Be brave enough to burn

[notsogreedy]

Who: All the Alices (and Ankh, his name is Ankh)
What: Just a mysterious castle built on top of a restaurant. What could possibly go wrong?
Where: World Two – Wings to the Sky
Warnings: Who even knows? Will update as necessary.



Ankh wakes up at the edge of the water, his arm draped over a rock and his face cushioned by a bed of sand and seaweed as the edges of waves wash over his body. The first thing he notices upon waking is that it's uncomfortable. The second, upon lifting his head and starting to pull himself out of the water is that it's familiar. Awareness dawning, he scrambles to his feet and looks around wide-eyed half expecting Eiji to be there somewhere. Of course he isn't.

But this... this is his last memory. For a moment he wonders if somehow this whole thing came to an end and he wound up back home, but that's wishful thinking. No, this is just his world. His heart, as the guides like to call it. It's only more obvious that this isn't real as he scans the horizon and finds Cous Coussier where it shouldn't be. And then on top of it... that's-

His eyes widen, and then narrow. He's not sure what to expect out of this other than nothing good.

But, after wringing the water out of his clothes as best he can, he makes his way to the restaurant and curiously to the freezer, where he finds the ice pops he expects to be there. Pulling one out, he gives it a skeptical look for a moment—does he dare assume it's really the same or even safe to eat?--but ultimately pops it into his mouth and discovers it tastes exactly like he expects. That much is something he can appreciate. But as for the rest of this...

With popsicle in hand, he continues exploring.

Comments

[bakegarasu]

[Otoha grunts as he picks himself up off the sand. His muscles are sore... like he was lying there for a while. Annoying. Whatever. His sword is still there, so he heads up to... a restaurant?]

[Whatever. Food is food. He glances up at the... decorations... and shrugs. Not his problem. He's seen weirder fetishes. He wanders around for a bit before coming to the door. He opens it, and steps inside.]

[... A castle? Interesting. He wanders around a bit before finding the Armory, gazing up at the stained glass windows.]

Fourth Puzzle Found

[worldkeys]

[ When Otoha enters the armory, it's exactly what you'd expect out of a medieval castle's weaponry, various swords, maces, and the like inside it. Aside from that, there are four stained glass windows depicting Otoha himself. A theme of various buildings, strange eye-shaped amulets, and being on the tops of tall skyscrapers is omnipresent. The first window depicts him with a girl, sword in hand, covered in blood. Her corpse is obvious and decaying. The cityscape around the two of them is destroyed. The second window shows him and another man running from a destroyed Shinjuku, flames spreading throughout the city, neither of them looking overly bothered. The third window shows Otoha and various yokai mobbing several obviously weak humans, with little regard or care for their safety. In the image, he is smiling. The final window depicts Otoha with the girl from first window again, although, this time, the two of them are sitting atop a building at night time, looking at the city's lights together, and both smiling.

He will find that he can tell everyone except Ankh which window is accurate and which ones are not. He won't even be able to point to the correct one or mimic it in drawing in Ankh's presence, nor will anyone else who knows. ]

[frozentear]

[Sebastian's eyes narrow as he walks into the armory and sees Otoha. He'll probably be less violent since this heart doesn't seem to have that effect, but Sebastian is still definitely not pleased to see him.

He approaches Otoha and holds a pen out to him.]

Here. Use this to mark whichever one is true so we can get out of here.

[bakegarasu]

[Otoha looks up up at Sebastian, and raises his eyebrows, taking the pen and staring at the windows silently. He doesn't move to mark one yet, but is still for a long few moments. The one with Reiji... there's something bothering him, even more than the fact that it's not true.]

... There's something...

[Something wrong. Something that's vaguely worrying away at him, but he can't tell what. He shakes his head and uncaps the pen, drawing a... well, a frankly awful circle around the last one - the one with him and his yurine on top of a building.]

Shinjuku got wrecked, but not destroyed. And it won't be as long as I can help it. That's what a Karas is for.

[Though with how he's saying it... it sounds a bit more like he's trying to convince himself, more than anyone else. After all, Eko had been Shinjuku's Karas, and he was the one who nearly destroyed it.]

[frozentear]

[...so he is a lot calmer now. Well, that's good to know. Sebastian isn't really sure what Otoha is talking about, but that's okay.]

Karas, huh...

[bakegarasu]

... Yeah. It's the city's guardian, chosen by the will of the city itself.

[frozentear]

Hmm.

[As long as he can help it... so he's the guardian of the city, presumably named Shinjuku. Interesting. He holds his hand out for the pen.]

Thanks... whatever your name is.

[bakegarasu]

... Otoha.

[He hands it over again, watching Sebastian carefully.]

[frozentear]

Sebastian.

[Huh... he really is a lot calmer. That must've been what Ankh was talking about, in the last heart...

He feels a bit awkward when he realizes he was staring a little too long, then nods and turns to leave.]

[bakegarasu]

... Be careful. Dying sucks.

[At least it did in that last world. Why would it be different in this one?]

Re: Fourth Puzzle Found

[notsogreedy]

[Ankh pauses just outside the door to the armory, looking down at a Condor medal laying on the floor.]

So this is where she was.

[After pointing that out to Sebastian and reminding him not to pick it up yet, he goes into the room and smashes the marked window, the one with Otoha sitting with someone on a building.]

Puzzle: Solved

[worldkeys]

[ The window shatters easily. Otoha will, as well, arriving safely in the hub where he will be aware of his death. Yet another medal will be on the ground where he was, with another batch of memories. This time, when the medal is picked up, Ankh will lose his sense of hearing. However, for some reason, he will find that he can "hear," but it's like the sound is being translated into something else and being transmitted directly to his brain. He will be aware that what he's hearing isn't sound, and that he's not really hearing, and it will even feel bizarre and he can't place what it is he's actually doing. Another light will brighten up on the lock. ]

Re: Puzzle: Solved

[notsogreedy]

[Ankh is completely unfazed by the sound of Otoha shattering just outside his field of vision, and only looks over to find another Condor medal laying on the ground. He doesn't move to touch it, and he knows Sebastian won't, either. As far as he's concerned, this puzzle is done, and he's ready to move on to the next room.]

[frozentear]

He... he just...

[So that's what happened in this world... the medals are like the clocks, they killed the owner in the process of getting them. It was less gruesome than last time, but still...]

[notsogreedy]

Shattered, like the window. [He says, as if there's nothing concerning about that at all, and walks toward the door.]

[frozentear]

Did the other one shatter too?

[Not following, not just yet.]

[notsogreedy]

They all did. [He says it easily, pausing at the door and glancing back when he realises Sebastian hasn't moved.] Are you coming or not?

[notsogreedy]

[Ankh walks in to find Otoha staring up at the windows depicting him. Convenient. For the moment, he doesn't say anything, just focusing on what he can sense of Otoha's desires. It's as much for general knowledge as to see if anything might have been brought to the surface by the images in question. The only other times he's been around Otoha, he wasn't able to read him, or his desires were so unbalanced by the world they were in that it was hard to tell much.]

[bakegarasu]

[What comes from him is a very strong sense of guardianship. There's a desire to protect, and as he looks at the image of the city, it just gets stronger. It doesn't seem to be focused at the girl, though there seems to be a residual amount of that, too... but the city, yes.]

[He looks over at Ankh, tilting his head slightly and moving so that he's half-facing the other. He still doesn't know him, so he doesn't trust him to have him at his back.]

[notsogreedy]

[He glances at Otoha as he moves to face him, then looks at the windows.]

So this is where you're from.

[It's not really a question. That much is obvious.]

[bakegarasu]

Yes. Shinjuku. My city. My home. ... My charge.

[He gestures to the girl.]

... She's the will of the city. My yurine. I'm the guardian of her and of the entire city.

[notsogreedy]

Sounds like a lot of work.

[As it stands, he's not sure he can imagine putting that much effort into protecting anything other than himself. He spends a moment looking at the girl, then turns to the rest of the windows. If he believes most of these, then protecting the city hasn't done much. Most.]

If it's already this destroyed, then why protect it?

[bakegarasu]

Some buildings got knocked over and there was some blood in the streets, but it's -

[And suddenly he can't say anything more specific.]

I defeated Eko. There's enough of Shinjuku to protect.

[notsogreedy]

[So it isn't so completely destroyed. That reaction is enough of an answer to tell him what he needed to know. That rules out two windows, if they were ever options in the first place. He already suspects he knows which is right, now, but he'll ask another question. He gestures toward the image with the yokai.]

What are they?

[bakegarasu]

Yokai. They're invisible to humans, usually. They live off of human belief... so a lot of them are very sick and part of my job is to tend to them. Eko... tried to wipe out the humans to let the yokai take over, but that wouldn't have worked since they'd need humans to believe in them.

[Otoha isn't the smartest, but he understands that much, at least.]