[LP CYOA] Spiral

[Akkudakku]

Hey hey... what if shit will go worse for us if we kill someone? You know, spiritual repercussions that will lock us out of nice harem endings?

 

[Kz3r0]

A.

 

[Zwist]

A.
And then lets kill everyone exept Iwano. Inlucding ourself. That infection looks nasty.

 

[treave]

Yeah, he shouldn't rationalise his own weakness to himself at least.

He hasn't, actually, but what's wrong with rationalizing your own weakness?

 

[TOME]

Rex Feral A
Nevill A
LWC1996 A
asxetos A
Baltika9 A
Grimgravy A
Kz3r0 A
Zwist A
Ifeex A

Jester C
TOME C
Lambchop19 C
ERYFKRAD C
Elfberserker C
archaen C


A - 9
C - 6

 

[archaen]

C

 

[oscar]

C, save the bullets for people actually out to get us

 

[TOME]

It is cold. Your cheek is resting against a hard, uncomfortable surface. For a moment, your brain turns this way and that, attempting to get you your proper orientation. It takes a while before you realize that you are lying down, presumably on a floor. Your awareness of your limbs begins to return, piece by piece. Hands outstretched. Legs splayed. They are all still there, you think groggily. Probably.

If this is groundhog day, then I fear we are in for a dismembering.

 

[treave]

If this is groundhog day, then I fear we are in for a dismembering.

Sounds like a good idea.

I'll close the votes in about 30 minutes.

 

[Nevill]

That was in our previous life. Can we try something new this time?

 

[Tigranes]

B, even if none of you cocks will vote for it

 

[treave]

I… this caliber might skid off the skull, so I should…

You raise the revolver in a single smooth motion and fire without warning.

Taketatsu’s right eye explodes in a burst of blood and black goo, and he falls backwards, a puzzled grin on his face.

You close the distance until you are standing over his twitching body. Blood is pouring from his nostrils and mouth. Under his shattered glasses, his remaining good eye is darting jerkily in random directions, his mouth muttering random syllables. His brain is scrambled. Absent-mindedly, you gently massage your aching left thigh.

There is no point in wasting the last bullet on him, you think.

Your next thought is, why am I smiling?

The panic hits you as you suddenly realize what you have done. You shot Taketatsu. You smiled about it. Falling on your butt, you let the gun drop from your trembling fingers, suddenly fearful of the weapon. Whatever made you decide to shoot him?

I should have shot him earlier.

There is no point in shooting him.

I’m a murderer.

He deserved it.

Breathing heavily, you try to calm down the arguing voices in your head. A soft moan catches your attention. Is it Taketatsu? No. He’s stopped twitching.

Maeda-san.

This time, you move. You hurry to her side as quickly as you can. She’s still breathing, despite the numerous wounds all over her body. She’s still alive.

A strange feeling rushes through you. Relief? You are not sure, but you try to stem the flow of blood from her chest as best as you can, wrapping up her wounds with your shirt. “M-Maeda-san, hang in there,” you urge softly. After this… yes, there should be a first aid kit in the kitchens. You are not Tokigawa, but you think you can manage basic aid at least. You look around the bloody hallway, filled with the stench of death. The building shudders again, creaking and groaning. You know it is risky to move Maeda, but you can’t leave her here either. Carefully, you raise her up. She has enough consciousness left to cling to you. While supporting the girl on your shoulders, you drag yourself towards the staircase again, gritting your teeth and bearing the pain.

At the stairs to the first sublevel, you notice something that worries you.

Kayano’s guts are still there, but the rest of her is missing.

Maeda trembles slightly, reminding you that she is still there. That’s right – you have something more important right now. Up the stairs you go, limping and hobbling, trying not to collapse from your aching leg. It takes you what seems like forever, but finally you make it to the first sublevel. Tokigawa, Okuyama and Sakaki’s corpses are not here either.

The kitchens are not far away now. “We’re almost there, Maeda-san!” As you tread laboriously towards it, you hear Maeda whisper softly, in a gentle tone that is so far away from her usual behaviour that it seems to be coming from a different person entirely.

“Sei-chan… you came back…” You can feel her clinging even more tightly to you – it is an embrace that is almost child-like in its affection.

“Mae…Maeda-san?”

Maeda does not respond. A short while later, you feel her fingers loosen their grip. She falls away from you. You turn around – as your leg twinges, you wince, moving half a second too slow to catch her before she hits the floor.

Shaking her shoulder gently, you whisper her name. It’s… she’s cold. She’s not breathing anymore.

Ah, it’s useless. It’s all useless.

You sit back, leaning against the wall. Taking a deep breath, you shake your head: you should at least try to see if anyone else is alive. An extreme weariness is weighing you down in both body and mind at the moment, but you crawl to your feet regardless and leave Maeda’s body behind. A low whispering is beginning to fill your ears. You still have to search the hospital…

***

Track: memories

How much time has passed? You wander the darkened hallways alone, having found no other living soul… still, the whispers grow louder and louder with every painful step you take, so you are not truly alone, are you? Gasping for breath, you sink to your knees. The bruise has spread up your torso and is even now visibly encroaching on your forearm, strange waves of black billowing just under your skin. Your head is spinning. You feel feverish.

You realize that the floor is soft under your knees – as if you are kneeling on carpet. Squinting, you force your bleary eyes to observe your surroundings. This… is not the hospital that you know. The elaborate decorations and ornate furnishings would not be out of place in some Western-styled mansion. Through the haze you hear footsteps approaching. You are no longer sure what is real and what is not, and you crumple to the carpeted floor, your eyes barely able to stay open.

Footsteps.

Feet.

Bare, pale feet, coming towards you.

The feet stop.

The owner squats down to look you in the eye.

Mitsu…ki?

The face is that of the little girl’s, though with eyes so sunken and hollow that you almost cannot make out her irises. Something is strange about her countenance, however. In your ill state, it takes you a few seconds before you notice the little details. The slight mismatch of skin and facial structure. The stretch marks. The loose hanging, jagged flaps of skin.

It’s just a mask. Just a mask made from her face.

Bone white fingers reach out for you, wriggling and contorting. Unable to move or even make a sound, you can only stare back in horror as the tips of those squirming, spindly digits contact the sides of your cheeks and dig in. You can feel the strange bruise marking your body swirling excitedly like a live beast anticipating food. Excruciating pain shoots through your entire body, as if countless roots are piercing and infiltrating every muscle, every nerve, every cell you have within you. Slowly, the fingers pull you in until you are almost nose to nose with her, staring into her hazel eyes.

There is a glint of… mischief? Cruelty? Longing?

Whatever it is, it ceases to matter in the next second.

She tugs at your head gently.

There is a wet, ripping noise, and an almost comical pop.

You feel so much lighter all of a sudden, as your body falls away behind you. It is a strange sight to behold. That of your trailing spine, swarmed with black, writhing tendrils. Your torso and limbs, twitching and jerking about in its last spasms. Your jaw slackens, your tongue lolling stupidly. Your eyes begin to roll up. Your consciousness fades, as she brings you closer…



---DEAD END---

 

[Nevill]

...did we win?

 

[treave]

Should you get an invitation to the Witch's tea party?

 

[Nevill]

Skip straight to the ??? part.

Because that is my expression right now.

 

[treave]

We'll do that tomorrow.

 

[Nevill]

Sadistic in-game and IRL, I see.

 

[Tigranes]

So, having found out basically nothing, we die!

I regret not making the case for B more strongly - no idea if it would have worked any better, of course, and things started going wrong a lot earlier than that, but going it alone with no knowledge and not much guts wasn't going to get us too far. treave I assume some kind of reload/restart/whatever is in place...

 

[Nevill]

So, having found out basically nothing, we die!

I regret not making the case for B more strongly.

I regret not checking the female showers. There was so much to find out! Undoubtedly, this was the main reason we did not get the happy ending.

 

[Kz3r0]

Seems to me that we should have avoided any choice reminding of our former self, that seems a cold blooded killer, so no Sartre and not solving puzzles on sight,or we should have tried to breack the time loop, going down the starirs we basically closed the circle, we had been saw down there before being there remember?
Or maybe we should have gone straight to the passageway with the passcode.

 

[Akkudakku]

Oh now on the second iteration (yeah right, rather n-th) we can do shit differently. Interesting groundhog day we have here!

 

[Nevill]

Seems to me that we should have avoided any choice reminding of our former self, that seems a cold blooded killer, so no Sartre and not solving puzzles on sight

What is the point of being in the Purgatory if you can't remember your sins to atone for them?

or we should have tried to breack the time loop, going down the starirs we basically closed the circle, we had been saw down there before being there remember?

There was no loop, I think. We crawled down there insted of running. The events seem to be different.

Or maybe we should have gone straight to the passageway with the passcode.

Or maybe we didn't do anything wrong and the first run wasn't supposed to end with us walking out of the hospital with Uehara on one hand and Maeda on the other.

 

[Kz3r0]

However this more than a corpse party seem s more lika a murder party.
Our character is one, supposedly, then we have at least other two, Taketatsu and the unknown guy at the end.
From what we gathered from the scattered notes some sort of ritual is taking place where everyone tries to kill everyone else or something like that, this would explain the presence of Amazonaki, she was the 'witch' performing the ritual, on the other hand from what Taketatsu said this is not the first time that we partecippated in this kind of ritual.

 

[Nevill]

Our character is one, supposedly, then we have at least other two, Taketatsu and the unknown guy at the end.

I don't think Taketatsu's natural state is that of a murderer. More like he was a normal weak-willed person driven insane by a desire to live.

I don't think any of us are murderers, except maybe 'us'. Then again, there is 'us' that we know nothing about, running around the basements and making promises to madmen. The last guy could very well be that 'us', if that's a human at all.

From what we gathered from the scattered notes some sort of ritual is taking place where everyone tries to kill everyone else or something like that, this would explain the presence of Amazonaki, she was the 'witch' performing the ritual

That would indicate that the memories of people involved were fake, or at least a part of them was. They have no memory of the ritual, and at least people like Uehara were opposed to the very idea of supernatural.

There is a matter of the charm we found on her body, though.

on the other hand from what Taketatsu said this is not the first time that we partecippated in this kind of ritual.

Did he? I've reread the second-to-last update and found no mention of it.

 

[Rex Feral]

Seems to me that we should have avoided any choice reminding of our former self, that seems a cold blooded killer, so no Sartre and not solving puzzles on sight,or we should have tried to breack the time loop, going down the starirs we basically closed the circle, we had been saw down there before being there remember?
Or maybe we should have gone straight to the passageway with the passcode.

I think we'll have plenty of time to do all that. Plenty of time to hit our head against the wall for countless times until we get things right. Or until we die forever or whatever worse could happen.

also

“Sei-chan… you came back…”

We are Shinoseki Adachi, where does Sei-chan come from...unless it comes from Seiji.

So Maeda knows Shinohara Seiji. Or we might be ourselves Shinohara Seiji, though I don't really trust delusional dying words of women.