Entry tags:

[open] there will always be a tomorrow

DUNGEON INTERLUDE

premise ⬥ taken ⬥ faq ⬥ navigation

→ 10/16 Lockdown

As of the lockdown phase on the 16th of October, Terrence Nowell has gone missing. He seems to have vanished without a trace--the trace of the cinnamon smell that he always gives off is nowhere to be found. Something is a little different about this Lockdown period. Despite how it's the middle of the month, a strong and powerful wind will flow towards the residential area, where it leads people to a very dark alleyway that's hard to see through. The wind seems to stop at an open sewer hole that's still draining whatever water that's left around it, but it seems that there's less water here than everywhere else. Was that there before? No, but it's there now, and it'll be there every time Lockdown occurs. Watch your step, lest you fall in... For those who don't like following the wind, they'll find themselves battered in the head with the occasional flying cats. Given enough time during the lockdown, these cats will pretty much infest every corner of Hirajiro with all their incessant meowing and rainbow trails as they fly around. Though, of course, they'll always be gone when Lockdown is lifted.

→ 1st Floor

If you dare to venture into the sewer hole, whether you fell in or took the ladder on the way down, you'll eventually find the floor that is covered in thick smoke. It can't be blown off due to the sheer amount there is. Luckily, the Velvet Room portal is right there at the foot of the ladder for easy access. The sky appears to be blue, but the weather feels strangely stagnant for some reason. The scenery might as well be some rendition of candyland, with lots of sweets everywhere used as building structure, a long path made of taffy over the small hills that doesn't seem to stick onto your shoes, lollipops for trees, cotton candy for bushes... you get the idea. You can try to eat the sweets, but they all taste like dusty metal and don't break off. It seems like a relatively happy place, but once you start looking for the stairwell that leads to the next floor, you can't seem to find it.

Things aren't always what they seem to be...

SOMNIUM
Type SHADOW	Resists NONE	Weak NUCLEAR
In the vast candyland, perhaps you'll be lucky enough to come across a fox-shaped shadow that has a mask over it with the chime of a bell. These are very small, quick, annoying to hit and very evasive. If your Persona's agility can surpass 10 or above, you'll be able to catch it or cast an AoE spell to cover for your lack of speed. It's fairly weak, so it'll most likely be killed in one or two shots. Only one will appear on the entire floor at a time. They respawn 5 minutes after the death of the previous one. More details below. Small yellow bells and black fox masks can be collected as loot.

MORSUS
Type SHADOW	Resists WIND	Weak FIRE, LIGHT
So, those flying cats that you saw? Once you kill a Somnium, the illusion breaks, revealing their true forms as bat-like Shadows. They come to attack in swarms, only casts Life Drain and Spirit Drain, and often perform those two skills all at once to suck the the majority of life and spirit out of a target in one go. Dangerous. They are also easy to kill, but you better have your AoE spells handy or you might get overwhelmed with sudden loss of HP and SP from sheer numbers. However, the above only applies when the illusion is broken. When under the guise of nyancats, they only smack people by running into them. Small clear pouches of sparkling rainbow glitter (as nyancat) or torn bat wings (as bats) can be collected as loot.

Once the illusion is shattered by killing a Somnium, the characters will realize that they had been walking through occasional giant puddles of blood on the ground when the smoke clears from the ground, the sky is red, and all the little structures of candy were wrecked buildings akin to a post-apocalyptic setting. However, the illusion rebuilds itself after five minutes of the fox shadow's death, turning the entire floor into candyland again with flying nyancats in which characters are forced to go hunt for the respawned Somnium again. It's a very vast floor.

During the five-minute window of the broken illusion, characters will be able to find the entrance to the stairwell to the next floor. When the illusion returns after five minutes, the stairwell entrance disappears and reappears in a different location when the illusion is broken again. That's not the only problem with the stairwell...

To get to the next floor, each character has to answer a very personal and guilt tripping question that will make them feel absolutely terrible after. The barrier will come in the form of an invisible wall that cannot be broken until the answer is given. The answer doesn’t necessarily have to be objectively true, but it can’t be a lie. The question will be announced out loud in the nearby characters' heads, but it will be addressed to the character themselves when asking. If in a group, the walls are stacked upon each other and each wall will break after everyone present in the group has answered their own personal questions. If everyone in the group hasn't answered their questions in five minutes, it's back to fox hunting for you guys.

The wall only needs to be broken once by a character. It won’t reform the next time they come back to the dungeon.

→ 2nd Floor

On the next floor, you will be greeted by the red sky, even darker than the previous floor's. You stand on a very sturdy white square pillar, about 20ft x 20ft in size. When you look forward, you can see similar huge square pillars alternating in white and black that have risen from the void, all apart at a set distance away from each other, but it's very clear that you can't make it by jumping. To get to the stairwell to the next floor, you either need to have some method of air transportation to get to there safely, or take the intended method.

The intended method from getting to pillar to pillar is kicking a can off the corner of the pillar, which makes a transparent skinny bridge to the next pillar that disintegrates very quickly over time. Only one person can cross a bridge at a time, unless you want to risk having people fall into the void. The can respawns at the same corner after the previous bridge fully disintegrates.

Those who fall off the pillars will fall unconscious and wake up in the exit of the dungeon (next to the sewer hole) with 1 HP and 0 SP and inflicted with a Forget debuff that lasts 15 minutes. Players have the choice to make their character forget whatever they want along with their Persona being skill sealed, whether that’s an important body function like breathing or a precious memory, or something trivial like what they ate for dinner last night. They’ll regain whatever they lost 15 minutes after waking up.

BLACK RAVEN
Type Shadow	Resists WIND	Weak ELECTRICITY
Remember me? These pesky Raven Shadows are back, lanterns and all. They mostly move together in huge flocks now instead of being separated. They shoot gusts of winds in an attempt to blow characters off the pillars or stick to their usual divebombing tactic. They sometimes flock around Alt-Vassago. Feathers and lanterns can be collected as loot.

ALT-VASSAGO
Type F.O.E.	Nulls PHYSICAL	Weak LIGHT
This strange demonic being riding a gator are on top of every black pillar. He is the F.O.E. of this dungeon. At first, he will only move to push the characters off the pillars. However, if you attack it, whether it hits or misses, it inflicts a Rage debuff on itself and ferociously attacks you and try to push you off. A single physical hit from it will probably knock you out in one shot if your endurance is 9 and lower. It has a ton of HP, so it's best to avoid the fight entirely and quickly move to the next pillar. However, if you need to buy some time, please take advantage of its messy rage debuff to lure and trick it into falling off the pillar. There will be one minute until the next one respawns on the same pillar, so you better get off the pillar fast. It also has a tendency to repeat "kill them all" in a very creepy voice when under the Rage debuff.

NOCEO
Type SHADOW	Repels LIGHT	Weak DARK, WIND
These smog shadows take on a humanoid shape, but their forms fizzes out often like static. They move slow like aimless zombies and stick together in hordes and respawn very often. They constantly have smog coming out of where their mouths are supposed to be. They're also very weak, but tends to cast Brainwash debuff very often so the characters can fight for them. They also tend to make a hideously loud emergency siren sound when dying or falling off the pillars. They're also bunched up a lot in the last several pillars before the stairwell to the next floor. Maybe flying was a better option after all. A small, black, still-beating heart can be collected as loot.

Just like the first floor, this stairwell has an invisible wall as well. Same things apply here, except you have all the time in the world... too bad you're on the same black pillar with all the Noceos and one Alt-Vassago. Better tell your friends to hurry it up before you get brainwashed or killed.

→ 3rd Floor

Once you finally arrive at the third floor, there is only a blinding, narrow, white room. It feels more accurate to say it might be a slightly wide corridor. It may be difficult to see, because of the absence of color on the walls. However, there is blood everywhere on the floor. The source is a humongous, tipped over blood container off to the side. The room reeks of the smell. Shadow Terry is at the opposite end of the room with his gold eyes and behind him is a low cage where the real Terry is trapped in with his powers sealed. There is no trace of the cinnamon smell whatsoever in this room. There seems to be another door behind where the Shadow is, marred with plain visible scratch marks with little blood here and there.

There's also a familiar melody (0.25x speed) for those who have heard it before that seems to echo, almost as if fading away, but it never quite leaves.

Shadow Terry tends to look slightly different than the Terry everyone knows aside from his eye color. He has a sharper look, but right now, it's hard to see. He's kneeling next to the cage that Terry is trapped in and quietly cries. When Shadow Terry hears you coming in, he turns to you, looking a little desperate from where he is when he sees you for the first time.

"Please help. I want Terrence to accept me."

→ Notes

⬥ There will be a time limit on subduing the Shadow. Terry needs to drink blood to extend his lifespan, which he hasn't done in a while, so characters will only have until the end of the 23rd (IC and OOC, 11:59PM EST) before Terry falls into a pseudo-death coma state. If characters manage to subdue his Shadow before that happens, they'll have a chance to persuade him into accepting the Shadow. There will also be a chance that Terry won't accept it, depending on how the persuasion goes. A new top-level will go up on the 24th if the Shadow hasn't been accepted by then. A note on any late Shadow interactions are here!
⬥ Since Shadow Terry and Dark Vassago are hard to deal with, characters are encouraged to fight, retreat, and try to fight them multiple times.
⬥ Since IC dates are very important, please include them at the start of each thread when posting under the Shadow thread.
⬥ Threads from this dungeon post can serve as Dungeon requirements for AC.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

i. 1st floor, 10/16-10/23
The third ofuda... Come on, let's team up. It'll be safer that way.

[ As with any new dungeon, Kido starts it off by addressing anybody who's nearby to tell them that she can hide their presence in order to get through the floors, so there'll be no need to fight any of the shadows. Why would they want to fight a little cat Shadow? They're so cute. ]

Huh... Usually the way out is straightforward, but this place seems to go on and on... Where's the exit?

[ Too bad there's no exit unless they fight that Somnium. Also, too bad her Persona, who is able to catch that fox around the neck in a flash with his 26 agility, refuses to come out. Haha. ]

ii. 2nd floor, 10/17-10/23
[ This whole place sucks! Ahh!!! The first thing Kido does when she initially sees the state of the place is to kick that can out of sheer frustration; it hits alt-Vassago on the side of the head and he roars with anger, snapping at anybody who's approaching his pillar so, uh, maybe we should try a different one instead. ]

Ugh... Follow my lead and cover for me! I'll get us through!

[ By this time, Kido's convinced Nekogami to come out, but he still doesn't really want to fight. Which is good enough for her, because she doesn't intend to fight: instead of crossing the bridge created by the cans and jumping the pillars one by one, she has Nekogami create the bridge with a sheet of ice slick enough to be used as a slide, although they'll still be slamming into whatever's on the pillar at the end. It's fine? It'll be fine. Nekogami just needs to make another slide fast enough to a different pillar, connecting all the white ones to avoid alt-Vassago and skipping over a majority of the pillars that way. ]

wc.
[ Please include IC dates with each prompt! Kido will answer her first door on the 16th, and the second on the 18th, so if you're interested in threading out door questions, please set the date to the 16th/18th. As alaways, I'm at

birdseed for any questions, etc! ]

[ Honestly, she's getting sick of looking at pastry cats that never shut up and leave rainbows. The entire scenery is a little sickening, but she keeps that smile on her face. ]

Maybe we'll have to uncover a switch? Or perhaps it's hidden in one of the candy houses.

[ She's not very keen on the idea on having to search every nook and cranny for the stairwell, but it's nice to see Kido so motivated. ]

[ Leave the cats alone! Though, Kido can admit she's already sick of the pastry everything else around here, maybe because there's just so much of it and there's no indication of where to go or what to do. ]

That last dungeon was bad enough. I can't believe we have to solve more puzzles this time too.

[ Fuck you, tengu boss. You're getting punched on that last floor. ]

If it's in one of the houses... Do you have anything that can create fire, Itsuki? If most of this place is sugar, it should melt easily.

[ Let's just burn the place down. ]

[ 45 didn't want to deal with the puzzles, so maybe she should be glad for that... anyway, she considers this for a moment. She had been making something, but... ]

I have an incendiary grenade prototype, but I don't know how effective it is.

[ She's always been the type to use smoke grenades, not incendiary stuff... nor make them. But she wanted to give it a try and well, maybe it'll work here. ]

Even so, none of it really give off that smell. In fact, it smells... stagnant?

[ Like old remains of what used to be. ]

[ That's true, now that 45 brings the smell to Kido's attention, but being around cats all the time and suffering a runny nose, she'd thought it was just the allergies acting up and making it difficult to smell anything. Still, she shrugs it off, because isn't there some rule that says that the simplest explanation is usually right? ]

Cheap or substitute ingredients often lack the richer smells cakes should be giving off.

[ Tengu boss just makes bad cake, essentially. ]

Does it matter? We just need to melt all the buildings to get a clearer look at the place, and I'll be able to keep both of us hidden while you throw the grenade anyways.

Noted~

[ She's more wondering how much the grenade will explode. She hasn't had time to test it, so... ]

Anyway, just tell me where you want me to throw it, kitty savior. We'll have to take several steps back when I do.

Edited 2019-10-13 20:22 (UTC)

[ Hopefully it does something and isn't just a dud. Kido glances back over her shoulder where the entrance to the dungeon is, though it's straight down and harder to gauge where the "end" of the dungeon is supposed to be. The Velvet Room door will have to work instead, Kido looking from the door to whatever is directly in the path in front of it. ]

The mound on the right, with the cherry. If that goes down, it'll wipe out everything below it too.

[ 45 takes out the incendiary grenade. It looks like a bigger molotov, but she lights a match to set the tip on fire and hurls it over at the mound with the cherry.

It makes a much bigger explosion than she expected--bigger than four large bonfires combined. Everything is on fire!! The things do catch on fire, but they don't seem to melt. In fact, it looks like they're chipping off instead.

Hm. ]

[ Hm...? ]

What the hell are these things made of?

[ But there isn't much difference between melting or exploding when the goal was just to decimate the place, so Kido gestures at 45 to come with her over to that building she hit, to see if there's some ...key or demon or whatever they're supposed to be finding to move on. ]

[ 45 follows Kido and looks around. There doesn't seem to be anything that stands out, but the burning smell is... gross and most definitely not burning pastries of any kind. ]

Smells like burning metal.

[ It's not a smell that Kido is familiar with, but she knows burnt sugar and this isn't it. Even standing before the ruins of the building, Kido can't immediately see if there's anything special she should be noticing, but she takes care not to actually touch anything because hot metal is likely going to stay hot. ]

I can't find anything noteworthy, can you? If you have any more of those grenades, maybe we can—-

[ A nyancat flies by and smacks Kido in the back of the head. ]

...Let's burn this place down.

[ This is fine. It's actually kinda funny but she doesn't laugh at Kido. She'd agree but she only brought one incendiary and she sees a fox in the distance.

She hasn't seen that anywhere... how suspicious. ]

There's an out of place fox over there with a mask.

[ It doesn't matter if it's a cat or a fox or whatever sort of candyland buildings these are, Kido's just out for blood and the fox will make a fine target. It's the only thing that's noticeable around here, too, and maybe this is the "key" they're looking for. ]

Maybe it's the "boss" of this floor, and it'll open a door when we gut it. Let's go.

[ They're just going to walk up to it... Because Kido turns her concealing eyes power on and ??? she doesn't think about needing to hunt anything down if they can just walk straight to it and stab it in the back. ]

[ She won't say no to that! 45 follows Kido and the Somnium doesn't seem to be aware that Kido and 45 are close, but it does look at the huge fire for a second before hopping off. It's a small little fox. It's probably cute, but there's only an ominous feeling it gives off with its mask and dark colors.

45 could just shoot it right here and now, but maybe it'll be better to let Kido take a literal stab at it since she looks pissed. ]

[ For a boss, it goes down disappointingly quickly. Kido has the taser in her hand, buzzing as she rams it into the side of the fox's head and instead of giving it that one shock and pulling away, she holds it there and drives it deeper and the Shadow gives way to sludge too easily, there was no satisfaction at all.

Black sludge plops onto the puddle of blood at their feet and splashes Kido's pants with red. She steps back and looks up at what the world has become, and she freezes. ]

...What happened to this place?

[ Cool. Even though it shouldn't be, but 45 is much used to this kind of setting--not because of how ungodly diabetic the last setting was, but it feels more like home. She's used to seeing post-apocalyptic settings, since. Well. She's from that kind of place. ]

Probably what it's actually supposed to be.

Why hide it?

[ It's gross and awful and extremely distasteful, but Kido would also take this over how sweet and happy it looked before. A dungeon is a dungeon, filled with grotesque monsters and somebody hateful at the heart of it all, responsible for all of this and a post-apocalyptic setting is the perfect reflection of such a thing.

Kido clicks her tongue and turns away from the puddle of blood at her feet, bloodstained footsteps trailing behind her as she walks a little ways down the road, staring up at the deep red sky, at the bats swarming towards them like black clouds rolling over the sky. Oh. Her powers got canceled the moment she killed that fox. And with several dozen eyes on them now, they can't hide. ]

[ Terry:

]

Dunno. Wanna ask the final boss?

[ 45 summons Malphas and casts Mafrei before they get a chance to spam Life/Spirit Drain. A bunch of torn bat wings fall, splashing onto the blood puddles. Fun. Malphas continues to cast them until there are none of them left. ]

Either way, since the environment has changed, the staircase might be easier to find now.

[ She doesn't want to ask the final boss so much as she wants to put a fist through his face, but she'll just have to let that motivate her through the rest of the dungeon first.

With Malphas taking care of the Shadows, Kido breaks out into a run, trying to see past the broken down buildings to find anything that screams "COME HERE TO GET TO THE NEXT FLOOR." Same tactic as before, then. ]

Take the right side of the street, and I'll take the left. Holler if you find anything.

[ If the Lake Dungeon was annoying because of physical attributes, this Dungeon is annoying for its mental attributes. 45 nods and goes to the right side of the street with Malphas aiding her. Neither of them can find the stairwell, so it's up to Kido... ]

[ She'd been looking at the ground instead of forward, with the lake dungeon on her mind and how all of its exits were holes in the ground, compared to the stairwells of the school. So. She more or less runs straight into the set of stairs and maybe 45 hears a startled shout of surprise and somebody falling, before Kido pulls herself together and calls over to her. ]

Itsuki! Over here!

[ Sometimes she wishes she had her exoskeleton so that she can be a little faster. Malphas carrying her won't make her faster either, so she just runs to where Kido is by following her voice.

And surely enough, there it is. ]

Great job.

[ She thought she was never going to find it... 45 walks on ahead, but then runs into an invisible wall.

Ghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh ]

[ Kido can't tell very well what happened, aside from 45 taking the lead and then stopping right there. Come on, move your feet. Door's right there. ]

Is something wrong? We need to keep going.

premise ⬥ taken ⬥ faq ⬥ navigation

→ 10/16 Lockdown

→ 1st Floor

→ 2nd Floor

→ 3rd Floor

→ Notes

no subject

i. 10/16

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

i.10/16

no subject