Persona: Labyrinth of Knossos [IC/PG-16/Started/Not Accepting]

[a bad post]

Seiko looked around her as the "friends" her other self had mentioned. Who were these people, her clone had called them her friends, but she had no memory of anything. Her practical knowledge as far as she knew was intact, but anything she might call personal... it was gone...

 

It didn't seem to be just Seiko though, the other students looked around uncomfortably, and she figured they probably didn't know what was going on either. In fact by the looks on some of their faces it was safe to assume they didn't their memories either.

 

Before she put anymore thought to it, the group again could hear the moans of unidentified creatures, this time though it was accompanied by the appearance of two odd creatures speeding toward them. The nearest one knashed its teeth at Seiko hurdling itself towards her. She dived just out of it way to avoid it, causing the malicious creature to crash into the floor creating a small crater about the size of its body.

 

The other white creature attacked a silver haired girl wearing armor, swinging its long tongue at her, though she also leapt out of the way, causing the creature to fly past her into the room's wall.

 

'We have to run! These things will kill us!' Seiko thought to herself, but the others looked at her, and nodded their agreement as if they'd heard her thoughts... next to her the first creature seemed to be regaining its senses. Deciding to think on the matter later Seiko decided that now might be the time to run. 

 

Scrambling away as the creature shook itself off Seiko ran towards the hallway directly ahead of her, while she hoped the others were following her she dared not look back, for fear of tripping and one of those things catching her. The hallway, which was not in fact a hallway actually a staircase, lead down farther into... it occurred to Seiko that she wasn't sure what this "building" if it was even that, was. 

 

Reaching the bottom Seiko found a young boy in blue at the bottom, seemingly idling around. Was he oblivious to how dangerous this place really was... how could he just be sitting around. Seiko stopped reaching for her wipeboard, before realizing she didn't have it with her.

 

"Come with me if you wish to live," the boy said perfectly calm, motioning her to the wall, he touched his hand to it causing a door-like blue rift to open in the wall, I'd hurry up, those things will catch up soon." With a final glance the boy disappeared into the wall. Not seeing any other chance of escape Seiko waved to the others pointing to the blue portal, before diving in herself.

 

-------

 

"Ahh... Good it seems we've all made it through in one piece, how pleasant," the boy said with a smile, though the comment seemed somewhat sarcastic, "it'd be quite troublesome if I'd lost one of you in my first contract." 

 

Seiko and her companions stood bewildered, and open mouthed just exactly who was this kid. Why was he down in some black... abyss.

 

"Shush, I'll answer all your questions now," the boy said raising a hand to cut anybody off who might be speaking, "my name is Victor, and I am a resident of the Velvet Room. I am here to form a contract with one of you so that you may summon your Persona, and inner self that you can use to fight those creatures." Victor paused allowing them to take that small, but unbelievable piece of information in, "what you just saw are known as Shadows. They manifestations of negative human emotions. Where you are right now is known as the legendary Labyrinth of Knossos from Greek legend."

 

"That's enough of that though!" Victor abruptly said seemingly done with explanation, "I have decided which of you I will contract with!" A brown book appeared in Victor's hands, with only a few small strides he crossed room until he was almost on top of a young blonde woman in a school uniform, "Raiko Mikazuki release your true self." With only that small whisper Victor's book flung open, an aura of power flooding the room, a small, glowing blue card spinning in the middle. 

 

Transfixed by this display nobody noticed as Victor quickly swing his arm stabbing Raiko through her chest right were her heart should've been... at least it looked as though he had stabbed her, no blood did not come out... the same blue light flooded from Raiko's chest. The girl looked racked with pain for a moment, before Victor pulled his hand and Raiko stumbled back.

 

"The contract has been formed," Victor said snapping his figures, and again they were somehow in the hallway, "now we need to get you weapons to fight the Shadows, shall we?" In each of the group's hands random weapons appeared, in Seiko's was a bow and on her back a quiver of arrows. "Any of you with weapons that need ammunition... don't worry my enchanted weapons never run out~" Victor said with a perky wink, "now only people with Personas will be able to harm Shadows, which means only Rai-"

 

"You!" A high pitched shriek was heard before several gun rounds impacted the wall next to Victor. A young girl with two sub-machine guns still smoking glared at Victor, "I'm going to kill you, you son of a bitch!"

 

"Oops, seems that's my cue to leave~" Victor spun turning into one of those glowing blue cards before disappearing.

 

"No! He got away again!? Goddammit!" The girl screamed her eyes boiling with rage, before running back down the way she had come, "I'll kill him yet!"

 

 Persona 2 - Battle Theme

 

It seemed the group would not be given any respite after the hectic turn of events as the two Shadows from earlier had popped up again, this time though with a new friend. Only Raiko did not back away in fear, as the Shadows approached her all eyes were focused on her as if she was the one single point in there world. 

[Tourmaline]

Eyes opening all of a sudden, her body felt very heavy. Not in the way that she was weak or ill, but a moment of weariness she could feel upon waking up from a lack of consciousness. It was most odd to her, this feeling. Before getting up and analyzing where she was, she felt at the ground and only then lifted her head, rubbing her eyes and yawning. She tried to look around more, but her vision was a tad blurry, though as soon as she saw the other people around herself, she shook her head and regained her senses, a slight disbelief coming across her face at her clearer view of where they really were, the confusion of who these PEOPLE were, and more so, the fact that she had no memories.

She turned her gaze to a girl who appeared to wake up before she did, ignoring the others who did not catch her attention at the moment. She lifts a hand slightly at her to let her know she was talking to her, but before a word could come out, two eldritch creatures appeared, making equally as disturbing noises. 

"W-woah!" Raiko gasped at the one that thought to dash into the girl she tried talking to. "Damn! At least I know who I'm against, now!" She stated to herself, deciding that, so long she was aware what was trying to kill her and what was not, she would use now to survive and later to get answers. Deciding that following the other girl was a better idea than fighting such disgusting, supernatural creatures, she ran in the same direction as her, though, in contrast, looked back to the rest of the group to see if any of them were lagging behind or caught. Had one of the others been caught, Raiko did not know enough, or anything, to even try making a heroic save for the poor victim. If anybody was going to get caught, it wasn't going to be her trying to save somebody else she didn't know.

After continued running through this staircase, Raiko could see the first girl speaking to a boy off in the distance. Before she was close enough to engage in any kind of interaction with either of the two, the boy disappeared and the girl passed through a blue portal that the boy seemed to spawn for their sakes. "Good! Freedom!" Raiko thought instinctively, knowing she could at least trust this more than any other blue portal from anywhere else, given the girl gestured to it as a path of safety and that, really, she was not going to fight two large creatures fast, large and strong enough to catch people by surprise and knock themselves out with the sheer impact of their tackles. This meant, of course, that she decided to go into the portal, choosing to aid any other people that may have not been caught by repeating the first girl's gesture to tell them it was the safest way to go, rather than to contemplate entering it or not.


At entrance of the new area, she looked around wherever they were to try making out what to do next, seeing the boy from earlier. Hearing his sarcasm, a small smirk appeared on her own face, chuckling at his tone, though still surprised by whatever the hell was happening. Or, rather, knowing that they were at least safe for the time being, considering the confidence, or perhaps even arrogance, in this boy's tone, she turned her head slightly to the first girl, focusing on her rather than the others, as she was solely aware of her thus far among the group, only able to let out a "Hey" as the boy cut her off, who simultaneously introduced himself as "Victor." 

She continued listening to his explanations, as he clearly knew what was going on much better than she or any of the others could. The idea of beating those creatures up as a job for a contract didn't sound too bad for her at all. She actually liked the idea of it, but she was a bit surprised to hear that it was her precisely he wanted a contract with. "What do you mean by a contra--" Her shock amplified at the feeling of his hand through her chest. It didn't hurt for long, though it was enough for her to shut her eyes and clench one of her fists, barely holding herself together and almost falling back at his pulling out. Despite what happened, her heart felt completely fine! More than that, light seemed to be flowing out of where the wound SHOULD have been. "W-what the hell just happened...?" She asked herself quietly, intentionally asking quietly enough so she could assess the situation.

The large hammer in one hand and shield in the other didn't help her surprise. It must have seemed very surreal that a high school girl could wield such equipment with less of a burden than most, and it even puzzled her, as she had no memory of her prior life, but her body was strong and fit enough after the quarter-lifetime of exercise her adventurous lifestyle bestowed upon her. It's not like she remembered any of the facts, though, looking down and muttering "man, these are badass...." She was not paying as much attention to Victor, but heard something about her alone being able to harm Shadows. That was before another girl with two guns appeared, too focused on thinking of what she could do before Victor and that angry girl both disappeared. It happened too quickly for her to interfere, after all.

She turned back to the Shadows, who appeared with a new ally to help them kill the group. Unlike the others, though, the new one looked much stronger than the mooks it joined. Usually she immediately would have smashed the smaller shadow with her hammer, but she felt a power welling up and that familiar blue light from earlier reappear around her. A burst of energy courses through her body and she feels invigorated and more confident than before. The light calms down momentarily and Raiko hears a voice speaking in a very archaic method saying "I am thou... Thou art I... From the sea of thy soul I come..." before a great figure appears over her and identifies itself as Skuld to her. She looks up at it in a bit of disbelief, a wider smile appearing after a few seconds. She looks back at the shadows, dashing closer to them and whipping her hammer across one of the smaller ones with no problem, eliminating it quickly. Wondering what kind of changes the persona entails, she yells "Skuld!" and, with her arm raised at the other small shadow, causing it to go ablaze, letting her get nearer to it to eliminate it, as well. She can react quickly enough to raise her shield and block the larger shadow's throwing itself at it. With a most clear satisfaction on her face, Skuld returns once more, and, rather than using it's weapon, crashes into the shadow with its shield, or "Bash." Noting it as an actual name, and running toward the enemy sort of recklessly in her excitement, the shadow manages to whip its tail against Raiko's side, stopping her in her tracks. "Damn!" the impact causes her to exclaim, pulling herself back together and sending her Skuld out, pointing its weapon at the shadow and tearing through it, taking more hits from various tails along the way but ignoring them as best as possible to "Cleave" straight through it, destroying it. 

Feeling bruised all over, Raiko walks back to the rest of the group, panting and kneeling in front of that first girl. She drops her weapon and shield on the floor of the hallway and, as Skuld dissipates, manages to ask her what she couldn't finish earlier thanks to Victor: "H-Hey, are you fine...?"

(Note that was not a stutter but a pant).

[Ｄｈａｒｃ]

Takao awoke to the sound of giggling.

 

His eyes slowly pushed themselves open, and he tried his best to look around the darkness while still remaining flat on his stomach on the ground, but to no avail.  He felt incredibly groggy, much like how one would feel when coming out of a drug-induced stupor, and it took him quite a few tries to get up onto his knees without falling back down onto his face.  Finally, by the time he was fully upright and his eyes had adjusted to the darkness in the surrounding area, he once again attempted to look around.

 

Counting Takao, there appeared to be a total six individuals…And it also looked to Takao in the low light that all of his fellows were female, something that would have made him blush in a less serious scenario.

 

Takao slowly stood to his feet, but a sharp pain in his forehead made him wince, putting up a hand instinctively to grasp it.  It was at this point he noticed that his thoughts were nowhere close to being un-muddled — no matter how hard he tried to process the information surrounding him and figure out where he was, the most he was met with was a headache.

 

“Damn…” he muttered to himself.  “What the hell is—?!”

 

His thoughts were cut off by low moans echoing off the walls of the dark chamber Takao and his fellows resided in.  He turned his head in search of the source of the noise, and he found himself staring at a pair of grotesque, floating creatures, long blue tongues hanging from their wide-open mouths.   Takao initially stood paralyzed in fear, watching as both creatures attempted to attack two members of the party in the dark chamber.  Thankfully, both attacks missed, and the creatures appeared dazed.

 

 Takao did not start running until after all of the others had gone past him, making sure everyone else was safe before doing anything himself.  As he ran after the group, he saw a boy clad in blue open a strange portal in the wall, which everyone disappeared into, one by one.  Finally, as Takao’s turn came around, he stumbled, almost tripping just short of the portal, but thankfully only falling onto his face after going through.

 

 

Takao laughed sheepishly at the boy’s sarcastic comment, still a good deal concerned about what was actually going on.  The boy, Victor, spoke a bit too quickly for Takao to respond to without running the risk of missing something, so he decided to keep his mouth shut.  However, when the light-haired girl Raiko’s chest was impaled by Victor’s hand, his eyes widened and his mouth fell open.  When she turned out to be uninjured, Takao was mildly relieved, but still not entirely relaxed.

 

Takao was surprised at first by the fact that a katana with a gleaming silver blade and ornate tsuba and tsuka materialized in his hands, but that surprise quickly shifted to amazement at how light the blade felt.  He somehow felt as though the blade should be heavier, as though he remembered it…He didn’t spend too much time dwelling on this, though, as his head began to throb, and a girl with two sub-machine guns burst into view.  She and Victor were both gone before Takao had any time to process what, exactly, had happened.

 

As Takao turned to look at the rest of his companions in the Labyrinth, his eye caught movement off to the side.  He shifted his gaze toward the movement, and his face blanched.

 

The two creatures from before had returned, along with an even more menacing-looking creature stalking low along the ground between them.  Takao tried to mentally steel himself so he could attempt to combat the trio of Shadows, but he recalled Victor stating that the Shadows could only be harmed by one with a Persona, and he hung back, looking toward Raiko expectantly.

 

 

Takao watched in awe as Raiko and her persona took down the three Shadows, totally enchanted by their grace and power.  Once the battle was over and Raiko returned to the group, Takao moved closer to her.  He waited until Raiko had finished talking to another girl before quietly asking: “Are…Are you okay, miss?”

[mitchermitcher]

"What's going on?" Somehow, Aisaku found himself on the run. Chasing him and his unfamiliar peers are two shadow-y looking creatures, hence dubbed 'shadows' by him. Shadows were chasing him and his unfamiliar peers. Right before that he found himself waking up in this unknown place, so unfortunately there was not much context for him to work off with. From what he observed though, it seems he's not the only person in the group to be confused, and he remembers nothing but his name. With the precise and miraculously profound observation that waking up an amnesiac in an unknown place was not a good situation to be in, he ran, and so did the others.

 

Running further, he and said unknown peers encountered a new room and subsequently a young boy with fashionably blue and fashionable clothes idling around. How unusual.

 

"Come with me if you want to live." While he did not have the memory to recognize the Terminator reference, he found himself chuckling at it. Saying nothing else, he nonchalantly went inside a portal that did not look natural in any way. Deciding that while he did not get that Terminator reference, he did want to live, he followed suit.

 

X-X-X

 

"Ahh... Good it seems we've all made it through in one piece, how pleasant." And Aisaku had to agree. The fact they were able to escape from two shadows chasing them was quite a boon if he had a say in this. Using this moment to catch his breath, Aisaku voluntarily collapsed on the floor.

 

"Shush, I'll answer all your questions now," The fashionably blue boy continued. Looks like he has a clear agenda, which is good. The more complicated the situation gets, the worse for him. Fashionably blue's name was Victor, and it seemed that he was there to unlock their Persona so they can fight the shadows...For someone who got straight to the point, Aisaku expected a more in depth answer.

 

Well, better than nothing I guess. He thought.

 

After explaining what he explained, he(Fashionably Blue) molested Raiko Mikazuki, one of the girls in the group.

 

No, he stabbed his hand into her heart, and she did not bleed.

 

Can't get much weirder anyways. He tried to compose himself and think, but physically he gaped his mouth.

 

Blue light filled the room, and then all was normal again. He(Fashionably Blue) withdrew his hand.

 

"Now we need to get you weapons to fight the Shadows, shall we?" After saying that, he(Aisaku Shiomi) found a knife has magically warped into his hands. Woah, this is beautiful. That's fine steel alright. And the handle is easy and practical to grip. The scabbard is just right too. This weight, it's perfect for throwing. f***, I'm in love. This knife is perfect. The shape's mighty fine too. That reflection it's giving is giving me goosebumps right now, this is really, really good steel. I want to try this out so bad. Seriously, what kind of metal is this? It's so light, yet it feels so sturdy. How am I supposed to maintain this? Do I need to rub it with oil every once in a while? Is it some sort of magical metal that ain't need no cleaning? I just don't...know.

 

Suddenly, the two shadows burst into the room, along with a new third one. One that looked significantly tougher.

[Admiral_Stalfos19]

"*GYUMP*" Yasu Miyake made her usual tick as she gulped, "Wh-... where am I? *WUMP* What is this place?"

 

She observed her surroundings with eyes full of fear and paranoia. There was no doubt that she was uncomfortable being stuck here, but for the life of her, she had no idea where she was or how to get out. Yasu had wondered alone for some time, but as luck would have it, she eventually found that other persons had coincidentally gathered in one place. Relieved that she wasn't alone after all, Yasu ran up to the others.

 

"Hey, *YUMP* excuse me *YUMP*! Can any of you tell me where *GUMP*...?" Yasu stopped with a disheartened look on her face once she saw the looks across the other people's faces, "Oh... *GWUMP* *GWUMP* Uh... *WUMP* never mind, I *GUMP* guess."

 

It was clear to Yasu that they were just as confused as she was. Desperate for answers, she tried to scout out this hell-hole of a labyrinth one last time from where she was standing, but didn't get the chance to learn anything new before all of a sudden, two Shadows had appeared out of nowhere and attacked the party. Luckily, the Shadows had missed the two girls they seemed to be headed for, with one running into a wall and the other careening straight into the floor. This in turn gave Yasu plenty of time to escape ahead of the rest. After all, if there was anything she was good at at all, she was a fast runner.

 

...

 

"Ahh... Good, it seems we've all made it in one piece. How pleasant," said a voice which belong to none of the others that were just there with Yasu. Instead, it came from a young man in blue, who had afterwards introduced himself as Victor and told them where they were. Next he made a contract with one of the girls, Raiko, though the way he went about it wasn't exactly pleasant. But Raiko survived, and she got a Persona out of it too which was nice.

 

Next, everyone was given weapons. Yasu stared at her own with a blank, confused look on her face. Sure, the scythe that she was given certainly looked cool enough, but she had no idea how to use it, and what was more, she wasn't much of a fighter to begin with. Yasu had half a mind to drop the scythe and leave it out of sight, and who could blame her? After all, since there was no hurting the Shadows without a Persona, what was the point of fighting them?

 

Yasu was just about to ask Victor something when some random girl declared hostility on the young man in question, having burst into the room with intent to kill him. Unfortunately, that meant that Victor had to do a little disappearing act, not to be seen again for quite some time.

 

"H- *YUMP* Hey! I've still *GUMP* so many question I *WUMP* answers to! WAAAAAAIIIIIIII...!!" But it was too late. Victor was already gone, and so too was the girl that wanted him dead. Yasu fell on her knees as she wailed in despair, unaware that the two Shadows that attacked the party earlier had come to finish what they started, and a third had come to aid them. The fact that the Shadows returned wasn't on Yasu's mind any more, nor was the battle between them and Raiko's new Persona. What was on Yasu's mind was that she still had questions that were left unanswered thanks to that girl.

 

"Why? *WUMP*" Yasu spattered through her tears, "Why can't she *YUMP* leave him alone?"

[Maeriberii Haan]

“…..”

 

Arisu woke up in an unfamiliar place, surrounded with unfamiliar people. She had no idea about what led her to be there or anything else, actually. She seemed to have lost most of her memory. She tried times and times again to access it, but all her attempts were only met with painful headaches.

 

As she still felt really disoriented, she thought it would be for the better that she stay on her place, instead of walking around. She used this moment to observe the other individuals around her. Three females, and three males, two of which looked very feminine for some reason. Though, due to the place being quite dark, she was not quite sure about her observation.

 

When she still tried to make sense of what was actually happening, low moans from somewhere on the chamber interrupted her. And soon after that, two creatures that violated every single rules of nature appeared.  While the two did look really frightening, and they did try to attack two people near her, Arisu couldn’t help but feeling intrigued by them. Though, as everyone started to run away from the two, she realized that trying to know more about the two could be the end of her, so she decided to run instead.

 

And then, she and the others stumbled upon a boy clad in blue, looking really casual in a place where dangerous creatures existed. And suddenly, as if the law of common sense had been thrown out of the world, he casually opened a portal from the wall behind him. As the others entered the door, Arisu was left with no choice but to enter the door too, though waking up to find everything was only a dream was a great alternative.

 

---

 

“…Persona?

 

…Inner Self?

 

..Shadows?

 

…Labyrinth of Knossos?

 

What the hell?”

 

Each passing time made like Arisu’s common sense deeply violated, as more and more information that led to even more questions was said.

 

And then, he made a ‘contract’ with someone named Raiko, though the detail was a bit fuzzy. After he was finished with that, a gun appeared on her hand, with a remark from Victor that they still wouldn’t be able to hurt the ‘Shadows’. And a girl suddenly appeared, and Victor immediately left.

 

And then the two mockery of Mother Nature from before returned, now bringing a new friend with them, which looked even more absurd. Though, Raiko managed to eliminate them all, by ‘summoning’ an armored girl from her head. Which somehow was solid enough to put harm on the ‘Shadows’.

 

Arisu resisted the urge to shot herself in the head to wake up from this nonsensical nightmare.

 

 

---

[宇佐見 蓮子@C94]

"Uh... Ungh..." Shingo slowly opened his eyes to a pitch-black area, with a lot of eerie purple mist surrounding him. He tried to remember what happened before for him to be in such a place, but... Nothing. He could not remember a single thing before waking up. A hint of fear and panic tinted Shingo's eyes as he gazed around his surroundings. A small group of people seemed to have ended up on the same place he did, four girls and one guy. Under normal circumstances, it would've been perfect, but the fact that all of them also seemed confused only raises more questions. 

 

As if the situation couldn't get any worse, Shingo suddenly heard creepy moans resounding around the space. Soon enough, two creatures that seemingly only exist for the purpose of inspiring fear on any who sees it appeared. The creatures attacked two of the girls trapped with him, though they both managed to avoid it. Every synapse in his brain told him to run away immediately, but the darkness and purple mist made it hard to see, let alone run. However, as soon as he saw the others running away, his panic overcame any common sense he had, and decided to run away before the monstrosities got back up. 

 

After a while, he arrived at the bottom of a staircase, where a young boy dressed in blue appears to have been waiting for them. The boy created some kind of door-like portal. Although at first hesitant to jump, he figured that it following the strange boy would be better than meeting the monsters again. 

 

---

 

"Ahh... Good, it seems we've all made it in one piece." Said the boy once again. The strange fellow identified himself as Victor, and then went on to mention terms that made Shingo's head spin. While he understood what the words "Persona", "Shadow", or "Labyrinth of Knossos" meant, he had no idea what it meant in the context of what Victor is saying. But before he can raise any questions, Victor picked one of the girls for a "Contract". The process appeared to be quite gruesome, and Raiko seemed to wince in pain for a bit. 

 

After the contract was done, Victor gave each of them their weapons. Shingo got a long wooden stick, comparatively easy to use to the weapons the others got, but he has zero experience with kendo sticks anyway. "...Huh? The others got arrows, knives and even a scythe but I get a stick? How is this gonna be effective against those monsters?" But before he could ask for a change of weaponry, a girl with guns-a-blazing fired a volley at Victor, which seemed to drive him off, for some reason. Soon after, the girl disappeared as well, and the two monstrosities appeared again, but with a new ally to help them.

 

The three Shadows, as what Victor said they are, seemed transfixed at Raiko, but she appears to be unfazed. Much to Shingo's astonishment, Raiko managed to destroy them all by summoning an armor-clad girl, which he can only assume is her Persona. With the battle over, Shingo let out a heavy sigh before planting his stick down to the ground and resting his body on it. "I don't know about you all, but that Victor kid only raised more questions... I say we start finding a way to answer them, and more importantly, get out of this hellish labyrinth." 

[a bad post]

Seiko watched amazed as Raiko expertly destroyed the Shadows. As the Shadows assaulted what Victor had called a Persona, it seemed that Raiko also recoiled back in pain. Even so she fought through destroying all three Shadows quickly.

 

Looking tired Raiko turned back making sure that her companions were alright, but most of all she seemed concerned with Seiko asking her specifically if she was okay. Seiko was caught off guard by the unknown girl's kindness, but at the same very happy that she cared. Nodding, adding a smile, in response to her question, Seiko looked next to her as a brown haired boy approached them, asking Raiko of her health.

 

She didn't hear Raiko's answer though, as after the boy spoke a wave of nausea rolled over Seiko and the whole world around her spun, before she herself collapsed to the ground.

 

----------------

 

"Heehee..." a voice echoed all around Seiko seemingly coming from every direction, "danger approaches fast. Speak the knowledge that only you may know."

 

Seiko didn't understand, what did the voice mean by speak, she was mute. Speaking of not understanding, she had no clue where she was. A moment ago she had been in the Labyrinth, and now she floated in a great black expanse. 

 

"Don't think so simple," the voice responded to her thoughts, "you of all people should know. Speaking can be done in more ways than the voice. Receive my gifts so that you may vanquish the darkness inside yourself."

 

A sharp pain stabbed through Seiko's head, and a searing white light filled her entire field of vision. 

 

-----------------

 

Seiko shot up like a bullet, breathing heavily, she grasped at the material of her sweater. Ignoring the odd stares she was no doubt getting Seiko thought back to the dream she'd had... or maybe dream was not the right word for it. Seiko certainly felt different now... but how she couldn't tell.

 

She didn't have long to ponder this before a malicious wave of energy filled her. Turning slowly she looked down the dark hallway of the labyrinth pure, untainted fear coming across her face. Something was there, something very evil was coming this way.

 

"Something's coming," Seiko's thoughts echoed not only in her own head, but in the heads of the others, "I don't know what it is, but something very wrong is coming this way."

[Maeriberii Haan]

 "I don't know about you all, but that Victor kid only raised more questions... I say we start finding a way to answer them, and more importantly, get out of this hellish labyrinth."

“Let’s find this Victor guy then. Though, given how he just disappeared into nowhere as that girl barraged him with bullets, I don’t think this’ll be easy.”

After recovering a bit from her minor breakdown, Arisu inexplicably gained a sudden interest in making sense of whatever’s happening there. Not making sense like ‘there must be a scientific explanation for this’ kind of making sense, but ‘I wonder if I can figure how things work here’. It was simply out of mere curiosity, though she also realized the possibility that her research here might eventually gave her international acknowledgement, and that made her giddy. Though, her daydreaming was interrupted when suddenly a girl in the group suddenly fainted, which prompted Arisu to rush over to her.

“Hey, hey!

What happened? Can you hear me?”

Arisu shook the girl’s body, desperately tried to see if she could respond. As her attempt was met with failure, she started panicking, as she had no knowledge about giving first aid in an emergency situation.

But it didn’t last long, as the girl woke up not long after fainting, though from her way of waking up, she seemed to have experienced quite a nightmare or something.

Her panting immediately turned into a face filled with the primal emotion of fear, as she stared blankly into the darkness behind Arisu.

"Something's coming,"

Wait.

Where this voice did come from?

"I don't know what it is, but something very wrong is coming this way."

If it’s true, that would explain why the girl froze in horror, though Arisu was definitely not sure whether to check what’s behind her or not.

Still, she guessed that trusting the voice, whoever did it belong to, would be better for now, so she turned around to face what’s behind her all this time.

“Hello, me.

It’s been a while.”

 

------

 

“..Who are you?”

Arisu stared closely at the figure in front of her, a figure that looks perfectly similar to her, though with golden eyes instead of her natural eye color.

“Ah, me.

Don’t act all unfamiliar like that on me.”

“Who..are..you?!”

Arisu asked once again, this time she looked more irritated than before. The figure in front of her didn’t seem to be concerned much about it.

“Ah, really tense, aren’t you? Let’s just hump another pile of paper and books instead of human beings.

Those creatures aren’t really worth our brilliance, right?

Stupid people and their stupid society…

You agree right, that our wonderful future has no place for them?”

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t lie to me like that, me. I know how much you loathe them, the idiots. They forced you to fit in their idiot system, their idiot society, and they didn’t even give you any recognition for your ability!

THOSE PATHETIC SUBCREATURES CAN JUST PERISH, RIGHT?”

“No…!

I..I never thought of them like that!”

The figure, whatever was it, was right about her.

But no way would she admit it to anyone if she could help it.

“You’re really bad at lying, me.

Aaaanyway, I’m curious about something, though of course, I already know the answer.

How does it feel, acting as if you know everything when people asked something to you?

How does it feel, faking your interest in helping someone, just to make people think you cared?

And lastly, how does it feel…”

“NANANA I CAN’T HEAR YOU LALALA!”

It was too much.

Arisu closed her ears with both of her hands, trying her best not to hear any more of it.

Noticing Arisu’s reaction, the figure just laughed before rapidly shifting into a more composed state.

“Yeah, yeah. :Let’s just pretend you’re deaf. Have I said about how you’d make a shitty actor, me?

See, everyone! Look at the girl right there!

This person that refused to be grouped with you humans will never, ever care about any of you! She’s just an actor, an attention whore that desperately craving for recognition!”

“..Stop..

..please..

I beg you, please stop.”

Arisu couldn’t take it anymore.

She grabbed her gun, and aimed it straight at her head.

“Oh, so you’re just going to take the easy way out, eh?

Go ahead then. It’s not like we cared about whether anyone will miss us or not.

Though, let me finish my last question before you tried to be ignorant back then.

How does it feel…

..To realize that despite your desire to build a bright future and to get people’s acknowledgement on your effort, you’ll never reach that, and you’ll just die as nobody, as it seems to be what you’re trying to aim here.

It feels pathetic, right? And not to mention, you, for who always viewed yourself as something better than other humans, you desperately wanted other humans to recognize your ability.

Pathetic, isn’t it?”

“......”

“Oh yeah, you did ask about who I am, right?

Well then…”

 

Dark smog gathered around where the figure stood, making everything around it to be engulfed in darkness. Arisu was caught by surprise, and she accidentally dropped her gun.

Not long after that, the smog slowly dissipated, revealing a monstrous creature behind it.

 

It looked like a girl, entirely in black and white and with a star instead of a face. She sat on a huge copy of her head, but this one had some sort of octagram on its face, and its braids were actually hands.

 

“I am the wickedness in your heart.

 

Yes, it is I..

 

I am Shadow, your true self ”

 

“….No!

I don’t believe it!”

 

Completely repulsed to believe that this…abomination was a part of her, she grabbed her gun from the floor and started firing to her shadow.

 

“...That can't be right.

You are supposed to be me? You think I'm going to believe that?!

This can't be all there is! And you're... not... ME!”

“How…pathetic, but it’s really fitting of you, me.

Let me demonstrate the patheticness of your existence to everyone then.”

The octagram on the Shadow’s face started to glow. Arisu knew that this won’t end well for anything in front of it.

“Everyone, get away!”

“….Be erased.

Solar Flare!”

A red beam of destruction was fired from the octagram, demolishing everything in its line of fire.

“And I’m just getting started.”

 

[mitchermitcher]

“Hello, me. It’s been a while.” Hearing that sentence, not addressed to himself in anyway, awoke Aisaku from his knife obsession. It was a rather interesting composition of pronouns, he noticed. Looking around, he saw a girl collapsed with a hammer and shield lying on the ground next to her, and some people gathering around them. More urgently, he saw a blond girl standing facing another blond girl. Normally there would be nothing wrong with two pretties talking to each other, but they looked exactly the same. Twins are quite distinct, so he was rather confident he would've noticed if there were twins in the group. In fact, one of them had bright yellow eyes, and looked rather sinister for reasons Aisaku couldn't really place.

“Who..are..you?!”

“Ah, really tense, aren’t you? Let’s just hump another pile of paper and books instead of human beings. Those creatures aren’t really worth our brilliance, right? Stupid people and their stupid society…You agree right, that our wonderful future has no place for them?”

“What do you mean?”

Their conversation went on as yellow-eyes continued to present her society-mocking ideals to not-yellow-eyes as if suggesting that was what she(not-yellow) thought all along, with not-yellow trying to deny it.

"How does it feel...To realize that despite your desire to build a bright future and to get people’s acknowledgement on your effort, you’ll never reach that, and you’ll just die as nobody..."

"This could get ugly real fast..." This time AIsaku himself muttered under his breath. As much of a realist he was, seeing someone getting talked down to and her worth denied was infuriating, and he was close to jumping in and interferring. Yellow-eyes' aura, however, told him that was probably a risky thing to do.

 

“I am the wickedness in your heart.

 

Yes, it is I..

 

I am Shadow, your true self ”

 

And before he realized it, the yellow-eyed doppelganger transformed into something much more sinister than a girl. It was a witch riding a sinister hat with human arms for legs, mushrooms surrounding her and a worn-out broom in her hand. A part inside him gave him the gut instinct that its' design looked strangely familiar and sparking, but he quickly ignored that part.
 

He prepared himself and his knife, about to throw it, when the witch's octogram glowed brightly. Combined with the yelling to get out of the way, he barely jumped before a flash blinded him. He felt an intense burning sensation on the edges of his left foot. He barely grazed it, but then he noticed that his former location was completely obliterated, and thanked fortune that a graze was all he got.

 

How the hell do you fight this thing?!