October Event

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10/02 06:12

✽ Silence lifts at six in the morning, and there is still quite a bit of time before classes start. Early risers who decide to return to school from the dorms cross the courtyard and open the double doors and—- something cold and wet drips down onto their head: old blood from the torso of a student(?) bound by rope and strung up above the doors to the courtyard, body burned black and cut in half at the waist.
The air is heavy, and the entire school smells of blood.

Hope... month...

✽ A large poster advertising the student store has been tacked up on the bulletin board. For October, store hours are now 6AM to 8PM Monday to Saturday, and noon to 4PM on Sundays. Outside of those hours, the shopkeeper is occasionally in the shop and will leave the door propped open if they are, but more often than not, the door is closed and there is no answer when knocking on the door. Laundry tokens can now be purchased at a reasonable price. The rock gacha machine is now located just outside the door so it can be played at any time. Please continue to spend your hard-eared points on plain boring normal rocks.
✽ In the dormitory, the construction paper covering the oil paintings start to soak through with blood, causing the papers to grow heavy and fall. The distorted faces in the paintings seem to be bleeding from their open wounds, the canvas wet to the touch and smelling of blood. Blood dripping down the walls and on the floor do not cause the dorms to change, nor do the splatters of blood seen on the glass over the star dormitory rooms occasionally throughout the month, as if it had rained blood in the darkness and silence of night, although no other evidence is seen elsewhere in the courtyard.
✽ The wisteria tree slowly continues to lose its petals, and the area roughly ten feet around the trunk of the tree has become completely dead and barren, leaving dry dirt underneath. Despite shedding its petals, new buds are becoming noticeable now too. The spider lilies that bloomed during the autumnal equinox remain, still covering the rest of the courtyard and extending into the forest surrounding the school. Outside, the air smells faintly metallic at all times.
✽ Occasionally throughout the month and increasing in frequency and intensity towards the end of the month, characters with 13 or more tallies will find themselves sensitive to sunlight and loud noises, prone to vertigo upon standing or turning too quickly, and suffering ice pick headaches throughout the day.
✽ Characters with 5 or less tallies will hear faint white noise during the normally silent hours of midnight to 6AM, but no other sound.
✽ The class roster on the bulletin board acknowledges class 1-D for leading the rest of the classes in rank, being the first to reach 100. All characters in first year classes and #-D classes will receive 500 merit points and will be able to exit out the front door to the school. They will be able to make it up to the front gate, but will find themselves growing lightheaded and about to pass out if they try to squeeze through the bars or climb over the gate itself. Please contact me privately if they would try to get out anyways.
✽ The void in the auditorium continues to grow, and (pending character interaction) by the end of the month will encompass the entire right wing of the first floor past the lockers, the home ec cooking room on the second floor, as well as the art club room on the third floor.

Exchange Program

✽ On October 11, students participating in the exchange program are given one pocket knife each and sent out the front doors, upon which they will find themselves in that canon location as if they had stepped out of any normal door in the area. For characters who visit their own canon's location, they will find all their friends and family alive and happy— except for the one person they are closest to, who will be absent. Nobody there will recognize your character or the person they are closest to, regarding both as complete strangers, as if neither have ever existed in the first place. But otherwise... think of it as canon good end, in contrast to elevator bad end.
✽ There is no bus to take them back to Yogen and they can stay as long as they'd like, even forever if they feel like it. If they wish to return to their real home, though, they would have to first return to Yogen and figure things out from there. The first time they open the pocket knife, they will find a piece of paper tucked between the blade and the handle reading "Use to return." If they use it on other people, that's the local law enforcement's business. In order to return to Yogen, perhaps remembering Natsume's presentation mentioning how they got there in the first place, they will have to use the knife on themselves, or otherwise die by happenstance or, eventually, old age. Two weeks after their return to school, they will find one additional tally on the inside of their wrist.
✽ In return, Yogen receives three exchange students: two familiar and one not.

OOC

✽ The first prompt leads into this month's mini-event, which is becoming a misnomer, maybe they should be called murder events instead.
✽ All students leaving on the exchange program will icly be gone for at least 10/11 - 10/17, although they will be able to return at any later date in October, at the player's discretion, regardless of how much time they experienced on their trip. Just like in the bad end elevator and the void school, nothing physical can be taken back from the exchange trip, but characters can at least drain their bank accounts eating good food and exploring town before coming back.
✽ The new exchange students are former npcs Kouji Seki and Chiaki Kudo, as well as a new student ???. They can be interacted with in their corresponding toplevels below, after 10/11.

Comments

[commences]

They don't like them, yes.

( but he shrugs, )

Doesn't mean they don't exist.

[closewithnewintown]

[a thoughtful noise]

Maybe there's a reason for that... You might be onto something.

... Hiro did say the dorms were haunted. Maybe I should test that out for myself.

[commences]

They are, I've used my hacking gun a few times, but... I never been able to see an actual appearance for why it does.

( but it could be because that building is the old school building, maybe there's more that they don't know or it's basically the monster that's trying to eat them alive. )

Are you sure you want to try by yourself? If that doesn't work out... hang around the wisteria, maybe you'll get lucky.

[closewithnewintown]

I'd just see the man in the kitty mask if I went there. [pause] Is he a ghost? I only see him when I can't sleep. That's a ghostly thing to do.

[commences]

What days can you not sleep? I know he comes out on the full moon... do you have sight to see ghosts? That's amazing!

( he's going to lean forward to stare into her eyes, trying to see if there's anything different about her. )

Maybe you don't need that after all! ( the fan that he points to, but he draws his hand away. ) But... I want you to have it, maybe it can become useful... I never thought I'd see something like it again.

[closewithnewintown]

Most of them. So it's probably not related. [she shrugs, inching away from him a bit.] I've seen weird stuff a lot. Ever since Hyde. It's just something you get used to.

[commences]

Oh, the stepping stone, I remember now. It all makes sense, he was a spirit, after all.

( from what he remembers both him and moraity admitting, it was something about being a servant. perhaps powers come with being close to them, stephanie was however. )

Ah... does this mean you really didn't need it, and here I thought I'd give you something to help your hopes... I can never do anything right.

( and with that, he'll stand up like he's ready to leave. he did come here with the idea that maybe he could do something helpful. )

[closewithnewintown]

[she watches him, head cocked to the side.]

... You don't need to give me anything, you know. There's nothing a friend can give you that's worth more than themselves.

[commences]

...I'm useless, so I wanted to give you something useful.

( isn't this how this works. not like he's buying her friendship, but he genuinely wants to help her with her goal, even if they don't match up with others. )

Even myself isn't good enough to help your thoughts, so I thought maybe other opinions from souls not like us would help. I wanted to ease your mind...

[closewithnewintown]

... You aren't. I know I can't convince you, but you really aren't.

[shakes her head] I don't want my mind eased. It won't be easy until I'm back home, in my uncle's house, sleeping in my own bed and wearing my own pajamas. Until then, being uneasy's the best thing I could be.

[commences]

Ahaha... don't say such things, I already know how insufferable I must be.

( but he will do anything for her hope, and that's why he was willing to give this since he knows the magical properties it possesses. he wants her to use it in anyway that she sees fit, talk to the deceased that no longer have a body, and can only make do with their spirits attached to this world. )

It'd be better... you're all worried, I just don't want despair to devour you... Not the hope I want to see brighten the darkest corners of this place.

[closewithnewintown]

Despair... I guess that's what it is. I never felt it before here...

[she pauses, looking off to the side.]

... I kept looking at the sky. I knew I wouldn't see anything... But, even when I jumped, I still looked up. Because I know that when I look up, and I see a ship in the sky... That's when I'll be safe again. I'm... hurting. All the time. And every day feels like it's gonna be too much... But, I know I'll see a day without an empty sky. I'll find my way back home.

[commences]

( his eyes widen as he turns to look towards stephanie, shocked at her statement that makes his mind come to a complete halt. there's this moment of irritation that bubbles up from him as his fist tightens. )

Don't say something so idiotic! You don't know the true meaning of despair, if you felt it, you'd kill yourself right now, you'd take joy out of seeing your peers struggle, wanting them to fail — wanting to see yourself fail because the futility of it all drives you!

( he raised his voice, sure, and he grits his teeth as he looks towards her — body shaking as his eyes swirl slowly, taken aback. it's an immediate response to hate it, to dislike the word on his tongue, and it sends a migraine in his head as he thinks too hard. he would never let someone on his watch fall into despair, he wouldn't let stephanie be subjected to it, and to hear it come from her mouth that... it's what she's feeling... it fills him with disgust. )

You aren't hurting, you're giving up... you're being a dumb child that can't even understand what everyone is going through to help prevent you from despair! You aren't the only one, the people around here are trying to safeguard their hope... and here you are... mocking it, not using it to your advantage!

[closewithnewintown]

[she stares at him with a fixedly bland expression, and ah, there it is, the bullshit she has absolutely zero motivation to muck through today.]

You know it's just a word for being depressed, right. [beat] Your world is weird, and you're even weirder, so maybe it means something weird for you, like how you are about hope. Like it's a religion or something.

[...] It's just not that serious, for anybody else in any other universe. Hope and despair are just feelings. You'll end up feeling them both, every once in a while. That's just what life is.

[commences]

Then say you're depressed, not that you're in despair... because it's not the same — ( strictly not, komaeda will not let her use that word for something like that, considering all those who suffer in despair aren't sad, they're more... getting off on their pain and sadness, and that doesn't fit the definition. )

Hope is what you all will feel, and I'll help it! I won't ever left someone as inconsequential as despair take over your lives! You're all much stronger than that... or should I give up and let you all die one by one...

( sure, he feels it every day, he's a very hopeful individual who was forced into despair, and it's nothing he can change now. doesn't mean he wants to hear it. )

Besides, you don't have time to be depressed when I'm around, I'll have to keep you on your toes.

[closewithnewintown]

... So, you're allowed to talk all the time about how you're worthless and want to die, but if I say that I'm kinda depressed after going through literally the worst things that could happen to a person, that's too far.

[commences]

Ahaha! Yep, that's how it is.

( yeah... does she think he'd feel bad for that? besides. )

Because you have people here for you, people that care about you, and I care for your hope... you're not alone as you make yourself out to be!

[closewithnewintown]

So do you. Despite how hard you work to make it difficult...

I'm not alone. I've never been. No matter where I've gone, I've always been able to make friends. [pause] But, that doesn't make the nightmares go away. That doesn't make it easier to breathe sometimes. It helps. But it doesn't stop it.

[commences]

Do you want me to stay the night with you?

( because maybe the nightmares will go away, maybe if komaeda bets his luck, she can have a better night sleep — he'll have them, but that's fine. it's his luck, one that he can force depending on what he does, and he stares at her. )

Just tonight.

[closewithnewintown]

... If you really want to. [a shrug] I don't think I'm really good company for a sleepover, though.

[commences]

We can talk about gossip, or whatever things... people do at sleepovers, I've only been at a few.

( but... first thing's first. )

I have to get a pillow from my room, and maybe I'll bring my sheets...

( because he can't take from crona. ) Crona-san should join!

[closewithnewintown]

They do live here...

When I have sleepovers back home, we tell each other scary stories. [...] I don't want to do that.

[commences]

I have a lot of scary stories, but... my life is practically scary so I could retell my... graduation years.

( like how he had to be a servant to kids and watch them kill adults. that was fun. )

Oh... I could tell you about the places I've been... hm... it's kind of boring talking about me, we can make Crona-san talk about themselves.

[closewithnewintown]

[shakes head] I want nice stories. Where nice things happen.

[commences]

In high-school, we had a small dog.

( he's starting his story, but she can tell him to save it if she doesn't want to hear it now. )

He was a cream color, he had the softest fur, and fluffiest ears.