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. ] |
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hiro
[ it's a hard weight and maybe, down the line, hawke will explain it to hiro. she's not very good at that, telling things about herself. the harder stuff. but if she thought it would help, maybe... oh, she doesn't know.
she lets out a soft, amused huff and gives a nod to hiro's statement. yeah, it did. but the conversation is moving on, to something more present and hawke is grateful for that. she looks a little surprised at the question, wondering if he means with carver but -- oh, no. no, she understands now. she looks down at her stomach, touching at the bleeding gash there with a frown. ]
Oh, not bit. Claws, actually. I took it down but...
[ a lift of a shoulder and her grin widens, turning back to her normal grin for nearly a moment. this is, of course, not helped when the mirror behind her does shift again. a hull of a dark ship, bodies piled together with no room between them, hawke sitting between her mother and her sister, covered in blood and staring up at the one small sliver of light in the ceiling. crying, groaning, silence cut through with a sudden piercing scream --
hawke's eyes widen and she glances back at the mirror before straightening up. ]
We should get out of here, yes?
[ she even holds out her arm then for hiro so he can lean on her instead of putting pressure on his foot. they can talk about this crisis out there, where nothing else can weigh awkwardly on the both of them. ]
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But first thing's first he's still staring at the gash and frowning heavily.]
Dude, it's gonna get infected if you don't treat it. Or at least stop the bleeding. [He's not a doctor (or his robot) but he knows that much. Is he worried? Of course he is.] Claws are even worse than teeth. [But he's stalled again by another memory and he can't stop himself from looking over her shoulder. What…had happened back then? It sort of looks like--
Nah. Let's not entertain those thoughts and he straightens up, eyes averting. And in another mirror, there's a pair of red robotic eyes staring out at the pair of them.]
Couldn't have said it better myself. [He eyes her arm almost suspiciously, half-ready to tell her he's fine to walk on his own…but in the end okay. Sure. Human crutch Hawke is a go.] Where to next? I've been looking for an exit and haven't had a ton of luck.
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she takes hold of hiro, letting him lean on her for support and starts to lead them through the maze of mirrors around them. staring straight ahead, no distractions by the mirrors at all. sometimes she can catch slight glimpses of terrible things and sometimes it's just them, just hiro and hawke walking through the mirrors. hawke starts talking as they walk, tone light and purposefully ignoring the heavy weight of the mirrors around them. ]
The bleeding's actually a good thing. I don't think I mentioned to you, but I'm actually stronger when I bleed. Went through a whole ritual and everything for it.
[ she lets it hang for hiro to ask, to give them something to talk about that isn't the blighted mirrors. still, he has a point. exits. she's not sure where, the door seeming to have disappeared on her as she entered but if she knows cerealia as well as she thinks she does, they probably have to do something for it to reveal itself again. perhaps something to do with the memories? ]
... Let's just keep walking for now.
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Yeah, you sorta failed to mention that part to me. [The tiniest of smirks.] That true, or that just something you're telling me so I worry less? You wouldn't be the first person I've met who has an ability kinda like that.
[The fact that they aren't finding an exit immediately's actually making him a tiny bit anxious. This isn't really what he was planning on. But walking they go just as he hears the echo of his own angry yelling.
"It's over, Krei."]
...what kind of ritual would even make that happen? [Yes good let's just ignore that until they're forced to face things.]
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her eyes flick to a mirror, where she sees hiro's own memory playing and her eyes glance down to him after but she doesn't say anything. she's not sure if hiro would want her to. they can ignore it together. ]
Blood ritual. [ she smirks as she throws that out there, grinning down at him to catch any reaction hiro might have. ] A very complicated one that ends with a person drinking lots and lots of dragon blood. I had to track down and kill three ah, rivals? I suppose they were rivals but I never knew their names. Was just told to kill them. Kill them, take something off their body, bring it back to the Breaker and complete the process.
[ a slight shrug of the shoulder on the side not carrying hiro. ]
So now, when I bleed, I gain the strength of a dragon. My father wasn't very pleased when I did it but you know, teenagers will be teenagers.
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(And also a teenage boy who's a fan of MMOs and into the idea of this sort of fantasy bullshit.)]
That sounds totally disgusting but seriously effective. No wonder you're pretty much unstoppable. I think if I did something like that Tadashi and my aunt would ground me for life. [Though he is curious...] No bad side effects? No scales in unseen places or unexpected fire breath at inappropriate times?
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Oh, it was. The concoction was vile and it makes you feel very, very weak for a while until your body adjusts. I could barely lift a spoon, let alone my sword. Still, this is why you act first, beg for forgiveness later. By then, the damage is already done.
[ she lets out a chuckle, remembering going through the process and how damned determined she was to preserve. she makes light of it now but it definitely would've killed her if she wasn't careful. she tilts her head to think slightly, side effects, huh? ]
No scales or fire but... it's not a very good thing to do to your body. See, for me to become the strongest I can possibly become, I also have to be near death. It's an exchange, my life for more power and I'm betting on my ability to kill my enemy before they can kill me. [ this isn't a very child friendly skill set, is it. ] But, ah, on the bright side! After I kill someone, I can drain their... how to put it, essence? From their body. It heals me.
[ rpg mechanics as fancy pancy spiritual bullshit. ]
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So like assimilation. [He can understand it when he puts it into biology, but at the same time:] And if you can't kill your enemy...what happens after that? That doesn't work in reverse, does it? [People stealing life forces from her, he means.]
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jaune
[ the touch does the trick and hawke finds herself blinking a few times, tearing her eyes away from the mirror as carver slams into the ground once more. her eyebrows furrow at jaune, confusion all over her face before -- oh. she understands now.
she lifts a hand to touch at the wound on her stomach, a frown tugging at her features before she nods. ]
Ah, probably? I'm without a poultice at the moment, unfortunately. But, you know, what doesn't kill you...!
[ her tone is light, grin spreading onto her face as easily as it typically does but there is an obvious disconnect here when the memory still keeps playing on the mirror beside them. hawke deals with things the way she knows how -- humor and avoidance -- and in this moment, it really, really shows. ]
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[ geez how often do you not get killed jaune ]
T-That's what you were gonna say, right? Stronger? A-Anyway, how... what happened to you?
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[ but the callous joke is cut off by a defeaning roar from the mirror and hawke's jaw clenches on the word and she gives a shake of her head. no, she won't acknowledge it just yet.
instead, right. wounds. a better thing to think about, somehow. ]
A monster got the better of me? Sharp claws, quick reflexes, though I did win in the end. I tend to do that.
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there's still mirrors around them but now, they're all broken. maybe they can actually talk now! ]
No, blood loss is actually good for me.
[ okay, hawke?? ]
We should find an exit though.
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...Also you said-- w-what do you mean "good for you", blood loss, what. What's going on here?
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I wanted to destroy them anyway, Jaune. You needn't blame yourself. They do look better now, don't they?
[ but oh, right. ]
Ah, the more blood I lose, the stronger I become. So, I might as well lose some more!
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kashuu
[ hawke doesn't have much of an opinion on kashuu either. she finds the whole sword thing funny, can't help but tease it for the absurdity, can't help but see the danger lurking in it from her experiences. so, her opinion stays ... while not low, indifferent maybe. she doesn't show much respect.
so she doesn't notice when kashuu nearly follows her into the building and also doesn't pay much attention to anything he does. instead, she's caught by the memory in the mirror, caught by watching her brother die and herself blamed over and over and over and --
and then she hears kashuu's voice. she jerks her head away from the mirror, frown deepening on her face as she looks for him and ah, there he is. ]
I -- [ she feels... hesitant to leave, actually, and giving in so easily to someone like kashuu when she could perfectly handle herself. she frowns. ] I'm quite fine where I am, actually!
[ sorry, kashuu. hawke's gaze heads to the mirror again. ]
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But he doesn't want to leave her here with such a gruesome scene, either. Especially not when it's replaying on a loop like that, and she just isn't moving away from it. So he fumbles for something to say, and eventually he manages a clumsy:]
—You have to eat, right? It's been a while but I found some food and I'm trying to find people to give it to before it goes bad.
[If he pretends he can't see or hear the scene playing out, maybe it'll be better for the both of them. But even though it's clear he's stilted and discomforted and biting his tongue, he doesn't leave just yet.]
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Is it good food? I haven't yet lowered my standards so much to eat garbage, Kashuu. And I'm not quite sure I can trust your ability to taste, you know.
[ she looks back to the mirror just once, sees carver hit the ground one final time before she finally just tears herself away and starts walking over to him. she knows this is for the best, even if it hurts. ]
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Rather than addressing that bloody scene:]
My tongue works just fine. [It's a little hard, maintaining some semblance of normalcy after so many days here - after seeing the mirrors capture so many painful pieces from so many pasts. His retort is lacking its usual snap and energy, even if the words fit. A little huff of a sigh follows, caught somewhere between tired and miffed, though neither are directed at Hawke so much as the situation in general. Why Does This City Suck Ass: The Eternal Quandary.]
Geez... Being picky even now. I mean, it's not great, but it's not gonna make you barf or anything. And it's not poisoned, either. I already checked. [And then he's looking back, when he thinks his face is carefully blank - which is, of course, promptly ruined with the brief look of surprise that flashes across when he notices that injury.]
—What happened?
slams here finally
Cassandra takes several steps towards the centre of the room, making sure her feet fall heavily: she doesn't want to startle the Champion unnecessarily. )
Hawke...
( And then she stalls, because she hasn't thought this far ahead. Her hand comes to rest at the hilt of her sword, which is still strapped to the side of her waist. )
Are - you all right?
( What an idiotic question. Cassandra's cheeks flame as soon as it comes out of her mouth. She makes a strangled sort of noise, then adds: )
There is no need to answer that.
AND ME TOO
her expression finally shifts, a tired smile appearing as her shoulders slump a little. the guilt eats away at her, deep in her gut, and she knows she's doing the same thing in cerealia as she did here -- she abandoned bethany and her mother, just as she failed carver. ]
I could use a bath but I think I'll live.
[ she refers to the physical injuries, the state of everything else. she doesn't need to talk about what's playing in the mirror right now. ]
You don't seem too worse for the wear yourself, Cassandra. I imagine that sword has much to do with it.
[ in the background, carver's body is slammed into the ground again. ]
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By the time she ends up where Hawke is, she's beyond annoyed, but she's trying not to be.
She doesn't mean to watch what's going on in the mirror, really. But it's hard to look away. When it stops, only to start over again, she walks over to where Hawke is and hesitantly reaches out to put a hand on her shoulder.]
Miss? Are you okay?
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Well enough, I think. Considering the situation.
[ the whole... trapped in garbage town, cerealia thing. ]
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Maybe we should get out of here? I mean. Maybe I'm just being nosy, but I'm sure staring at what it's showing you isn't going to help.