as well. Hope you're fond of sharing.
PHASE IV [ ??? ] If you survive the monsters, the crumbling landscape and the untrustworthy buildings, you may eventually find a terminal. It is buried deep among the rubble. One turn around a corner, one stumble into a hole, and you will find it. It sits there, out in the middle of nowhere; the building in which it used to be housed is apparently long gone, reduced to nothing but rubble.
And if you turn it on, there is a brief message.
Transmission Broadcasting.
Transmission Connected.
And then, there is a face.
BONUS [ ??? ] For those who have been wearing their masks a little too much, they might also start to notice that there are some strange effects attached, which worsen the more they’ve been wearing said masks. How badly they worsen is up to your discretion.
➝ Broken Mask: An intense feeling of paranoia, focused on whoever your character is with. They might also begin to remember fabricated memories of being betrayed by those people.
➝ Barcode Mask: Everything will begin to have value to them. There will be whispers in the back of their mind of the worth of their friends, the worth of a monster, the worth of everything around them. An intense need to own and consume as much as possible and as quickly as possible.
➝ Dripping Blood Mask: An intense lack of self-worth, a hollow feeling and thoughts of being weak and empty. Feeling as disposable as possible and an intense listless along with it.
➝ :( Mask: A need to prove yourself, to show everyone how strong you are as quickly as possible. You can do things, you can be of worth to everyone around you. Why won't they see that? Why?
➝ Ivy Mask: A choking sort of terror from all things metal and technology based, and a need to lash out against it. An intense distrust for anything that they feel is against the laws of nature.
➝ Grey Mask: More personable than normal, more emotional, more empathetic. An intense feeling of kindness and gratitude to those around you and a renewed love of life.
➝ Feather Mask: A dulled, lack of emotion. A detached feeling to everything around you. A sort of bland curiosity towards things without any empathetic reaction.
➝ Bloody Fingerprints Mask: They'll feel absolutely fine. No change. The effects of the broken mask can stack on top of the others, if they chose to break their mask after the other effects began to appear. No other effects can be stacked, as no other changes can be stacked.
PENALTY [ ??? ] For characters who die while in the dark parts of the city, things will get... a little strange. They will die as normal, but they will wake up almost immediately after their death -- in the Nexus Code. They will have a few surreal moments to be there, to see their friends who have left Cerealia hanging lifelessly from odd, glimmering strands (though there are some faces, of course, that are missing, anyone who was spiritual, or magical, seems strangely absent) and then --
They’re back to being dead.
When characters revive in Cerealia, anywhere from one IC day to three or four IC days later, they will find that things are… not quite right with their code. They’re glitching, for a lack of a better word. Sometimes, their fingers will phase right through an object, their own limbs registering as cold and lifeless. Sometimes, they will see a face watching them -- but when they turn around to try to see who it is, the face will be gone.
These effects will last an IC week, before slowly things go back to normal.
That was strange.
[ 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. ] |
zestiria spoilers in here js whoop
[ He's strong. He's always been strong. When it happened, he had been able to push through his agony to finish things with Heldalf. After coming back to Cerealia so soon after those events, he'd had time to think on it and properly grieve a little. Though only a little. But seeing it all over again — experiencing it all over again — is a whole other story.
The mirrors display Gramps' death, and he recognizes it almost instantly, with how fresh the memory is. His initial reaction is nothing but shock, as he looks on at the scene playing out before him. He doesn't know how to react at first — it's almost like his body and mind freezes up. ]
What's ...
[ —going on?? He doesn't know, but in the next moment, he's quickly shutting his eyes in an attempt to avoid the scene. He reopens them a few moments later, facing a different direction now, only for the memory to reappear on the mirrors in front of him, right at the moment he took Gramps' life.
And he gasps, ] Gramps! [ stumbling backward a couple steps before stopping. This is just triggering those memories and causing those feelings to well back up at the surface. This moment in his life will never be something that can just be moved on from so easily.
At the end of the scene is his familiar sobbing (along with his best friend's), and rather than watching that too, he's dropping to his knees and losing his composure himself, much like he did before. He's not sobbing, at least, though his eyes are welling up and he's choking back the tears as best he can muster. ] G-Gramps ...
[ And then the memory repeats itself. ]
phase extra.
[ It's the next day and he's heading back down into the underground to help out anyone who's still down there, and to see if he can find anything else helpful (and see if he can find his friends). This whole place is still an unexplored mystery to him, and you best believe he remembers there was another path downward when he chose to go up. He intends on checking that out as well. But his body is sort of saying otherwise — he's hungry. Massively hungry. And he's getting weak. It's hard even going without one or two meals, but a whole day? It feels like a pit is opening in his stomach, and he's using the rails for support more than he wishes he would. Honestly, it'd be really bad if something where to come out and attack him, like those monsters(?) from above ground.
And just as he's thinking that, a bit of the rusty pathway gives way under him, and suddenly he's hanging onto it with what little strength he has. ] —Gah!
[ Wh-What a time he's having here ... The loudness of the ground giving out and his grunting as he tries to pull himself up might attract those in the area. He struggles, but it's largely to no avail. A-Anyone wanna help a guy out? ]
phase wildcard.
[ Anything else you wanna play out? He'll make it down further eventually ... ]
PHASE EXTRA..
[ almost suddenly, the young assassin is there with a hold on his arm. though she's struggling with the lack of strength in her own body to pull him up instantly. she's in the same exact state as him, after all. the lack of food and ever building hunger is taking a toll on her body and she feels fatigue settling in fast.
still, she does her best with little strength she does have. her heels digging into what's left of the solid ground beneath her feet, breath heavy with sounding out groans as she tries to bring the man up. ] Jeez-- maybe you ought to cut back on the fine Shepherd dining, yeah?
[ there's a breathy laugh at the end of those words. lord she's so hungry she could eat literally anything at this point. at long last she manages to tug Sorey right onto the rest of the steady pathway and she collapses onto her hands and rear once she does. ] Okay.. give me.. a moment to catch my breath.. before you go breaking anymore things.
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[ Oh, boy, is he glad to see her. So he'll do his best to help out with her tugging by trying to pull himself up too, though weakly. There's ... a little help from him, at least. But ah, her joke isn't helping.
And he gives a weak laugh. ] Wish I could get some of that dining down here. [ He's starving.
But he's relieved once he's been safely pulled back up onto the walkway, and he catches his breath there with her. ]
Don't worry ... Won't move a muscle ...
[ If he doesn't move he can't break anything, sob. ]
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once she's able to catch her breath, she's back to pointedly looking around the area and squinting at the pathways that go up or down. ]
So.. which way now?
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III
Or at least, that's what he thought.
The more he wandered further into the building, the more that he gets the impression he really shouldn't have stayed here. While it was pretty cool to see a building that might be filled with fun mirrors he shouldn't stay long.
But when he heard a familiar voice nearby?]
Sorey-san? Sorey-san? Is that you over there? [Please let it be someone, he and Patamon don't want to be alone by themselves]
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H-Huh? [ Ah, wiping his eyes with his sleeve. ] Takeru?
[ And he'll look around for him. Does he need help? What's he doing here?
He catches sight of the memory again, though, and he whips his head in another direction, shutting his eyes tight and balling his fists. He really doesn't want to see it again. ]
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So you are there! Where are you anyway? This place is really creepy!
[With that, he gave a sigh of relief. Thank goodness, he wasn't alone here! Although, he wished he found him fairly soon!
That and he couldn't deny that something bad must have happened to his friend.]
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Phase III
His throat clenches at the scene playing before them, but that flies out the window when he sees Sorey sink to the ground on his knees. Mikleo doesn't notice that another memory fades into the mirrors as he goes to kneel in front of his friend and take him into a tight hug, like he's trying to shield him from the pain they both still feel when that memory of Gramps resurfaces.]
I'm here.
[It sounds like two Mikleos speaking at the same time, though. The memory that plays in the broken mirrors, as he finally pays some modicum of attention to them, is from when Sorey lost his resonance during their first battle with Heldalf. In the mirror, the water seraph sounds and looks alarmed, repeating that same phrase over and over every time the Shepherd calls out their names. Each time it's spoken, it sounds a little more broken. At one point, he reaches out to touch Sorey, but he doesn't register it, which causes some tears to fall from his face as he whispers again, "I'm here, Sorey...."
Then it fades back into Sorey's memory for a repeat, apparently going to cycle through both of their memories. His grip on his life partner tightens perceptibly.]
Let's get out of here, okay?
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M-Mikleo?
[ It's easy to recognize what it's a memory of, but of course from a different point of view from his original experience with it. And after a moment he looks to his friend, before the memory of Gramps starts playing again, and he shuts his eyes tight.
Then he nods. ]
R-Right.
[ Good idea. Best idea. They need to get out of this room. ]
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Three months hasn't been long enough.]
We're not staying in here. [Mikleo's tone brooks no argument on that point.] We'll ask Edna if she can do anything about shelter with the stone around here.
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Wildcard - before phase extra?
The water seraph can be seen sitting with his back against the wall of the makeshift house Edna created from stone. He feels worthless, hollow, and listless. All he's good for is making water, but that doesn't help Sorey and Rose and his other human friends with getting food. Mikleo thinks that he should be helping them by looking for food, any kind of sustenance. Then, his thoughts intrude on that and go darker. What's the point when he's going to fail? He's the weakest and less experienced seraph. Edna's the better person for the job, especially when she's an earth seraph and in her element down here.
Mikleo stares at the wall in front of him, but he doesn't really see it. His gaze is listless and rather empty. His thoughts are turned inward and spiraling down in a cycle that should've horrified him. The water seraph should be fighting it, pushing through and shelving his personal feelings aside to do what needs to be done, but he just feels indifferent to it.
What's the point? What's the point?]
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So, he sounds a little concerned when he speaks up. ]
Hey, Mikleo?
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Hm?
[He's...listening, at least?]
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phase iii;
stahn can understand that. both in the sense of loss itself, and because of how important his own gramps is to him. and that's exactly why even though the same memories have been repeating in the shards for him—leon turning his sword on stahn, the emergency lift leaving leon in the cave beneath the oberon factory, and the ensuing aftermath with rutee in a catatonic state and stahn's crying and screaming to go back for leon as kongman restrains him—he presses forward.
he has to make his way to sorey and when he does, stahn crouches down to his level; he's not in the best state of mind himself right now, but it doesn't stop stahn from trying.]
Sorey... [stahn clasps a hand on his shoulder gently to try and get his attention and pull him away from being sucked into his own memories (while trying to ignore the ones that are playing back for him as well).]
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Stahn?
[ Now that he's looking up again, he notices the other memories that are showing up on the mirrors, catching glimpses of it in his blurry vision. It's hard to take it all in right now, though, and after a few moments he opts to shut his eyes tight. ]
S-Sorry, I — [ —don't know how to handle this? Am breaking down? Not sure, but there's so much going through his mind he's not even thinking to get up on his feet and get out of here just yet. ]
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but just like the aileron family motto says, he can't leave behind a person in need. so if someone else needs his help, he'll force down his own feelings despite how overwhelming they are. sorey needs a hand, maybe even more than he does so... he'll bear it.]
We shouldn't stay in here, Sorey.
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phase iii
flynn's eyes widen upon spotting it. sorey. some are images playing before him, too, and ones on a far more painful of a level. sorey seems to have killed something in a hand that resembles an old man... his chest tightens at the sobbing that follows in the memory and at that weak 'gramps' that comes as the real sorey falls to his knees. oh god. poor sorey.
whatever's happening, one thing becomes clear: they need to leave. concern for a friend and all related can come after. flynn moves over toward sorey and kneels down beside him, reaching out to gently clasp his shoulder.]
Can you stand, Sorey?
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I-I, uh — yeah.
[ And then his gaze drops to the ground. He's a little out of it thanks to all this, and it's sort of like he's not completely all there yet. His mind is still a little trapped with those memories. ]
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first, however, they need to go. flynn stretches out a hand for him to take.]
We cannot remain here. Let's get outside.
[his voice, though gentle, also holds a firmness to it. if it becomes necessary to carry him out, it will happen. staying here and watching these memories on repeat won't do anyone any good, especially not sorey.]
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Phase extra
Are you...alright?
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But he gives quite the sigh of relief once he's back to safety, catching his breath a little. ]
Th-Thanks ... I'm okay ... I think.
[ Well in the sense that he didn't fall to his death or anything. Not so much the pit of hunger in his stomach. ]
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You must rest, otherwise you body will give out. Do you need...assistance in moving?
[ Cause he'll carry you if you do. No big deal to him. ]
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extra
Hold on!
[He set his sword down next to him so he can grab him with his other hand too, to help him up since he doesn't know if he'll be able to do it with just one hand or not at this point.]
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And he tries to pull his knee up onto it once he's getting far enough. ]
J-Just a bit further —!
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They're so close...he'll still try pulling as much as he can, grunting as he puts more effort into it. He's encouraged by their progress so far, he can't just let him fall now.]
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