//EVENT031.EXE

[reparator]

//event031.EXE

Lightning flashes. Thunder booms and rain patters on the roof. It’s all about ambience here in ViViD, of course. You gotta set the mood! Welcome to the Pleasurable Super Youthful Caring Hospital Stage, PSYCHward for short. It works, shut up. It’s a stage created for your well-being, health and happiness. Be careful, though. The first step you take in the dilapidated asylum carries you right into a puddle. Look down, and the puddle is red. Ah. Of course it’s blood. It’s only going to get even more fun from here. Good Day. I Am The New Introducer For ViViD Levels. Mosley? Who's That? Anyway, Please Have Fun And Remember To Be Safe. Safety Is Our First Priority At CERES. Thank you. Enjoy.

//SCENARIOS.EXE

PHASE I [ 400 ] The first room any people familiar with the ViViD song and dance routine will find is one that is...wonderfully full of body bags. Body bags everywhere -- on the floor, on the shelves, uncomfortably tossed over the back of a chair...and each body bag has a helpful tag. Handy. Of course, within each bag is a newcomer; they won’t be able to escape the body bags until someone else unzips them. They’re dressed in little more than hospital gowns, toe tags still attached to bare feet. Welcome to ViViD! Enjoy your stay. Of course, there has to be an element of surprise to it. Some body bags contain living, breathing newcomers, yes. But the others? These contain corpses. The toe tag on them indicates a loved one or someone important to you -- or someone you hate beyond all else. You open the bag, and there is their face, achingly familiar and frozen in death...but blink and suddenly they’re the corpse of a nondescript stranger. PHASE II [ 600 ] Step out of that room and now it’s the asylum proper. Lights flicker. It’s dark, but it’s still more than clear to anyone with ears -- something’s stalking everyone in this place. The shadow flickers on the wall, the lights go out -- you turn a corner and there it is, jumping out at you with an unearthly cackle -- A puppet. It hangs there limply, utterly harmless. All around the facility, these harmless puppets lurk. In lockers, behind doors, in dark halls… But they’re all literally inanimate and harmless. Whose dumb idea was that? PHASE III [ 1000 ] But slowly, the atmosphere changes. Go in deeper, and the sounds around deaden until there’s nothing left but the dark all around and the sound of your own breathing. And yet, irrevocably you know, whether as an aspect of the level or something else entirely -- Something is actually hunting you now. It makes no noise. It can’t be seen. But it’s stalking, and it’s on the hunt. To make matters worse, now the asylum seems to have become a proper maze, with dead ends everywhere, and practically no light to see them by. And the only other souls you’ll see are the other people stuck in the maze -- but there’s something not quite right about them either. You can see...bits of their code, lurking under the surface of their skin, and as you watch, it’s being corrupted, bit by bit, the longer they’re in the dark. If you look down, it’s happening to you too. Better hurry. There’s only one way out. PHASE IV [ 1400 ] And then you step through a doorway into light. You escaped the maze, but this is an asylum, and you’re about to see why. There are rows upon rows of cages of aliens. They cry out and reach out through the bars with webbed or clawed hands or tentacles, begging for release. Let them out, or don’t -- the exit to Cerealia proper is right there at the end of this room, inviting and safe. But if you do elect to let them out, the entire room suddenly goes silent. And there, in that cage you opened, there is no longer an alien, but instead a doll. And it’s watching you. Stay any longer, and the doll with start to move, reaching -- and if it touched you, suddenly you’re the one locked away behind bars. On the plus side, when you take the exit to Cerealia, it’ll deposit you in the Pleasure District, where massagebots will reach for you to try to drag you in for a sensual massage. Welcome! PENALTY [ ???? ] You were caught in the maze. It’s hard to say even now what it was that caught you, but now you’re strapped down to an operating table, and there’s a flat-faced doctor standing above you. The restraints can’t be broken. There’s a prick of a needle, and you fall unconscious -- and that’s probably a mercy. When you wake up, you’ll be back in the asylum somewhere, but missing a sense -- the one from your character’s application will be gone. A character who is sight will have been blinded, for instance, and a character who is touch will feel nothing. This will last until they log out of ViViD and get into Cerealia. [ 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. ]

//RUN.EXE

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. Thank you!

Comments

[truedetective]

[In the dim light, the figure approaching her seems to be wielding a... sword? Well, it's not the first person she's known to bring a sword to a gun fight. Or a monster fight, as it is.] I'm fine. We should get out of here as quickly as possible.

Do you have a flashlight? Any tool to illuminate the area?

[majinken]

We'll have to move slow and careful...

[because stahn is shaking his head a bit in an effort to answer her question.] I can use fire, but that would be too dangerous right now.

[truedetective]

You can... 'use fire'? [Naoto's brow furrows as she thinks. This is a game, isn't it?] Is that some sort of ability granted to players of this game? [The thought that it's something like her Persona-- or that she can even use her Persona here-- hasn't actually occurred to her yet.]

[majinken]

Eh? Oh... no, it's not like that! That's just something I can do anyway.

[well, his sword can, but it's probably not the time to get into the semantics of how this works.] I actually never heard anything about ViViD giving people abilities or anything...

[truedetective]

So what do you mean by using fire? Any of us can use fire to cook or light things, but you probably wouldn't have phrased it like that if that's how you meant it...

[majinken]

Oh, not like that! They're artes... magic. I use it to fight.

[even if he still thinks it would be totally efficient for cooking, but that's neither here nor there.]

[truedetective]

Magic? [It's not completely unfamiliar to her, especially after the Midnight Channel. There are things that could certainly be considered 'magic' there. But other than that one incident in the outside world, they've never been able to call their Personas outside the TV.] So you mean to tell me that you have magic powers, that you can summon at will?

[The Shadow Operatives. They'd been able to summon their Personas in the real world, too. Surely it's not impossible.]

[majinken]

No.. it's not exactly like that.

[he pauses for a moment, trying to think of how to explain it. it's not the time to really do this, probably... but naoto asked and he's not the kind of person to leave others hanging.]

It's something my sword can do, and it's used for fighting. I mean, I guess I can use them when I want as long as I have Dymlos, but... it's not like, magic magic.

[what an apt description. it's mostly because the magic is science, but hey. minor details.]

[truedetective]

[It's not like 'magic' magic, he says. So 'real' magic exists in his word, she imagines; he just can't use it. She wonders what her Persona would fall under.] I see. then it's a property of your sword. At any rate, you're likely correct that it's too dangerous to use for lighting. Swinging your sword around haphazardly in an enclosed space isn't a very good idea.

[majinken]

Mm. I wouldn't really have to swing to use it, but it's still fire... Unless...

[he has the idea of using an aura for it that can illuminate stuff—it still gives off heat, but a little less dangerously so.

(too bad the sword itself is shooting him down before he can even finish the thought, causing stahn to scrunch his nose.)]

...I thought it was a good idea. [he grumbles, but it's not directed and naoto. what he says next, is.] I think we'll just have to move slow and careful and stay on our guard.

[truedetective]

[Well that doesn't make any sense. Why does he just stop talking?] ...I didn't say anything against it. Why did you change your mind?

[majinken]

[it comes with having a talking sword nobody else can hear. it's not as one-sided a conversation as it seems.]

It'll take too much energy to do, I guess...

[truedetective]

[This is highly irregular.

Actually, no, it's kind of normal irregular given the group she usually goes with.] All right. You know your capabilities better than I do. We'll figure out something else.

[majinken]

Mm! I think if we're slow and careful, we can probably find a way out...

[that's probably the best option they have anyway, right?]

[truedetective]

Careful, yes. Slow... I wouldn't want to spend any more time in here than we have to.

But that doesn't excuse sloppiness, either.

[majinken]

Mm... Maybe slow's not the right word. But I think going too fast could be dangerous anyway, especially with things like this.

[truedetective]

Well-- no, I'm not advocating we go too slow or too fast, I'm just saying we shouldn't spend too much of our time on frivolous things, nor should we be overly hasty. And in fact, we are wasting time on frivolous discussion right now.

[majinken]

Ah... right. We can talk as we go, can't we?

[clearly, they're both just subscribed to the jrpg rule of standing around for exposition even though they're capable of doing two things at once here.]

[truedetective]

Yes. Since you have the melee weapon, it'd be prudent for you to go first. I can shoot over your shoulder; you can't swing over mine.

[Well, maybe you could. She's really quite short.]

[majinken]

Mm, that's fine! I don't really mind anyway, since that's what I'm used to doing.

[not because he's terribly tall, thought quite a bit more than naoto. but he's used to leading the pack even when fighting with other sword-wielders.]

Let's get going, then!

[truedetective]

Mm, yes. [And they... might as well just pick this direction.] Are you used to fighting in smaller groups? With your... magic sword.

[majinken]

Small? Eh... maybe. There's usually like... 9 of us that fight together a lot back home.

[it's a big party.] It's a little different here, though.

[truedetective]

I see. That's closer to a 'small group' than an army, at any rate.

What's the primary difference?

[majinken]

Well... we don't really have to fight that much here. At least... where I'm from, I have to a lot more. But even when I do have to, it's usually only with a couple of people and that's it.

[that's a pretty big difference for him, at least.]

[truedetective]

That makes sense. So this world is more peaceful than the one you're used to? --if I may ask, why did you fight? What were your motivations for doing so, back home?