MARCH EVENT LOG

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00:00 03/01

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.

Comments

[waitingforplayer2]

[ A jubilant and somewhat high-pitched upupupu twists and morphs into a lower-pitched and more masculine chuckle. ]

This was always coming. We merely had to get all the preparations in order first.

[ The television monitor flicks on, displaying footage of a moustachio'd man wearing a brown suit. He tilts his head slightly, inspecting Ranger. ]

So what is it that you're going to do, then?...

[rearranger]

... I see, so that's the game here.

[ He speaks more to himself than the voice on the screen. It was always coming, huh? But ASUNARO would never waste time and resources to prepare, so he supposes this too is just a daydream. Then again, perhaps it's the last six months that were? That would, he think, be a far better punishment. After all, crushed hope makes for a finer wine than no hope.

Regardless, it's fishing for a reaction. Ranger isn't naive enough to think he won't give one, but showing fear and weakness at the offset would be the same as a human cutting their hand and sticking it a piranha tank. He looks back, confirming once more that here's no where to go back to, and crushes any hope that he might have before it can begin to form. He takes the first few steps forward, paying mind to try and catch and anomalies. ]

[waitingforplayer2]

Indeed.

[ The last six months - the mere prelude, to this. Another experiment. Just to see what happens if, say... an AI gets to live away from home for a little while. Interact with other people. ]

But it's all only the set-up. It's not the Main Game.

[ The light in the room clicks on, blindingly bright - it's a small room; there's a table in front of Ranger, with a pistol sitting on it. And as Ranger's eyes adjust, in the light it's clear to see:

Gashu was never in the monitor at all. He's in the room with Ranger. ]

This is.

[ He picks up the pistol, and fires once between Ranger's eyes. ]

[rearranger]

[ Ranger doesn't remember the first time he was shot, but he knows the story. It should come as no surprise then when there's a redux. Ranger doesn't feel any pain, but he's acutely aware of the damage done to his hardware.

That's what he gets for allowing himself to grow so soft. He's too slow, though there's something wrong with that. As long as he were paying attention, he should have been able to step out of the way. But he hadn't, and so his eyes flick up for a few seconds before his body collapses.

How unlucky. ]

cw: memory loss

[waitingforplayer2]

[ Somebody gently catches him from behind. Safalin's there, Gashu's silent assistant, the dark light still shining in her eyes.

She lowers Ranger onto a bed, which is propped up at a near-vertical angle so that Gashu can still face him. She starts attaching wires to his head. ]

I can keep you alive for just another few minutes. Please hold on, Ranger.

[ Gashu claps his hands once. ]

Now, we will begin the Main Game. The basic rules are that one person to be sacrificed will be chosen by majority vote. [ ... ] As there are 9 presently alive, [ ... ] a final vote will be held using these, deciding the ultimate victim.

[ Every so often, he seems to glitch out and skip, like he's still talking from a television monitor. He patiently explains the four Roles - but Ranger knows all this already, doesn't he? Behind him, Safalin's strapping Ranger in so that he can still stand up. There's a podium in front of him with several faces on it. ]

Now then, the Main Game will now begin.

[ The walls lower, revealing eight other podiums. Eight other shaken-looking individuals stand at the podiums - four boys, and four girls. They should look familiar, and Ranger should even be able to pick out the names: that one's N.... or maybe A-....

But try as he might, the names won't come. His hardware must have been really messed up by that pistol shot. ]

[rearranger]

I don't want it! Just let me die, you bastard!

[ The worst thing he can now is respond, to show any kind of reaction, but those heated words slip past his lips all the same. It's not true though. He doesn't want to die. Ranger wants to drag out every painstaking second., and he has no choice but to make the appropriate changes in order to reduce the strain on his system just that little bit, to extend the life of his battery just that little bit longer.

It's like he's watching a faulty projection, but there's no flaws in ASUNARO's works. There would be no mistakes allowed in the Min Game in particular, which is so essential to securing a victor in their game. But he knows the rules, and so he doesn't need them explained to him.

He's standing in front of a podium. He doesn't feel wobbly, as that particular sense has begun to malfunction and shut down, but he can fill in the gaps well enough to understand that if not for being secured he would be a heap on the floor. The scene is familiar, but the names and faces fail to register. He blinks slowly, searching his memory banks over and over - it only takes him seconds to run through the data and come up empty so many times.

Who are they? If such a critical piece of hardware was damaged, how is he supposed to make a choice? No, even without that, the roles are more important in this game. He just needs to focus, that's all. He just needs to at least keep his attention on what's going on around him. He just needs to figure something out, what to do, how to remember, anything - ]

voting will commence in 2 turns

[waitingforplayer2]

[ Because he's ASUNARO, Ranger knows exactly how much time is left on the clock. He can tell that the discussion period has been drastically shortened so it can finish within his lifespan. Time is rapidly running out.

The podium lights up with Ranger's role, for only him to see.

SAGE

Immediately, a diagram of the podium circle pops up. He can see that the SACRIFICE is a boy two places to his left. He can see that the KEYMASTER is a girl across the ring from him. Everybody else, of course, is a COMMONER. ]

"All right, everyone, I might as well say it: I'm the Keymaster."

[ That's from the boy two places to Ranger's left - the Sacrifice. ]

"What? No! That's not true! I'm the Keymaster!"

[ The true Keymaster speaks up, flustered and angry. Already the discussion is starting to devolve. ]

[rearranger]

[ It's always like this. It doesn't matter if it's during the game or if it's at the school, the end result is always idiotic discussions that turn into chaos. Does it matter who's voted for in this case? He thinks he should know them, but he doesn't, and Ranger doesn't find that he has any particular attachments aside from himself. But nor is he inclined to give away his role, as that will cause issues for him down the line.

He glances around once more. There's not much time left, and there's no way to prove who the Keymaster is without first confirming the sage.

Perhaps it would be for the best if they chose the first person who spoke up. If they did, then this game would end quickly. ]

voting will commence in 1 turn

[waitingforplayer2]

"Then how are we supposed to decide?"

The boy immediately to Ranger's left speaks up. He stands resolute at his podium but with a laid-back air - apparently willing to take charge if nobody else will, before the situation devolves beyond any semblance of productivity.

"Well, I'm gonna vote for █████ █████ on this one." So says a boy standing directly next to the Keymaster, looking a little embarrassed. "Sorry if I'm wrong, everyone!"

"You can't just do that!" Another girl shouts indignantly. "The Keymaster might be █████!"

"There must be a way to figure it out!" says yet another girl.

"There would be," the leader points out, "if the Sage would reveal themself. Are there any takers? Otherwise, we'll just have to guess."

The real Keymaster looks distraught at this. "But if you vote for the Sacrifice...!"

"That's a risk we have to take, right?" The leader shoots back indignantly. "Besides, you two just made it into a coin flip. One of you is probably the Sacrifice. Nobody with a Sacrifice card would want to stay quiet and be quietly killed, would they?"

The Keymaster pounds her podium. "You're just going to leave this decision up to luck?!?"

[rearranger]

[ Ah, he sees the game now. This little scene is to bait him into revealing himself as the Sage, all so that they can survive as a group. How foolish. If they think one of them is the sacrifice, then it would make more sense to vote for a third party. But then, that runs into the same issue.

He's got it. If he doesn't speak up, then the sacrifice will be chosen as punishment for his inaction. If the sacrifice is voted for, they'll be able to choose one person to leave with, and the rest will be executed one at a time. Then again, maybe the punishment will be that he's voted for because of his inaction.

If he had a promise that he could survive this, then it might be the same as if he saw a familiar face. He could cast his die and see what comes of it. As it is, Rio Ranger's only duty is to preserve his own existence as long as possible. It's not to his benefit to ensure he's voted for when his fate could instead be a coin flip.

If it's a game that he can't win, then he can't help that. At any rate, he's not meant to interfere in the game or influence his decisions - that's a rule too. ]

How unlucky...

[ He mumbles, considering who his own vote should go to. ]

[waitingforplayer2]

"Interesting," says a voice in Ranger's ear. Gashu's been monitoring his brainwaves, of course.

"Don't you know him??" says the Keymaster. "Think about this. What card is HE most likely to get?"

"He's not predictable enough to do that." The leader sounds more annoyed by the second. "We need to choose. Time's running out."

"Indeed it is." This time Gashu speaks to everybody. "You will find that your podium has been activated. Please vote for your choice."

The podium opens up - not that Ranger even needs to touch it to vote, with his impaired motor capacity. Whichever person he thinks of - that will be his vote.

"And who will you condemn, Ranger?" Gashu's in his ear again. "If it was up to you, and only you... who would you choose?"

[rearranger]

Ranger stares down at the device once more, tuning out the pointless chatter. He hums thoughtfully as he views the selection, none of which he can assign names or values to.

"... Little unfair to ask that, don'tchya think?" He mumbles, "Since it's all just chance anyway."

It's no different than rolling the dice to start, but least of all when he knows that every roll will come up snake eyes. He's not so foolish as to misunderstand the name of this punishment, and he can guess the next steps.

Not the Keymaster, and not the Sacrifice, so who..?