yogen | MARCH EVENT LOG

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At midnight on March 1st, a rolling lightning storm hits Yogen. Thunder crackles, and strikes of Anvil Crawler lighting can be seen lighting up the sky; anyone paying attention to the courtyard may see the explosive strike of lightning hitting the wisteria tree. Petals scatter throughout the air and are carried off in every direction by the wind...

00:01 03/01-03/31

As the month goes on the school will start to look even more barren. As the month goes on, several students start to disappear, with rumors spreading here and there about students disappearing after entering the forest. Those rumors twist and warp, and within just a few days there are rumors of a witch in the forest. But it's not a witch, nor a ghost, or anything else, but a dream, and those who enter will find themselves reminded of such by a soothing voice, the voice of a person they're familiar with, speaking gently in their ears:

"You are dreaming... They have always led and will always lead you here... Remind yourself, this is a dream..."
The world shifts subtly. There are gravestones marking the pathway now, and before long the forest is replaced by a completely new scene. A voice reminds you once more that this is a dream, and that you have always been here. You have always been led to this place. But where is this place? It's the world of a player character. It's nothing more than a snapshot in time. It might be one that they wish to escape, or perhaps a warm memory of a time that they wish to return to, but it is always an important memory to the character.

Whichever it is, the only way is to move forward. As characters move through the memory, characters will soon notice a snake and holly tattoo that spreads over their body will be. It starts small, a clump on one's back, but will spread across all parts of a character's body. It will reach the neck and face last, killing them upon reaching the eyes. As the curse spreads, they will notice changes in the dream including hallucinations, hearing lullabies, and shades that pursue them. They will also notice increased exhaustion and lethargy.

Upon reaching the end of the memory, they will find a glowing ball of light representative of a lost student's soul. Finding the soul will lead to both characters awakening at the edge of the forest, and the character who had been dreaming will be covered with the tattoo for a brief moment before it disappears.

Those who entered the dream may hear that same voice from before that tugs at their mind as the dream fades away:

"Remind yourself, this is a dream, and soon you will awaken. But you are here, as you always have been, and as you always will be... Soon, you will wonder where you were, and each moment after, will bring you here..."

OOC

✽ Dreams may be whoelsale memories, or they may be more akin to dreamscapes based on a person's memories or mental state.
✽ The holly pattern represents the pain of love and aches of the heart, while the snake represents the yearning for the dead that consume a person.
✽ The tattoos will be blue or red.
✽ Characters may be drawn into the forest more than once, or require multiple memories to be gone through before reappearing. In those cases, the character who had gone through the initial memory will simply wake up in the forest alone.
✽ Characters who hear the voice upon leaving the dream will be more susceptible to entering and being lost in the forest.
✽ Anyone who is not rescued by the end of the month will be found at the edge of the forest. The tattoo will cover their body and stop just short of their eyes. It will disappear within an hour, but they will be exhausted for the rest of the day.

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[It's not Rika's first time seeing an elevator--Yogen itself has them, so she's seen them, but seeing a completely different one in front of her eyes is something completely different.

And what catches her off guard is how she's roughly shoved into the elevator from behind, enough that she basically trips over her two feet.

But she tries to scramble back up, quickly, quickly, before it's too late! just to see who's did that, if she even has a chance to actually see. If it's someone who's planning on killing her... it's a face that she needs to force herself to remember.]

Ohhh ho ho ho!! [ The laughter is unmistakable, as is the blond girl's evil grin on the other side of the bars. As the elevator starts to descend, Rika might notice - there's something wrong with Satoko's eyes. A dark light within them, a void that's consumed her friend's soul.

But there's no time for that. The elevator's falling away already. Ohohoho morphs into upupupu, echoing and spiraling around Rika, and before she knows it, the elevator's arrived at its destination. The doors slide open.

There's a television on in front of her. It glitches white-- blue-- and finally a blood red light, along with the words:

FURUDE RIKA HAS BEEN FOUND GUILTY.
TIME FOR THE PUNISHMENT!

[That laughter.

She could never mistake that laugh, not in a hundred years.

Her eyes widen as she sees that grin, all too sharp and with eyes that seem wrong. All too wrong. There's a proverbial thorn in her side, questioning how she could have been betrayed like this along with the conflicting idle thought of there's no way that Satoko could ever do something like this--

But she remembers.

All too well.

It makes the pit of her stomach sick, just thinking about it.

Of the time when Satoko had done something unspeakably, immeasurably wrong--

She isn't given much time to think on it, as the elevator dives, lower and lower and lower, everything echoing and reverberating in her ears are the taunting laughters. Rika wants to cover her ears so badly, so very badly.

But she presses on. Stumbling out of the elevator, her gaze flits onto the television, the way it glitches, and the bright, almost blinding red text.

Her eyes widen, a second time already today, as her breath stills. When she speaks, she doesn't even recognize her voice as her own.]

Guilty...?

[There are many questions.

Of what, she wonders. She doesn't move from where she stands, just outside the doors of the elevator.

All she can do is stare at the screen, blankly, as if hoping it'd answer her single worded question that she'd spoken aloud.]

Edited 2022-03-04 07:01 (UTC)

Upupupu~ you already know, don't you, Rika-chan? You made too many mistakes this time...

[ The disembodied voice is tinny, coming from the TV's speakers. Whoever's speaking isn't revealing their face right now - but they seem to be having a good time. ]

And we all know what that means, don't we? You want to save them, DON'T you?

[ The lights in the room finally SNAP on, too bright for Rika to see at first. But when she does, there won't be much in the room for her to see, besides the television.

And a knife, attached at head-height to the wall, its silver point gleaming and pointed straight towards Rika. ]

[Does she already know...?

Mistakes. Mistakes, mistakes. She tries to run them through her head, and wonders what kind of failure she must have done this time around.

...No, she hasn't failed yet.

She can't let this voice, laughter and all get to her.]

I don't know who you are. [Rika speaks sternly, her brows knitted.] But you really must be a coward if you can't even show your face. And if you think your silly little knife is going to scare me, think again.

[Determination kindles deep inside of her.

She's reminded of a Fragment, seeing the knife at that height, but she ignores the thought.

She begins to move carefully, her hand pressed against the wall. The bright light may make it difficult for a girl like her to see, but she knows she can rely on her other senses. She has to.]

Upupupu!!! [ The chuckle only gets louder and more jubilant. ] Aw, Rika-chan~ did you really think it would be that easy~?

[ As Rika makes her way down the hall, knife after knife greets her, taped to the wall in the same way, at the same height. Surely Rika wouldn't like to reconsider~? ]

Well everyone, it looks like our Ultimate Looper has decided to do this the hard way~! Will she make it to the end in time to save her friend? Let's watch and see~!

[ Televisions everywhere she looks, with somebody in silhouette grinning down at her - sometimes it looks like a bear, and sometimes it might be a girl, but there's always a wide grin to greet Rika wherever she turns.

There's a lot to be distracted by - so Rika will almost certainly miss the knives that fly out of the darkness, aiming for her stomach. ]

[Ugh, how annoying.

She will have to do it the hard way. And while there may be a lot to be distracted by, she needs to run. To hurry.

This person...

Were they the one that did something to Satoko?

She runs. Frantic. And when the first knife does hit her in the stomach, enough to make her stumble.

Ah.

So this person is going to attempt to kill her, huh? No, she can't let that happen. Not again.

But if they're referring to her as a looper, they know, don't they? That even if she dies -

She'll just come back.

Rika forces herself to hurry. Run. Run. Run--]

Ah! And we have first blood! Hmmm... why don't we watch that again on instant replay?

[ Time rewinds. Rika's running in reverse down the corridor; the knife yanks its way out of her stomach and flies back into the darkness; her wounds mends itself.

Then time reverses again, back to the normal flow, and in seconds the knife returns to make the exact same wound, just as painful as the first time. ]

Ooh!!!! That's gotta STING! But Rika-chan can power on through the pain, can't she~?

[The word 'instant replay' makes her almost freeze in place, but then she feels her time rewind.

It's very different like this, with how her wounds fix themselves and then the actions repeat.

Her eyes widen in shock and she feels her legs wobble, unsteadily. She swallows.

There's something in her heart that can't take it. A world like this--

She doesn't want it!

Her mouth moves and she blinks away the tears.]

Hanyuu... Hanyuu, Hanyuu, Hanyuu!!

[The same name called out repeatedly, desperate and childish and weak.

It hurts.

It hurts so much.]

Where are you when I need you...!?

[She keeps moving forward, pressing on regardless. If it's too much, then... she'll have to exit the stage herself. But she doesn't want to give up. Not yet.]

Ooh, maybe if you do well enough, he'll come for you~ Hey, Rika-chan, how bout I let you go if you can escape before I count to ten?

[ The monitors flash a bright RED again, and then numbers count down along with the voice.

10... 9... 8...

The next knife goes into Rika's back, and the one after that slices her ankle.

But wherever Rika's ended up - from where she is, she can see a door in the darkness. And there's a sign over it.

EXIT ]

['He'?

...Her rattled brain thinks about Keiichi.

Akasaka.

The two that had saved her in the past.

She doesn't want to hope that she'll be saved. Nor does she hope that this person, whoever they are, will actually let her go. Why would they...? And yet, that small nagging part of her brain wants to believe in spite of her pessimism.

She hurries.

The knives stab her, but she ignores it.

This is nothing.

This is nothing.

Compared to those hundred years, this is nothing.

She keeps moving.

One,

two,

three-

Keep going.

...no matter what...

Don't stop. Because to stop means to die. Her hand reaches out towards the door--]

[ When she opens the door... reality splinters.

She opens the door and a knife hurls itself straight at her face, piercing through her brains and killing her instantly--

She opens the door and fire bursts through the entranceway, fire washing through her flesh and incinerating her body in moments--

She opens the door and inhales a deadly gas, leaving her to choke out and die on the floor of the labyrinth itself--

A hundred more deaths, each more painful than the last - but there's one reality still where nothing has happened. And though Rika feels every punishment--

If she can bear it... there's one room that's safe. One reality where she isn't dead.

A dark room with a cavernously tall ceiling, and a small huddled form on the other side of it, lying in a pool of blood. ]

[She's been through a hundred deaths.

A hundred more should be nothing--or so she tries to convince herself over and over again, because she truly believes that she'll find that one reality, that one Fragment where she isn't.

There's someone there.

Who...?

There's a fear that sears through her, but she takes those careful steps forward anyway.]

[ At the end of the punishment... the destination. The person she came in to save. But it's too late to save her.

And anyway, this was never just Rika's punishment.

The closer Rika gets to the body, the more the surrounding area will fade away, until it's just the two of them, and the pool of blood spreading out from the body on the floor.

It's Chiaki Nanami - choking on her own blood, breaths getting shallower by the second. Her discarded hairpin at her side - glowing faintly. ]

...

[It's when she sees the familiar face that Rika finally understands, frowning deeply.]

I see. [She crouches to where Nanami is, the color in her eyes shifting from its normal hue to something much more that of a witch.] I'm sorry. There's nothing that I can do.

[ She looks up at Rika, and between her tortured little wheezes, shakily gets a couple words out. ] Pl-please... Rika-san...

...

[ She'd felt it all.

It was hard to understand, for a lot of the dream, what her perspective was. She could see down into the labyrinth from the cameras peppered throughout it. She could see through the monitor, through the eyes of the one torturing Rika.

But she had felt all of it. Every slice, every wound, every painful death, right up until the moment Rika had found her.

Now she was back, stuck in her own mortally wounded form, shakily gasping for air, her blood slowly leaving her body.

Tears burn her eyes but she has no strength to wipe them away. Because the worst part is...

She was also the girl laughing at Rika, the girl who pushed Rika into the elevator. She had felt all of it. She had caused all this. If Rika had never come looking for her, this wouldn't have happened.

Nanami wouldn't have done this to her. ]

I-I'm... s-s-sorry.

For what reason are you apologizing? I was the one who came here in the first place. Everything else was just simply the consequences of my actions.

[She answers coldly, the red color not disappearing from her eyes.]

[ A choking little laugh, as she hears that, her consciousness ebbing away... in a haze, she repeats the last words she ever heard in life. ]

E-even in your s-s-situation... y-you would ss-still try to protect s-someone...

[ And then she lies still, and her tortured breathing finally stops.

The discarded hairpin glows even brighter, slowly surrounded in a ball of pure light. ]

[As the other girl's life seems to fade, Rika's expression falls and she shakes her head.]

That's wrong. I'm not nearly that selfless. I just simply wanted one thing.

[Her voice rings out cold as she notes the hairpin, crouching down and reaching out.]

[ As she touches it, the ball grows brighter, filling the room and all of Rika's vision with white light.

Before she knows it, Rika's awaking at the edge of the forest - and nearby, Nanami's stirring too, unharmed but disoriented, shaking death-like sleep out of her eyes. ]

...

[So that's that, isn't it?

It's definitely a little disorienting, to be in this position and a part of her wonders why it had happened in the first place. Was it due to the kami and their presence...? Or something else?

Those questions wrap in her mind, but she ignores them for now.]

Mii. Chii, are you awake? We probably should head back to the school grounds.

[She immediately masks her discontent with her usual act, smiling as if nothing's wrong and pitching her voice in a manner that could almost be seen as off for someone of her physical age.

And why yes, she's getting a nickname now.]

Mmm....?

[ A horrible dream... is that all it was? She stares at Rika, who seems none the worse for wear... did she even go through it, or was it only herself doing the dreaming?

Remind yourself, this is a dream, and soon you will awaken. But you are here, as you always have been, and as you always will be... Soon, you will wonder where you were, and each moment after, will bring you here...

A not-quite-voice from the forest tugs her attention back to it... she stares. Why would she want to go back, if going in made her feel this? Unless...

Unless that isn't all that is to it. ]

Ah... yeah... [ She nods slowly, getting shakily to her feet, as if they haven't been used in a while and she needs to re-awaken their muscles.

She should ask Rika questions... but she's too lost in thought, staring at that forest. ]

[Rika has had bad dreams for ages and while this one was just as worse as many of the others that came before, if not more so, she knows how to reel herself in.

Now's not the time to cry, anyway.

She can do that once she's back at the dorms, alone in her room, with nobody to see or hear her.]

We probably should keep our distance from the forest for the time being. I don't know why it's doing this, but -- it isn't safe.

It... isn't safe.

[ She echoes it slowly, and then nods, still staring out at the forest. Yes, she shouldn't do that. It wouldn't be the safe thing to do. She might experience that again.

But what if she doesn't?

She follows Rika anyway though, staring at the ground as they walk. Memories of... dying again and again, are surfacing; the details of the dream haven't gone away, it seems. And...

She looks up at the girl she's following. ] Did... you dream that, too?

Depends on what 'that' is.

[It's an immediate and clipped sentence. While she's certain that she knows what the other girl means, she really doesn't want to talk about it.]

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waitingforplayer2 - 2022-04-04 01:53 (UTC) - Expand

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