[ He's running in after his stupid, other self, but of course he doesn't make it before the figure falls backwards into the water. And that only means he has to quickly guard his face from the scalding waters that gush up, splashing against them.
In that distracted moment, since i rolled an 8 to continue failing all these combat checks, Dimitri is basically knocked back completely by a flailing claw. Good luck guys. ]
[-doing, he means to ask, but it's very clear that they're attacking.
what comes next, though... this monster is unexpected, and his expressions twists on noticing the masks of his people incorporated into its form. parts of his form, though they're-- surprisingly inert.
the rest is troubling enough. he hisses as he gets splashed by those waters, but since he isn't immediately being targeted-- emet-selch takes the opportunity to uncap that ? vial, hurriedly, just popping the top off with his teeth on account of his one good arm.]
[ Sure, the clawed hand that seems partway perhaps a lion’s paw comes to smack the two of them, and it knocks Dimitri over leaving a deep gouge from its claws, before meeting Joonghyuk at his blade, where it will struggle and parry him. Joonghyuk comes out slightly better, able to push the hand back as its claws flex, the creature leaning in close to look at him. It speaks, but its words are perfectly simple. ]
K▘LL▋… HA▜E…
[ Your strange reflection slash guide slash ‘you’ is gone! Fell into the whirlpool, forward birthed a big-ass demonic creature. Try not to look too hard at it, especially the bits that glitch, hiding something incomprehensible and barely of of Joonghyuk’s world, let alone yours. Even the sight of it is enough to pierce your head with a keening ring, causing a nosebleed.
Emet-Selch can pop off the cap of the terribly-labeled vial, the black smoke wisping out of it the moment he opens the cap, and then… the vial cracks, and a bunch of small balls just fall out and scatter on the ground all over the place. After a few seconds, they all start popping off like fireworks, just the snapping and explosions of a bunch of (Umineko Voice) miniature bombs, essentially, surrounding them. Chaotic. For you? Yes. For Hole-kun also? Absolutely, who finally retracts its hand to kind of make some confused noise and start trying to yeet these firecracker cherry bombs SOMEWHERE. He is distracted. ]
[ STUPID—but now Joonghyuk has to look at this thing proper. It gives off the effects like he's weaker than he actually is... It reminds him of the worst parts of home and all of the many abandoned and unwanted timelines. His head hurts, but he doesn't let that stop him. He has to survive. Survive... Why?
With the small bombs, he snaps out of it and leaps back. Dimitri will come with him whether he likes it or not. Joonghyuk takes this moment to catch his breath, wiping away the blood that drips from his nose. The grip on his sword tightens as he darts back in to take advantage of the distraction. His sword glides in a wide arc leaving a gold afterimage, attempting to run its blade into this thing's flesh. If it catches, he drives his sword deep into it and ignores all of the "water" that threatens to burn him.
[ It's fine. He's burning and bleeding, and looking at the wrong reflection at the wrong time gives him a terrible headache, but it barely seems to register; he'd lunge back in immediately if not for the fact that Joonghyuk is grabbing him by the scruff or something, which he doesn't look too pleased about.
But he also doesn't have to stay back long—as soon as Hole-kun is put on the defensive, they have to press what little advantage they can get.
He reaches down, drawing a second knife that's been sheathed in his boot, and throws it right at the monster's face. ]
[time to take as much advantage of this distraction as possible. his sword requires both arms, so he doesn't bother to reach for it; he can still manage the gun, though, he thinks, given that it's a bit smaller to him than the other two.
he's still not very good at aiming, but you know, it's a shotgun so it's probably fine?
emet-selch aims it over the heads of the other two, so that if he misses horribly he at least won't shoot them, and fires.]
[ Looks away from indecent nipple accusations being thrown around in the CYOA chat. You see the great thing is that I rolled a glorious 1, so that’s happening.
Joonghyuk gets a good grasp of his sword and it sticks deep into the entity’s arm — if this thing even has bones, the sword slices through it, halfway deep into the forearm as It makes some kind of noise. Not pain, necessarily — as far gone as a creature of malice as it is, thousands of years worth of pain and waiting as it’s experienced, it no longer feels this as an experience any worse than a mere distraction.
Granted, that being said, the sword in its arm locks it in place, which makes it prime grounds for Dimitri to throw his knife right into one of its eye… holes? Where the blade simply sticks out. It doesn’t bleed blood, only black sludge, and it kind of flails about with its free hand half-blinded. Emet fires the second and final shot of his shotgun which hits its free arm, though the gun does get knocked out of his grasp as it flails with shrapnel in its terrible beans.
It simply groans, making a move to shove Joonghyuk away and therefore free its arm from the sword instead. With a grumble, it hauls itself out to the limit of its binding chains — it is now fully out of the hole, where should you glance down, you see the red cross fully exposed, an empty hole, no more lake water. It will make another move, to slam a fist down into the middle of you three. ]
[ Joonghyuk, upon seeing the red cross, remembers now... The man in the bag had cross eyes, didn't he? What is this all supposed to mean? Too bad those thoughts are shelved when he yanks his sword out to avoid the fist swiftly falling down onto the three of them. Unfortunately, with a 5, I don't think he will escape the aftershock from the impact onto the ground?
The way Joonghyuk ends up angled has the last smoke vial in his pocket tumble out. Maybe it will crack? I will let Lowe handle that. Joonghyuk, however, is focused on the thing. He makes another attempt, maybe to hop onto its arm that slammed its fist and run up to kick it in the head. If he becomes a lizard... Then he does this as a lizard. ]
[ They're making some progress, but the creature doesn't seem wholly fazed. It doesn't even seem alive. He doesn't have a chance to look down the hole, because he has to move out of the way of it charging at them again.
Thanks to this 2, he is likely not going to escape unscathed again or actually accomplish anything, though that won't stop him from trying to latch onto this stupid creature's hand like the world's most furious squirrel, stabbing it in the wrist and wrenching the blade as far as it will go. ]
[we're all about to have a bad time with this fist, i guess, because emet-selch got an 8 on this
the gun goes flying, clattering across the floor in the distance, and he curses under his breath. besides the vial, that second shot was the last thing he could easily use, so...
he's going to be pulling the sword from its place on his back, before the monster's fist slams into the ground.
if he gets the opportunity, though, he's going to try to stab that fist with his sword, one-handed. there's not as much strength behind it as normal, with one arm, but oh my god is he trying.]
[ God do you understand how tempting it is when YJH rolls a fucking 5 to not do something completely stupid when I also really want to do something insanely awesome at the same time. Do you. Okay I will apply the 5 to your dodge, which yeah, the aftershock will kind of send him tumbling. The vial accidentally falls out and breaks as he does this, and black smoke envelops him…
…And he turns into a fucking dinosaur, baby. He can scamper up Hole-kun’s arm, digging claws into him and do a lizard-kick right to his head, which just kind of causes his head to loll and you distinctly hear a grumbled ‘owie’.
Dimitri your roll I’m in tears. Yeah okay he will just kind of. Get the full fist-paw then, just knocked and crushed into the ground, knocking the wind out of him. Fortunately he isn’t just crushed into a pulp on the spot as Emet-Selch uses his quick thinking to have the entity slam its fist right into the sword with its own momentum, causing it to draw back pretty quickly, though they’ll both become covered in black sludge trying. Big guy doesn’t quite get such a straight-on hit, but he’ll still be knocked back by the aftershock, hitting the ground quite hard.
It lifts its hand, distracted by the sword piercing through it as well as the lizard-man currently harassing it. The greatsword can clatter on the ground as it attempts to swat at YJH like he’s a particularly annoying gnat, leaving the hole open and unguarded. ]
[ Joonghyuk is a fucking dinosaur because Lowe dictated it. This... Is not what he wanted... And he has to watch as his sword clatter onto the ground because he has no thumbs. I guess someone below can use that, but he's awfully displeased. Adrenaline runs through his new cold-blooded veins as he climbs on all-fours, digging his claws into the abomination for traction. He makes sure to drag every step.
When he reaches its head, he pierces its neck with his claws. ]
Get into the hole!
[ This position leaves him vulnerable for the SWATTING, so he will be swatted like the gnat he actually is. ]
[ He gets crushed, saved, and slimed in rapid succession, which leaves him... dazed, to say the least. It takes him a second to realize that Joonghyuk is a dinosaur now. A lot is happening.
Dimitri forces himself to his feet, though with a 6 he's struggling to get much air in his lungs or distance from the creature. But he's not running anyway—not without making sure all three of them have a way out of here.
So instead, he pulls out the vial he'd gotten from Joonghyuk earlier. ]
Get back!
[ When he's pretty sure he can get a clear shot, he chucks the explosive smoke at the beast. He's close, and rolled an 18, so here goes nothing. ]
it's clear he can't carry his own sword, though, after he's dropped it, so while being covered in this sludge feels horrible and he groans, pained, as he gets to his feet...
someone has to get these swords while dimitri blasts this thing.
he takes up his own with his good hand, using his left to grab joonghyuk's lighter blade, staying back long enough to ensure he has both weapons before he finally listens and heads for the hole. fuck him up one more time for it.]
[ You are a dinosaur, this is your fate. It’s okay, Emet-Selch is making sure your sword doesn’t get left behind, that man will respect your weapon probably. Joonghyuk’s claws leave gouges in the strange cloth at every step of the way — you don’t know what’s under there, but the black blood welling in the tracks does seem to mean he is successfully being shredded. It groans as reptilian claws pierce into its thick neck, tearing deep.
For a moment, through the black spray, you all feel he sees something in there. A shadow of a face, someone you hate and yet someone who knows you better than anyone else. It can only last so long though, as with Joonghyuk's claws stuck in fabric and whatever this thing’s body is made of, it finally grabs at Joonghyuk with a free hand, intending on crushing his lizard body —
Except Dimitri’s explosive smoke vial hits true right in its torso, leaving a gaping hole in its wake, fiery pieces of cloth raining down. Half of its body gone, the entity stutters and struggles, half-throwing but mostly simply dropping Joonghyuk straight down where he simply falls into the hole at the center. You fall in, trusting the process, that this won’t burn you further. Wouldn’t it be funny if I just killed you for this? ]
[ But no. You fall. And though it initially feels exactly like falling down through an endless pit, eventually, it transitions into a different kind of feeling -- like you're sinking into water. A faint light above shines, and it's quickly fading as you sink lower and lower, and you feel like you're losing yourself.
After regressing so many times, are you still who you say you are? No longer a person but a concept in someone else's story, when death of even yourself is so meaningless as to simply undo it. If something goes wrong, just press restart, and try again. But like the Ship of Theseus, when you try again with your new memories -- different parts -- until everything that you are becomes defined by this new purpose... is it still you? Are you still fighting for the same person, or an ideal? Will you ever succeed, or will you continue to fail? How much will you have to alter to achieve your happy dream?
In the end, it was too hard to swallow the hatred and rage once it became too much, boiling over. You don't want to face it, the evil within you that awaits. It is a beast that hurts people, scares the ones you love, the antithesis of what you wish to represent, what you want to be. It was easier to kill him here, to remove this threat, easier to not think about it -- but how long will such a solution last? It's there, waiting with bloodied teeth at the back of your mind, ready to pounce the moment you slip, to take matters into its own hands. How long can you hid it before it takes over?
They told you of a future where everything you love ends. Your perfect utopia should have been forever, a grand life of discoveries with the two friends you hold dearest -- then you became aware of a crack in the glass, and told that you can do nothing but watch as it spiders, and now you stand at the center of a thin pane ready to break, the circular cracks taunting like the spinning wheels of Kairos. One day, the glass will finally shatter, and your desperate bids to keep the peace will irreparably break. How can you ever accept this dark future as your inevitability?
[ Morning comes, but not easily. You 'come to', awakening wherever you are in the hotel, still feeling the aftereffects of your nightmare. It's something you'll want to forget about, and it'd be so easy to, if it weren't for the leftover injuries and soreness in your body... but even beyond that, something else haunts your mind.
For days after, you'll feel a little strange -- distant from yourself, disassociated from your sense of identity and what it means to be "I Am". You forget. Are you really you? Or is the self you saw in the mirror, the one that fell in the pitch bog, the real you? And if not that, then who? Do you even exist?
This self-doubt will last for a few days, coming and going intermittently, in bouts of panic and uncertainty. ]
BADNIGHTMAREENDALL WAS LOST IN THE CHAOS... ARE YOU SURE YOU'RE EVEN AWAKE?
The mods really let me shitpost like this. Therefore, you each get a copy of En's fabulous hit song. It's in a nice little paper sleeve. There's nothing special about it aside from that it's literally a music CD. You must pray to yourselves that there is a CD player somewhere in the hotel if you wish to listen.
×××
PIECE OF PAPER
A piece of paper you received with the hotel logo on it. Wonder what that's about. *Note that this piece of paper is for your eyes only and I, Lowe, do not have access to it. If you discuss its contents as a group OOCly, you must do it away from my 👀.
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guestservices) wrote2022-06-12 11:18 pm
no subject
[ He's running in after his stupid, other self, but of course he doesn't make it before the figure falls backwards into the water. And that only means he has to quickly guard his face from the scalding waters that gush up, splashing against them.
In that distracted moment, since i rolled an 8 to continue failing all these combat checks, Dimitri is basically knocked back completely by a flailing claw. Good luck guys. ]
no subject
[-doing, he means to ask, but it's very clear that they're attacking.
what comes next, though... this monster is unexpected, and his expressions twists on noticing the masks of his people incorporated into its form. parts of his form, though they're-- surprisingly inert.
the rest is troubling enough. he hisses as he gets splashed by those waters, but since he isn't immediately being targeted-- emet-selch takes the opportunity to uncap that ? vial, hurriedly, just popping the top off with his teeth on account of his one good arm.]
This had better help.
no subject
HA▜E…
[ Your strange reflection slash guide slash ‘you’ is gone! Fell into the whirlpool, forward birthed a big-ass demonic creature. Try not to look too hard at it, especially the bits that glitch, hiding something incomprehensible and barely of of Joonghyuk’s world, let alone yours. Even the sight of it is enough to pierce your head with a keening ring, causing a nosebleed.
Emet-Selch can pop off the cap of the terribly-labeled vial, the black smoke wisping out of it the moment he opens the cap, and then… the vial cracks, and a bunch of small balls just fall out and scatter on the ground all over the place. After a few seconds, they all start popping off like fireworks, just the snapping and explosions of a bunch of (Umineko Voice) miniature bombs, essentially, surrounding them. Chaotic. For you? Yes. For Hole-kun also? Absolutely, who finally retracts its hand to kind of make some confused noise and start trying to yeet these firecracker cherry bombs SOMEWHERE. He is distracted. ]
no subject
[ STUPID—but now Joonghyuk has to look at this thing proper. It gives off the effects like he's weaker than he actually is... It reminds him of the worst parts of home and all of the many abandoned and unwanted timelines. His head hurts, but he doesn't let that stop him. He has to survive. Survive... Why?
With the small bombs, he snaps out of it and leaps back. Dimitri will come with him whether he likes it or not. Joonghyuk takes this moment to catch his breath, wiping away the blood that drips from his nose. The grip on his sword tightens as he darts back in to take advantage of the distraction. His sword glides in a wide arc leaving a gold afterimage, attempting to run its blade into this thing's flesh. If it catches, he drives his sword deep into it and ignores all of the "water" that threatens to burn him.
THEY WANT HOLE NOW ]
no subject
But he also doesn't have to stay back long—as soon as Hole-kun is put on the defensive, they have to press what little advantage they can get.
He reaches down, drawing a second knife that's been sheathed in his boot, and throws it right at the monster's face. ]
no subject
he's still not very good at aiming, but you know, it's a shotgun so it's probably fine?
emet-selch aims it over the heads of the other two, so that if he misses horribly he at least won't shoot them, and fires.]
no subject
Joonghyuk gets a good grasp of his sword and it sticks deep into the entity’s arm — if this thing even has bones, the sword slices through it, halfway deep into the forearm as It makes some kind of noise. Not pain, necessarily — as far gone as a creature of malice as it is, thousands of years worth of pain and waiting as it’s experienced, it no longer feels this as an experience any worse than a mere distraction.
Granted, that being said, the sword in its arm locks it in place, which makes it prime grounds for Dimitri to throw his knife right into one of its eye… holes? Where the blade simply sticks out. It doesn’t bleed blood, only black sludge, and it kind of flails about with its free hand half-blinded. Emet fires the second and final shot of his shotgun which hits its free arm, though the gun does get knocked out of his grasp as it flails with shrapnel in its terrible beans.
It simply groans, making a move to shove Joonghyuk away and therefore free its arm from the sword instead. With a grumble, it hauls itself out to the limit of its binding chains — it is now fully out of the hole, where should you glance down, you see the red cross fully exposed, an empty hole, no more lake water. It will make another move, to slam a fist down into the middle of you three. ]
no subject
The way Joonghyuk ends up angled has the last smoke vial in his pocket tumble out. Maybe it will crack? I will let Lowe handle that. Joonghyuk, however, is focused on the thing. He makes another attempt, maybe to hop onto its arm that slammed its fist and run up to kick it in the head. If he becomes a lizard... Then he does this as a lizard. ]
no subject
Thanks to this 2, he is likely not going to escape unscathed again or actually accomplish anything, though that won't stop him from trying to latch onto this stupid creature's hand like the world's most furious squirrel, stabbing it in the wrist and wrenching the blade as far as it will go. ]
no subject
the gun goes flying, clattering across the floor in the distance, and he curses under his breath. besides the vial, that second shot was the last thing he could easily use, so...
he's going to be pulling the sword from its place on his back, before the monster's fist slams into the ground.
if he gets the opportunity, though, he's going to try to stab that fist with his sword, one-handed. there's not as much strength behind it as normal, with one arm, but oh my god is he trying.]
no subject
…And he turns into a fucking dinosaur, baby. He can scamper up Hole-kun’s arm, digging claws into him and do a lizard-kick right to his head, which just kind of causes his head to loll and you distinctly hear a grumbled ‘owie’.
Dimitri your roll I’m in tears. Yeah okay he will just kind of. Get the full fist-paw then, just knocked and crushed into the ground, knocking the wind out of him. Fortunately he isn’t just crushed into a pulp on the spot as Emet-Selch uses his quick thinking to have the entity slam its fist right into the sword with its own momentum, causing it to draw back pretty quickly, though they’ll both become covered in black sludge trying. Big guy doesn’t quite get such a straight-on hit, but he’ll still be knocked back by the aftershock, hitting the ground quite hard.
It lifts its hand, distracted by the sword piercing through it as well as the lizard-man currently harassing it. The greatsword can clatter on the ground as it attempts to swat at YJH like he’s a particularly annoying gnat, leaving the hole open and unguarded. ]
no subject
When he reaches its head, he pierces its neck with his claws. ]
Get into the hole!
[ This position leaves him vulnerable for the SWATTING, so he will be swatted like the gnat he actually is. ]
no subject
Dimitri forces himself to his feet, though with a 6 he's struggling to get much air in his lungs or distance from the creature. But he's not running anyway—not without making sure all three of them have a way out of here.
So instead, he pulls out the vial he'd gotten from Joonghyuk earlier. ]
Get back!
[ When he's pretty sure he can get a clear shot, he chucks the explosive smoke at the beast. He's close, and rolled an 18, so here goes nothing. ]
no subject
it's clear he can't carry his own sword, though, after he's dropped it, so while being covered in this sludge feels horrible and he groans, pained, as he gets to his feet...
someone has to get these swords while dimitri blasts this thing.
he takes up his own with his good hand, using his left to grab joonghyuk's lighter blade, staying back long enough to ensure he has both weapons before he finally listens and heads for the hole. fuck him up one more time for it.]
1/2
For a moment, through the black spray, you all feel he sees something in there. A shadow of a face, someone you hate and yet someone who knows you better than anyone else. It can only last so long though, as with Joonghyuk's claws stuck in fabric and whatever this thing’s body is made of, it finally grabs at Joonghyuk with a free hand, intending on crushing his lizard body —
Except Dimitri’s explosive smoke vial hits true right in its torso, leaving a gaping hole in its wake, fiery pieces of cloth raining down. Half of its body gone, the entity stutters and struggles, half-throwing but mostly simply dropping Joonghyuk straight down where he simply falls into the hole at the center. You fall in, trusting the process, that this won’t burn you further. Wouldn’t it be funny if I just killed you for this? ]
× 𝙳𝙰𝚆𝙽 − 𝙰𝚃 𝚃𝙷𝙴 𝙴𝙽𝙳 𝙾𝙵 𝙲𝙷𝙰𝙾𝚂.
After regressing so many times, are you still who you say you are? No longer a person but a concept in someone else's story, when death of even yourself is so meaningless as to simply undo it. If something goes wrong, just press restart, and try again. But like the Ship of Theseus, when you try again with your new memories -- different parts -- until everything that you are becomes defined by this new purpose... is it still you? Are you still fighting for the same person, or an ideal? Will you ever succeed, or will you continue to fail?
How much will you have to alter to achieve your happy dream?
In the end, it was too hard to swallow the hatred and rage once it became too much, boiling over. You don't want to face it, the evil within you that awaits. It is a beast that hurts people, scares the ones you love, the antithesis of what you wish to represent, what you want to be. It was easier to kill him here, to remove this threat, easier to not think about it -- but how long will such a solution last? It's there, waiting with bloodied teeth at the back of your mind, ready to pounce the moment you slip, to take matters into its own hands.
How long can you hid it before it takes over?
They told you of a future where everything you love ends. Your perfect utopia should have been forever, a grand life of discoveries with the two friends you hold dearest -- then you became aware of a crack in the glass, and told that you can do nothing but watch as it spiders, and now you stand at the center of a thin pane ready to break, the circular cracks taunting like the spinning wheels of Kairos. One day, the glass will finally shatter, and your desperate bids to keep the peace will irreparably break.
How can you ever accept this dark future as your inevitability?
You continue to fall, and exhaustion sets in.
Just forget about it.
There's nothing you can do.
It's time to get some sleep...
... ]
××× 𝚁𝙴𝚆𝙰𝚁𝙳𝚂...
[ Morning comes, but not easily. You 'come to', awakening wherever you are in the hotel, still feeling the aftereffects of your nightmare. It's something you'll want to forget about, and it'd be so easy to, if it weren't for the leftover injuries and soreness in your body... but even beyond that, something else haunts your mind.
For days after, you'll feel a little strange -- distant from yourself, disassociated from your sense of identity and what it means to be "I Am". You forget. Are you really you? Or is the self you saw in the mirror, the one that fell in the pitch bog, the real you? And if not that, then who? Do you even exist?
This self-doubt will last for a few days, coming and going intermittently, in bouts of panic and uncertainty. ]
ARE YOU SURE YOU'RE EVEN AWAKE?
HOTEL TICKET (x2)
You each receive two (x2) hotel tickets.
×××
DREAM☆KINOKO LIMITED EDITION CD
The mods really let me shitpost like this. Therefore, you each get a copy of En's fabulous hit song. It's in a nice little paper sleeve. There's nothing special about it aside from that it's literally a music CD. You must pray to yourselves that there is a CD player somewhere in the hotel if you wish to listen.
×××
PIECE OF PAPER
A piece of paper you received with the hotel logo on it. Wonder what that's about.
*Note that this piece of paper is for your eyes only and I, Lowe, do not have access to it.
If you discuss its contents as a group OOCly, you must do it away from my 👀.