The Backrooms Final

>>5861
She woke. Still pressed against her beloved. There was no sun, or needles to mark the time of day... Only the assumption that time had passed. And Cat's silent relief, which doesn't last long before being replaced by curiosity.

>Ashley (morning)
<Catriño...

"Huh...?" -she turns her little head, facing her companion-

Hilda speaks in her sleep.

<Catesoro...

"..."

But unlike dad, she only says things that make her feel good.

<Cat... Cat... Ash-leey~

"Eladia..."

Her angelic and precise voice met Hilda's like warm breath. Their names embracing with the affection of their owners, who now touch their foreheads. Because Ashley wants more closeness.

>Ashley (present)
"!" -a silent startle, a sharp turn, and in her sight she finds a huge moth-

(...fluffy...)

Very fluffy... But dangerous nonetheless. Although her body doesn't scream danger, knowledge urges caution... And her gut warns of the eye contact that the girl struggles to break away from. She slowly turns her face away, but her eyes remain on the moth until her head can no longer allow it, only then ending on Hilda's smile.

"?"

Catherine stands, expressionless, hands at her sides in a posture so png natural it's almost uncomfortable to watch. This also provides the perfect comparison to the little animal. The vacant stare, the simple pose, the unnatural stillness, and of course, the whiteness that suits them so well.

"What?"

But Catherine doesn't get it. She understood where it was going, but the eyebrow movements escape her mental framework.

"It didn't do anything to me." -she imagines that's perhaps what Hilda wants to know. There was no need to harm that bug. But that wasn't the topic- "Is it a sign?"

Her dad taught her some signs they knew in the platoon to communicate without using their voices. If Hilda wanted, Cat would teach them to her, they were useful, but she didn't recognize this one. And it meant there was a similarity between the moth and her.

"..."

Catherine allows herself a second look. It still surprises her, it's big. She's thought about it, and compared it, and confirms it when she takes a few steps that bring her closer to the window and the danger.

It's big.

(Bigger than the Zenaida Dove, and bigger than the American Crow.)

Bigger...
(And it's bigger than the greylag goose... It shouldn't be this big...)

(It looks like a... greylag goose...)

Such is its size. About 80 centimeters tall, estimated by eye and comparison, by the girl's enormous gaze.

(But it's a moth...)

And that was unnatural. They shared that perhaps, the closeness to the wild, without being something with more qualities. One, tied to the earth, the other, hated for being the ugly cousin...

But perhaps both today accept better, not having wings, or living covered in chitin. Because there are very good things about being who you are, and not someone else. Cat turns to face that something.

"Do I look like a moth?" - she asks, smiling -

...

She asked for comfortable clothes. Not pajamas or a dress, for whatever they were going to do, because the surprise to Hilda made her forget her clothes in the picturesque meadows. She thought a little about going back and getting hers... But she gave up. Her dress, in the middle of hundreds of hectares, would be as hard to find as a needle in a haystack. There was no attachment capable of making her waste the limited time she has on a futile search. At least those clothes served their purpose well.

In more suitable clothes for work, she follows Hilda to the greenhouse. The place seemed very cozy and interesting to her. She couldn't help but look around with her mouth agape, enjoying the variety of well-kept ornamental plants, which enjoyed -imagine- good care under the warmth of these glass panes.

(How nice.)

She likes plants. She doesn't usually think about it too much, but seeing herself surrounded by a place where life proliferates so much, and is well cared for, deserves at least some recognition.

(It's like a small forest... but in a little glass house...)

There were even little animals, Catherine can't help but notice the deathmoths being brushed. The girl stops walking just to watch this, amazed.

(Fluffy...)

She finds them adorable! The girl almost didn't grab Hilda's wrist to ask her to get one... that one by the window was perhaps a good candidate... but she soon gave up.

(No... it's not easy. Nor convenient.)

Suppressing her childish desires, like having pets, is something else Dad has taught her. Although she loves animals, she must do it from afar. Never get attached, never name them. She has disobeyed him. But that doesn't change the fact that those are the rules.
On her walk where she observes everything, she finds those girls from before. The princesses, sitting, holding an umbrella...

(Sunshade... or parasol.)

That's what they're called if they're for the sun.

(For water, umbrella. For sun, parasol.)

(And shade: sunshade.)

She mentally recites her little phrase to tell them apart. But beyond the object, those holding it remain unfriendly. They glare at a curious Cat as if she were disgusting. The Oregonian loses all curiosity and looks blank again toward them, just before they prissily escape her sight.

(...doesn't matter...)

What matters is what Hilda thinks. Though she can't help sniffing her little crotch out of habit from that last gesture, finding its usual complex natural fragrance.

(...I don't smell bad...)

While she's distracted, Hilda glances at her.

<When are you going to get rid of that thing?

"?" -she turns to her- "Huh?"

She doesn't understand at first.

<Now your hair's going to get stained. I'm terrible at giving gifts.

Ah, she means the crown she's wearing. Catherine's huge eyes look upward and converge at the corners beside her nose, giving her the funny look of someone cross-eyed. Naturally, she can't see what's happening on her head with just that, so she turns back to Hilda.

"I like it..." -she says, completely oblivious to the big paint problem-

aren't we mixing things up? the necklace was a pretty little blue gem. Like any necklace. The one who gave a stone to the other is Cat, the one Hilda nicknamed Rocky

And then, it's as if a bolt of knowledge strikes Hilda.

<But you won't be able to criticize me for that anymore, because today I'm not your girlfriend...

"My what?"

She asks with one eyebrow raised. Until now, that word had eluded them as if they didn't know it, because maybe they didn't. What they had didn't have a name, only a mistaken assumption of best friends, but Hilda seemed to have figured it out out of nowhere, leaving Catherine completely offside. Surprising for the girl who couldn't say or hear 'date' without choking on blush-blood until yesterday. I guess it has to do with the flashback that wasn't shown from the morning, but well it wasn't shown so I don't know, and this happening with no development at all is kinda funny kek And yet no, I'm nitpicky about details! REEEEE Sorry for my autism.
<I'm your instructor!

"???"

She keeps her eyebrow raised, would they let that slide?! Well, anyway, Hilda goes shopping at a bush and returns ready for war. The albino looks surprised.

(She looks like a soldier...)

She doesn't know how to take that.

"You have a weapon."

Specifically, a shotgun.

<The backrooms have a second name! D-A-N-G-E-R! Danger!

"You missed the 'i'..."

Yes, maybe correcting her while she's so excited isn't the kindest thing, but asking Catherine to read the room, and not correct, especially grammatical matters, is asking the impossible.

"D - A - N - G - E - R." -she spells out now, with her usual lack of expression, and moving her finger like a baton to the rhythm of the letters- "Danger."

<We have to speak her language, we have to be dangerous. Sometimes it's not enough to just escape.

"Hm." -it's true, she's experienced it firsthand from minute one. Trying to flee the skin stealer was a failure that led her to a wall and, with no other options, to bare her teeth-

Hilda spins the shotgun like a baton, and finishes the act by pointing to the side.

<Since I didn't want it to be too easy for me, I brought this instead of my sword.

"But it's a shotgun." -Isn't a shotgun easy to use...?-

She follows the target of the sight with her eyes, finding beyond the barrel two of the three frightened princesses. One of them looks quite good. But it doesn't last. Maybe she was trying to look confident, or the shock was too great for a reaction, but soon, she falters and faints. She ends up underwater, with her companions only screaming uselessly, and Hilda looking surprised.

"...she's going to drown..."

She explains to the blue one, and then approaches the group of princesses. She gives the two still on land her expressionless gaze, and passes them by to, depending on how deep the other one is, crouch down and drag her from the bank or get into the water herself to grab her and bring her back to land with the other girls. Without looking at them at all... Until before leaving, when she would only look at them. Again, without any particular expression.

(...)

She turns her back on them, and returns to Hilda. They might be mean to Catherine, but Catherine has no reason to be mean to them.

2/3

>>5863
>Ashley
Hilda leads the way with a weapon and a staff. But the staff is a broom. They were going to the deepest part of the greenhouse to do some cleaning, Cat didn't have a problem with it. Sometimes she felt bad for pulling up weeds, because maybe those plants deserved to live too, but it was necessary. Although sometimes she took the trouble to replant them in deeper parts of the forest, where they wouldn't bother anyone.

Now maybe she wouldn't have the chance to replant them. But she doesn't dwell on it, because she's more interested in everything around her. The yellowish crystals amaze her despite their ugliness, she had never been surrounded by so much crystal, and she finds it beautiful. Like the trill of that melodious nightingale, or that noble thrush and the classic sparrow. Unmistakable even when muffled by meters and crystals.

The crickets joined the avian orchestra with their lulling rasp of wings, an instrument that reminds her of home, of the night, and relaxes her, with the running water being little more than the cherry on top.

"Ahh..." - she exhales in impression, looking at the ceiling -

And Hilda would see this once more when she turned around. A girl looking up, as if seeing the pyramids for the first time.

"I like this place..." - she states and falls silent, letting herself be carried away by the murmur of nature, closing her eyes, and breathing deeply, enjoying the closeness to greenery, to life - "..." - she let out a sigh -

When she opened her eyes, she looked at Hilda again. Ready to continue.

On the walk, she can see her counting her steps. She had noticed it before, but now she confirms it.

(I usually count in my mind.)

It's quieter. She wouldn't say it either, she doesn't want to distract her. Besides, she understands. Catherine counts her steps too. On the farm, she knows how many steps there are from the bed to the door, and from the door to the dining room. How many steps, and how many she has to take to the wheat field. She knows it well, so much so that if she were blind, she could walk from the bed to the dining room, or to the bathroom, and specifically to the shower, from memory. It's a habit she brought from home. Because she had to know how many steps until it was safe to use a bathing place, where the silver bags for bathing were, or where her little refuge was, where she hid by herself from time to time.

The walk culminates in a door. The bars are thick, so much so that she feels that those 'chainsaws' she has seen in the men's camp, made for cutting trees, would never win this battle of iron against iron.

As if that weren't enough, the sign, large, red and white to stand out from meters away, with raised dots even for the blind to understand, shouts a warning at them with a megaphone.

"Hm... It seems the other side is dangerous."

Hilda hands her the key. She takes it without a problem. Hilda asks her to stop. Catherine hadn't made any moves, so she stays in place with her blank expression while the other girl takes care of putting away the broom brush.

<it could be useful.

"Yes. For cleaning." - it's not a joke, that's its function -

Hilda fashions a spear with nothing more than a broomstick, some rope, and a knife. Extra points for improvisation, but once Catherine has it in her hand, she can't help but look at it closely.

(...)

She doesn't quite know what to think. She trusts Hilda's knot-tying skills, but this, in any case, didn't seem like a very good idea. Although, something unconsciously tells her it might work.
Her eyes return forward, seeing Hilda smile. Catherine smiles too... she doesn't know why. That's new. Hilda opens the door. Cat blinks a couple of times, looks at the key, so what was it for? She keeps it anyway. It would surely help them later.

Ladies first. Cat crosses the threshold, and wastes no time, turning to look at Hilda again, who puts down the brush to stop the door. Her eyebrows go up and down insistently, and Catherine for a moment thinks she's now saying she looks like a broom brush. But as if she could understand her in a unique way, that needs no words... her voice almost reached her mind.

<Am I not a clever girl?

"..." -and she smiled again, mentally returning a yes... and then coming closer, dropping the spear and grabbing her by the cheeks- "kissie." -she made duck lips, she suddenly really wanted to kiss her... but she was supposed to be her instructor now- "kissie..." -she asks again, she doesn't care about etiquette, she wants a kissie-

...

After that, they resume their walk. Cat holds the spear with both hands, and looks at the place. She can't say it's like the forest this time. The plants grow much more disorderly and that's coming from American forests and the undergrowth proliferates in a strange way. It's as if nature had reclaimed its place with violence, and now everything is its own. And like humans, more of one than the other, because the grass they walk on is dead.

Hilda peeks around a corner, Cat, who is a little taller, does the same, her head sticking out a bit above the other girl. Making them an adorable spy totem. Which is also a bacon dispenser, because Hilda throws a bit of bacon out there.

(Bait.)

Hilda counts, and nothing and no one bites. The girl comes out, and the albino accompanies her.

<Only step where I step.

She nods. She's heard that many times, and never had trouble obeying. She follows Hilda's movements like a mirror, being her white shadow until they manage to enter this area completely.

If the previous corner was where nature won by force, here it's where they changed an average role in the war for a leader role in the cage. Above them the plants curve like arches of the triumphal arch, becoming natural ceilings and corridors in the most unnatural way possible. Catherine feels in the middle of something majestic, it impresses her, and she sees it as the eighth wonder of the world. Or as the first of this alternate world. Everything in this greenhouse is worth seeing with your mouth open, and keeping in your memories in detail.

They reach some benches that seem to be made of stone under the thick greenery.

(I wouldn't sit there.)

While Catherine thinks about the essential, Hilda seemed more interested in a striking puddle. She touches it, the albino is cautious.

"Eladia... In nature, bright colors are used to warn about poison." -she explains aposematism in simple words, but Hilda must know more, because she tastes the mixture, causing Cat to break her natural silence with a gasp-

<Moth jelly.

Catherine is relieved in silence. She supposes she already had an idea of what the substance was before even touching it, but next time, she would probably interfere before getting worried. Because she must balance what she trusts and what she wants to protect her... like with nitroglycerin.

<There's a fence.

"..."

3/4 (it got long, sorry kek)

>>5863
>Ashley
They won't be long finding her. It lands on the wall. And it's enormous, breaking scale.

(More than a common goose... Bigger than a common turkey...)

And it doesn't look friendly at all.

(More than a swan... Bigger than an emu...)

The birds are starting to fall short.

(Bigger... than Dad...)

And Dad is huge. A person who has to duck to get through doorways, and who makes Cat crane her neck to see him. His height was little to envy Joe, though clearly in muscles he lost out, like a nut against a squirrel.

(Giant...)

Maybe with the wings of an albatross, the height of an ostrich, but with the creepy appearance of a nighthawk. Brown, resting on past victims. Its back full of darkness, on which drawings of human horror seem to be traced... making it look like the true origin of the death legends attributed to the black witch. The Ascalapha odorata. (Though Cat doesn't call it that)

"It's dangerous..." -she whispers, she doesn't even need her instincts to know when corpses litter the floor-

<It's quite large...

"With wings like albatrosses. And the size of an ostrich..."

<But it's still an insect, it's fragile. If you try hard, and give it a good surprise blow, you'll kill it.

"...you want me to kill it..." -she says, looking at Hilda, then back forward- "kill... that..." -because just calling it a moth is a stretch-

(I once wondered why moths and butterflies are different.)

(I watched them a lot. I never saw them together... because one comes out during the day and the other at night.)

(But they have more differences... moths have that hair my dad told me is called chitin. And they fly violently, while butterflies seem to float, and look beautiful, soft, and fragile with their fluttering... moths look like birds of prey. Fast, and they can crash.)

(And the most different thing is when they land. Because butterflies are beautiful, and they fold their wings again and again, with smooth movements, like a beautiful book they slowly close and open... they show you their contents, their colors. Beautiful...)

(But moths extend their wings, they never fold them... And they show their nocturnal patterns. For camouflage. And they look big. Or they let their wings hang down, like a cape, which makes them look long. They never fold them.)

(They are similar and different.)

(But I don't hate them.)

(I've never killed a moth.)

She tightens her grip on the broomstick.

(But now I have to.)

Her eyes drop for a second to the makeshift spear.

(With this...)

And they bounce like a basketball to fall once more on the moth.

(It's very big...)

She repeats.

(It's so big...)

(But it's just an insect...)

She repeats what Hilda said.
(But insects are tough...)

And it breaks the spell of love words with reality.

(They aren't animals. Moths don't have hearts or brains...)

Her dad used to advise that if she ever had to kill an animal, she should aim for the head, and if she were ever experienced enough, for the heart, to finish things in one move.

(And its wings are so big, if it flapped them, it could knock me over.)

Birds flap their wings and push air. They blow. When a hummingbird passes by you, its gentle flapping can mess up your hair a little. To scale that up to a moth this size, with the violence it could exert with a swat, is madness.

(And the dust...)

Moths shed dust when they move. When they flap their wings. Even if the wind didn't blow it away, one this big might blow up a dust devil that would make her cough and blind her completely.

(...)

She simply analyzed the possibilities and reached the same conclusion as Hilda and her dad.

(I have to kill it in one blow...)

Like squashing a fly on the wall. You do it all at once, with surprise and decisiveness, or you fail and it escapes. But the difference is that this one wouldn't become a nuisance, but her executioner, if she failed.

(I have to kill it in one blow...)

(I have to kill it in one blow...)

It repeats.

(But this stick...)

It's short. And she doesn't know how sturdy it is.

(I wish I had a real spear... two meters long. Or a whale harpoon... and be like Ahab...)

(Because I have to kill it in one blow...)

(But I'm not Ahab...)

(But I have to try... I have to kill it in one blow...)

She grips her spear tightly. Strangling fear and doubt.

(I'm going to help Eladia...)

This is what she asked for. This is the training. There's no room for doubt anymore if she wants to be his bitch. She's already thought through the possibilities, she knows what she has to do. She doesn't want to think anymore.

(I... am Ahab...)

https://youtu.be/Qtk1O7Fwtg8?si=T3Uyg9AqtrMOdW3M▾
Catherine runs with one hand gripping her weapon tightly and the other open near her hip for balance. Focused on the back of her white whale, her eyes like a green laser sight. She stops within a stone's throw.

(I have to kill it in one blow.)

She repeats, in half a second, as she almost breaks her back leaning backward to gain momentum, sending her whole body forward, to release the spear right where she was aiming directly. That spot between the wings and under the head, in order to pierce it.

(I AM AHAB!)

She strains with all her might, as Hilda suggested. (30 energy invested in strength!) and she takes her dad's word for it, that humans' greatest advantage over animals is the ability to throw things.

Strength: 1d50 = 49
Agility: 1d50 = 26

>>5875
<Irene Di Lombardi (Day 68, Hour 1)
HP: 170/170
Energy: 72/80
Hunger: 38/40 - Thirst: 38/40
-Strength: 11 + 15 Machete
-Agility: 11
-Stamina: 12
-Luck: 3
Inventory:
-Pockets 2/4
Towel (Bloody)
Almond water bottle with salt (13/15)
Techniques
-Migatte no gokui: Supreme secret of the body judging itself (-10 Energy/Hunger/Thirst. Avoids damage during the turn it is used).

Level 10
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bepGYHbvIKI▾The windows remain closed to prevent the breeze from entering. The interior lights of the bus separate them from the darkness of the night. You close your eyes and concentrate, very sure that the real killer is nearby. You remember when you tried to dodge The Smiler blindfolded... Would it be just as difficult to find Leon's attacker? 20d50 = 526

The argument makes you open your eyes. On the bus, tempers are running high, no one seems happy, and no one noticed if someone was missing during the shootings. You didn't notice either; you ran as soon as you heard the shots. Otherwise, you would have already solved the mystery.

Eleanor: It was an ice zombie, I have nothing more to add.

She says without looking away from the window.

You dismiss the young ladies and ask Hether if she saw anything. She places her baby on the seats before standing up and communicating with her hands.

Francine: She says she didn't see anything strange, she was asleep the whole time.

She translates the signs.

A wild idea occurs to you. With the Eye of Argos in hand, you shake it and ask to see the killer. Everyone present has their eyes fixed on the sphere, including Hank, who was skeptical. The darkness inside the glass stirs before revealing the interior of the bus, zooming in on Hether's figure, hugging herself and pulling up her coat collar. The bus fills with a communal gasp.

Francine: Hether... How could you?

She asks, covering her mouth with her fingers, her voice very high-pitched, as if her throat hurt to make the accusation. Hether, instead of being repentant, seems annoyed. She takes a moment to adjust her hat before gesturing wildly with her hands.
Francine: I'm not translating that.

Eleanor sighs, gets on her knees on the seat, and crosses her arms over the back of the chair. Looking at Hether, she takes it upon herself to communicate the words.

Hether (Eleanor): Leon deserved it, because of him Marco was left behind to die. I took Irene's gun while she was asleep and left. I shot him in the back, but I'm sure he saw me. I hid in the wheat field until everyone showed up because of the noise, then I joined the crowd and only when I felt safe did I return to the bus to put the gun back in its place.

The teenager's monotonous voice is the only sound on the bus until Hether concludes her confession.

Hether (Eleanor): I don't regret what I did... Eleanor saw me do it, but she didn't care, she even offered to lie for me.

Hank: Eleanor!

He exclaims at his daughter's indifferent attitude, though Eleanor doesn't flinch at her father's alarm. A layer of discomfort settles over everyone, and the nomads proceed to discuss what they will do with Hether now that she has revealed herself as the killer.

Hank: Fuck it! Let's leave her on the side of the road and keep going. Let the snow solve the problem.

Francine: She has the baby with her, we can't leave her!

Hank: Obviously we'll keep the baby, we're not monsters. In the first place, it's not even hers, right? She just got it from somewhere. Maybe she's unhinged and we don't know it.

As the debate heats up, Hether stands with her arms crossed. The baby tries to crawl out of the seat, but Sue picks him up and hugs him to her chest. As Francine and Hank don't seem to reach a resolution, Nadjela looks at you.

Nadjela: You used your Italian mumbo jumbo to find the killer. That was a bit like... cheating. Anyway, you should decide what happens to her.

She says and takes a drag from her Mary Jane joint, her eyes are red, the sharingan of Jamaica.

Nadjela: Even if it doesn't seem like it, she's dangerous. But that's obvious by now.

Your pseudo younger brother whispers in your ear.

Claus (Eleanor): The settlement we're going to must have inspectors... Or guards... Maybe they should handle it, not us.

>>5886another 60%, not bad
>Irene

Questions lead nowhere, so it was better to skip the minigame and go straight to the answers using the Eye of Argos cheat.

The artifact reveals that, indeed, Heater had seen something, and that something was Leon because she killed him! And according to Francine's translations, it was revenge for leaving Marco behind, the argument gets heated.

>That was a bit like... Cheating

Irene puts her hands on her hips, "Is using a calculator to solve a math problem cheating?" Don't ask Irene about linear functions or me Heater was dangerous "Don't tell me, we can deal with that, it shouldn't---Wait!, why do I have to decide?, wasn't this a democracy?" Was it ever?, well, aside from Hank having a gun, and Slime, Irene seemed to be the strongest so it could well be a meritocracy, especially when you can get powers in the storage room.

"Ok, people calm down!, Hank, we're not going to leave anyone on the side of the road to die, much less take away a baby's closest thing to a mother, what example do you want to set for the children?"

Woman assumes a position of power, deviates to 'Does anyone want to think of the children?'.

"Besides, we can't just throw any problem out the window. We're going to a settlement, right? If they're even minimally organized, they should have some system of justice as Claus suggests. They'll take care of it."

"I can't pretend to be ignorant, I admit, Leon probably deserved it, for things he did inside and outside the storage room, I can't blame you for having that to motivate you, Heather," she says, looking at the girl. "So, what I am going to judge you for is killing a group member in cold blood, who, like the others, collaborated to keep you alive, and using MY weapon. Now there's one less person to stand guard, one less person to go get supplies, and one less person to defend the rest if we encounter danger. Tell me, are you happy with what you did?"

Regardless of whether they answer with signs or translation, "Sit in the back. Let the others keep two seats between them." She leans in to whisper to Claus, "Tell Slime to keep an eye on her."

With that out of the way,

"Now I think... we should finish burying Leon and... keep driving, does anyone have any objections?"

...

to get a little ahead, and because I don't want to leave the turn so simplistic, ignore this if you want

A little while later, at another stop on the side of the road next to the huge wheat fields, Irene wanted to take advantage of the break and had asked Claus to help her train, but it wasn't asking Slime to help with her reflexes, once they are facing each other, she gives Claus Leon's knife implying

"Now it's your turn to train. I don't know how long it will take us to reach the settlement, but still, you must know how to defend yourself better, both for yourself and for others." She waits for Claus to take the knife. "We'll go slowly, then we can practice with Slime, you look like an agile fighter after all."

She draws her machete, "Show me what you've got, then we can see where to guide you, attack me without fear." She spoke very wisely, but she also had no idea how to teach fighting that wasn't pure instinct, Irene wasn't cut out to be a teacher. The machete was more for show than anything, she was mostly going to try to dodge Claus and kick him a bit to see how he fights.

Strength: 11 + 15 Machete + 1d50 = 11
-Agility: 11 + 1d50 = 37

Sorry for the delay. Especially to you, anon >>5874 I was spaced out and didn't notice your turn was after the one before Irene. My apologies.

>>5874
>>130151
>the thread doesn't end so soon due to internet server issues and things like that
Don't worry about that, we'll make another thread and that's it. Although I'd like to finish the ice worm matter in this one, we'll see if it's possible.

About advancing, actually, you're the one I'm most interested in progressing with. Until your matter is resolved, the situation of the town of Malta remains uncertain, kek.

<María Isabel Norton IV (Day 60, Hour 10)
HP: 28/80
Energy: 17/100
Hunger: 8/20 - Thirst: 9/21
-Strength: 9 + Small bow
-Agility: 12 - 5 Star orange coat
-Stamina: 10 + 5 Star orange coat
-Luck: 1
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Trinkets
Trinkets
Trinkets
Crowbar
-Small quiver 12/12
x11 Typical arrow
-Skills:
Deja Vu: Go back one or two turns in time. Costs 10 hunger and thirst.

Level 10
To Charlie's teary eyes, you're just a weird girl who shot her with an arrow, not her friend from the future. Almost unable to see through the tears of pain that soak her little face, Charlie waves her wand and conjures ice from the air.

Something shakes you as it crashes and crumbles against your back, the remains of the snowball slide to the ground. You don't even turn around, your eyes are fixed on your target, you follow it with your small bow and the tip of the arrow.

Dirty Bill smiles, though a thin line of blood escapes from the left corner of his mouth, this is because a moment ago one of the partygoers grabbed him by the throat and lifted him off the ground. Towards that same entity, he fires.

The cannon rumbles three times. It opens and pulverizes his chest and apron, making confetti and streamers fly from the holes, also a few candies and plastic toys. Near your feet lands a little green soldier, like the ones you played with as a child.

The remaining partygoer catches his brother's body, shakes him, and upon realizing he doesn't react, looks at the sky and lets out a roar filled with sadness and rage. At that precise moment, you release the string from your little hands.

The arrow whistles and lodges itself in Bill's shoulder. The man leans back, his expression contorts, and a muffled growl escapes his tight lips. With wide eyes of surprise and anger, he turns until his gaze locks onto you. At least until a bullet pierces his neck from side to side, and he ends up lying on the ground on his side, with his eyes closed.

Marco Gol remains kneeling on one leg from the rooftop, the barrel of his rifle smokes.

You think it's over, the pool of blood under Bill's body grows and releases smoke upon contact with the snow...

But before you can exhale the tension you've been holding inside, Bill opens his eyes again and plants a hand to start getting up. He waves the unlit whip, it coils around his neck and ignites. Bill's face turns red, smoke erupts, and a faint aroma of bacon spreads. With another flick of his wrist, Bill uncoils the weapon and slams it against the ground in front of his feet. On his neck, what was once an entry and exit hole is now a wrinkled burn scar surrounding his throat and nape, the result of extreme cauterization.
Bill turns green. With the weapons planted against his knee, he bends over to vomit. After expelling all his bile, he wipes the back of his hand across his lips and straightens his back again. You notice him slide his feet and sweep through the snow until he stands in a strange position, as if preparing for something dangerous.

Bill: Ingens...

Meanwhile, in the surroundings, the white horde continues to attack. The protectors keep them at bay with their batons and riot shields.

Brutus: I have a gift for you... DEAAAAATH!

The giant shouts and breaks away from the group (-250 HP) with a hail of bullets ahead, the rotary cannon devours the belts of projectiles, as the man slowly moves towards the horde, not with fear, but brandishing a bestial smile.

-Brutus
HP: 200/200
-Strength: 19 + /roll{1d3000} Sasha the M134 Minigun (3000/6000)
-Agility: 10 - 20 Sasha the M134 Minigun - 10 Auxiliary ammo belt + 1d50 = 39
-Endurance: 19
-Sasha the M134 Minigun
Function: Increases the die roll for each bullet spent. Divides damage among all enemies. If an auxiliary ammo belt is possessed, a total agility roll greater than 0 is needed to reload and continue attacking.
Description: Gatling-style 6-barreled rotary machine gun, famous for its high rate of fire. Ideal for helicopter assaults, or starting a revolution in Kosovo.

Alondra compensates for Brutus's separation by joining the protectors herself (+250 HP). Her legs tremble, but she fights with the strength of desperation, you witness her putting her hands inside Flame's body, almost as if it were a puppet, aiming and pressing or pulling some internal mechanism, and launching a stream of fire against the creatures.

-The Partychef
HP: 71/300
-Strength: 15 + 1d100 = 25
-Agility: 15 + 1d100 = 27
-Endurance: 30
Traits:
-If their HP is less than 50%, their stats are halved, but their dice become 1d100.

--BNTG Protectors (Alondra - Brandon - Zelanda)
HP: 730/750
-Strength: 1d100 = 35
-Endurance: 1d100 = 52
Traits:
-Damage is directed at all characters within range.
-They add resistance to allies
-Every time they lose 250 HP, they add +25 to all rolls, including allies'

---------

-Bill the Dirty
HP: 79/280
-Strength: 30 + 20 Pegasus Lasso + 1d50 = 8 / Magnum Revolver (x3. +2 Priority. 2/6) + 1d50 = 29
-Agility: 28 + 20 Pegasus Lasso + 1d50 = 45
-Endurance: 30
Techniques:
-???

-Charlie
HP: 84/100
-Strength: 5
-Agility: 8
-Endurance: 1
Techniques:
-???
-Ice Virgin Veil (Off)

--White-walker Army
HP: 99338/100000
-Strength: 1d100 = 81
Traits:
-Damage is directed at all characters within range.
-Every time a character is defeated, they recover 100 HP.

>>5889
>Luck: 0
Fixed.

>>5877
>>5878
<Rando Roadagain (Day 49, Hour 23)
HP: 76/100
Energy: 50/50
Hunger: 20/20 - Thirst: 20/20
-Strength: 9 + 15 Machete / 14 Ghasto (+1 extra attack)
-Agility: 8 / 14 Ghasto
-Toughness: 8 + 10 Spiked Armor (10 direct contact damage) + 2 Mask
-Luck: 3
Inventory
-Pockets 0/8
-Trainings
Strength: 9 (5/10) - Agility: 8 (4/10) - Toughness: 8 (5/10)

Level 10
The daytime snowfall continues to dust the landscape through the kitchen window.

Marietta: With love...

She places her hands on top and pushes down.

Marietta: And perseverance.

The plastic grinds and cracks, but millimeter by millimeter the plant is entering the blender's glass. When Marietta turns to get some water to add to the juice, Ghasto and Rando take the opportunity to free the melon-launcher and move it away from the appliance.

Marietta: Cruel...?

She tilts her head.

Marietta: I'm not a cruel girl. Why do they say ugly things about me?

She lifts the jug and takes a sip of cool water. Seconds later, her eyes widen.

Marietta: Oh.

She places the jug on the counter.

Marietta: I have to go to a meeting.

Running with short steps, she hurries to pee in the bathroom.

The plant would remain unnamed by Marietta, and Rando without a sweater because Von Karma wasn't in the mood to let her hair grow too long.

Later, the masked man would learn that Marietta was raised by her stepfather, because in the purple-haired girl's words: "Mom ate Dad and then left." Marietta didn't find it strange; there are species like spiders that practice sexual cannibalism. She even found it romantic, seeing it as a way for the husband to give himself body and soul to his wife.

...

The machete lies at Rando's feet. The masked man picks it up.

Nick: I took a look at what awaits beyond the road. It's not something that can be beaten by one or two people. He prefers to bet on the sure thing, and that option is to eliminate you, my friend. And yes, I could have attacked you from behind, but for me, if there's no challenge, there's no thrill-

The words and the night are cut short by a gunshot. Nick falls chest-first into the snow. A few meters back, Ghasto is seen in humanoid form with his arm extended. Steam rises from the tip of the revolver he wields. Rando doesn't hesitate, rushes towards the fallen man, and kicks the blade away. The machete disappears into the wheat field at the same time Nick rises like a shadow...
The fist collides with Rando's mask, then a knee sinks into his abdomen, and with a kick to the side, the masked man stumbles back a couple of steps. Ghasto throws a second machete at Rando, but Nick stretches out his arm and catches it without looking, almost as if he had eyes in the back of his head. Blood gushes from the large hole in his back, and red trickles run from his lips to his chin.

Nick: You should have emptied the revolver when you had the chance.

As he says this, the tattoo on his shoulder blades begins to flutter. Rando can't see it, but Ghasto, who is behind him, can. The movement of the wings starts slow, jerky, like an animation missing frames, until they gain fluidity and dimension, and from his tanned flesh rises an eagle's cry.

The other lines along Nick's body stir as if coming to life. Multiple pairs of eyes from his hands, shoulders, legs, abdomen, pectorals. It's like looking at a pack of hounds trapped in a human body.

Nick: I'm not the only one with beasts watching my back. But mine weren't gifted to me by providence, I earned them, and they are made with ink from the sea and blood from my opponents.

-Nick of the Polynesian Beasts
HP: 28/190
-Strength: 21 + 15 Machete + 1d50 = 40 / 21 Wolf (Blunt) + 1d50 = 46/ + 21 Snake (Poison) + 1d50 = 2
-Agility: 19 + 1d50 = 3 / 19 Eagle (Dodge) + 1d50 = 49
-Resilience: 22 + 22 Bear (Resilience) 1d50 = 44
Techniques:
Polynesian Beasts (Passive)

Marietta, in her light sleepwear, comes out of the house due to the noise and runs over, her eyes widening as she encounters the fighting scene.

Marietta: Are they...? Are they fighting to the death for my love...? How romantic!

She clasps her hands by her face and wiggles her hips, thrilled by the idea.

...

>Does reloading cost me a turn, is it by dice?
It costs a turn. Some firearms do require dice for a successful reload, the revolver does not.

>Can I do it with Ghasto?
Yes, you can spend Luck to reroll Ghasto.

>Can I roll training dice on all those days we skipped and increase stats?
Training points increase according to the routine and without needing to roll dice.

>>5889
Things are going more or less the same as last time, only now Bill has an extra arrow stuck in his body, just one.

"Did I do something wrong? It seemed easier the first time." He unzips his sweater to see if it's really bothering him so much that they're all going to die because of it.

With the zipper open, he feels a chill from the air Charli blows on him and the look the other guy gives him, but looks can't kill and the cold air has already passed, so he doesn't have to worry about that now, but about shooting enough arrows before a hundred thousand dead fall on him or they point a revolver at his face again.

>I have a gift for you... DEAAAAATH!

"Is everything really going to end the same as last time? The point of going back was so fewer people would die."

And he has reason to worry, when what he's doing is changing things so little that they keep happening.

"Sorry about the arrow, I thought it would hurt less than letting them shoot you." He doesn't feel very confident taking his eyes off the guy who can kill him in a blink to see if Charli is listening, but he assumes she won't go far with an arrow in her leg. "And also for not helping you with something again after you got me out of prison, fairy godmother. I'm Marcos, by the way, if you didn't hear the first time." It's kind of a hassle to repeat the same thing again, but whatever. "I don't blame you for wanting another body, I did the same thing." He shrugs, his reason for becoming a girl isn't the same as Charli's, but that doesn't matter. "It's not your fault the white worm forced you to do bad things to grant your wish, I don't think you wanted to hurt these people. And they're good people, if we tell them a stronger bug forced you, you'll be fine, I support you. I don't think they'd execute two girls, especially if we help save the town."

He's talking too much for the time he has, so this time he makes sure he's well prepared and shoots two arrows at the whip guy before things get much worse.

Strength: 1d50 = 47
Agility: 1d50 = 41

Since the thread said Final and you said it would end here, I thought it was going to be the last thread, but ok. Even with the coat zipped up, didn't she have enough agility to shoot two arrows? Bill would have had much less health now and this turn would be easier if so.

>>5891
To make up for my previous lack, I'll advance this little turn. Also, according to the math I did, your waifu wouldn't have had enough agility to shoot two arrows. But I'm a humanities person, there's a chance I got the calculations wrong, but for now I don't see a flaw.

<María Isabel Norton IV (Day 60, Hour 10)
HP: 28/80
Energy: 14/100
Hunger: 8/20 - Thirst: 9/21
-Strength: 9 + Small Bow
-Agility: 12 - 0 Stellar Orange Coat (Open)
-Stamina: 10 + 0 Stellar Orange Coat (Open)
-Luck: 1
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Trinkets
Trinkets
Trinkets
Crowbar
-Small Quiver 9/12
x9 Typical Arrow
-Skills:
Deja Vu: Rewind one or two turns in time. Costs 10 hunger and thirst.

Level 10
You zip up your coat, the wool stops clinging and constricting you. You feel colder, but freer.

Charlie: It's an arrow! Ho-how is it not going to hurt?! It's a piece of iron, the body is not a good place to stick a piece of iron!

He shouts with tears and snot on his face, his hands wrapped around his wounded leg. Soon you introduce yourself, state what you are, what you know, and what happened, without giving yourself time to breathe, to the point where your vision blurs. Charlie's face goes from tears and indignation... To tears and surprise.

Charlie: Marco... Is that really you? You're... You're a different color.

He lowers his head at the mention of his service to the white worm.

Charlie: I-I just wanted... I wanted to feel good being myself!

He can't take it anymore, he bursts into tears and buries his face in his hands. The sight makes you want to cry too, but you take a deep breath, prepare several arrows this time, and peek out of the alley.

The drum of Brutus's minigun rumbles and deafens, sounding like tearing fabric. Fragments of ice fall from the sky, sink into the snow, and bounce off building roofs: a fraction of an arm, or pieces of a frozen torso, also ears. The sound stops and you see the big guy, with shell casings and pieces of white-walker at his feet, taking a moment to insert the next line of ammunition into his cumbersome weapon. He's managing even though his fingers are sweating.

Your gaze shifts from Brutus to Bill, who is obviously preparing to do something bad. The damage caused by television is palpable in you when the only thing you can think of is a Simpsons gag: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AABfcmpATtk▾
You pay dearly for the distraction, you won't have time to shoot! And in your haste, you drop the arrows you were holding. The curse of small, chubby fingers.

The handle of Bill's whip creaks under the pressure of his fingers.

Bill: Tornad-

???: STOP!

A woman's voice cuts through the storm. All eyes turn to the small figure located 20 paces from Bill. Bandages keep the nail immobilized in the eye of the BNTG mayor, and although a sheen of cold sweat covers her body, her expression remains surprisingly serene.

Anastasia: Bill, don't you see how absurd all this is?

She spreads her arms to gesture at everything. Bill frowns, straightens his back, and lets the whip rest extended.

Bill: It's no more absurd than anything else.

Anastasia: You're leading a horde of ice zombies while repeating fantasy fight moves that Harry and you invented when you were kids. Almost like it's some damn summer game.

The mayor retracts her arms and hugs herself.

Anastasia: Let's be honest, what will you gain by killing us all?

Bill: A ticket out of this place. The white worm is a benevolent god.

Anastasia: Entities lie.
Bill: They can't be any dirtier and more treacherous than humanity. Humanity gives you hope, and then destroys it, you know that well enough.

The mayor grunts and presses the bridge of her nose with one hand.

Anastasia: For the last time, Bill... I'm a lesbian!

Bill points an accusatory finger at her.

Bill: You only say that because you've never felt a penis inside you.

He spits on the ground and cracks his whip against the snow.

Bill: I'm sorry, public middle school mediator. You won't get out of this with your ridiculous new age hippie diplomacy.

The woman removes her hand from her face and nods.

Anastasia: I know, I was just distracting you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6tuD532Bkc▾
The partygoer rises behind Bill and traps him in his arms. Bill's face contorts in fury and he lets out a curse that is cut short as the chef's arms squeeze him, cracking all his bones.

Zelanda raises her cannon, which resembles a sports motorcycle, only dirty with blood, snow, and ash. The weapon lights up, snow particles swirl and evaporate, the woman aims and, upon activating the device, fires a line of energy that sounds like a sharp whistle. The energy strikes Bill and leaves his coat open and scorched.

You nock the arrows and shoot, then nock another and shoot immediately, almost without looking. The arrows whistle, and bury themselves in the flesh, biting deep.

The first in the stomach, dark blood spurts out like a jet.

Bill: Motherfuckers! The worm will kill you all-!

The second in the forehead.

Silence.

The partygoer releases his arms, Bill's corpse sinks into the snow.

The security ring formed by the BNTG sentinels' shields and batons holds firm. They watch in surprise as the white walkers begin to walk backward and disperse, their gazes always fixed on the humans, until their glowing eyes are barely a fleeting light lost in the darkness of the night.

12 experience points received!

-Bill the Dirty
HP: 0/280
-Strength: 30 + 20 Pegasus Bond / Magnum Revolver (x3. +2 Priority. 2/6)
-Agility: 28 + 20 Pegasus Bond
-Stamina: 30
Techniques:
-???

--White-walker Army
HP: 96362/100000
-Strength: 1d100 = 100
Traits:
-Damage is directed at all characters within range.
-Every time a character is defeated, they recover 100 HP.

Anastasia walks up to Bill's corpse, nudges it with the tip of her foot, and finally kicks it to turn it over, contemplating Bill's increasingly grayish face, the arrow protruding between his eyebrows. After confirming death, the mayor takes a pack of Lucky Star cigarettes from her pocket and starts smoking. Malta approaches her and places a hand on her shoulder.

Malta: You need urgent medical attention.

Anastasia: First, let's burn our dead.

The partygoer goes to where Tom's body lies and carries it carefully so as not to separate the halves. He does the same with the remains of his brother. The amorphous mass, like the white walkers, retreats silently until it disappears into the darkness.

Alondra: Marisa!

The mechanic, with the robot-child under her arm, shouts, approaches, and kneels to get to your level while feeling your small body with one hand.

Alondra: Are you hurt? W-Where did they touch you?

Her eyes move up and down your body repeatedly.

Alondra: I saw what you did, you killed that man! You can cry... You should cry.

Her trembling gaze goes to Charlie and she notices the arrow lodged in her.

Alondra: Medic!

The nightmare was over. Strength leaves your body. You fall to your knees.

But isn't someone missing?

>>5882
>>5883
>>5884
>>5885
<Catherine Hills/Ashley Williams (Day 23. Hour 8)
HP: 110/110
Energy: 69/70
Hunger: 19/20 - Thirst: 19/20
-Strength: 5
-Agility: 12
-Stamina: 4
-Luck: 1 + 0 Hilda's Collar + Wilting Flower Crown
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Book: New Horizons and Relative Axes, by C.H. Pickles.
Notebook
Pencil
Handful of Salt
-Sack 1/5
Liminal Dictionary

Level 5
You grab the cover extended by the furry hand. It contains a VHS. You check the front and back.

Jason and the Argonauts (1963) is a classic adventure film based on Greek mythology, where the hero Jason embarks on a perilous journey to retrieve the mythical Golden Fleece and reclaim the throne of Thessaly. Alongside a crew of heroes, he faces iconic monsters, including reanimated skeletons and the bronze giant Talos.

It's an adventure. An ideal genre for Hilda. You thank the monkey for the delivery and close the door. Time to get some sleep.

At some point before leaving for home, you would use the giant television to watch the movie, and Hilda would seriously ask you if you would like to go hunt living skeletons and cyclops with her. Not soon, nor in the following days, but later. For Hilda there was no rush, she believed you both had all the time in the world, while you secretly counted down each day.

...

The moth remains stuck to the other side of the windowpane, fluttering to reposition itself each time its fluffy body is lowered by gravity. Hilda takes your shoulders from behind, and with one hand begins to comb your hair just as guests do with their deathmoth pets.

Hilda: White and pretty, very white, very pretty, very mine.

She tells you, and you ask her about the resemblance she already identified.

Hilda: Yes, and you fly too.

Before you can ask what she means, she takes you by the waist and lifts you with a comical ease since you are a bigger child. With you positioned on her bony shoulders, Hilda trots around the greenhouse so the breeze can ruffle your hair. The guests grumble or adjust their monocles with a look of disdain, such a shameless display of childish freedom sours their stroll.
...

As you walk through the greenhouse, you leave behind a trail of colored droplets: yellows, purples, vermillions, etc. It's paint from your flower crown. Hilda notices and that fills her with insecurity about the gifts she gives. Gems are rocks, and rocks are heavy, and you always wear the necklace, would that have consequences for your neck...?

Hilda pats her cheeks and grunts inwardly after realizing she's acting like a fool. She adopts a different mindset, straightens her back, takes a deep breath, hardens her tone, and points a finger at you to speak to you like a soldier. But unintentionally, a compromising word slips out.

You ask: My what?

Hilda: What...?

The finger she was pointing with deflates and her eyes widen.

Hilda: I...

Girlfriend. She said it.

Hilda: ...

She quickly covers her mouth with her hands, at the same time a blush tinges her cheeks. She looks flustered, as if she had stepped on a landmine. She closes her eyes, moves her hands from her mouth to both sides of her face, and shakes her head. She doesn't know how, but she's sure she ruined it! Because that word wasn't supposed to come to her, nor the understanding that you are more like Luz and Marie, than like the leader and Doggo.

She carefully opens her eyes and looks at where you are to study your reaction. At least superficially, you remain calm.

Hilda: I didn't say anything. You misheard.

That's not true, but Hilda insists on walking as if eager to leave her mistake far behind. But every handful of steps she glances at you with narrowed eyes, as if trying to glimpse what you're thinking.

Hilda: And what did I say?

D-A-N-G-E-R

Hilda: And how is it?

D - A - N - G - E - R.

Hilda: And what did I say?

D-A-N-G-E-R

Perhaps, the fifth time she asks, you'll notice her mischievous little smile.

1/?

>>5892
>It's an arrow! H-How is it not going to hurt?! It's a piece of iron, the body isn't a good place to put a piece of iron!

"Sorry. I said it would hurt less, not that it wouldn't hurt." I could have also said 'snowflakes' but he's not that old, I don't know if Charli is older and I'm not trying to argue but to clarify "At least it does less damage than a gunshot. I've seen many gunshots and people rarely get up from those, today I've already seen like 10 or more."

>Marco... Is that really you? You're... You're a different color.

"You have fewer wrinkles. But couldn't you have asked for longer legs?" It's a sincere question, he doesn't know the details of his deal with the worm, he only knows that both of them would be a little better off with a few extra inches, now it's less likely he'll have a career as a basketball player.

>I-I just wanted... I wanted to feel good being myself!

"Y-yeah, yeah. There's nothing wrong with that." He nods and tries to hold back tears, glancing at the alley exit, he's lucky talking is a free action and they won't all die because he stopped to do this "I'd hug you, but I don't want to hurt you by accident."

He gives Charli a pat on the back and leaves the alley to let him cry in peace where he won't get too emotional, he needs his eyes to see where he's putting the arrow. Turns out he was worrying about the wrong body part because it's his fingers that betray him at the critical moment.

>Tornad-

"D'oh..." He grunts annoyed and closes his eyes, preparing for the next time he opens them there to be like 3 extra dead or more, but no.

>STOP!

The woman he met today and the man he met today seem to have a history together, what they're saying sounds like just enough context to understand the drama, like one of those telenovela scenes that would sometimes skip when he changed channels. But even though he has a female body, he's not old enough yet to be entertained by gossip and telenovelas for more than a few seconds so, just like when he skipped one while changing channels, he loses interest in a few seconds, loads as many arrows as he can and prepares to shoot.

>I'm sorry, public high school mediator. You won't get out of this with your ridiculous new age hippie diplomacy.

"Honestly, I wouldn't have minded if it ended like this." He has no right to complain either, if he's already aiming two arrows at the other guy.

That talking is actually a free action is put into question after Bill is distracted using his mouth, but he can't complain if it's thanks to that they can kill him before he kills them. Or he can kill him. Specifically him. With an arrow to the noggin.
"All right! Well, there you have it, I killed a person!" Is the first thing he says after Bill's death is confirmed and he can stop holding his breath, fists shoved in his pockets. "And this time it wasn't even someone half or three-quarters spider, that thing about becoming a monster the higher you go must just be a saying... It wasn't even that hard, though my hands are shaking."

He's surprised himself at how steady his aim was in the midst of those tense moments, though he hadn't noticed how much he was shaking until it was all over and he didn't have the strength to even stand. He zips up his jacket again to be doubly sure it's not just the cold making him shiver and the adrenaline leaving his system that's keeping him safe from hypothermia.

He's also surprised Bill didn't get up again like a zombie and that the others left instead of jumping them, but that's another topic he's not going to discuss now.

"Do I have to pray now? I mean, I'm already on my knees." He doesn't feel like raising his arms, and if he raises them to pray for a dead person, he won't be able to put them down until he prays for all fifty or a hundred lying around, not counting the thousands who retreated.

>Are you hurt? W-Where did they touch you?

"Uh... I don't remember." He also doesn't want to remember, as the phrase 'Where did they touch you?' makes him think. "I think the garage exploded." And that's the last time he remembers getting seriously hurt, aside from the blow Alondra landed on him in a past life.

>I saw what you did, you killed that man! You can cry... You should cry.

"He killed many more... And he would have killed more too." He pouts, feeling more like crying for other reasons than that, and he probably will, but he doesn't want them to assume he's going to cry over that guy.

Then Alondra notices the arrow Charli has stuck in him, and he does too, so she runs to hug him protectively, suspecting that seeing him with an arrow stuck in him would be suspicious and he'll have to convince them it's not and it's totally fine to let him stay in town. Also, just in case the weird guy from last time shows up.

I gain 2 or 20 HP, 1 to Luck, and 1 to Strength.

>>5762
As the bow's description says "For every 5 agility you get an extra attack." I assumed that with less than 5 agility you can shoot one arrow, with 5 or more you can shoot two, with 10 three and so on. Or with less than 5 agility I can't shoot any arrows, with 5 I shoot one and with 10 two?

>>5893
<Catherine Hills/Ashley Williams (Day 23. Hour 8)
HP: 110/110
Energy: 39/70
Hunger: 19/20 - Thirst: 19/20
-Strength: 5 + 20 Hilda's Lance
-Agility: 12
-Endurance: 4
-Luck: 1 + 0 Hilda's Necklace + Hilda's Flower Crown (Melting)
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Book: New Horizons and Relative Axes, by C.H. Pickles.
Notebook
Pencil
Handful of Salt
-Sack 1/5
Liminal Dictionary

Level 5
The little princesses remain paralyzed at the side of the pond, biting their nails as they watch their friend sink into a meter of moss-green water. You walk between them, stretch over the railing - it pressing into your solar plexus - and extend your arms and fingers as far as possible to reach the wet skirt. You pull the fabric, grab the girl by the armpits, getting your chest a little wet, and carefully lay her down beside the pond.

Returning to Hilda, you glance over your shoulder. The soaked princess opens and closes her little eyes, still somewhat disconnected from reality... She'll live. One of the friends fans her face with a fan, and the other lifts the hems of her skirt to run and get a jumpsuit.

None of them thank you, but you didn't expect them to. You notice Hilda looking at you in profile.

Hilda: You're good, Cat.

She uses your name/nickname, as she always does when people are around. She pulls a handkerchief from her vest pocket and passes it over your neck and chest, trying to dry you. She would hate for you to get sick.

Hilda: I would have let her soak a little longer. I'm not as good as you.

The number of outsiders dwindles to a distant rumor. The windows are weathered by dust and humidity, plants grow wild and untamed, and Hilda's lips again roll the word "Ashley" as if it were her favorite. Meanwhile, you marvel at the claustrophobic, stained glass that covers them.

You like it.

The bully slows her pace to look at you, and gives you a small smile. She has practically forgotten her strict instructor persona.

Hilda: These places are almost like people. It's worth being brave and exploring, because you'll find treasures, special places, things that make your heart race.

The door with steel bars appears, along with the warning sign indicating danger.

Hilda: And also things that hurt.

She adds in a lower tone of voice.

She creates a spear for you, it's yours because it's made for you. She grabs the key from your hands and uses it to open the door, the iron groans as it moves I thought it was implied, my bad. You go first, and she places the brush as a stopper in a move she judges to be genius.

You grab her face and purse your lips. To your left: Stained glass: To your right: Dirty glass: Behind you: Barred door. In front: Hilda blushing, her cheeks squeezed by your hands. It's an arrangement of elements that comforts you.

Hilda imitates you, makes duck lips and brings them closer, presses yours, it's an almost electric softness. Mwah. She pulls away, looks down at your chest, and places her hand over your heart. At first, you might think she's trying to feel your heartbeat, but she's actually making sure you're wearing dry clothes. She meets your eyes again, smiles, and leans in to give you another innocent kiss. Still smiling, she looks to the side.

Hilda: The levels don't explore themselves, Ashley.

She says without making the slightest movement or gesture to pull away.

Somehow you manage to resume your journey and venture into the depths of the greenhouse. "Depths" is a word that resonates in your head and seems very fitting for what you see, because even though it doesn't beat, the skeleton of cement and glass merges with the plants, and they are indeed alive, they crowd against the glass, lacerate the concrete, coil around the metal beams.
Because you were being nosy, you bump into Hilda's back, who stopped without warning to point at...

Hilda: A spike trap.

A carpet of aloe Vera. From a certain perspective, yes, they look like fearsome green needles waiting for unwary prey. Among the specimens peeking out from the earth and the broken windows, you also recognize chamomile, rosemary, mint, and eucalyptus.

The bluish girl might not know about real-world botany, but she does know about labyrinth monsters, which is why she doesn't hesitate to stick her finger into a jelly concoction and suck the viscous substance, clicking her tongue as she savors it. You relay your information and your concern to her, and she dismisses it with a wave of her hand.

Hilda: If it were poison, I would have told you... Hey, look, a puddle of poison.

Obviously.

Hilda: Want to see real poison?

She asks the second question with childlike excitement, almost as if she were going to show you a dinosaur. If you said yes, she would pull out her bottle of liquid pain from her backpack: a plastic container holding a red liquid and a piece of paper taped on with the words "Liquid Pain" written in Hilda's messy handwriting and a drawing of a skull with crossed tibias.

Hilda: Pick the plant you like the least.

Once you have one (it might take a while), she could get her blades out. Hilda uncaps the bottle and drops a drop of the substance onto the plant. In a second, it withers, and in the next second, it disintegrates into a handful of dust.

Hilda: It's more spectacular with rats. They literally explode, it's like, boom!

She spreads her arms, the liquid in the bottle sloshing dangerously. She screws the cap back on and puts the bottle in one of her front pockets.

Hilda: I have it for emergencies, I don't think we'll use it. Did you know some people drink it?

...

You track the moth, following the trails of jelly and cut leaves. You find it. It's big, bigger than you expected for your first prey. But Hilda, hidden beside you, reminds you that it's still just a bug. The undergrowth conceals you.

Hilda (Whispering): Yeah, you have to kill... Killing is good, it makes you strong.

You frown, her murmur has a hint of demand.

Hilda (Whispering): If that thing saw you, it would hurt you without hesitation. I don't want you to get hurt, I want you to be like me. If you're scared... Don't be, because I'll be behind you, okay?

You grip the spear.

-Hilda's Spear
Function: +10 damage. +5 damage for each "Hilda" item equipped. If you throw it, add your total agility to the damage.
Description: Improvised spear made from a broom and a double-edged knife.

Hilda's treasures remind you that you are not alone.

Hilda (Whispering): Remember, one hit. It would be very bad if you gave it a chance. The deathmoth won't give you one, that's why it's called that.

You lift your body. The leaves rustle slightly. Then you jump and dart out. Step by step on the cold ground, with the potential worry of getting tangled in a root. With each second, the moth looks more massive, and the designs on its back increasingly resemble skull grimaces.

Your heart freezes.

The weight of a possibility falls upon you.

It's not a natural insect, its eyes are on its back, and it saw you coming from afar.

It doesn't just have a pair of gazes, it has dozens, they spread across its wings and have faces that laugh at you.

Such abrupt certainty almost makes the spear slip from your fingers... But you compose yourself.

It was fleeting, a theory you didn't take even half a second to dismiss, because it was more the work of terror than logic. The reality is you only have one chance...

And you weren't planning on wasting it.

You throw.

2/4

>>5895
<Catherine Hills/Ashley Williams (Day 23. Hour 8)
HP: 110/110
Energy: 38/70
Hunger: 19/20 - Thirst: 19/20
-Strength: 5
-Agility: 12
-Endurance: 4
-Luck: 1 + 0 Hilda's Collar + Hilda's Flower Crown (Melting)
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Book: New Horizons and Relative Axes, by C.H. Pickles.
Notebook
Pencil
Handful of Salt
-Sack 1/5
Liminal Dictionary

Level 5
The spear buries itself under the fold connecting the head to the rest of the body, with a wet crunch. What was an inert threat, awakens and flaps its wings, generating a gale and a horrible buzz. The wind buffets you, the collar hits you in the nose, and the kicked-up dirt makes it hard to see. Male deathmoths are thrown in all directions by the wind. Through the curtain of dust, you glimpse the moth's figure and the buried spear wriggling like a flagpole in a furious storm. You could swear the weapon would break, that the insect would catch you...

But the knots hold, and the flapping ceases.

-Deathmoth (Female)
HP: 0/80
-Strength: 8
-Agility: 12
-Endurance: 4

5 experience points received!

The dust settles and you can see again. The moth is once more inert, small spasms make its wings tremble, and steam rises both from the hole where the spear is stuck and from beneath the creature. The wood of the spear creaks and separates from the body, falls, and bounces into the den of remains, the broken end continues to be consumed by the action of unknown acids.

The hours tumble by. Hilda runs and reaches you. She looks at the dead moth, and then looks at you from bottom to top.

Hilda: How...? How are you feeling?

Physically, your hands and back hurt, and your legs too from the sudden effort, and your flower crown starts sticking to your forehead from sweat. But that you are whole is obvious to the blue-haired girl, what worries her are your emotions.

Hilda: Don't worry about the spear, when I can I'll make you another one, twice as good.

Something sounds. A groan from the den startles her and makes her point her shotgun. Is the moth alive...? No, the noise comes from the semi-dissolved remains in acid and jelly. The blue-haired girl takes the lead to cover you, and she quickly identifies that one of the skulls is opening and closing its jaw, and it has beautiful blue eyes. The proximity of the nest should be nauseating, but the jelly gives off a sweet aroma that is pleasant, and that might even be worse.

Wanderer: Enough... Enough...

The voice of the skull with straight hair is hoarse but feminine, interrupted by gasps of difficult breathing. It lacks features, lips, nose, or eyebrows, a green, greasy layer replaces its face, but not its expression, because its eyes manage to convey desperation. Hilda looks at you, then looks at the woman, she remains silent.

Wanderer: No... more... No more...

She waves her bony hand, the only one you see she has, and such a gesture dislodges another lump in the den. The lump rolls until it ends up at the foot of the mound of death, it is shiny, it is not bone, it is metal: a video camera. Soon a drop of water falls on it, then two more on you, you look at the ceiling, and among the tangle of plants you manage to spot a sprinkler.

Hilda: Ashley, go back the way we came and wait for me on the path. We need to find a place to set up the tent before it rains.

Hilda says, her eyes on the woman who stares back at her.

Hilda: I... have to make sure of something.

3/4

>>5896
<Catherine Hills/Ashley Williams (Day 31. Time 18)
HP: 110/110
Energy: 70/70
Hunger: 20/20 - Thirst: 20/20
- Strength: 5
- Agility: 12
- Resistance: 4
- Luck: 1 + 0 Hilda's Collar
Inventory:
- Pockets 4/4
Book: New Horizons and Relative Axes, by CH. Pickles.
Notebook
Pencil
Pound of Salt
- Bag 1/5
Liminal Dictionary

Level 10
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dC6Hq-OvaUY▾Snow was falling like lead through the window, and your reflection was painted by the black mirror of darkness. But you still saw the green of the greenhouse, and all the experiences you had in the hotel before leaving. The things that quickened your heart, and the ones that hurt.

But you must focus on the now.

You had already swapped the pound of salt in your pocket for a new one, and you headed to the lobby to receive today's guest. It was a miracle that she agreed to come with the worsening weather, but Charmy insisted. The kids were aware of the doctor's visit, but didn't receive details, at most Charmy excused you by saying you had a tooth problem. It would have been up to you to be honest with Hilda about your problem.

Wrapped in your coat, you waited until someone knocked on the door. Charmy peeked out from the window on tiptoe, and then made a gesture for you to open. The blizzard nearly hit you in the nose as you opened the door, and the invading cold almost suffocated every trace of warmth, a shadow entered, and you pushed to close it.

The person, with every part of their skin carefully protected by thick clothing, removed their snow goggles and lowered their scarf from their nose to speak.

She's a blonde woman with glasses.

Julia: Hello, darling. Do you remember me? They've told me you've made new friends. I hope you also discovered some music you like.

Since they needed privacy, the three of them went down to the basement. The hum of the old power plant is like a constant purr coming from the bottom. There's a collapsible metal chair for you. Charmy sits on a box. Julia, already in her typical work robe, leans towards you to check your eyes with a low-lumen flashlight.

Julia: Tell me everything you can about your episodes. The more detailed, the better.

Put away the flashlight, and take out a small hammer with which she gently taps your knees, testing your reflexes.

Julia: Depending on what you tell me, I'll be able to intuit whether what's affecting you is psychological... Or a material and physical phenomenon.

Put away the hammer, and now take out a wooden palette with which she examines your mouth.

Julia: At a superficial level, I don't perceive anything out of place beyond particularly prominent fangs. For now, I'll rule out vampirism.

It's hard to tell if she's joking.

Put the palette in a plastic envelope, and now take out... A sandwich? Just enough to remove the napkins that wrap it so your nose is assaulted by the smell of bacon grease and the sweetness of corn syrup and jam. You also spot banana/chip slices.

Julia: During the trip, I didn't have time to eat. Would it bother you if I eat while we talk? It's an Elvis. If you're up for it, I can offer you some.

4/4

>>5887
<Irene Di Lombardi (Day 68, hour 1)
HP: 170/170
Energy: 72/80
Hunger: 38/40 - Thirst: 38/40
-Strength: 11 + 15 Machete
-Agility: 11
-Endurance: 12
-Luck: 3
Inventory:
-Pockets 3/4
Towel (Bloodstained)
Almond water bottle with salt (13/15)
Eye of Argos
Techniques
-Migatte no gokui: Ultimate secret of the body judging itself (-10 Energy/Hunger/Thirst. Avoids damage during the turn it is used).

Level 10
You still have the bruises and scrapes from when Smile rammed you, again and again against the snow, like it was breading a cutlet. You really tried to dodge the entity with all your instinct and ability, but sometimes trying too hard yields no result, and it's better to take the easy path. You discover the killer not through deduction but with an anomalous object that shows it to you.

Hank: You're the one with the magic ball that knows everything. Obviously we expect you to decide.

Abandoning Hether in the cold night feels barbaric. You argue for reaching a safe settlement and letting local justice handle it, but not before blasting her with words and making it clear that because of her actions, there are fewer of them now. She keeps eye contact, and when you finish speaking, she doesn't answer, just crosses her arms and looks away.

Hether retreats and takes a seat in the back, hands resting on her thighs. She keeps her eyes fixed on her feet for a while, until she lifts her gaze to scan the seats.

Sue peeks her head out from her spot, still carrying Baby in her little arms. She hesitates whether to hand him over.

The mother and the child stare at each other for a minute that feels uncomfortable, while the baby stretches his arms toward Hether and smiles. Just as Sue was about to pass him, Francine intervenes, grabs the infant, and pulls him to her chest.

Francine: Having me hold him is the safest for now. Please understand, Hether, it's nothing personal.

The baby bursts into tears. Hether crosses her arms again and looks down at the floor. Francine steps aside to let a long shadow pass; it's The Smiler, sitting upright next to the woman, keeping its dark, expressionless face fixed on the front. Hether doesn't move a muscle.
The snow and the night grow colder. Hank pours half a barrel of gasoline into the hole where they just dumped Leon’s body. Nadjela keeps him company. You approach them, and the guy from Florida, noticing you, explains what they’re doing.

Hank: She says we should burn it, so he doesn’t come back as one of those—ice people. I agree.

Nadjela nods, takes a hit from her marijuana joint, uses the lighter to set it fully ablaze, then hurls it into the hole. Flames spread and rise, painting everyone’s faces in shades of yellow, red, and orange. They keep a solemn silence, broken by the guy from Florida.

Hank: I’ve always wondered, though… why gasoline?

The college girl glances at him sideways but says nothing, waiting for Hank to elaborate.

Hank: The bus runs on gasoline. That shouldn’t be right—it should be diesel. What’s the reason? Is it a clue? Is this place trying to tell us something, or is it just some damn mockery?

Nadjela: Nothing here works with logic, friend.

Hank: There’s always logic. You burn fuel, the vehicle moves. It’s just that the fuel type is wrong. It’s things like that which confirm to me we never should’ve been here—this place is a glitch in the Matrix.

He shakes his head and walks back to the bus. Nadjela shoves her hands into her pockets and looks at you.

Nadjela: Thanks for not letting them throw out that woman. Francine and Hank are good people—they’d have regretted it later. They’re just angry, and confused. I was too… until I found a magic plant.

She glances at the sphere in your hand.

Nadjela: If you take that back to the real world, you could help a lot of people. Take care of it.

She gives your shoulder a pat and returns to the bus. You settle in as best you can on your seat, knees bent so your legs don’t stick out. You close your eyes, but a hand on your foot makes you open them again. Claus stands by your seat, hand clenched near his chest. His uneasy gaze can’t decide where to land.

Claus: I… This… Can I…?

He swallows hard and shakes his head.

Claus: Sorry… It was nothing. Please rest.

He turns his back and heads to his seat.

1/2

>>5898
<Irene Di Lombardi (Day 70, Hour 12)
HP: 170/170
Energy: 80/80
Hunger: 40/40 - Thirst: 40/40
-Strength: 11 + 15 Machete
-Agility: 11
-Endurance: 12
-Luck: 3
Inventory:
-Pockets 3/4
Towel (Bloody)
Almond water bottle with salt (11/15)
Eye of Argus
Techniques
-Migatte no gokui: Maximum secret of the body's judgment on its own (-10 Energy/Hunger/Thirst. Avoids damage during the turn it is used).

Level 10
Leon's knife was lost along with his body. But you found a crowbar under the bus seats, covered in grease, you had to wash it in a stream through the cornfield. You handed it to the boy, and he took it with both hands and looked at it as if it were a strange hieroglyph.

Claus: What do you want me to do with this?

You clarify that you want to train, that he should use the crowbar to fight you. The young man immediately startles and quickly shakes his head.

Claus: I don't want to fight. What if we just talk about our feelings? Th-This morning I saw a butterfly and it made me feel good.

Sometimes Claus could be more effeminate than you. You insist that everything will be fine, that you will go slowly, and that he must improve to defend himself from the dangers of the backrooms. Claus looks at the crowbar again for a while, then nods without seeming very convinced.

Claus: Alright, here I come.

He runs towards you with the crowbar raised above his head.

Claus: Aaaaaaah!

He trips on a pebble, falls face-first into the snow, and slides a few centimeters until he touches your feet with the crown of his head.

Claus: I-I give up...

The man calls you from the bus.

Hank: Irene, stop playing! It's time to follow the route.

You pick Claus up from the ground and take him to the vehicle. Claus apologizes for being useless and incapable of fighting.

You see Nadjela leaning against the back bumper of the bus, she takes a deep drag from her joint before throwing it on the ground and stomping on it, then shakes her coat as if that would somehow clear the stench of burnt cat hair that permeates her from head to toe. That's why everyone tries to sleep far away from her.

Nadjela: I'm running out of magic grass... That's going to be a problem... I don't want to feel my head full.

She tells you.

Hank is in the driver's seat. Francine is holding Bebe and giving her almond water with a bottle, Sue is holding her and moving the infant's little feet. Eleanor is lying on her back against the window next to the seats she occupies, reading a Lovecraft novel called The Thing on the Threshold. Rosynini is filing her hooves with a file, she asks you about your oral hygiene when she sees you pass. In the back, Hether remains with The Smiler beside him, Hank tied his hands with a rope and refused any other alternative with the excuse that they don't know when they will reach the settlement.

Francine: Marco Polo once said he was lost in a level for 100 days. He had to drink his own urine and eat the tips of his fingers.

The blonde whispered, obviously so Hether wouldn't hear the mention of his lost friend.

Hank: 100 days?!

The guy from Florida couldn't lower his voice. The idea seemed absurd and desperate.
Hank: I refuse to believe it. Just look at how he dressed... The guy was a bum, a lunatic. We'll reach the town or whatever before we know it.

The bus starts rolling again.

The landscape is like a repeating GIF you've seen a thousand times, an eternal cement row flanked by a gold carpet dotted with snow. But you're still paying attention, because sometimes there are anomalies, farms, places worth scavenging.

Sue and Claus play a game as they lean against a window.

Claus: I spy.

Sue: What do you spy?

Claus: A little thing.

Sue: What little thing do I spy?

Claus: It's golden... And tall... And there's a lot of it.

Sue: Sue says, what Claus spies is wheat.

Claus: Wow, you won again!

Sue claps. Then, as if she'd thought of something she absolutely needed to share, she gets on her knees on the seat and leans her face into Claus's ear to whisper something.

Claus: At night the snow stops and the wheat sways. It's a very curious detail. Thank you for sharing it with me, Sue.

The young girl lets out a giggle she catches in her hands.

Up front, Hank and Francine are engrossed in an argument.

Francine: I'm just saying maybe we should leave the road and go through the fields.

Hank: Sure, let's abandon our only shelter and means of transport to go wander aimlessly through a bunch of snow and wheat. Sounds like a foolproof plan. You probably cured cancer or launched rockets to the moon before ending up here.

She narrows her eyes and crosses her arms.

Francine: I don't like your tone, Hank.

Hank: And I don't like your idea! We're staying on the road, end of story.

She sighs and shakes her head.

Francine: I wish Maverick were here, maybe he would have thought of something to get us out of this.

The guy from Florida takes a deep breath, looks over his shoulder, and points a finger at her.

Hank: Well, he's not, and he's probably dead, just like we would have been if we'd stayed in the city.

Francine: Hank...

Hank: I know what I'm doing, these aren't empty words, my daughter depends on what I say or do.

Francine: Hank, the road!

The guy from Florida turns his head, his eyes widen, and he slams on the brakes. The tires screech and burn the asphalt. You plant your palms on the seat in front of you instinctively, you don't get hit. Claus catches Sue before she falls, and Sue protects Bebe.

Eleanor retrieves her book from the floor and dusts it off. She sighs.

On the side of the road where you were going, there's a parked bus. Time has rusted its metal and peeled its paint, snow has covered it, and a black paste darkens its windows, but aside from the damage, it's like any other bus, just like yours. Hank picks up the rifle and stands up.

Hank: Irene, let's go check it out. Maybe we can get more resources and fuel.

He gets out. Through the front window, you see him approach the vehicle and circle it with cautious steps, trying to look through the windows without much success. He heads for the door but keeps his distance, waiting for you to arrive so he can tell you he'll cover your back.

2/2

I'm reporting in just to say I haven't died, but my life now consists of leaving work, sleeping, eating to go back to work. That even though I like it, it's exhausting kek

Good luck with the other OPs

>>5900
Thanks for letting me know about your absence in advance. Lots of encouragement and good luck with your work.

>>5900
>>5894
<María Isabel Norton IV (Day 61, Hour 7)
HP: 40/100
Energy: 50/100
Hunger: 20/20 - Thirst: 21/21
-Strength: 10 + Small bow
-Agility: 12 - 0 Stellar orange coat (Open)
-Stamina: 10 + 0 Stellar orange coat (Open)
-Luck: 2
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Trinkets
Trinkets
Trinkets
Crowbar
-Small quiver 9/12
x9 Typical arrow
-Skills:
Deja Vu: Rewind one or two turns in time. Costs 10 hunger and thirst.

Level 10
Alondra: This isn't the first time it's happened to me. We'll build others.

That's what Alondra told you when you informed her the garage had exploded. What came next was picking up the pieces and licking your wounds. The sentinels joined several tents to form a large medical pavilion, which also served as a dining hall, inn, and bar. From the height offered by the stool in front of a makeshift bar, you looked towards the exit: The tent flaps stirred, and through the snow, you saw men and women bringing shovels to start digging graves to throw and burn the dead.

"Next!" they shouted from beyond the tarps separating the medical area. Charlie emerged from that area with a wobbly gait and both knees bandaged. Alondra accompanied him, with one hand on his small back. The two approached you.

Alondra: Have you eaten yet?

She asked you. Your stomach responded with a growl.

Alondra: Hey! Can't you see the kid is hungry?!

She yelled at the person serving at the bar.

They placed a metal bowl with a spoonful of some kind of paste in front of you. Alondra asked what that stuff was, and the sentinel replied that it was food.

Alondra: But what kind of food?

Food to eat, the guy replied, being parsimonious with details. It's sustenance obtained from emergency rations, but the letters were blurry, and they couldn't agree on whether it was banana mash or corn sludge. It's thick, lukewarm, odorless, and lumpy. But it's better than nothing.

Charlie carefully climbed onto the stool and, once seated, began to slurp from his bowl. Behind you, a merchant passed by, trading supplies for trinkets. Alondra spoke to him and left the pavilion with him, leaving you unsupervised.

Charlie: The doctor bandaged me, but he got the wrong leg the first time.

He clarified, wiping the back of his chubby hand across his lips to remove any traces of food.

Charlie: Thanks for keeping my secret, Marcos. Alondra is very kind; she agreed to keep me under her care. She said it's actions that help her gain good karma, and that's why she survived when so many others lost their lives.

He picked up the bowl again and, with his lips pursed, contemplated it, as if the sludge contained all the solutions he longed for.

Charlie: I betrayed my original essence, and now I've betrayed the white worm. I thought I would be a better person than the man I came from, but that was an illusion. Maybe I don't have the beard on the outside, but I still feel it itching on the inside.

He raised the bowl and took a sip of the paste. He moved it around in his cheeks until he swallowed and added with a gasp:

Charlie: 42.

He looked at you.
Charlie: That's the answer to life and the universe and everything. It's what the worm told me when I prostrated myself and questioned it for wisdom... But you know what it didn't know...? The question. What good is an answer without the question it answers?

She sighs and shakes her little head.

Charlie: It revealed its ignorance... It's not a god... It's just a crawling bug. I should have deserted upon learning that, but I don't know, it seemed unprofessional.

Alondra returns with cans of soda and two packs of cookies in her arms, her hair disheveled. She gives each of them a soda and a cookie. Charlie crumbles hers over the concoction in an attempt to flavor it.

Alondra: We'll spend the night here. Tomorrow we'll look for a new home. Maybe we can sell Flametower-18k for a vehicle or a mule with a cart. My plan is to go down or up, anything that gets us away from this shitty weather.

That said, the mechanic walks away again to clear a mattress inside the pavilion. She finds one that's missing a corner, as if a giant creature had taken a bite out of it. But otherwise, it looks sound.

Charlie looks at you again.

Charlie: I... I'd like to stay in this town. It's the first time the white army has retreated. Maybe here there's an opportunity to defeat it once and for all and save the backrooms. What do you think?

That night, snuggled under the sheets with Charlie and Alondra, you found it difficult to fall asleep. From the darkness came the sobs of children and adults, the curses of drunks, and the screams of the wounded. But after much tossing and turning, you managed it, you plunged into the dream cycle, opening in the process a window that points to tomorrow...

You are standing in a snowy wheat field, the frost agitated by the wind like millions of needle fragments hitting your skin.

To your left lies Alondra, sprawled in a growing pool of blood. To your right, Charlie is on her knees, a broken wand in one hand.

Charlie: Is this the right thing...? If we defeat it, the world will be broken forever... Maybe it's best for everything to end, kept in a sarcophagus of ice. That the great lie, the great comfort of 256, be consolidated forever at the hands of those who caused this.

She closes her eyes and turns to ashes carried by the wind. The ground trembles as if struck by an earthquake, and a silhouette draws itself on the horizon: a tall, bulbous tower twisting like a snake, swollen, with a tortuous slowness that promises an equal death.

I bring you peace... I bring you love.

Your ears bleed as you receive the message. The wind rages and flays your skin. The red-haired girl is dragged away and turns into an icy skeleton. The same happens to the batter. The girl with pigtails and fox ears. The albino young woman. The masked man and his otherworldly cat...

You lose your flesh, and the white snow devours you.

With a shriek, you wake up and sit up on the mattress, bathed in cold sweat. No one else is in the sheets. Beyond the folds of the pavilion, sunlight streams in.

...

>I figured with less than 5 Agility you can shoot one arrow, with 5 or more you can shoot two, with 10 three and so on
It's just as you say. With the coat closed and Agility at 7, you can shoot two times at most.

"Then I'm going to help?" he asks, since 'we' sounds like a group effort, and he can't imagine rebuilding a building is quick or something one person can do alone. "I want to learn how to do something."

In and out of Alondra's workshop, there's not much they ask him to do or trust him with. Now that things are under control again, the responsible adults won't let him burn corpses anymore—only watch others do it. He's not especially eager to work at this exact moment, after what just happened, but jobs don't wait for you to be in the perfect mood, and neither do zombies, mercenaries, worms, spiders, and the other creatures out there trying to kill you.

>Did you eat already?

"Huh?" He's too absorbed in his thoughts to notice the question at first, and his stomach answers before he does.

>Hey! Can't you see the kid is hungry?!

Truthfully... the lack of appetite he had earlier when they were talking about entrails and lentils still slightly upsets his stomach. The look of the edible food they serve him isn't exactly the most appetizing thing in the world either.

>But what kind of food is it?

"Isn't poison," he says, before putting a spoonful in his mouth. "That's what my grandma always said."

He can't afford to be picky. If he doesn't eat it, someone else will—maybe some even hungrier African kid.

«Wasn't this supposed to be some farming town or something? Did they lose all their crops and livestock to frost?»

>The doctor bandaged me, but messed up the leg the first time.

"Maybe he was nervous." Makes sense, he supposes. A nervous doctor feels more trustworthy than one who's blind or unlicensed.

>Thanks for keeping my secret, Marcos.

He nods, pretending he doesn't want to talk with his mouth full, though really he just doesn't want to talk at all. There are things he wanted to ask or say, but zero desire to do so now. Probably just tired.

Besides, there's no need to thank or apologize all the time. Someone's always helping him survive, or he's helping someone else—just part of daily life here.
>Alondra is very kind; I accept staying under her care. She said these are actions that help her accumulate good karma, and that's why she survived when so many others lost their lives.

"There are good people here. Though I haven't met many."

Looking around the tent, he doesn't recognize any other faces, but assumes many in the village are similar, given how peaceful it is when they're not being attacked.

>I betrayed my original essence, and now I've betrayed the white worm. I thought I'd be a better person than the man I came from, but that was an illusion. Maybe I don't have the beard on the outside, but I still feel it itching inside me.

"Like, betraying Hitler or Napoleon or some guy like that should be a good thing, I think. It's more like correcting a mistake—everyone makes mistakes."

If he closes his eyes tightly, he can still see the mistakes he made and the people who died because of them. Even if Charli made mistakes with consequences just as bad or worse, he won't blame him too much for that—though maybe someone more directly affected by those mistakes would, if everyone were told about them.

>42

He nods.

"42..."

He stirs his food as if gazing into something profound within the bowl, only a few centimeters deep, then realizes '42' doesn't make sense.

"What?"

Though he pays more attention after that, he doesn't understand in much detail what Charli means, beyond the idea that the worm isn't any more a god worthy of reverence than any other grinning critter or blue bird from the backrooms could be.

"It's disappointing to build up an image of something you think is too good to see in reality, then finally see it and it's not exactly what you expected—or better..." He leans back against the chair's backrest, forgetting he's sitting on a stool, nearly falling backward before quickly sitting upright again and pretending nothing happened. "Better for all of us that the worm isn't an all-knowing, all-powerful god, and that the backrooms creatures aren't invincible monsters that get back up from the dead two minutes before the credits roll to kill the last survivor. That way, we've got a better chance of surviving."
Normally he's the type who never has plans for the future, not because the devil mocks those who talk about such things, but out of sheer laziness. He tends to act in the moment, and so far that's been enough to keep him alive. Adding that to how exhausted he is, he doesn't bother arguing with Alondra's plans before she leaves.

>"I... I'd like to stay in this town. It's the first time the white army has retreated. Maybe here there's a chance to defeat them once and for all and save the backrooms. What do you think?"

"Yeah..." he replies in a somewhat low voice, distant and blinking a few times trying to shake off the drowsiness. "Me too. I don't know if it's good for you, but I was thinking of telling everyone once and for all that I'm not a little kid. I don't think they'll let me contribute much if they keep seeing me that way."

By this point, people should already know enough about the white worm that there's no need to run around spreading the news. Besides, he wouldn't be able to do much more on other levels than he can here once the zombies come down there too—though how much they'll actually ask him to do is questionable.

Even if it doesn't feel like much, from personal experience he knows that if he bothers to give at least a little help, he can prevent people more important than him from dying. So he has no excuse not to try—his own survival also depends on making sure that worm doesn't keep crawling around.

So when he sees Alondra again, he stands as firmly as he can to declare his decision.

"You can't sell Flametower, it's mine! You said you'd give it to me, it's not fair!" The urge to cry that he's been holding back for a while now serves him well in this moment. "I like Flametower, I don't want you giving it to someone who won't treat it right! It wasn't my fault it broke, I swear! I don't care if you don't have the parts to fix it, it can still talk and it's my friend! I promise I'll treat it better! I don't even want a car, I want to stay here with it! Bwaaaaaah!"

It'll be embarrassing to admit later that he was some 18-year-old guy all along after doing this, but a man does what he must.

The rest of the night isn't much calmer, though the sobbing he hears now doesn't seem to be coming from him anymore—at least, he thinks. His head is too foggy to be sure whether all the people he hears suffering are actually in the tent with him, whether he's imagining them, or if it's some mix of both.
"What a pain, not even being able to sleep or eat properly when it used to be so easy. All that's left is not being able to shit properly and dying choked like my uncle."

But they don't even let him rest in peace while sleeping, it seems that as soon as he closes his eyes he has to fight for his life once more in desperate situations with people he knows dying left and right.

>"Is this the right thing...? If we defeat him, the world will be broken forever... Maybe it's best for everything to end, kept in a sarcophagus of ice. Let the great lie, the great comfort of 256, be consolidated forever at the hands of those who caused this."

"The best thing is whatever lets me live longer." It's not the kind of thing he takes time to think about before deciding that he'd rather it be him than whoever is trying to kill him, if he doesn't have context that's what he'll decide. "Let us live, I mean."

>I bring you peace... I bring you love.

The worm rises, looking less loving and peaceful than the first time he saw it so calm in its castle, he can almost feel terrified of it now. With such a large bug in front of him, he doesn't even need to aim before firing, the biggest problem is that the wind is not in his favor nor in favor of anyone else with vulnerable skin that can be torn off.

"Hii!" He lets out a little scream and looks around to make sure no one heard him.

He ignores the nightmare for what it is and tries to calm down, it's not the first time he's dreamed that some kind of overdeveloped insect is killing and eating him alive, and it won't be the first time it comes true, neither technically nor figuratively nor much less literally.

To forget minor worries, he concentrates on major worries and checks the sheets more carefully to see if he has wet them, even if they are borrowed and no one else is there to see him. Having fixed or ignored that other problem, he goes out to see if the ground is less snowy under the sunlight or if he will have to keep walking with his coat closed, also to make sure Alondra hasn't gone out to sell Flametower behind his back.

I thought that with two arrows and the x2 from the agility die greater than 40, I would leave his health below the 79 he had on the penultimate turn. If I shot only one arrow or didn't count the x2, it would be 79, but it's the same now.

>>5899
>>5898
>Irene

"Having power doesn't give me the right or anything... whatever"

The investigation culminates in a trial and deprivation of liberty for the mute girl, even if it saddened the baby, it was an acceptable middle ground, but it didn't give her headaches.

Like having to burn Leon's body "Well, I doubt he'd like coming back as one of them... it's like a Viking funeral"

Flames engulf Leon's body, the flames paint them, she thinks about saying something but is interrupted by Hank's tangent about diesel.

"Aren't they the same thing?" Automotive mechanics wasn't her thing either, Nad had her thanks to give her "Thanks, I guess... it's what my brother would have done, he's... he's too much of a boy scout to leave someone behind" Is and was carried a very strong connotation that she still wasn't comfortable facing "You know... just because we're in the storage room doesn't mean we have to be savages or anything, I'm not here for speeches"

>If you take that back to the real world you could help a lot of people

Thinking that for a second made Irene let out a laugh "Pfff, I can't imagine being a detective or getting very far before the government knocks on my door, but I'll think about it, thanks"

Before going up, she gives one last look at Leon's makeshift grave "You were a huge asshole, and I also wish I could have shot you... but I won't forget all the help you gave us, I hope you can rest in peace, wherever you go"

She stops talking to herself and goes inside to sleep, she settles in until she's interrupted by Claus, who regrets it halfway, to which Irene stretches and grabs him by the clothes to pull him back.

"If you want to sleep with your sister, you can say so, that way we'll be less cold" She hurries and assumes things "Come on" She lies back down on the seats and moves to make space for Claus, if he accepted, she would hug him tightly like a stuffed animal until she fell asleep

...
>>5899
She didn't have a knife, but she did give Claus a crowbar to start the melee path.

"Butterflies are pretty, and feelings are too, but if we run into another lunatic like Art or an entity we can't break bread with like Slime, we're going to have to fight, and the more of us who know how, the better... I'm sure Donny would say the same thing"

The training effects are... few, she observes Claus on the ground, and crouches beside him.
"I guess sparring is too advanced for you yet... ehhh" She tilts her head, thinking, "What would Marietta do?" She was a superhero, she must have training methods. "(Let's see... skeletons, tentacles, psychological problems...)" Better not. "Tatsumaki?" Marietta's master for sure!..."(We don't have the time or resources to train 14 hours a day... and Claus isn't a superhuman to endure it)" Quick, the answer comes to her. "Heh... I guess all roads lead back to Donatello." Hank calls her, Irene sighs and gives Claus her hand to get up. "We'll practice your swings another time, in Donny's absence, I'll make you a baseball player." Did Irene know baseball? Nope, but she had Donny's image of practicing tirelessly in the yard firmly ingrained in her memory, so she could at least impart the movements for hitting. "You're not useless, Claus." She kisses his forehead. "You just need time. I was also defenseless and scared when I arrived at the storage room, and look at me now. I'll make you a total 'badass' before you know it. Now, why don't you go see if anyone needs help with anything?"

She goes with the closest thing to advice in the group, the Floridian, the stoner Black girl, and her, the Otaku, and of course, Francine, who is herself. Nothing could go wrong.

"So I'll keep in mind looking for more of that... herb, on our outings." The pink mare asks about her oral health, now that she's started treating her teeth as best she could under the circumstances, she hoped it was better. Doubts about how long they would be here were prevalent. "100?... That's a lot, but at this level there seems to be no shortage of resources. I think we'll go crazy before we starve... can we harvest the wheat?" A ridiculous idea came to her, and now she adds her own tangent. "I mean, yes, it's full of snow, but that's due to external influence. The natural state of the level should remain. Could we harvest it and have flour to bake? If you can cook sandwiches with aluminum foil in the engine, we should be able to do the same with bread, right?"

Ridiculous idea aside, more talk about the path. "Well, the path is getting tough, but going into the wheat where we have no visibility would just make us bigger targets, don't you think? It's not like this place is infinite. If we're not going in circles, we'll eventually find something or understand the pattern this level follows and speed things up, don't wanderers do that?" She tries to be positive, seeing the friction between Francine and Hank. "Let's just... try not to fight amongst ourselves. Nothing good will come of it."

They brake suddenly, a new bus was on the road, new by novelty and not by its condition. Irene was already getting out with Hank.

"Do you think we can get spare parts from it? When was the last time they changed the bus's tires?"

She helps Hank circle it, looking underneath, and then above, stepping back a few paces and jumping. If there was nothing, all that was left was to look inside, guided by the image. The door was open, inviting. Irene goes with her machete.

"..." She taps the door a few times with the blade. If there was no response, she enters to see what was going on.

-Strength: 11 + 15 Machete + 1d50 = 12
-Agility: 11 + 1d50 = 38

>>5902
<María Isabel Norton IV (Day 61, time 7)
HP: 40/100
Energy: 50/100
Hunger: 20/20 - Thirst: 21/21
- Strength: 10 + Small bow
- Agility: 12 - 0 Orange star jacket (Open)
- Resistance: 10 + 0 Orange star jacket (Open)
- Luck: 2
Inventory:
- Pockets 4/4
Trinkets
Trinkets
Trinkets
Lever
- Small quiver 9/12
x9 Typical arrow
- Skills:
Déjà Vu: Goes back one or two turns in time. Costs 10 of hunger and thirst.

Level 10
You want to learn to do something.

Alondra: Now? It's too late, I can barely keep my eyelids open. Tomorrow we'll see how we do. For now... Don't move from here.

She goes off to haggle.

It's reassuring that the white worm isn't a true god. Charlie shakes her head and points her spoon at you, the orange pulp dripping from the tip.

Charlie: But it also means that victory or defeat will be the responsibility of all humanity. Doesn't it scare you what they'll put on our epitaph?

Responsibility, something you aren't given just for pretending to be a simple girl, too small, too naive. You could tell the truth to the others to get rid of that stigma.

Charlie: Are you sure? Giordano told the truth, defended that the Earth revolves around the sun, and they threw him into the fire. Sometimes people can't live with the truth. The man I came from fought with it every day.

Charlie's gaze fills with sorrow when a blue fly lands on her soup.

Charlie: Uuh... Another lost soul.

She starts looking for where the insect came from.

As soon as Alondra reappears, you stand firm on the stool to confront her decision with tearful eyes. The mechanic raises her hands in surprise and defensive attitude.

Alondra: Robots don't have feelings, they don't care if you treat them well or badly-

Your complaints turn into crying. Alondra visibly gets nervous, not knowing how to deal with this because it's the first time you're acting like this.

Alondra: Alright, alright! I won't sell it... For now. But I can't return it either, many of its parts are soaked in fuel, it's very flammable.

Next to the mattress is Alondra's backpack, and from this protrudes the head of Flametower-18k, with the eyes sealed, turned off. Maybe it was best that she didn't hear the conversation.

You return your attention to Charlie and discover her leaning under the bar. Her small pinky finger goes in and out of the wood, but there's no crack or hole, simply it sinks into the solid as if it were intangible. She looks at you with a calm expression.

Charlie: It came out from here.

Without warning she brings her finger close to your face. The plague startles you and you scrunch your face as if you had just sucked lemon. You remembered a hot summer day, the one where they discovered a dead, swollen rat on the roof of the house.

Charlie: I pierced something wet, what do you think it is?

The fairy asks the sentinel for a bit of water and soap. When she has the bowl in front of her, she submerges her hands and scrubs them diligently.

1/2

>would leave her health below the 79 it had in the penultimate turn
Well there's the possibility that she might have calculated wrong. Although as you say, at this point it doesn't really matter much, kek. I'll be more attentive in the next fights.

>>5902
<María Isabel Norton IV (Day 61, Hour 9)
HP: 50/100
Energy: 73/100
Hunger: 18/20 - Thirst: 19/21
-Strength: 10 + Small bow
-Agility: 12 - 0 Star orange coat (Open)
-Endurance: 10 + 0 Star orange coat (Open)
-Luck: 2
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Trinkets
Trinkets
Trinkets
Crowbar
-Small quiver 9/12
x9 Typical arrow
-Skills:
Deja Vu: Rewind one or two turns in time. Costs 10 hunger and thirst.

Level 10
Your pantaloons are dry. It's a small relief that helps you calm down, and gives you the energy to face a new day.

Sitting with the sheets over your legs, you observe your surroundings. To the right of the mattress, Alondra's backpack is still there with Flametower inside, hunched over with his eyes closed. It doesn't matter if you call him or make faces at him, he remains inert.

You manage to put on your star-shaped coat. You walk outside, beyond the canvas the snowflakes continue to fall softly. The same shovels that dug the graves to burn the dead are now being used to shovel snow.

A small hand rests on your shoulder. You look back and find Charlie. Maintaining eye contact, she offers you a piece of stale bread.

Charlie: Dip it in milk.

Alondra finds them at the bar, where Charlie and you were sharing a bottle of gluff milk. It's green and excessively creamy, but it tastes good. Charlie wipes the back of her hand across her mouth to sweep away her foam mustache. The mechanic informs them there's work to be done.

Charlie: I have to go to the bathroom. I've been holding it since yesterday and I can't anymore. I think I'm going to explode.

Alondra: Okay, but make it quick.

Charlie pulls you to the latrines outside the pavilion, and when she goes in, she asks you to keep talking so she doesn't feel alone and to keep her from getting scared. She comes out and sighs, there's a piece of toilet paper stuck under the sole of her sneaker.

Charlie: I'm good as new. Let's go back.

You don't need to go back, an old pickup truck approaches with an engine that coughs and an exhaust pipe that spews opaque, foul-smelling fumes. You saw it when you left the pavilion, though you didn't know who it belonged to. A song from the country plays from the cassette player.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rN67kPp5tQ▾
Alondra drives. She stretches, opens the door for you to get in on the passenger side. The backpack with Flame lies under the glove compartment's overhang; it's difficult for you to place your feet without stubbing your toes on the robot's head.

Alondra: Do you like her? She's a loan from the local government. Her previous owner was torn apart by the ice zombies; I doubt she'll want her back...

She starts the jalopy.

You arrive at the crater where the mecha was shot down by Bill the Filthy, and she orders you to collect the scrap fragments (-10 energy), while burly BNTG sentinels help her load the heavier weapons and parts onto the back of the truck. When you're rolling through the dirt streets again, Alondra opens up about what she's doing.

Alondra: See those guys working high up on the palisade?

She stops to look in said direction. With hammers, chains, and welding tools, men and women are reinforcing the wood and installing a few improvised turrets.

Alondra: In the cold air, you can smell and expect the final wave. If you were old enough to know video games, the closest analogy would be preparing to play Left or Dead 7 in real life.

You arrive at the scorched skeleton of what used to be your house. The task is the same: start rummaging for scrap and things you can salvage, only here the search area is much wider and you must be careful not to step on anything that explodes (-15 energy). There are other people working, orders from the mayor, Alondra assured, not sounding convinced about having strangers rummaging through what used to be your land.

???: A lemonade, please.

Someone calls you just as you're bending down to pick up a yo-yo with one of its melted faces. Looking up, you discover a young, big-headed girl with hazel eyes and a smile, who extends an arrow for the exchange.

It's Dora, the girl from the other day. It seems she survived.

Dora: Artemis.

She points a finger at you. Did she forget your name?

Dora: No, no. Your bow. You're like Artemis now. So cool.

2/2

>>5903
<Irene Di Lombardi (Day 70, Hour 12)
HP: 170/170
Energy: 80/80
Hunger: 40/40 - Thirst: 40/40
-Strength: 11 + 15 Machete
-Agility: 11
-Endurance: 12
-Luck: 3
Inventory:
-Pockets 3/4
Towel (Bloody)
Almond water bottle with salt (11/15)
Eye of Argos
Techniques
-Migatte no gokui: Maximum secret of the body's judgment on its own (-10 Energy/Hunger/Thirst. Avoids damage during the turn it is used).

Level 10
Hank: The same- what- you-?

You open and close your mouth in incomprehension. You growl, frown, and shake your head.

Hank: Remind me never to let you fill a tank. You'd cause a disaster.

Already on the bus, with the cold and serenity of the night pressing against the windows, Claus approaches you with a doubt but regrets it halfway. You attract him, he keeps his face down from nervousness. He looks up when you talk about sleeping together, and gives you a shy smile, as that's exactly what he came to ask you for.

You open the blanket and lean back against the seats to give him space; it's complicated, but since you're both thin, it's not impossible. The boy lies down next to you, you face each other, and in the closeness, he whispers to you.

Claus: Thanks... With Slime watching Hether all the time, sleeping wasn't the same anymore.

For a couple of minutes, Claus's legs move and brush against yours, looking for a comfortable position without bothering each other. That's when you take the initiative and pull him into a hug, sharing warmth. The closeness of another human being chases away the coldness of the environment in a way a simple blanket cannot match. For a while, Claus is tense; you hear how fast his heart is beating, but little by little his thin body relaxes.

Claus: Goodnight, Irene.

You fall asleep before him, with the wild thought of how such a weak boy has managed to survive this long...

The thought transcends the night and leads you to try training him in the morning. After seeing him fail in his first and only attack, you think of your references: Manga characters.

Marietta (Imaginary): You should get him pregnant.

That doesn't work and would be wrong on many levels. But that's what happens when both the Von Karma from the comics and the one from the backrooms act dissociated from reality. They are not human.

Tatsumaki (Imaginary): Throw rocks at him until he reacts or gets stoned, there's no middle ground!

That doesn't work either. Claus isn't a character from Boku no Hero; he looks more like he's from a bishounen, or a weird otome anime where he belongs to the protagonist's harem. You only have to see how he looks at you sitting in the snow with a repentant puppy-dog face, and the crowbar abandoned to the side. The only reference you have left is your brother.

Claus: Baseball player...?

He accepts your hand to help himself up, but still doesn't understand. Even more so when you give him a kiss on the forehead; he gently runs the tip of his fingers between his eyes. You tell him he's not useless, and you use yourself as an example of overcoming challenges. He looks away.

Claus: You know...? Deep down, I feel like I've been here longer than you. I'm not talking about weeks or months, but maybe years... Maybe my improvement organ is broken like my head.

But despite his discouragement, he picks up the crowbar from the floor and nods, assuring you that he will try his best at whatever you are planning.

1/2

>>5906
<Irene Di Lombardi (Day 70, 13:00)
HP: 170/170
Energy: 79/80
Hunger: 40/40 - Thirst: 39/40
-Strength: 11 + 15 Machete
-Agility: 11
-Endurance: 12
-Luck: 3
Inventory:
-Pockets 3/4
Towel (Bloody)
Almond water bottle with salt (11/15)
Eye of Argos
Techniques
-Migatte no gokui: Ultimate secret of the body judging itself (-10 Energy/Hunger/Thirst. Prevents damage during the turn it's used).

Level 10
Harvest wheat? Francine looks out the window when you ask and bites her lip.

Francine: With this weather... I don't know. Those stalks look dying.

You argue for continuing down the road, but your stance is more conciliatory than Hank's. You advocate for peace between the parties.

Hank: I see you're a girl with a head on her shoulders. Keeping on driving is the best option.

They're forced to brake suddenly because of an obstacle on the road. Hank gets out first, you follow him, and once you're at his side, you share your interest in the bus. Hank pinches the rubber of a tire and it tears.

Hank: Too old. But the inside should be better preserved. Same concept as a can of tuna.

You venture up to the door, climb the mound of yellowish snow aged by time, grab the handle, feeling the cold metal through your gloves. You pull with all your strength...

Rubber and metal screech, but the door only opens a couple of centimeters. You peer through the gap at the edge, finding darkness and a heavy—slightly sweet, like moldy sugar—smell that numbs your nose.

Hank: Let me help. Sometimes I forget you're just a girl.

The man from Florida jams the rifle butt into the edge gap to pry it open.

Hank: One, two, and...

You both pull together.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=870j0RZhRD4▾
The door pops loose and you fall on your ass into the snow.

When you open your eyes, an amorphous swarm jostles you and deafens you with its buzzing. A hundred moths flutter around your face, one flies into your mouth and you accidentally bite it, producing a wet crunch (-2 hunger).
The rest of the swarm leaves for the wheat field, and from there ascends towards the clouds, to the sky, disappearing into the white of the heights.

Hank: Are you okay? Do you want water?

He asks you before returning his attention to the inside of the bus. He decides to go ahead, gets on, and disappears into the gloom of the bus. A minute passes and he doesn't return or give any sign of life. You stand up and, with your machete ready, you enter cautiously, but you don't need to go far to notice the skeleton in the driver's seat.

It's slumped against the grimy window, a dusty rifle in its bony hands, and at its feet lies a Florida cap with a hole in it, plus an open, empty box of ammunition.

You cast your gaze into the interior of the vehicle. Hank is standing in the middle of the gloom, flanked by seats occupied by bodies. You recognize Nadjela's clothes, Hether's, even your own with Claus's remains thrown over your lap. You don't locate Francine, Sue, or Rosynini.

Hank's attention remains fixed on one specific corpse. A small one, with a book abandoned under the seat. Like the rest of the corpses, it has a bullet hole somewhere on its body. In Eleanor's case, the hole is in the back of her head.

Hank perceives you behind him, but doesn't turn as he speaks to you.

Hank: I'm not prepared to lose another daughter, Irene.

He turns slowly, his brow furrowed and his eyes downcast.

Hank: Let's promise never to tell anyone about what we saw here.

You return to the bus, Hank wearing a somber expression, but when he rejoins the others he tells them the bus is rotten and empty, and immediately puts the vehicle in motion to get as far away as possible. Francine immediately becomes suspicious and approaches you.

Francine (Whispering): Exactly what did you see?

Another one calls you, Rosynini, but it's for a different matter.

Rosynini (Whispering): I have an idea of how we could escape. It's a bit dangerous, but it could work.

She murmurs to you with her hooves near her snout.

Rosynini (Whispering): The problem is the weight. We're too many. To increase the chances of my idea working, we'd have to leave people behind...

Since you're doing meta, I'll take the opportunity to chime in and let you know that I'll be posting my turn in the next few days, OP. Maybe for tomorrow, I think I'll reply to Cat first because I'm really looking forward to writing that particular turn... And I need to think carefully about how I want to handle Marie's.
This post is more of an excuse to post these silly things I wanted to send kek. I realized I hadn't been making meyneys with Cat so I made these.
I was thinking of starting to make more curis for the roleplay. It amuses me.
Anyway, I'm putting it on record. If the number of posts bothers you, let me know and I'll delete it and just post these silly things along with my turns tomorrow.

>>5907
<Martin Emilios Palacios (Year 30, Day 19, Hour 9)
HP: 77/100
Energy: 46/50
Hunger: 18/20 - Thirst: 18/20
-Strength: 14
-Agility: 13 - 5 Watered Hazmat Suit V2
-Endurance: 14 + 10 Watered Hazmat Suit V2
-Luck: 3
Inventory
-Pockets 2/4
Thalasin (19/30)
Magnum Revolver (0/6. Damage x3, Priority +2)
Abilities:
Werewolf (Transformation): x2 base stats. x3 base stats in aquatic environments.

In the Frontrooms
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6zhuFAoC6Y▾The silence is deafening. It vibrates through your entire body.

Your eyes threaten to tear from the vastness of the space. Occupying all of your upper view lies the profile of Jupiter, the sight crushes you with its immensity, your bones ache just from contemplating it, it's as if your skeleton wants to break through your flesh and escape. The skin of your face stretches against your skull because of it.

But you would be more lost by averting your gaze to the void, because in the distant stars you perceive the far-off shadows of incomprehensible horrors. You manage to hear the world's lament of crusts that were once cities, empires. It's like the roar of a dying beast.

Three black spots spread across the surface of the gas giant, accompanied by the drumming of a colossal heart that for a moment you mistake for your own. The planet stares back at you with growing malice, and you could swear those sharp mountains that look like teeth are smiling at you.

???: Overwhelming, isn't it?

The male voice, soft, and with a French accent, pulls you out of your shock. You look to your right and see the guy, for a moment you mistake him for Polar, but his hair is too neat, and Polar didn't wear a leather jacket or designer black sunglasses. You look ahead, you see Jupiter again, a styrofoam ball hanging by threads above the Buenos Aires sign. Near the post, there's a plaque that says:

Immensity - Coco Le Pou.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_I9xto06A0▾
Dozens of works occupy space in the white gallery with a domed glass ceiling, and buzzing like flies around them are the hundred or so visitors. Chatting, strolling, hypnotized by their cell phones, indifferent to you. Only the man from before shows a slight interest.

Coco Le Pou: That's a modernist outfit. Is it from Prague?

Like a zombie, you advance through the crowd. No frozen claws or anomalies jump at your face. It feels like being in a dream.

You push open a double door, and the sun greets you, warming the rubber of your hazmat, and the mundane noise of cars and pedestrians. A crumpled flyer from a certain Javier Milei, a man with lion-like hair, collides with your feet. To your left, there's a feminist protest, one of the feminists steps forward and stains your suit's visor with purple spray paint, accusing you of being sexist and an oppressor.

But what most draws your attention, almost like a magnet, is what rises between the buildings to your right...

The obelisk...

You're home.

You escaped the backrooms. But the questions still remain...

What did the experience leave you with, beyond being able to turn into a hideous walrus? What did it mean to meet Aurora, Malcolm, the cardboard knights, Polar, the strange people from the future...? Were they even real?

Where will you go? What will you do with your life? Will you keep a low profile? You have an empty gun, and a box of pills that reminds you of your illness.

Unless you resolve it somehow, you won't last long. It remains to be decided what you will try to extend your life, or if you will limit yourself to enjoying the little time you have left.

>>5818
>>5909
I cited poorly. This is for you, Martin >>5819 Depending on your decisions, your epilogue will be shortened or lengthened.

>>5908
Yes! I'll count to three and you'll delete it all! Don't defile the sacred length of the thread!

Kek.

They turned out very cute! But hey, Hilda isn't thaaaaaaat ugly (Waifu comparisons are hateful). Look at the pic, she's skinny, bony, violent, bad-tempered, ugly, dresses badly, doesn't wash her hands, but she's never a communist!

>>131302
Same. A big kiss

>>5906
>Irene

No, cute guys couldn't get pregnant, she had failed her Oshi, and she had failed Tatsumaki, apparently she was more of an Autist than a Based one. Claus would be trained more gently.

"To say something, knowing how to move something heavy to hit is a good start before more advanced tactics" Claud still doesn't understand, and runs his fingers over where she kissed him

>"Maybe my organ for improvement is broken like my head"

"Awww little brother, don't say that" Now she speaks to him in a higher-pitched voice playfully "Everything will work out in time, as long as we're together, we'll keep surviving, and you'll get stronger, you'll see. Tomorrow we'll start with some exercises, I'm sure if we find another car we can take its wheels to use as dead weight" Ideas were already coming to her, maybe she would look adorable but she was going to leave him with the body of a Spartan!
...
>>5907
"I'm not saying it's a permanent solution either... but we should start thinking about something else"

They go out to see the vehicle in the middle of the snow, they force the entrance and are assaulted by a swarm of deathmoths.

"UGHHH" Irene falls to the ground spitting out the dusty remains, and wiping her sleeve over her tongue "How disgusting... yes please" She takes a sip of water to clean her palate before entering.

The interior of the bus couldn't be worse, first it might be a coincidence then it becomes a harsh reality when she sees the corpses in identical clothing.

She gasps, bringing her hand to her mouth, seeing their remains, and worse, seeing Claus's, now... she looks away.

>I'm not prepared to lose another daughter, Irene.

"And I can't lose another brother..."

>Let's promise never to tell anyone what we saw here.

"I promise..." She says looking at the ground... but before she can leave, she grabs Hank's arm "Wait, please listen to me"

"I've already dealt with this, I've seen people, twisted things that were supposed to be 'me'... and it's not pleasant, it could be something like that, or just the storage room wanting to play with our heads. But I want to tell you this seriously, and don't treat me like a child because we can both fight and survive on our own. This is a sign, a sign we need to learn from Hank, if we keep going aimlessly on the road we'll end up like this, okay?" She lets go of him "I don't want to boss people around, I was never good in teams, but please, stop being stubborn please, and if not for that, do it for your daughter, okay?... just, think about it and tomorrow we'll discuss it all together"

Before leaving, she checks if there was another Machete like hers or a crowbar among the remains of the bus 1d50 = 26

She leaves without looking back in any case, her bangs covering her eyes.

Francine was suspicious, naturally "Nothing good... tomorrow morning we'll discuss and see if we can think of another plan to continue, keep it in mind"

Rosy also had something to tell her, but it was a slightly more extreme idea "... 'How many people?'" She whispers her question so no one can hear

>>5908
kek, I should make another edit to this role... but I have no ideas, someone give me a funny image
>>5909
Bravo Martin, you escaped the storage room!, I don't know if it would be good or bad given your condition, but you did it!
>>5910
>Depending on your decisions, your epilogue will shorten or lengthen.
Don't scare me

>>5909
>>5818

The winds lash, the snow strikes, and he has one thing on his mind. Head held high, with hopeful eyes, clinging to the belief that up there, in the eye of the storm, lies salvation. He doesn't turn, not even when he hears his companions scream. He only catches fragments of what happens to them out of the corner of his eye. He doesn't care, this isn't about them, this is about him.

He was the one who chose to risk it all by calling this his ticket out. If he succeeds, he wins the lottery; if he fails, he ends up as cold cuts. He should be scared, he should doubt more in the face of adversity, but after all that has happened, even the latter option starts to sound appealing. He would leave this place on his own terms, it didn't matter if he did it alive or dead. The important thing is that it was what he wanted.

"Don't get worked up and worry about yourself. You'll be better off."

He rises, pushes the air, ready to accept whatever comes his way. A hand stops him, his supposed brother, trying to cling to a bond that never existed. Martín brings his own hand closer, for a moment he considers pulling Polar and the rest so they can accompany him. Only he doesn't, dragging others into his problems isn't something he does. It's others who try to sneak into his, it's time he stopped getting involved where he's not called. With a clenched fist, he hits Polar's hand and delivers a kick to get him off.

The others fall, he ascends, wrapping himself in the storm until he becomes one with it. The dust rages, clouds his vision, and hinders his consciousness. Breathing becomes difficult, even swallowing saliva is a struggle. Being so high up, the labyrinth looks small, insignificant even. It was a mere particle that vanishes with the wind. No, it's not the labyrinth, it's him being blown away, far, far away from here...

"Ha... HA, HA, HA, HA, HA! If you don't laugh, you'll go mad..."

The air currents stop, and his mind kicks into gear. He shakes his head, wipes his eyes, and observes. Buenos Aires, home, sweet home. The corners of his lips turn up, revealing teeth followed by a laugh. He removes the helmet from his suit, looking at the sky, and what he witnesses turns his happy chuckle into a desperate laugh. He had escaped, but he hadn't reached his promised destination. He falls on his ass, sitting down to consider his options.
Except that he also didn't have time to think about it, the very environment he found himself in was already doing its work. His ears ring, transmitting the null sound throughout his body. The gravitational force doesn't crush him, it expands him, he feels every muscle trying to break free. Faced with that sensation, he has no choice but to breathe and observe. He was expectant of his own mortality, it was an end he could never have imagined. That was his comfort, not knowing what he was facing made accepting all of this less terrifying. Witnessing horrors beyond his imagination, the only thing he could think was

"I don't understand"

As he utters those words, the world changes. The infinite space becomes finite, limited by doors, walls, and windows that keep all the external chaos at bay. It takes him a moment to compose himself, apparently he's in a... museum? A museum where they've surely already classified him as a fucking uncultured swine for what he just said.

"I mean, I know what the idea is, but showing me a picture of the object as it is doesn't quite convey it. It's like a teddy bear, sure, real bears can be cute and all that. The thing is, if you show a baby a teddy bear that's an exact copy of a bear, it'll probably end up crying. That doesn't happen with teddy bears because we remove realism by emphasizing the parts we find cutest. Do you get what I'm saying? To better grasp that idea of 'immensity,' you need to emphasize it, you need to make the viewer feel firsthand what you want to convey. Do you see where I'm going with this?"

He still doesn't quite understand where he is, but the fear of looking like an idiot outweighs it. Before he knows it, he starts spouting any old nonsense just to pretend he knows something about art. Once he calms down, he starts looking around the place. It looked normal, too normal, there were no entities, no infinite corridors, nothing at all. Even the people there looked and dressed like any decent person would, if anything, he's the one who doesn't fit in.
"This? From the ministry, I doubt you know them. They're a very exclusive group, or underground as they say. If there's a chance later I'll tell you how to get one"

Once he stops messing around, he goes outside and breathes some fresh air. Or well, as fresh as it can be when someone throws aerosol in your face; if he hadn't been paying attention and covered himself in time, he would be dying of poisoning. In another context, maybe it would bother him or he'd say something to the crazy chick who did it, but now he has more important things to worry about. He walks for a while until he reaches the obelisk, continues until he gets to Republic Street and lies down on one of the benches there.

"Get out... Get out, get out, get out! Get out! Get OUT! GOOOOOOOO LLOOOOCCOOO!!"

With eyes to the sky, he whispers, his voice gradually rising, repeating a single word over and over. His shouts soon turn into cries of euphoria as he raises his arms in triumph. He was locked up, beaten, mistreated, bugged, anthropomorphized, infected, aged, frozen, etc., and none of those things were able to stop him. With tears in his eyes, he jumps up, feeling like the king of the world. He feels like if he went and played the lottery, he'd win, but as that thought crosses his mind, another one arrives.

"Where the hell did I get money from?"

More importantly, did he still have a house? Because yes, he's in Argentina, but he has no idea how much time has passed on this side. For all he knows, he doesn't even know if this Argentina is even the same Argentina he left; it could be an identical copy somewhere else in the multiverse or something like that. He needs a way to confirm his suspicions, patting his pockets, he starts to rummage through every corner of his suit to see if by chance there's a loose coin with which he could use a public phone. A plan that's total crap, because nowadays there are no public phones and nobody uses coins, he'd need something else...

"Maybe that guy will give me a hand..."

With no one else to turn to, he starts running in his Eternaut cosplay, heading towards the museum where he appeared. The albino he ran into earlier seemed interested in his clothes. Maybe if he keeps up the act of getting him another pair, he can bum his phone for a while. He just needs him to lend it to him for 5 minutes to make a call to a construction buddy who lives near his neighborhood.

>in case he gets a phone

"Hey Daniel, listen, it's me, Martin. Do you remember me? The house and everything else, is it still there?

>>5910
And you go and quote wrong again, it's bad, bad, bad dude, everything's wrong with you, baaaad https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P7U8mFX7Z1w▾ kek

>>5856
>Why the legs?, Can I at least keep one?
I'll let you lose only one foot, only if you don't replace it with a better one afterwards

>D-does it count if in the visions of the future Marie also lost an arm?
Nah, if it doesn't happen on camera, it doesn't count

>Let's make it a spin-off in the literature club
Alright, alright, my plan to subtly gaslight the rest of the anons into slowly starting an idol role is finally bearing fruit, kuek

>>5912
>Bravo Martin, you escaped the storage room!

>Arrives
>Joins a quest that never ends
>Loses the girl who followed him
>Gets locked up
>Escapes
>Becomes directly responsible for at least 4 deaths
>Takes a nap
>Condemns the future
>Returns to the past and abandons his new group
>Refuses to elaborate

If he had to be an Argentine character. Another crowning glory for my beautiful country. It's being celebrated at the obelisk, I'll see you on the other side if you make it out

>I don't know if it would be good or bad given your condition
I don't know whether to die peacefully in a hospital bed or fighting a bunch of ice zombies. I think I choose the former, maybe I'm the weird one

>>5911
<Irene Di Lombardi (Day 71, 7 AM)
HP: 170/170
Energy: 80/80
Hunger: 40/40 - Thirst: 40/40
-Strength: 11 + 15 Machete / + 15 Machete
-Agility: 11
-Stamina: 12
-Luck: 3
Inventory:
-Pockets 3/4
Towel (Bloody)
Almond water bottle with salt (10/15)
Eye of Argos
Techniques
-Migatte no gokui: Ultimate secret of self-judgment through the body (-10 Energy/Hunger/Thirst. Prevents damage during the turn it's used).

Level 10
You spit moth pieces into the snow. Among the crushed mass, you still see an insect leg twitching. It's strange, and you don't understand why, but that image makes you think of Donatello. Hank passes you his almond water bottle, and you rinse your mouth and throat before climbing into the vehicle.

You perceive the bus as a dark, moldy metal tomb, and its occupants are none other than yourselves—versions flayed by time after suffering a terrible fate. Hank makes you promise not to tell the others, to avoid demoralizing the group. You agree, but not without stressing that this is a sign, and that repeating the same thing while expecting change is pointless.

Hank rests his gaze on his palm and shakes his head. He stays like that for a minute, then lowers his hand, looks at you, and nods.

Hank: Tomorrow... We'll discuss it.

There's a hint of distrust in his voice—maybe part of him thinks planning is pointless and that they're already doomed. When he leaves through the door, you turn back to sift through dust and skeletons, searching for any other useful weapon. During the process, you instinctively hold your breath...

You find the weapon at your corpse's feet.

-Rusty machete
Function: +15 damage. +5 poison.
Description: Spanish farming tool, poisoned by time.

With a machete in each hand, you feel like a character from Attack on Titan. Mikasa is your home.
With the (Functional) bus rolling down the road again, Rosynini takes you to her seats. To disguise the delicate conversation, she pretends to fix your hair. With her behind you, her fluffy body against your shoulders-back, and her hooves on your head, she begins to whisper the idea that occurred to her.

Rosynini: Did you see my butt?

It's up to your discretion how to respond to that.

Rosynini: The balloons are my glitter brand. Imagine you have two cows, one is earth, the other is air... I can make this bus like the second one, and we'll float, very, very high, until we escape or discover where the right path is.

And the problem?

Rosynini: A bus is very heavy, and it doesn't help that there are so many of us. Since I went to college (You notice she repeats the college thing a lot) I know how many people we need to leave behind to attempt the plan, at least two. We'd also have to remove the wheels, the fuel tank, the steering wheel, uh, leave it like a wreck... I don't know if Hank will agree.

They discover Hank's opinion in the morning, when they stop in front of the wheat to have breakfast.

Hank: No!

He throws his beet sandwich on the ground and points an accusing finger at Rosynini. The glitter-pony hides behind your legs. Claus is very still to your left and glances at you.

Hank: Do you really want us to destroy our only shelter and means of transportation? Have you gone mad, or did you conspire with the monsters to kill us all? You're a colored mare, I don't even know why we listen to you.

Rosynini: C-colored mare? T-That's o-our word...

The mare's eyes water.

Francine: Even if we agreed... How could we abandon anyone in this place? It would be cruel, inhumane.

Francine comments, hugging herself to hide her shivers.

Nadjela also hugs herself, though she says nothing, instead looking around with nervous eyes as she scratches her arms, neck, and torso.

Sue and Eleanor watch them from inside the bus. Martha also from the back.

>>5893
>Ashley
Kek the hairy hand.
They're offered some kind of box, and without hesitation, they take it. They hold it at arm's length, like a freshly washed plate. First impressions come from the cover, which they examine with the interest of someone appraising a diamond. Their eyes tirelessly shift from the title to the characters, and from them to the details.

(Fantasy...)

They assume. And then, after a second look to be sure, they think the image is fascinating. Beyond whatever intention might have been behind it (drama...?)—they suppose—for Cat, the drawing looked... strangely realistic. They would've thought it was a display with statues and real costumes, had they not looked again more carefully.

(But you can tell it's fake...)

That surprises them. It seems realistic enough to confuse them, yet not so much that they can't tell it's a drawing. They wonder what causes that, but discard figuring it out and proceed with the inspection. They lower the object, now holding it in front of their abdomen like you would a book, supported only by their eight fingers interlaced like a net. The thumbs don't join in.

The purpose of this was to gently raise and lower the box in small motions—feeling its weight. This was her natural scale.

(It's fine...)

About the size of a paperback. A short one, obviously. Then she stops the weighing and lets her thumbs run over the surface, feeling its texture.

(Plastic.)

That's all she has to say. Then, she brings the object to her nose, and her nostrils flare rapidly as she sniffs. It doesn't smell like a book. She opens her eyes and turns the object around—she wants to fully understand Hilda, and she knows Hilda loves these things. On the back cover, she finds the most interesting thing so far: text. Like with any literary piece, though, it's just a brief explanation of what's inside the package.

(Mythical fantasy.)

She was right at first. Though with nuances. And with that, she thought she'd seen everything, but knew she hadn't. She turns the case so the opening faces her. She holds the spine in her palm. Then, with her eight fingers again, uses her thumbs to touch the opening. She's surprised to find a bit of unnecessary resistance, and hesitates, afraid of breaking the object. She glances up for a second at the monkey, and its complete indifference makes her blink slightly... before finally, cautiously, returning to the film, which she assumes hasn't been opened in a long time, causing it to stick a little.

She forces the spot where the covers join, and with a sound she'd describe as hollow and plastic—startling her—it pops open. Revealing a rectangle with small windows that don't allow her to relax the wide-eyed stare the noise had given her.

(I can't see anything...)

Is this what fascinates Hilda? Is it actually, in fact, a step beyond books, where you only have a premise and must use your imagination fully?

(No...)

Catherine dismisses the idea almost instantly. Not that she doesn't believe Hilda can imagine, but she knows her—or thinks she knows her well enough—for such a thing to seem like something she wouldn't fully enjoy.

(Is the film... inside there?)

That, somehow, seems more plausible. She doesn't know exactly how. But it must be like the television she already knows. It's perhaps possible that these small windows she's now facing could turn into an image. Or something.

In truth, Catherine can't quite picture it. But after analyzing it as deeply as she can, it's captured her attention.

She wants to watch it. She wants to watch it with Hilda. She wants to see Hilda watching it... Just once before having to say goodbye. Like she does with the case, which she closes again with a plastic clack as the pieces snap shut—but which makes Cat think it's jammed... or broken. She returns the film, thanks, apologizes for jamming or breaking it, and closes the door along with the day, going to bed.

...

Catherine empathizes with the fuzzy insect. They connect, in white and in wildness. If her feet weren't tied to the ground, they'd be much more alike. But the difference unites them. And though neither of them is a butterfly, Cat's smile suggests she doesn't mind being the most useless of moths.

And with the affection that followed—caresses through her silky, white Rapunzel hair—which she accepted with growing calm, like the rest of her tamed, ugly cousins.

<White and pretty, very white, very pretty, very mine.

Though maybe they weren't that ugly.

"Yours..."

Nor that wild.

"Yes..."—she answers, her voice turned almost a sigh of love, of longing—"you've tamed me."—she remembers those words written in her heart, so she won't forget—

<and you fly too.

"And—"

An objection was coming. But then came proof—something tugged at her quickly, making her flail her arms and legs for a second, surprised to lose the precious ground she'd just accepted as her territory, before the familiar warmth she loves turns the new world into her own.

"Uh? ¡-!"

She gasps from the initial shock. Hilda moves forward, and Cat's head lags half a second behind, threatening to fall before following the rest of her body as she stabilizes. At first, she's surprised, looking around with visible haste, her hair turned into an expansive white banner that flutters magnificently.
Cat clings carefully for a few moments, afraid of falling, but then the breeze, the motion, the height—excitement rises, a snort that quickly turns into laughter.

"Ja! Jajaja!"

Cat opens her mouth wide and closes her eyes, laughing like a little girl at her first amusement park. She laughs, with an expression of pure happiness the audience has never seen before. The joy of realizing she's no longer the most useless of moths.

That with her girl, she can fly.

...

One step leaves a trace. A trace is the worst mistake she could make. Every step Catherine takes tramples over the most fundamental rules her father ever taught her. Footprints in the forest could get them into enormous trouble—trouble she'd never understand, not even on her deathbed, because she never failed him before, and today Dad is far away. Very far.

And right now, Catherine doesn't even think. Even though her steps paint the white canvas of her long hair, or mark her path like Hansel and Gretel, she'd rather hold onto this gesture of love than undo her crown as common sense would dictate. As Hilda demands.

Hilda growls, frustrated for some reason.

"What's wrong?"

A fair question with no answer. The atmosphere shifts from frustration to something closer to a lesson. Yet this moment won't last long. Hilda's march is interrupted by a slip—something deeply mysterious. A word escaping the vocabulary of the supposedly cultured one in the duo.

<What...?

"My what." —she repeats— "What did you just say?" —clarifying her question, maybe it was too cryptic—

<I...

"You said: 'today I'm not your girlfriend.' That's what I heard."

<...

"That's why I asked 'my what'..." —she explains, in case it's still unclear— "to understand."

Instead of answering, Hilda decides to smother her voice with the palms of her hands. Embarrassment colors her cheeks, and Cat, confused, gives just a single blink that seems to last much longer than normal. They're mirrors—if mirrors showed the exact opposite of how you look now—because the blue one seems strangely desperate, while the white one remains as expressionless as ever.

"Are you okay?" —she starts to worry slightly—

Hilda shakes her head as if that could shake off an imaginary flame. The oregonian's concern has already passed the minimum threshold for action.

"Hilda...?"

She calls out. Hilda opens her eyes. Catherine looks at her with self-imposed calm, but she can't help breaking the silence just to make sure...

"Are you okay?"

It's the same question as before. But she really needs to know. She doesn't want her to feel bad. Or feel unwell in any way. If things went wrong now, it would be a devastating blow to the dreamlike journey they'd been having.
She refuses to let even such a thing disrupt the good. If she's not enjoying herself, they can go somewhere else. If she's feeling unwell, Catherine can take care of her. But there's something in her mind, a knowingly hypocritical thought implanted right where emotions form: if anything is wrong...

(I want her to tell me.)

She wants to know... Hilda would want to know too. And that hurts a little. Catherine understands she's hiding things from her, her discomfort. For the sake of their time together.

But maybe Hilda would rather know than be happily ignorant. Cat... won't know. Because she'll keep hiding the truth despite the pain.

<I didn't say anything. You misheard.

"..." —she stares with an uncomfortable normality, with that expression so devoid of emotion it's impossible to tell what she's thinking, yet somehow feels like judgment. Or that's what Hilda might think, given the sustained silence of her impassive girl— "Hilda, I heard you..."

In contrast, she seems not to hear her now. She turns her profile and paces in place. Left, right. The glimpses at Catherine turn out as expected: a girl standing perfectly normally. Arms at her sides, monotone expression. But Hilda wins, and the façade dissolves on her third look, now met with a slightly raised eyebrow.

"Aren't you going to tell me?"

Probably on the other side they expected her to drop the idea of knowing. But it's hard when, through tears and blood, they forged the foundation of their relationship on a principle they might still be searching for even today: I want to understand you.

Maybe. Hilda still does things that spark her curiosity or extreme confusion. Like the bite she herself delivered. Perhaps if they hadn't been separated by centimeters of glass that hindered communication, she'd have understood sooner, and they'd have spared themselves much pain... but there's no resentment. Today she believes she understands, and accepts the mark she carries like a cow accepts a hot iron brand. Cows can love their owners just as dogs do.

Nevertheless, for the one in blue, things might be less complicated. Catherine thought about it a bit, and Hilda knows how to make her laugh, make her feel cared for, make her happy. She thought maybe her other half knows her better. Soon she decided that wasn't true. It wouldn't have bothered her. On the contrary, the annoyance comes from being wrong. Because she knows that if it's not true, it's perhaps only due to the things she's sorrowfully keeping to herself.

I wish Hilda mattered less to me. So she could confess casually, as she would with anyone else, what's happening to her.

(No!)

She throws that intrusive thought into the fire as if it were an unpleasant parasite. Hilda matters most to her. She'd never want her to matter less.

1/??

>>5893
>Ashley
<And what did I say?

That didn't save her from having flaws. Everything related to letters seemed to be one of them.

"Pelgro." -she clarifies- "P - E - L - G - R - O." -she uses her finger as a baton again to mark the rhythm as she pronounces the letters- "It would be pelgro. Not danger."

<And how is it?

"It's missing an 'i'. After the 'L'... P - E - L - I - G - R - O." -same gestures, her eyes go up as if trying to remember a musical score, because she has to think about it carefully, she wouldn't want to teach incorrectly- "Danger."

<And what did I say?

"Well... Maybe you didn't hear me. You missed the 'i'. That is: 'P - E - L - G - R - O'... Pelgro..." -her baton finger is raised to clarify- "That's not a word."

Danger. Pelgro. Danger. Pelgro. This repeats a worryingly high number of times. But Catherine turns out to have surprising patience to go over the word as many times as the blue one asks. Although in the end she's no longer sure what to think.

"Let me explain. There are..." -she looks at her hand and quickly raises her fingers- "7 letters: essence"

She shows him her hand and lowers her fingers again.

"The P." -she raises a finger- "The E." -and another- "The L." -and so on, or not, because she stops there- "this is the one you missed. The fourth letter." -she raises her finger- "the 'i'. There we have da-nger..." -she raises the next finger and continues- "G - E - R." -she thinks she has it- "Dangeeer." -she emphasizes the 'e' with her expressionless face-

Hilda smiles almost mockingly. Cat blinks a little, it's that mischievous little smile that makes the albino understand she's holding something back. She lowers her hands, without stopping looking at her with that neutral face that becomes a slightly serious one.

"What?" -they understand each other on special levels, even if Catherine isn't the most perceptive in social matters, she senses something. She hopes the basic question is enough to answer, but if not, she proceeds with:- "You're playing a joke on me."

It's a total affirmation that comes with the tone of someone who has just discovered who the interlocutor is.

"Hm... I'm angry."

She's direct, and her slightly furrowed brow seems proof enough in someone who so rarely has expressions drawn on her face.

"It's a joke."

Her style is more... poor, to put it mildly. But that was her attempt to play too, and to 'get revenge'.

>>5895
>Ashley
Paralysis is general. Fussy girls are overwhelmed by the relentless stream, and become criminals of inaction. Ashley passes among them like a specter of the lake, oblivious to the gazes that fall upon her, or to anything other than the task at hand. That girl with her face under the green veil of the water.

Her hands extend, and they get what she was looking for. She pulls, ignoring the water that stains her, and drags it to the safety of the ground once more. She moves away without saying or receiving any words until she reaches Hilda. A final glance confirms that everything is fine, she doesn't care about the rest.
<You're good, Cat.

"…?"

She looks at her. She can't help but reflect a momentary surprise, at the words and the care that came with them. Hilda warns against the myth of pneumonia, Cat allows it. She liked everything that came from those hands she got used to. She closes her eyes, surrendered, at the light touch, and uses the darkness of her eyelids to weigh the label. 'Good'… 'you're good'…

"I hadn't thought of that…"

<I would have let her soak a bit longer. I'm not as good as you.

Catherine opened her eyes and gave her a tender look that conveys the deep appreciation that the same blue-haired girl seems to forget she deserves.

"That's fine too…"

She retorts, and suppresses the urge to hug her or caress her face in public.

"You would do something." -and that changes everything-

When that girl fell, her dear friends didn't offer her a hand. But Hilda would have been willing to help, even if she were a stranger with whom she hadn't even exchanged glances.

"You're good."

She affirms it with a capital letter and a period. There is no doubt or hesitation in her voice. And also nothing that Hilda mentioned.

'Better'.

Such labels don't matter to her. Whether you are more, or less. She just knows that she is… And she wants her to know it too.

…

The accounts were settled, and the walk continued to unexpected places. To those spaces where few decide to go. Where glass is neglected, where gazes don't reach and the only voices come from the exuberant nature.

She knew that green surrounded her. Even if in the middle there was an extensive barrier of yellow. The whispers of the only mother who saw her grow, mother nature, with her chirping, with her song, with her warmth, made her feel at home.

She enjoyed the golden lines that filtered through the dirt like someone who allows themselves to disconnect by floating under an extensive shower.

Lost in a sigh of nostalgia, she admits that she likes the place. It's calm, warm, and familiar. There would be few things that could improve it.

<Ashley

That was one.

Cat is not entirely absorbed, even in enjoyment. If she were to ask for one thing to add to this place that seemed so precious to her… It would be Hilda…

(No…)

There was no need to ask. Hilda was there.

<These places are almost like people. It's worth being brave and exploring, because you'll find treasures, special places, things that make your heart race

"…"

She took a moment to look up again. Appreciating this almost never-trodden place once more in that way. She thought of home, of the hectares of lush forest that surrounded the small cave she inhabited. Of how she could run for 15 minutes in any direction without getting tired because she had practiced, and because no matter how many times she put one foot in front of the other, the trees never ended.

(That's an exaggeration…)
But it was an intentional exaggeration, clearly the forest had a limit. But it was huge, capable of making her feel the freedom she longed for despite being bounded by the concrete beyond. She felt sorry for those in the city, those who never saw the beauty in the forest. And, in part, Hilda's words made her feel a little bad too. Cat saw the city, but superficially. More than once she wondered how many things that unknown world held.

The truth was, it probably didn't matter anymore. The city was in the past, the forest too, although the place where she stood now resembled it. She looked down without thinking much more, and found that happy girl again. The smile was contagious.

"Yes..."

People. She hadn't thought about it. Hilda must be her most beautiful discovery. Even if it caused her some pain, it was eclipsed by a star in the shape of a heart.

She wondered for a moment if Hilda was right. If perhaps this whole life of barriers and hiding was a mistake. But she dismissed it immediately, it couldn't be that way. Dad taught her, and Hilda agrees.

<And also things that hurt.

Cat realized she didn't have the courage to meet people like she did to explore places. She hid behind that idea, thinking she saved herself pain - or at least wanting to think so - and they crossed into the dangerous place.

(People don't have this.)

She thought about the sign as she crossed the threshold. She knew at least where she was going.

(Although... Hilda...)

Hilda did, she thought. At first, she was so aggressive that she might as well have had the same danger sign stuck on her forehead. Remembering such days today felt strange, almost funny. Looking back physically, and seeing that face she adores and not that scowling girl from the distant past is the definition of contrast.

That look Hilda gave her ignited something in her. And soon, the blue-haired girl had her child with eyes shining like someone appreciating a diamond, giving her her lips and asking for hers. Hilda doesn't hesitate, just a little kiss. They connect. Another fleeting show of affection that Cat feels carries more beauty than shooting stars adorned with the same adjective. After the kiss, she looked tender, happy, relaxed. Unaware of the hand that guards her heart, not because she cared little, but because she didn't want to look away from it just to look at herself.

"I'm fine."

She assured, no matter what, although her palm felt the strong heartbeat like a big drum of love calling her special girl. It works. Hilda looked at her once more and approached with that speed between slow and fast that the shortest love kisses have. Cat received her, closing her eyes in the sweet moment, savoring the love that grew once more in her chest. The second ended, Ashley opened her eyes to find a girl trying to avoid looking at love in the eyes.

<Levels don't explore themselves, Ashley.
Catherine moved her face closer. She embraced her, closing the small distance left, and pressed her lips and nose against Hilda's cheek. It wasn't a kiss, nor a sniff—she rubbed her face against her companion's profile like a loving kitten begging for affection. Words were unnecessary; she wanted closeness, tenderness.

Hilda could decide whether to give more, or resist this brief moment of sweet devotion before the albino gave up, releasing her with the careful hesitation of someone who doesn't want to let go, then crouching back to the short distance they'd had at first, eyes meeting to allow the blue-haired girl the next move—whether it'd be their final moment of closeness, or the first step forward.

Thus they ventured deeper into the most secluded part of level 5. This prison of flora stood like a monument, and Cat observed it as such. That green ceiling felt like a distorted vision of her home—a faint memory, blurred by years until it blended with some nearly lucid dream. The trees were glimpses: of her home, of the encyclopedia, and of this world where wooden forms existed that even she didn't know. The sight dazzled her so much that she slipped into an unusual carelessness.

"Oh!"

It was a slight bump against Hilda's back that brought her feet—and gaze—back to earth. She stepped back. She didn't apologize; it didn't occur to her to apologize for something that didn't seem particularly wrong. Hilda wasn't bothered either—she looked serious, but because of what lay at her feet.

<Spiky trap.

Cat's eyes dropped downward. There, she found the green floor rising into threatening, jagged points. The forest girl smiled at her and stepped forward, taking Hilda's place as guide.

"Don't worry."

She said, before crouching down beside the leaves of that plant—one well listed at the beginning of the encyclopedia under 'A' that she'd read. She stretched out her hand as she spoke, making her intention clear.

"They don't sting."

She grabbed one of its leaves, pulling from the top. She whispered a soft "sorry" to the plant, then used the knife on her spear to rip the leaf out from its base. Standing up, she turned halfway and showed the succulent plant to Hilda.

"It's good for the skin." -dad's info-

Maybe that would make the girl see it as something ready to smear on her hands, or maybe it sparked no interest at all—but Cat pulled her hand back anyway, just in case.

"But not like this."

She walked back along both their footprints, until they reached that bench whose days of usefulness had long been forgotten. She approached, leaned her upper body forward, and carefully placed the leaf on the bench, almost giving the impression that it was sitting there. She stepped back a few paces without taking her eyes off it, and smiled.

(The bench will be happy to be useful.)

She looked at Hilda.

"We can come back for the leaf later. It needs to..." -she thought explanations were unnecessary- "sit like this a moment before it works." -she'd left it cut-side down to drain the aloin-

Maybe Hilda was curious how something with such obvious spines could fail to prick. Catherine gave a simple explanation.

"It keeps snails away."

2/?

>>5895
>Ashley
But she didn't stop there. She walked over to where she had recognized another wild plant and crouched down beside it.

"Look."

From Hilda's position, it might have looked like a simple, generic plant. One of the many weeds growing in this now untamed environment. But from Catherine's perspective, as she brought her face close enough to confirm, there were those tiny hairs that would make anyone uncomfortable. It was a nettle.

"Come closer." -she asked, without taking her eyes off the plant- "some plants have false thorns..." -think of the smooth agave besides Aloe vera- "and others... They don't show their thorns. This one stings..."

And against all instinct, Catherine extended her hand and squeezed it hard, as if strangling the stem... without showing any ill effects.

"...unless you squeeze it hard."

The school of life. In Oregon, nettles were very common. Catherine got stung, and that's how she learned. Although the trick of holding them with this firmness came from Dad.

"Just so you know."

She let go quickly, as if afraid it would sting her anyway. It wouldn't be a pleasant experience, which is why she respected this plant.

"I know the plants here..." -she confirms in case one catches her eye- "that's a eucalyptus."

She pointed to a small shrub, far from the towering image of the majestic common eucalyptus that Hilda might not even know.

"It's called: 'varnished gum'." Varnished gum -found in the encyclopedia under 'E' for its scientific name- "...yes."

She didn't have much more to say. They were supposed to have flowers, but not yet. And this was a strange place for it to grow, but Hilda might not mind that. It served at least to show that she knows them. Just as Hilda knows Deathmoth jelly.

<If it were poison, I would have told you... Hey, look, a puddle of poison.

"Yes..." -it makes sense, but...- "...What if you didn't know what it was?" -that seemed like a valid question, would she have tasted the possible poison?-

<Do you want to see real poison?

"..."

She had no reaction, honestly, she didn't really care. But that happy face her child made was contagious, and she couldn't help but agree.

"Yes."

It wasn't a lie; seeing her so happy, it became a yes. Hilda was quick to go to her backpack and reveal a bottle containing a liquid of the darkest red possible before being black. It was, according to the label:
"Pain... Lícid?"

He put it into words, his eyes leaving the bottle to look at the girl, for her to confirm if it was a wrong word. It was, as he expected.

"Liquid" -that was the correct one- "...I'll teach you how to write it later."

He didn't want to directly say it was misspelled, but his words made it clear in a way he found more appropriate. Cat liked the idea of teaching Hilda how to write things. Not so much what was coming.

<Choose the plant you like the least.

"Oh..."

He soon guessed they were going to hurt one. His gaze wandered to the nettle that Cat had already grabbed today. He wondered if that was the best candidate, it stung, its little hairs hurt a lot, in a way that could justify a vital lesson. But the girl wouldn't say she didn't like it.

It wasn't her fault. It was perhaps all she had to live on. She couldn't move, nor speak. She just wanted to be planted and live without being bothered. If it hurt you, it was because you went to bother it, because its thorns were all it had. But you learned from that, and if you held it firmly, it wouldn't hurt you anymore. Catherine thought for a moment that if Hilda were a plant, perhaps she wouldn't be very different. And then, even saving distances, it seemed to her that she liked nettles a lot. She looked away from the nettle and preferred to approach any random weed.

"I'm sorry."

He repeated in a low voice. He extended his hand, plucking a small leaf at random. Just one, and he returned to Hilda to show it to her like a child handing over their lollipop.

"Just one leaf."

He stated it with words, so she would understand what he preferred. The instructions were to put it on the ground, and so it was done. The leaf lay on the floor with the bottle tilted over it like a roof. Cat watched intently as a single dark drop, which even alone wasn't transparent at all, protruded and separated from the mouth of the bottle. The darkness crushed the green, consuming its life like a flame until it was completely pulverized.

gasp -he gasped, he felt sorry for it-

<With rats it's more spectacular. They literally explode, it's like, boom!

"..." -he startled when they shook the bottle near him, Hilda covered it, but Cat still looked embarrassed- "..."
But she didn't object. She knew rats were a pest. She wasn't above killing them. She thought maybe making them explode was excessive, but she had resorted to crushing one with a rock.

(Does cruelty not matter if it's a pest?)

She didn't see herself doing it, but she thought she understood that way of looking at things, though it didn't quite convince her. She already had something Hilda and Dad agreed on, at least.

<I have it for emergencies, I don't think we'll use it. Did you know some people drink it?

"..." -she frowned in confusion, tilted her head, trying to understand from another perspective, she didn't succeed- "...You can drink it...?"

She would never have imagined it.

...

They reached the objective. Stuck to the wall, too far from the moths she already knew, from her home and from this world. The fluttering around her, of those small male insects, was a constant reminder of it.

And she had to kill it.

<Yes, you have to kill... Killing is good, it makes you strong.

(Kill...)

<If that thing saw you, it would hurt you without hesitation. I don't want you to get hurt, I want you to be like me. If you're scared... Don't be, because I'll be behind you, okay?

She knew it. Even though she was lost in thought, seeing every possibility, synthesizing the danger, her engine was always her. The spear that protected her was made by her, her motivation was her, and the breaths that now pushed her, in addition to her own, also came from her.

She wanted to confirm it for her. But she didn't. She was constantly talking in her mind to give herself the push she lacked.

<Remember, one hit.

She knew it.

(I have to kill it in one hit.)

She had it clear as the clearest water. She would be Ahab, aiming directly at her holy grail.

>AHAB
Propelled by his ivory leg, the captain leaped from the swaying Pequod, seagulls swarming his whale by the thousands. But then they looked like vultures anticipating a legendary death. Ahab ran with his harpoon as hard as his good leg and his obsession allowed.

It was huge. Her demon surprised her every time she faced it again. The twisted patterns tattooed on its back reminded her that even though she had the tools, nature still reigned on the wide sea.
<How...? How do you feel?

Her mouth hung open, staring at the corpse. But once she turned, her face was that neutral one as always.

"Ahab did not sink."

3/?

>>5917
>>5896
>Ahab
What?

>Ashley
sigh -closed her eyes, seeming relieved; when she opened them again, she looked normal- "I'm fine..."

She brought a hand to her back, rubbing it because it hurt, then looked at the other hand—this one hurt too. She glanced back at the girl who'd asked, and added to her answer:

"It hurts a little..." -her legs too, but she didn't think it necessary to mention that- "...but I'm fine..." -she stopped rubbing her back- "it's not the first time I've done it..." -Killed. She'd had to do it before- "but..."

Cat looked at the corpse. The spear had become one with death. Dissolved, by the acid the weapon received from her.

<Don't worry about the spear, I'll make you another when I can, twice as good.

"Hm..." -she looks at her again- "thanks..." -that would be good- "But... that broom belonged to the monkey." -maybe not the best moment, but clearly they'd destroyed a cleaning tool-

Such inconvenience was reduced to nothing by a sudden whimper. Both alert, they sharply turned to face the source of the sound. Nothing in sight. It was beyond the pink jelly. Catherine tilted her head, seeing nothing, and Hilda decided to lead the way—soon joined by the albino.

As they approached, they found within the liquid a figure from which the pink seemed to have stolen nearly all the brightness it once held. Except for the shine in those eyes, which even in pure agony preserved the full beauty of her soul—a soul that still had much ahead, even as the world gnawed at her body.

Catherine stared. Her mouth hung open, voiceless, eyes reflecting the horror at her feet.

The school of life. That idea felt unpleasant now. Dad had shown her many animal corpses, revealed their organs. She'd seen various stages of decomposition. All of this, Dad proudly reminded her, she wouldn't learn in a normal school—only in the school of life.

But she'd never seen anything like this.

Complete human destruction. The pain that consumes a person until they desperately beg for it to stop, the face of unbearable agony.

At that moment, Cat had a bad thought.

(I wish she'd died.)

She thought it, then immediately felt that what she'd thought was wrong. But after considering whether it truly was wrong, she thought maybe not. The pain she was witnessing was unfathomable, grotesque, making her feel terrible. She thought that if she were dead, it might only hurt to see her, but she could look away and carry on with sorrow.

But seeing her like this was different. She was now a woman in hellish torment, and that caused Cat something far worse than merely seeing her dead like those skeletons around her: she didn't know what to do.
to

luck,

there

was

another

sound.

An

excuse

to

look

at

something

else,

something

that

fell,

a

device

small

enough

to

fit

in

one's

hand.

It

was

a

camera.

Right

after

the

sound

of

it

dropping,

came

the

sound

of

dripping

water,

and

with

the

sound,

a

sensation.

Catherine

lifted

her

gaze

as

she

felt

the

cold

touch

of

water

against

her

skin.

Above

her,

she

found

the

culprit—

a

sprinkler.

"..."

She

looked

down

again;

the

shock

still

frozen

on

her

face.

<Ashley,

go

back

the

way

we

came

and

wait

for

me

on

the

path.

We

need

to

find

a

place

to

set

up

the

tent

before

it

rains.

Catherine

looked

up

again...

then

down

once

more.

She

said

nothing.

Did

nothing.

<I...

I

need

to

make

sure

of

something.

The

girl

stayed

a

moment

longer

in

that

spot.

She

turned

halfway

around,

and

without

words

to

even

confirm,

simply

walked

away.

The

sound

of

her

footsteps

was

all

that

reached

Hilda,

confirming

her

departure.

She

followed

the

path

as

instructed.

Went

back

to

that

bench,

where

plants

now

formed

a

barrier

like

three

doors

wide.

She

looked

up

again.

She

knew

they

were

indoors.

Knew

it

wouldn't

rain.

But

maybe

soon

she'd

hear

thunder.

sigh

Catherine

realized

she

hadn't

said

a

word

since

seeing

the

dying

woman.

Normally

she'd

have

responded

when

Hilda

spoke

to

her

directly,

but

at

that

moment,

it

never

crossed

her

mind.

(I

hope

I

didn't

upset

her...)

She

thought

that

might

have

been

very

rude—

Dad

would've

been

angry

not

getting

any

confirmation.

But

Cat

excused

herself,

blaming

the

horrific

images

before

her

for

her

loss

of

words.

When

something

fascinates

you,

or

horrifies

you,

sometimes

you're

left

speechless.

That

thought

crossed

her

mind

to

ease

the

worry

that

Hilda

might

be

upset.

(That's

what

I'll

tell

her.)

(And

I'll

explain

what

"speechless"

means.)

It

became

her

answer

to

the

possible

doubt.

And

it

wasn't

a

lie.

Death's

face

still

haunted

her

mind—

a

grisly

scene,

one

that,

like

the

night

of

Jean

Jacket,

she

might

never

forget.

But

one

she

thought

she

could

set

aside,

if

only

for

a

moment.

She

raised

her

hand,

holding

the

camera

she'd

grabbed

before

running

off,

in

a

quick,

nimble

motion—

one

Hilda

might

have

noticed

if

she'd

been

paying

closer

attention.

It

was

a

camera.

She

recognized

it

as

such

from

an

encyclopedia,

and

though

she

wasn't

sure

of

any

particular

memory,

she

thought

she'd

also

seen

one

in

a

shop

window.

What

she

was

certain

of

was

that

it

looked

different

from

the

ones

she

remembered—

except

for

the

lens,

which

betrayed

its

purpose:

taking

photos,

objects

similar

to

paintings,

but

made

with

a

single

button

and

a

flash.

(I

stole

it...)
It wasn't the first time she'd stolen, even if Hilda thought otherwise. Catherine had never been a completely good girl. She'd stolen for simple amusement, watching people search desperately for their lost belongings, convinced they'd misplaced them—or simply forgotten. She stole for the pleasure of possessing one more thing, like that time she scared a child and kept the ball they'd left behind. It was a pretty ball.

(...no...)

Cat shook her head. Her first excuse was that she'd planned to return the ball if the kid came back—which never happened. The second excuse, the one that justified everything beyond that single moment, came from her father:

(Objects are happy with us. Fulfilling a purpose.)

Dad stole. Or rather, he gave purpose to certain things, like plastic pipes from someone else's house. It was one of life's basic rules. Those pipes had sat in nothingness for so long, Dad occasionally watching them with the same focused attention Cat gave squirrels. And when it became clear their existence was abandonment, he chose to take them and give them purpose.

Cat wasn't different now. The camera had been useful once. Or maybe not very, but it was happy fulfilling a function. That wouldn't happen again—because the fingers that pressed its button would never move another inch.

(It's better.)

She put the camera away, convinced of her decision. Later, she'd show it to Hilda, and together they'd find a reason for it to exist. Now she just had to wait, and to wait for that moment, she approached the bench where the aloe leaf rested—already drained of all the aloin it once held.

(...doesn't look so bad to sit on now...)

She really wanted a seat at that moment, and she would've taken it despite the greenish mess, if not for the fresh puddle left by the aloe.

Catherine sighed.

(I'll wait...)

And she picked up the leaf...

...

"Mhm~🎶"

Strangely, Catherine hummed as she finished preparing something. The comfort she felt around Hilda had become incomparable. Her voice was as sweet as a canary's song in the morning, matching the tenderness of the melody about peaches she was singing—a nostalgic tune she'd soon share with Hilda.

"Mhmhm~"

She let a drop of aloe gel—already placed on a beautiful plate (now ruined by the experiment)—fall onto the veins of her wrist. She rubbed it in carefully, a smile creeping onto her lips. It felt incredibly refreshing, with no irritation at all. She thought Hilda's skin might have tolerated the plant's insides, aloin and all, but she preferred not to take risks.
Returned to the room, ready for the movie, jumped onto the bed behind Hilda and wrapped her legs around her. Before Hilda could utter a word, Cat's hands reached around from behind, grabbing those cheeks she loved so much, now slick with cooling gel.

"Look at this."

She said, making it clear this wasn't just a silly joke, and proceeded to smear the refreshing gel all over Hilda's face until it formed a moisturizing mask. Once done, she let go and waited for her to turn around. Cat couldn't help but giggle.

"You've got a green face."

She pointed out what amused her.

"Do you like it?"

She asked happily, hoping that even if skincare wasn't something Hilda actively sought, she'd at least enjoy the refreshing sensation of the natural product. Catherine enjoyed it on her own skin, at least.

After that, it was just a matter of finally enjoying the movie they'd picked. At first, Catherine was genuinely amazed by the special effects, but soon her attention began to drift.

At one point, she found herself hugging Hilda, missing the best parts of the film but not missing Hilda's reactions at all. She loved seeing her so engrossed in the on-screen punches, or the monsters so realistic that Catherine imagined they could easily exist here as "entities." She loved catching that sparkle in her eyes, sharing it with her own as they glanced at each other.

The albino ended up doing silly things at random moments. She grabbed Hilda's arm with her mouth, giving it a soft bite muffled by her lips. Another time, she hugged her hair, sniffed it, and rubbed her chin against it with the same affection Hilda had often shown hers. Then, she rolled across the bed, moving closer to Hilda like that, looking up at her from below, Cat's hair now dangling down to the floor. And both of them looked happy. Until the one with the random idea was the blue-haired girl.

<if you'd want to go look for living skeletons and cyclopes with me.

"¡!"

Cat wasn't in the middle of being silly. It came out of nowhere, during a perfectly normal moment while both were sitting like anyone simply trying to enjoy a movie. Catherine's eyes widened for a second—clearly taken aback, a reaction she couldn't hide behind her neutral expression.

"..." —she slowly lowered her eyelids back to their natural position, recomposing herself to answer properly. It must have taken her at least two seconds, though they felt longer— "...if we could..."

She didn't want to give a firm yes, even though she wished she could. Lying hurt... lying to Hilda hurt. She could lie to anyone, even to herself. But when she lied to Hilda... her heart filled with deep sadness.

"...if it's ever possible... I'd love to..."

Another thing she wasn't drawn to... but she'd love to go with her.

If only she could.

4/?

>>5897
>Ashley
(I wish I could...)

It was one of her last memories from that beloved outing. So painful. What she thought was that there were more mixed feelings than ever, and that the most beautiful moments were balanced with others of great mental burden.

(Bittersweet.)

She thought, to give her memory a taste. Although it ended on that bitter note. The way back was a constant question for her: 'If I disappear, will it be okay?'. It was fair to ask it, trying to enjoy that outing to the fullest was to make her goodbye count. But she didn't reach a conclusion that day, nor today.

She sighed again. Catherine wasn't one to show anything, but when her soul wanted to escape like that, she couldn't hold it back. The glass fogged slightly with her breath, and then she pulled away from it, tired of an introspection that led nowhere.

Today was an important day. The appointment with the doctor was scheduled for later. Killing time until it arrived was all she had left, she really needed a distraction after her conversation with Hilda.

>Catherine (a while ago)
"..."

Her mouth looked like a fish out of water. It was a constant struggle to sculpt a word that never came.

Her initial plan was horrible. She had thought of saying very bad things to Hilda, of lying more than ever, confessing that she supposedly didn't love her anymore. That they shouldn't love each other.

That plan was stupid. She knew it, but she thought that maybe then she wouldn't miss her even if she died painfully afterward. On paper, it was the best safety net, but in practice, there, saying such a thing was impossible for her. She wished for a moment that a certain potion from a certain book existed, so she could be very mean, but that was fantasy.

"Nothing..."

She finally told her, justifying having called her separately to explain the reason for her appointment with the doctor.

(Weak...)

She told herself, head down. But before Hilda left the room, she quickly raised her head.

"Hilda..."

Calling her one more time. Once she stopped, Catherine closed the distance Hilda had made, returning to a distance worthy of two people in love talking. The American looked uncomfortable, as never before, her hands at her sides moved slightly, rising a little as if they wanted to do something without knowing what, and her eyebrows were raised in the sadness of someone who foresees bad news. She couldn't look Hilda in the eyes for long, so she lowered her gaze, only for her eyes to be forcibly bounced back, as her father would be angry if she didn't speak to her properly.

"Look for me after I talk to the doctor. I'll tell you something..."

It was all she said. For Hilda, it was just another promise to her that she would surely have kept even if she hadn't asked, as they had gone everywhere as if they were constantly playing a three-legged race. But for Catherine, it was something more, a decision. She was forcing herself to confess what had been happening to her, no matter what Julia was going to tell her later.

...

>Ashley (present)
It was a day of moments that felt definitive. The time she was about to spend was both an attempt to kill time and an attempt to prepare herself to face what was coming.

She decided to spend some time in Charmy's office, with her, who would be her tutor for a few moments. During her stay, she had discovered that she liked the place because of the amount of things there were to look at.

"I kept a camera." -she mentioned while looking around the place-
This she had told Hilda on previous days, so they had to decide between them what to do with such a device. If it were a secret, Cat wouldn't have mentioned the above, but if it weren't, there was the confession.

"What is that?" -it was a record player- "record player... Does it work to play records?"

She reduced it to the most obvious, confused as to why a machine would be necessary for such a simple task.

"I can play them myself."

But such an object went beyond just playing. Catherine probably received an explanation, as she would need it.

"Where are they?"

She looked wherever they pointed. And she approached the collection of albums that adorned the place, Catherine became as curious as a cat once she discovered such a diversity of boxes. They were all covers, but they all possessed beautiful drawings of an enormous size. Like a Marie Deathmoth to the Light, she couldn't help but hover over the various packages and examine them, stopping from time to time at some pretty drawing or another.

The first one that caught her attention was the one that stood out for being voluminous rather than beautiful. Catherine looked at it curiously, and took it with both hands, lifting it. It was a cover with different shades of green, with the image of a gentleman from yesteryear in the upper right corner. The words written she didn't understand, they were in Spanish, but her interest came from the particular shape of the box, which broke with the square shape of its companions. Curving, becoming pointed, or flattening depending on the side. It seemed designed not to fit anywhere. It was surprising. Artaud

"Wow..." -she gave it the reaction it deserved-

Catherine leaned it against other records, and looked at others. Soon she found a drawing of those you couldn't ignore. A majestic elephant in a forest. The night looked cold, but it mattered little, as the good-natured giant kept her warm with that bonfire fanned by his trunk like bellows The Glow Pt. 2

"Little elephant..."

She left that one, and moved to the next. A man looked at the sky in a red landscape like a painting, or taken from a painting that was about to be erased. That's what Catherine thought, that it was paint, because this same red color was seen superimposed on the man's bare chest. The girl narrowed her eyes suspiciously. She wasn't sure if he really had that painted on his chest or not. I let love in

"..." -she gave a scrutinizing look- "I don't like it." -clear example that it's wrong to judge a book by its cover-

She left this one and picked up another. Upon lifting it, she opened her eyes in surprise. She was greeted by the face of a... thing. She couldn't tell what it was, some kind of animal lurking in the deepest darkness. But it wasn't any animal she recognized. It was as if something about it was very wrong. She put it down quickly, she didn't want to keep looking into those eyes of the night. The Seer

"..." -she blinked a little-

Not knowing what to say about it, and not having found anything that caught her attention yet, she picked up one more. Thus lifting a most normal cover. A drawing, an almost childish drawing. Lookaftering

"Little hare..."

She recognized it well. It was a hare, not a rabbit. Those legs didn't fool anyone. Catherine looked at Charmy with this album in her hands and confessed:

"I want to listen to this one." -that image connected with her-

Cat stood up, walked a bit to Charmy, showing him the record more closely. Holding it with both hands as you would a book open, to show the other some particular pages.

"Can we play it?"

I'd like to develop the scene of listening to the record after your response, to give it space and let it breathe on its own keksito

5/7 confirmed

>>5897
>Ashley
Later, the girl found herself sitting in a chair, already waiting for the time that, according to Charmy, was getting closer and closer.

To pass the last moments, she waited by the door. A certain song had been stuck in her head for a while, but she didn't want to think about it yet, so she ended up picking up a small book that looked cute from its cover and letting it steal her attention for a bit.

The story was very short, and the little rooster so tenderly drawn to sell the work was a very important character. The pages, yellowish and perfumed by the antiquity of the paper, went by quickly, giving way to an ending that left the girl with a grimace of sadness.

She turned the last page and looked at the back cover, as if expecting more. But all she found was the certainty that the short novel had left her sad and full of uncertainty. That story showed a very fitting parallel with her that touched something in her heart or near it in a way that hurt.

She looked at the door. The one through which the doctor would soon arrive, and she couldn't help but compare herself to the protagonist in her wait. But with the key difference of hope. Catherine expected the worst. She realized at that moment that all this time she hadn't had hope. That she assumed whatever the doctor was going to say would greatly harm her and Hilda as well.

Catherine puffed out her chest like a turkey showing off its feathers. At first, she seemed to want to channel the colonel's energy... but she let out the air with another sigh, returning to her shy reality.

(I wish I could have more hope...)

...

A while later, there was a knock at the door. Cat seemed to startle, as if that tapping was her cue to exist. She quickly looked at Charmy, who was glancing outside before giving her the signal. The girl went down and ran, with the clumsiness of being unaccustomed to the coat, to the door to open it quickly. It was an inverted slam, but to the wind, just a slam that it used to burst into the house, almost breaking Cat's nose, who proceeded to hold it with her whole body and push it with her shoulder to return it where it belonged.

(Perfect.)
Catherine nodded to herself, acknowledging her own good work before turning and finding the only person this visitor could possibly be.

"You're right on time." -or rather, shortly after Charmy announced she'd be arriving soon. Such a thing deserves recognition-

<Hello, darling. Do you remember me?

Cat responded with a nod and nothing more. It would be difficult to forget that first day, and she was a big part of that first day.

<I've been told you've made new friends.

(Not true...)

She kept that to herself. She didn't need to receive a response like that. For Cat, her only real connection has been Hilda.

(...people...)

She had an echo of her blue child's words. The one where she said perhaps people were worth as much as a pretty place. Catherine dismissed the idea of meeting more people at that moment, the idea of meeting more people was difficult for her. That was perhaps more the Catherine who stayed in Oregon than the one standing before Julia now.

An intrusive thought sprang like a spring in her brain: 'Won't I regret this?'

(No.) -she denied the idea as soon as she could- (everything was as it should have been.)

And so she tried to calm herself, knowing those words were somewhat hollow, but also knowing she couldn't do any more to change them now.

<I hope you also discovered some music you like.

"..." -she looked up, derailing her train of thought, she was surprised, feeling as if she had guessed what had happened only a few hours ago-

(That doesn't make sense...)

But she didn't allow herself to think something so silly. And those raised boxes and her little mouth turned into a smooth circle, returned to their original position. Neutral for a second, then almost uncomfortable with her eyebrows lowering to squint her eyes, which went to the side and down, fleeing those scrutinizing eyes.

"...yes..."

She responded almost listlessly. The song that had been burned into her mind for a while now seemed beautiful to her, as if from a fairy tale. One of those she used to read and share with dad on nights when her whole world seemed to be made of joy. When she was happy.
But at the same time, it filled her with enormous sadness. Not just laden with nostalgia, but because she had put into melody what she planned to tell Hilda, stealing from Dad that idea of quoting lines from books and incorporating them into real life, as if Cat didn't know that one thing or another was thought up by someone else. Someone who didn't really exist.

Hilda wouldn't know. Maybe Cat would tell her, but otherwise, she wouldn't know. That wouldn't matter much. What the girl was looking for was simply to verbalize what she feared most in case this went wrong.

The three of them went to a more private place. The basement.

(The opposite of the attic.)

That's right. Cat sat in the chair they designated for her.

(It's cold.)

She thought she'd prefer a less cold one, but soon that thought was replaced by another confirming that she didn't care. Julia approached her and looked into her huge eyes. Catherine was as cooperative as possible, even though she didn't want to be. Allowing her head to be manipulated so the flashlight had better access to her sea of green. Her pupils contracted and her eyelids narrowed at the hand holding them open uncomfortably.

<Tell me everything you can about your episodes. The more detailed you are, the better.

"Everything..." -she repeated, trying to synthesize the magnitude of such a request-

The doctor put down the flashlight. Cat blinked several times, hoping that would be enough to calm her sensitive eyes. It turns out she's a girl very accustomed to nightlife, in the literal sense, meaning she enjoyed moving around the woods at night. Not jumping between bars, especially when the only one she'd been to exploded.

They give her a little tap. Catherine kicks her leg. Looking at her leg, she made a face of worried surprise she couldn't help, her eyebrows arched and her lips slightly parted, revealing a glimpse of her white teeth. Then she looked at Julia with the same expression.

"I didn't do that...!"

She sounded as if she had just failed at something and had to justify herself. Her back was slightly raised, as if the fright, impatience, or nerves wanted to tear her from the chair.

<Depending on what you tell me, I'll be able to infer whether what's affecting you is psychological... Or a material and physical phenomenon.

"..." -she shrank back in her seat-
That was what she most wanted to know... And, once again, returning her face to its normal, expressionless state, she remembered her greatest fear: that she didn't know which of the two options was actually worse.

They asked her to say 'ah'.

"Ah."

It was short and literal. Julia had to explain a bit more to get to the:

"Ahhhhhh"

She saw herself in another world as they put a popsicle stick in her mouth. With her gaze lost on the wall visible to the side of the doctor, she doesn't remember thinking anything in particular, but she was surely thinking about everything. Julia seemed blurry, as if the wall were the most important thing in her vision. Then the examination stopped.

<On a superficial level, I don't perceive anything out of place beyond some particularly prominent canines. For now, I'll rule out vampirism.

"..."

(That's fantasy.)

Dracula... She had seen Bigfoot, and it was very curious, but vampires still sounded like fantasy to her. She, clearly, wasn't one. Otherwise, she would know. That's what she thought. Her canines were just like that, they had to be, for biting. Although it was a bit strange. Dad's were normal. She always thought it was because maybe hers were like Mom's, Dad always said Cat looked a lot like her mother. Just like her, but small...

Then Julia reaches for a sandwich.

(Clearly not food.)

In its classic flavor vs. food battle, this thing was the most 'flavor' of all flavors. More than Tarzan's Flavor, which was called that.

(Heh.)

The corners of her lips curved upward for a second from the inside joke. Then they quickly returned to their place, remembering that she wanted to keep her face neutral. Anyway, the point was that that sandwich wasn't food. Her little nose twitched a bit from the overload of aromas, but she got used to it easily and quickly.

The combination struck her as extremely strange. Meat and banana combined was odd to her. But she didn't judge it; if Cat got really hungry, she would have devoured it too. Even if Dad would never have allowed her to even touch food that looked so unhealthy with a stick.

<I didn't have time to eat dinner during the trip. Do you mind if I eat while we talk? It's an Elvis. If you'd like, I can offer you some.

"No."

That answer was for both, the question and the offer.

Now, all that remained was to answer...

6/7 SIX SEEVEEEEN

>>5904
>But it also means that victory or defeat will be the responsibility of all of humanity. Aren't you scared of what they'll put on our epitaph?

"What they'll put on my tombstone?" He doesn't understand the other word. "No. I am scared of dying, but not of thinking about how I'm going to die. I'll surely be more scared when the worm is already on top of us."

Imagining a hideous bug is coming to kill him is like reading a creepypasta. At most, he'll think a fat worm promoting peace and love is a silly monster and believe it's one of those parodies. It's when he has something like that in front of him and truly threatening his life that he starts to feel fear.

>Are you sure? Giordano told the truth, he defended that the Earth revolves around the sun, and they threw him in the fire. Sometimes people can't live with the truth. The man I came from fought with it every day.

"It's also not certain they'll give me anything important to do just because I'm older than I look. I'm still not an Action Man, or a G.I. Joe, or at least a Rambo."

He stands on the stool to look again at his unimpressive physique, searching for a flabby or fleshy spot to pinch to highlight, of which he probably has several due to his sedentary life in recent weeks.

"The other thing I was thinking of was looking for those white native girls. It seemed like they already knew I wasn't a child and they gave me the bow. But Tom was the one who knew where they were... And well..."

He sits back down with his head bowed. Tom is like his first or second role model in the storage rooms, a strong and good guy who survived many things, except Bill.

"If the man you came from was a liar, then all the more reason not to be one. I don't know if it was the same guy I met, but I disliked him from the start. People like that are better off going to the..." He gets too emotional and almost swears at the table, it takes him a few moments to calm down and he pretends to pass them with a spoonful of the food he has left. "May they go to hell. If someone is a bad influence, you can stop hanging out with them, even if they're family."

>Okay, okay! I won't sell it... For now. But I can't give it back to you either, many of its parts are soaked in fuel, it's very flammable.

"M-mm." He nods. "Tom-toma..."
The emotions he was trying to contain as an unflappable male are of great help when he needs to act like a crying little girl and manages to save Flametower from being sold, but it works too well and he has a hard time talking or breathing properly for a while, so he just asks Alondra to open her hand to give him the trinkets he picked up after landing, to see if they help with the repair.

After that, he turns around and zips up his coat to cover as much of his face as possible out of shame. Luckily, no one else he knows pays attention to his humiliation.

>The fly came out of here.

"Mm?" He covers his nose "From your finger?" He crosses his eyes to look at the finger in front of his nose and any holes it might have.

>I pricked something wet, what do you think it is?

"Something dead?" It smells like that to him "Some things release a lot of juices when they've been dead for a while and flies like those things."

>>5905
"Good morning." He says to Flametower, and it is, because it's dawning dry, which for him is a victory.

He looks at the men left in the village working outside and yawns, reconsidering again about working even though no one is demanding it. The chewed-up blanket he got out of bed even sounds cozy after feeling the aches from the night before. He's about to fall asleep standing up when something suddenly touches his shoulder.

>Wet it with milk.

"Eeek!" He squeaks again but plays it tough and just watches Charli until he receives the stale bread "Thanks..." He bites the bread without paying attention and checks how hard it is, this, too, he tries to ignore to maintain appearances "Good morning."

After breakfast, he accompanies Charli to deal with a problem he can completely empathize with.

"I never knew why girls always went to the bathroom together. I thought it was to gossip more than to pee, but not that they did both things at the same time." He speaks from outside the bathroom as Charli asked, leaning his back and the sole of a shoe against the wall with a hard look as if he were a bouncer outside a club "My grandma always said only crazy people talked to themselves, I didn't understand how videos or the internet worked and she'd scold me when she saw me recording myself with my phone. I still recorded more when I was out of the house, in some abandoned place. I stopped recording videos because no one watched them and I didn't want someone who was in those places to hear me."
He doesn't regret his failed career as an influencer, content creator, urban explorer, or whatever it was, really, it's obvious nobody succeeds with that stuff, it doesn't bother him at all to fail. After all, exploring dangerous places at night is something you do for the love of it, or out of hatred for your family and as an excuse to spend less time at home with them... Although if getting another, more masculine body doesn't work out but escaping from storage rooms does, maybe he'll get more views just with the face he already has.

"Hey... Do you do anything specific with your hair or is that magic too? Instead of combing it, I just put on a cap and that was it." He still misses her "But if I'm going to be in this body for a long time, maybe-"

The door suddenly opens and he jumps in surprise.

>I'm as good as new. Let's go back.

"Mm..." He points to his shoe "You've got... something on there."

Outside, they recognize Alondra's new car, although 'new' isn't the right word.

>Do you like it? It's a loan from the local government. Its previous owner was torn to shreds by the ice zombies, I doubt they'll want it back...

"Yes!" He almost jumps into the car with excitement, although the space doesn't allow it.

It's very strange for him to be able to travel by car, not even by taxi, for the car to belong to someone he knows is hard to believe, he doesn't care much if it's an old or used car, as long as it works.

"Does the government give loans just like that to anyone who asks or are you someone important in town? It seemed strange to see you last night with the mayor on... that stage."

Halfway there, they stop so he can see again how Alondra's giant robot ended up and wonder how a single guy with a whip and a revolver did that without even being touched by one of those heavy weapons.

"Did you also kill someone last night?" Alondra will know better than anyone, it's best to ask her directly. He's not going to believe that such a large war machine shot peace and love, unless they were the kind the town sheriff always carried on her shoulder.

>Do you see those guys working on top of the palisade?

"If I didn't see them, I shouldn't even have a bow." He squints to see if he recognizes any of them, which is difficult because he only knew about 4 people from the BNTG by sight, although the fact that they are still here after having finished providing reinforcements last night is a good thing, and that there are more than a handful is even better.
>In the cold air, the final wave is smelled and awaited. If you were old enough to know video games, the closest analogy would be preparing to play Left or Dead 7 in real life.

"Do you have to be old to know games?" He doesn't understand, in all the stores they always sold him any game regardless of the number on the ESRB cover. "In Plants versus Zombies there were waves too." He doesn't know the other game, while he remembers how easy it was to pirate and install even on school computers.

After the town was almost taken over by unknown mercenaries, assuming that's what happened, having strangers wandering around the town again doesn't make him trust them either, but surely it won't happen again. He gets to work, until someone else calls him.

>A lemonade, please.

"F-flametower, the lemonade!" He shouts almost immediately out of nervous reflex, not wanting to lose a customer, but the robot he's shouting at isn't making lemonade, it's in a backpack.

>Artemis.

"What did you call me?" Genuinely confused.

>No, no. Your bow. You're like Artemis now. That's cool.

"Ah." He stands tall, proud. "I don't know her." He puts his finger on his chin and starts thinking. "Hmm... There was a guy in The Walking Dead with a bow too. Darryl, I think it was, or Dale. I don't know, that series had like 10 seasons and I stopped watching it. But he was cool too, he used arrows to shoot zombies without making more noise and attracting more zombies."

He takes the arrow Dora extends to him and puts it away, his hand trembling, not knowing if he even has lemonade to give her. He looks around nervously, looking for an excuse to stall for time among the rubble of his house or a glass of lemonade conveniently placed somewhere.

"Uhh... Were you here last night too? The kids around here are really tough, huh... Want to see it?" He offers her the bow to entertain herself while he runs off to find lemonade somewhere. "I'll be right back... Alondra! Do we have lemonade!?"
I think you also left me a bit more luck than I should have had, I used 1 in the fight and only leveled up 1 with experience.

>>5897
>Ashley
...and she stayed like that. Sitting there with a blank expression for a while.

She was in one of those situations again—ones she never got used to. An interrogation. Getting information out of Cat was, as always, a small test of endurance. Though maybe "patience" was the more appropriate word.

To begin with... well, the girl didn't know where to start. One would say "from the beginning," and she thought that herself, but floating in the air was also the question of whether she even wanted to start, even though she was the one who agreed to the conversation. Also, how to start. Questions piled up, and though they were the most basic ones, in situations like this they became the heaviest and hardest to answer.

Almost instinctively, Cat's gaze drifted away, eventually landing on Charmy, who was comfortably sitting in her box. The girl's expression said nothing, but her inaction spoke for itself. She spent a few moments using her blank face to silently convey her wish that the woman would speak for her. Charmy did know quite a bit about the story after all, though it would be inappropriate for someone else to take the lead in the orchestra she herself had assembled.

Realizing her attempt had failed, her face continued avoiding Julia, but now also Charmy. She looked here, there, and though the basement had few things of interest—especially compared to the leader's office—that wasn't really the point; the point was to buy some time.

"Aren't you going to auscultate me?"

She asked. That was a word she never used, and she knew it. She wouldn't have used it in other contexts, beyond the obvious reason, because it was one of those words she discarded the moment she learned it. Like "subreption," even though it fit her life perfectly, or "garrulous," because that sounded strange to her, and besides, it was the opposite of the quiet and reserved Catherine.

"..." —she looked back at Julia— "Why do you combine them?" —more precisely, she was looking at the sandwich— "meat and banana." —it sounded strange— "it looks unhealthy. But bananas are healthy. Do they cancel out the lack of nutrition?"

That was one way to see it.

"Is it bittersweet?" —like her memories?—

...finally, she looked her in the eyes.

"...I kept... a camera..." —another random piece of information— "..." —she sighed, curling up slightly in her seat; since those days in level 5, she could no longer hide her feelings like before—

The sigh made her lower her head for a moment. When she lifted it again, her eyebrows were slightly drooped, weighed down by sadness.

"I'll tell you... everything."

And so she did:

"The first thing that happened was a long time ago. Many days."

"I don't know about the second... during those days I couldn't sleep... The days... I couldn't tell them apart."

"..." —such a confession deserved a pause; she looked at the floor for a moment, but forced herself to raise her head again— "that doesn't matter." —more or less— "it happened out of nowhere... it was at night..." —she looked at the doctor with the seriousness trauma demands— "everything stopped... everything. Only I... I could move."

She raised her hand, placing a palm into the air to express what came next.

"And the air... in front of me..." —she stared at the space before her palm, at the distance where the phenomenon had appeared that night— "it cracked... like glass... and... something... something looked at me... it was..." —she suddenly closed her eyes, bringing her hand to her head, grimacing— "ow..."
It happened again. And it would keep happening. Remembering that thing made her head hurt—a headache like when you drink something icy too fast. Fleeting, but sharp, like a slap to the brain.

Without removing her hand from her forehead, she looked at Julia, the same worry she felt mirrored on the doctor’s face.

"It hurt so much to see it... it... it hurt my head..." She shook her head slightly. "It hurts," she corrected herself. "If I remember... it hurts."

She managed to lower her hand. Once that was settled, and once Cat stopped staring at her shoes like she was waiting for a terrible scolding, she lifted her gaze slightly, looking up at the doctor from below.

"...other things happened after... recently..."

No one knew this. Not even Charmy... not Hilda. This was new.

"When I was in the urban level with Hilda..."—the 5—"and we were eating... something strange happened..."

She didn’t know how to begin. Again. But she forced herself not to deflect, though obeying her own command took at least half a minute—unless she was rushed, which might’ve backfired.

"...I... I don’t know how... but I saw myself... I saw myself trapped. By some... clothing..."—she hugged herself, mimicking the grip of a straitjacket—"by clothes that wouldn’t let me move... I couldn’t move at all... it was... it was horrible..."—she leaned slightly forward, giving herself the look of a disturbed child that her story had been missing—

"And... and... I was... locked inside a night. It was raining... there was a storm. And someone was talking to me... a doctor... Doctor... Kraepelin..."—she recalled as the details came back—"he was telling me..."—and she raised her eyes, wide open, to quote—"...You must come back to us... you have to return... to the real world..."

She looked down again. The floor seemed like the best place to gather her thoughts. That scene terrified her more than any monster ever could. She’d felt trapped, lost, distant. Like losing everything in the blink of an eye.

"I didn’t want that... I didn’t want it... and... when it ended... I was just back at the table. Like... nothing had happened..."

...it took her a moment to compose herself. But she realized that having her own arms wrapped around her was the most comfortable way to finish talking.

"Also... I saw a basket..."

She’d wanted to talk about that with Hilda, but distractions made it impossible. She lifted her gaze, now with her usual calm back on her face.

"Do babies go in baskets?"

That question she’d practiced earlier that day, and had finally managed to ask.

"I saw a woman giving a basket to a monkey... and... I also saw a baby’s hand... same day."—the day of the other vision, she means—"I don’t know if I imagined it... dad..."—she stopped hugging herself, realizing she’d said too much, placed her hands on the chair, and her eyes drifted to the wall parallel to Charmy—"dad used to see things sometimes..."—she confessed outright, figuring Julia wouldn’t just drop the question—

It took her another second to look back. She met the doctor’s gaze with all the seriousness her blank expression could convey. And she confessed the last strange thing that had unsettled her:

"I also felt a strange tingling in my vagina."

7/7

>>5912
>someone give me a funny image
This:

>>5914
>Irene

...

The magic mare explains her powers concentrated in her equine hips.

"Ehhh...I guess?" After cow explanations, Irene understands better "Ohhh, like telekinesis?" The problem was that the bus had to be destroyed like the one they found outside "Oh...well"

Irene stays quiet, weighing the situation.

"We'll discuss it tomorrow"

Things don't get better the next day.

"Hey!, there's no reason to insult her, Hank" Says Irene, although the discussion doesn't progress much, the option was risky and nobody wanted to abandon anyone, the girls were in the bus and...

Irene's eyes suddenly open wide, noticing the anomaly, something was wrong. She stands up and asks Francine, seeing that both were back facing away from the bus.

"Francine...how many people did we start with on the bus when we left the city?" She wanted a headcount, and she knew the woman would know names and faces better than her "How many people did we lose?" She wanted to keep track properly. With a >, she makes silence before saying the following "So, now we would be me, Claus, the Smiler, you, Hank, his daughter, Sue, Heather, the baby, Nad and Rosy, am I wrong?" Again, she wanted confirmation to not sound like a crazy person "If that's the case...who is Martha?"

She didn't have a very close relationship with the people in the god group, they lost Leon, Marco, Birds, the puppet boy, but keeping track herself, that last name of the person in the bus didn't compute.

"Hank, call your daughter outside, and have her bring Sue" She was already preparing for the possibility, trying to keep her voice low while continuing to ask Francine "What would be the chances of someone sneaking into the group without us noticing?" In terms of knowledge about entities, she trusted these wanderers more

even when I noticed it, I feel bad for going back to check and see if it was wrong or not, kek

>>5913
<Martín Emilios Palacios (Year 30, Day 19, Hour 11)
HP: 67/100
Energy: 42/50
Hunger: 16/20 - Thirst: 16/20
-Strength: 14
-Agility: 13 - 5 Watered Hazmat Suit V2
-Endurance: 14 + 10 Watered Hazmat Suit V2
-Luck: 3
Inventory
-Pockets 2/4
Thalasin (19/30)
Magnum Revolver (0/6. Damage x3, Priority +2)
Abilities:
Werewolf (Transformation): x2 base stats. x3 base stats in aquatic environments.

In the Frontrooms
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeILSPhyExw▾The artist lights up a peculiar, metallic device, from which he inhales a sweetened vapor. His eyes under the sunglasses focus on the styrofoam sphere. A group of strangers surrounds them, saying nothing, just listening and nodding occasionally, attentive to the conversation.

Coco: Haven't you considered that the problem might be you? Your lack of imagination, of desire. Try looking at it from another angle... like this, from the side, tilted, so it looks more imposing. It's far from the real thing, but hardly anyone is brave enough to face true immensity. My original idea was to stuff a blue whale, but there wasn't enough space, nor enough state funding. It's a dark age for avant-garde art.

After leaving the gallery, you are overcome with joy, you take a deep breath of that air of normalcy, and look for a bench to rest in full contentment (-10 HP). The deceptively soft-looking concrete pounds your body. But that doesn't dampen your joy. You stand up, shout, cry, and snot gets into your mouth. Passersby make sure to keep a safe distance from you.

You look for a public telephone. You find an available booth, spray-painted with graffiti like a whore abused by a crowd. Someone left a volume of Condorito on the phone. When you pick up the receiver and hold it near your ear, you only hear silence, pressing the buttons produces no sound, and you doubt a coin would fix things. You also suspect the puddle at your feet isn't old water...

You return to the gallery and locate the man from before surrounded by his fans, who are asking him about Immensity and his muses. You have to wait for them to disperse before approaching him and asking to borrow his cell phone for a moment to make a call. He takes another puff from his vape.
Coco: Better not. I have a feeling you can't be trusted. Be honest, how many did you abandon?

After that curt rejection, there's no choice but to walk to Daniel's house. You rack your brain and start to navigate the streets and avenues. Unlike the backrooms, the constant stimuli make exploring twice as exhausting. An abortion choreography blocked your path and forced you to linger; the way they drop naked toys tied with nylons from their waists to the ground is almost hypnotic.

There are fewer peddlers than before, and some police officers stop you to ask if you were carrying construction materials. They caught you, almost patted down your pistol, but a radio alert about a lunatic hijacking a commercial plane and crashing it into his parents' house causes them to lose interest in you and rush to do their duty.

After all those details, you reach Villa 31. With its block houses, colorful, superimposed, piled up, battling each other, and barred balconies from which you are watched with distrust. You see a bakery you used to frequent, but the sign sticking out indicates it has become a free and popular clinic, run by a slum priest named Carlos. You could try to sell the pills; anyway, with your illness, you weren't going to last long, although since you returned from the future, you haven't checked if your holes are worse.

You go down a very narrow alley; you have to turn sideways to let other pedestrians pass. You cross by a pile of old, wet cardboard boxes; one catches your attention because drowned puppies are floating inside. You climb a staircase and are relieved to see the door of a house open and spot pieces of hair on the floor. Simon is still in the hairdressing business; some things never change. You peek inside... A woman is cutting a boy's hair, though her features seem powerfully familiar to you.

Daniel. You remember your objective. You keep climbing and reach a metal door. You just have to knock, and while you're at it, think about what to do with your life. What was the last thing you remember before falling into the backrooms, what was the date before you got lost in liminality?

Sorry for the delay. These last few days have been complicated for me. Starting Monday, I will try to respond to everyone as soon as possible.

>>6707

"I don't know what you expect either, dude, it's Latam"

He says, half-laughing, to the artist with an ego so inflated he thinks they're actually going to give him that much money for something so trivial. Leaving him behind, he starts exploring, coming across a bench harder than a bitch's cunt. Nothing to be surprised about, anti-homeless architecture has been a thing for years. Besides, with all the bruises and stuff he must have, it's normal that it hurts, which reminds him, wasn't he sick? He had pills for that, maybe if he takes one it'll help a bit.

He takes a couple of laps around the pharmacies to see if they can get him more and what the price is. He already knows it's going to cost an arm and a leg, but whatever, he'll worry about the money later. Now the thing was to find a phone, which he does. It's all covered in graffiti, piss, and a probably dead chick. Normal stuff, it's Latam, more than Mexico, it's Latam, but still Latam.

"Queti, worry about your own life, dude, and don't come here playing soldier for people you don't even know"

He replies with all the bad vibes and a sour face possible. Whatever happened in the backrooms stays in the backrooms, he's not going to dwell on the topic or pretend to cry over things that should have been clear by now that he doesn't give a shit about. His life is his and others' is theirs, let everyone take care of themselves however they want. For Martín, "taking care of himself" means continuing to live without thinking too much about what happened or what he did.

"Oh, and acting all high and mighty because others supposedly don't understand your 'art' is for a complete idiot. If you can't explain yourself, then it's your fault, not theirs"

Before leaving, he takes the opportunity to curse out the artistic vision of the asshole who wouldn't lend him the phone. He considered transforming and tearing everything down just to mess with him, but he'd better save that in case he has to go out and steal. Given the circumstances, he can't rule out having to do it depending on how the house ended up.
Since he doesn't even have money for a taxi, he has to walk a good couple of hours to get home. The police stop him halfway, which is not that strange given how he's dressed. The only odd thing about all this is not recognizing their faces; it seems they got rid of the others while he was gone.

"The railing, how I missed the railing of this place"

He takes a second to deeply inhale the smell of burnt tires and stagnant water. He ends up coughing for a couple of minutes, having lost the habit, but once that's done, he keeps walking as if nothing happened. The broken, pothole-filled streets, the crumbling houses, the trash piled up in vacant lots, the narrow alleyways barely wide enough to squeeze through. If you think about it, there's not much difference between living here and in the backrooms. Well, there is a difference, he knows this area and what to expect. Like Simón's barbershop, for example. Did he have a daughter? He'll ask later, for now, he has to check the house.

He had planned to call Daniel to save him the walk and have him pick him up on his motorcycle while they caught up. Since he made the trip, he could bother to knock on his door and say hello, but he prefers to check his own shack first. He just has to keep going straight for a couple more blocks.

It was the 2022 World Cup final when he woke up in the backrooms after drinking too much because Argentina won the championship. He still doesn't know how much time has passed on this side, but one thing is clear. He doesn't have to worry about overdue bills because, like everyone in this neighborhood, he's hooked up to every service available, so they can't take his house for that reason. Stealing it is another matter, which they also couldn't do because everyone knows that besides the TV, he has nothing worth taking. Now the question is to find out if anyone else decided to occupy his house. If that's the case, he has a gun and an extra 60 kilos of fat to take out whoever it is.

>>5890
Rando scratches his head with the back of his machete because his mask doesn't protect him but sometimes it doesn't let him get cut...

[Cat?]

[You're right. Cocytus is a tough nut to crack, if it's the one I know... Certain death awaits you if it were just you, but... you have me here, don't you?]

[Hm... So far it's been good to trust you... I guess I'll do it again...]

[Don't worry, I'll take advantage of this situation as best I can, it's my job...]

The battle continues and they land good blows, so good that the Latino has to pull out one of his aces up his sleeve to claim victory. Leaving the cat butler a little something in the process... Rando, although he can't see it, knows when something is dangerous and gets on guard while Ghasto explains to him.

[I know my nature is too much for a human to understand, but, reduced to a mere beast? Hmph!]

He pouts, very dignified, while also preparing to devour him as soon as he's weak enough because he'll need his mass for what he plans to do.

[I wasn't a gift, I'm here on loan, which is only possible through the benevolence of my mistress... Much more adorable than a crude providence.]

[What do we do now?]

[Prepare yourself... The one you should attack is the owner of the zoo... I'll gladly make an opening for you...]

Ghastarla snakes its tail and scratches its revolver a bit while the muscular guy in a combat stance runs among the animals to reach Nick and cut his throat. He plans to use all the necessary effort in this race.
Depending on the outcome, he looks towards Marietta, a little worried, but from what he already knows, she's the least threatened here...

[I want you all to myself, him too, it just had to be resolved like this! Sorry for waking you up!]

He shouts before returning to the fight or not.

Rando:
F: 1d50 = 8 A: 1d50 = 14

Ghasto:
F: 1d50 = 32 G; 1d50 = 15

>aldo

As I see it, I can use the effort mode and I have full points. As it suits me, I'll roll enough dice to be faster than the beasts and kill the black guy.

>aldo 2

Fuck... I check the date and I realize I haven't visited the thread in months. I thought the roleplay was already over kuek.

And well, I'm no longer in my beautiful country because some shitty Chinese won the elections so I've had a lot of work to do... I apologize for the delay, but I'm already married to the roleplay, I want to see it through to the end and for Marietta to be happy before I retire for good.

How are you, my negro? I don't know how long ago it came out or if you've been asked, but did you see the Backrooms movie? What did you think of it?

It shook hard here. So scary.

>>5915
>>5916
<Catherine Hills/Ashley Williams (Day 23. Hour 8)
HP: 110/110
Energy: 39/70
Hunger: 20/20 - Thirst: 19/20
-Strength: 5 + 20 Hilda's Spear
-Agility: 12
-Endurance: 4
-Luck: 1 + 0 Hilda's Necklace + Hilda's Flower Crown (Melting)
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Book: New Horizons and Relative Axes, by C.H. Pickles.
Notebook
Pencil
Handful of salt
-Sack 1/5
Liminal Dictionary

Level 5
You heard her yearning murmurs during sleep. And also her laughter as she carried you on her shoulders. Discomfort and doubt also have their particular timbre, and you recognize them in Hilda when it seems her own words trap her in a mysterious checkmate. Her face recoils for a moment, but her regretful eyes return to you as if seeking mysterious comfort, asking something of you. Perhaps time?

Hilda: It can't be like this, due to my carelessness, I refuse.

She closes her eyes and shakes her head until she stops herself with her palms. She reopens her gaze and looks at you, all seriousness radiating from her.

Hilda: When I'm ready, I promise I'll tell you. Scout's honor.

After that oath, both of you continue the journey. Perhaps doubts or theories about the word that slipped out will assail you, but Hilda displaces them with her games or her talks.

Hilda: If we got trapped and ran out of food, and had to eat ourselves, what would you do?

She asks, tilting her head towards you, half her face tinted with the dull gold filtering into the barred glass corridor. It's a rather morbid topic of conversation especially considering my recent experience, but not atypical of Hilda.

Hilda: I'd give you my left arm. I wouldn't mind because I have two.

But when you offer her a part of yourself, she makes a dismissive gesture with her hand (Pic 1).

Hilda: Meh, I don't want it. I've tasted you and you're salty.

She affirms with her eyes tightly shut, before opening one and peeking at you. It's obvious that saving you from cannibalism doesn't save you from her jokes, especially when she makes you repeat words.

Hilda: Pfff, a joke?

She asks with laughing eyes, hand to her mouth, cheeks puffed by the noises she's containing.

Hilda: Heh... What are you saying, Ashley? Of course... Of course not, ha. A joke, me? But I'm super serial.

The jest turns into a gasp of surprise when you express your anger, and turns into a pout when you tell her it's a joke. She brings her little fist towards your right arm, seeming like she'll hit you, but at five centimeters she regrets it and opens her fingers, and without warning, lunges at you. You almost fall but manage to grab her by the arms. Your back ends up against the barred glass, and your chest serves as a home for Hilda's face. She rubs her face against you, her nose tickling you slightly. She looks at you with lowered eyelids, looking very satisfied with her position.
Hilda: I love you. Never forget it, just like I'll never forget you told me I was good. That way, when I feel tempted to do something really, really bad, I won't, because you'll be with me.

She buries her face in you again.

Hilda: My north... My star.

Her compass.

A very peculiar compass, because she was the one who had to guide you through the storage room, and more than once she stopped to check on you and make sure you were okay. Another oddity is that you were also a compass that asked for cuddles and attention; it was impossible for you not to rub your cheek against the troublemaker's cheeks, and she, with her face adorned with a pretty blush that highlighted the blue of her eyes, complied, even though she also said that time was eating away at her.

She led you to a curved wooden bench, flanked by weeds, shook off the dust with a swipe of her hand, and sat down with her legs tucked up and your head resting between her thighs and tummy. She curved over you, like trees and vines curve under the weight of a greenhouse. With one hand she strokes your hair, and with the other she caresses your features; even though she didn't bring her lips close, you felt her kissing you with her eyes.

Hilda: Are you hungry?

Not really, but she still pulled out a chocolate chip cookie, took a bite, and then brought it to you, feeding you (- Hunger), and then wiping the crumb away with her fingers.

You could stay like this forever, but...

Hilda: I think ants are crawling up my pants. Let's keep going.

As she separated and stood up, she shook her hips and lifted her knees to pat her legs. Further ahead, you find the aloe vera plant. With a demonstration, you show her that it doesn't prick or cut. She nods, murmurs something to herself, and observes the specimen with a vague grimace of dissatisfaction.

Hilda: So it's not a thorny trap or a strange monster.

With the spear knife, you cut a couple of leaves and let them rest on one of the ruined benches. Hilda's gaze stays on you, capturing the whole process.

Hilda: So we leave them here? For how long?

You explain.

Hilda: With everything you know, I think you'd get along well with... Hmm. Forget it.

She was going to say Luz. But she doesn't want to share.

Hilda: I'll keep it in mind in case I have to deal with a giant snail.

As always, it's impossible to know if it's a joke or if there really are such things in the backrooms. Probably.

1/?

>>7280
>>5917
<Catherine Hills/Ashley Williams (Day 23. Hour 8)
HP: 110/110
Energy: 39/70
Hunger: 20/20 - Thirst: 19/20
-Strength: 5 + 20 Hilda's Lance
-Agility: 12
-Endurance: 4
-Luck: 1 + 0 Hilda's Collar
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Book: New Horizons and Relative Axes, by C.H. Pickles.
Notebook
Pencil
Handful of salt
-Sack 1/5
Liminal Dictionary

Level 5
Out of nowhere, Hilda starts humming a song.

Hilda: I want snails~ Giant snails~ Not medium or small~ Giants are what I want~

She's quite off-key but looks happy, hands on her backpack straps, swaying back and forth on her heels. But you have to stop her to take her to your discovery: the nettle.

She leans in with you, peeks at you from the corner of her eye, and when you catch her, she looks back at the specimen.

Hilda: It stings, I'll note it down.

You assume she notes it in her head.

You squeeze the little plant. She purses her lips in surprise. You let her know that firmness is key. Hilda's mouth relaxes, and she reaches out to try it herself.

Hilda: I don't feel anything.

She rubs the spines with her thumb, up and down, a few come off.

Hilda: I'm made of stone.

She isn't, her greatest rough patches are her temper and her scars, but everything else is soft, warm, loving. But you're the only one aware of that.

Hilda: Euc-a-lyp-tus.

She repeats slowly.

Hilda: Eucalyp-Ack!

She bites her tongue trying to say it fast.

Hilda: Ow...

She says with her tongue sticking out. It's a bit swollen in the middle, no blood, but it's bruised. Now the tough girl looks at you with eyes shining with hope, as if expecting that in your deep knowledge of the forest you have something that can help her.

Hilda is resistant to other things. But Hilda is not resistant to Hilda. That is knowledge worth understanding.

...

You worry the blue-haired girl might poison herself.

Hilda: Obviously I wouldn't try it without knowing.

She waves a hand, dismissing the matter.

Hilda: Little me would, but I'm big now.

By little me, she refers to herself a year or two ago.

Hilda: And as the big girl I am now, I have to take care of you.
You suspect you are actually older than her, taller is obvious, but also older.

Hilda: Don't do silly things like this.

You cross your eyes.

Hilda: Or it is.

She makes a grimace complicated to describe.

Hilda: Everything is under control.

The girl who later plays with a potentially explosive poison tells you: Liquid pain. A phenomenon for which Hilda shows more willingness than learning to write ("Yes, yes, later, later," she told you). Your blue nettle demanded a sacrifice, and with greater regret you offered it a common weed... A leaf.

Hilda: But Ashley, if there's plenty of that here.

She doesn't seem to understand the reason for your dejection, but she accepts the leaf nonetheless and you see her smile as she spills a drop of pain. She trusted to surprise you, but upon seeing you, she discovers you are self-conscious. She raises an eyebrow.

Hilda: What's wrong? Do you want to do it?

Liquid pain is drunk.

Hilda: Yes, but diluted, with water or...

She gives you a mischievous smile and raises an eyebrow. She leaves the sentence unfinished.
...

A spray of paint goes from your head to the ground. It's the mark of the gale that defied your spear, a memory, because of the untamable beast now only an empty shell remained, pinned to the den of rot like a butterfly pinned by a needle. To the bluish one behind you, you have only one thing to say:

Ahab did not sink.

She scratches her chin with attentive eyes.

Hilda: Uh-huh?

You're fine, that's all she needs to know to relax her expression.

Hilda: Pain? Where?

Back, legs. When you turn around, Hilda, without warning, pulls up your clothes above your head, then you feel a hand placed gently on your bare back, near your bra? (It's up to you to clarify if Cat is wearing underwear at this moment).

Hilda: Hmmm, yes, I can fix it. But not here, not now.

The touch leaves you as she lowers your dress. You look at her, and you worry about the broom situation.

Hilda: They have many.

She doesn't seem to need further justification than that. She smiles at you, looking proud. But soon a tortured groan erases her smile and draws her attention to the moth nest.

2/?

>>7281
>>5918
<Catherine Hills/Ashley Williams (Day 23. Hour 10)
HP: 110/110
Energy: 37/70
Hunger: 18/20 - Thirst: 17/20
- Strength: 5 + 20 Hilda's Spear
- Agility: 12
- Resistance: 4
- Luck: 1 + 0 Hilda's Necklace
Inventory:
- Pockets 4/4
Book: New Horizons and Relative Axes, by CH Pickles.
Notebook
Pencil
Handful of salt
- Sack 3/5
Liminal dictionary
Video camera
Aloe leaf

Level 5
You move away.

Behind you remains Hilda, her full attention fixed on the mound of jelly where the rotting figure writhes. You pushed aside branches and leaves with your palms, and the moment you passed, they snapped back together fiercely, flinging droplets from the sprinkler water.

You spotted the stone bench, and your legs froze, refusing to walk further—someone was there: a vision of pale nakedness, draped in a mantle that seemed woven from crystal. She crouched there, a finger near her chin, inspecting and sniffing the aloe leaves you'd left on the seat. The antennae on her forehead (because she had antennae) twitched, and she turned her face toward you. Her tinted-glass gaze devoured you for seconds that felt like eternity, and your heart instinctively lurches when her lips form a smile.

Inviting, provocative. You don't know if it's to devour you or to play—perhaps, for her, they're the same thing.

Thunder breaks the spell—a gunshot.

You jump and glance behind. From where you came, the undergrowth ripples in a wave-like motion. Turning back to where the apparition stood, you see her mantle unfurled—revealing itself to be a vast pair of wings. She levitated forward, as if walking on air, her movements so mesmerizing that your senses lagged in reacting. By the time you registered it, she was already within arm's reach, and she leaned in.

She could have snatched you from the ground like an eagle seizing a piglet, but instead, she leaned down and offered you her hand. Instantly, you realize she mistook you for one of her own—a wingless fairy, a wounded nymph. With that gesture, she promised to take you with her deep into the wilderness, into the heart of fauna and flora, where mysterious moths dwell in harmony beyond human noise.
Horror leaves you speechless, fascination leaves you speechless, you're incurable. And the moth princess, seeing her offer go unanswered, pouted in sad disappointment, lifted herself up, turned her back on you, cast one final glance, then flew away into a dark hole in the glass ceiling—taking with her the possibility of going along, of becoming like her, of leaving Hilda behind.

Your heart aches again with the certainty that Hilda would never stop searching for you, through every level, every hardship, until she found you alive or dead. And how would she react upon seeing you transformed into one of the monsters she boasts about hunting...? A mystery.

As minutes pass, it becomes harder to tell whether what you saw was real or just your nerves acting up. But no, you're convinced it was real—though that doesn't change the fact that, in part, it felt like a dream...

But dream cycles also incubate nightmares.

You pick up the video camera you "borrowed"—the excuse being to give it purpose, after all, that person won't need it anymore... Thinking about it brings forth her face. No, that wasn't a face—it was what hides beneath a face, bones barely covered by a paste that somehow manages to keep pain receptors active.

You gather the dried aloe leaf and wait. During the wait, the occasional drip from the sprinklers turns into a light drizzle. The undergrowth at the back stirs—Hilda emerges, using the butt of her shotgun to push aside the bushes.

She reaches where you are, doesn't speak immediately—first she scans the surroundings before looking at you again.

Hilda: Everything okay?

She wants to know if anything strange happened, though her choice of words is peculiar. She says nothing about the figure in the nest, leaving it up to you whether to bring it up.

Hilda: We're way too close to the exit. I wanna go a bit deeper before setting up the tent.
She wants to spend the night there, in the "outside". They sped down the stone path, and along the way the drizzle gave way to rain; the dampness started soaking them, and instead of getting angry, Hilda laughs and jumps with arms outstretched, splashing the little streams forming.

Amid the hotel's luxuries, when her attention drifted from you, you noticed her tense, distant, as if longing to look beneath the Egyptian silk rugs hoping they hide a hole. She wanted to jump to find the Giant in the fog; only the glass stopped her. Like you, she in her own way was a free spirit, only made for an infinite forest hiding impossible dangers.

She's a backrooms girl, which is why she instantly overcame the shock of finding the next glass corridor, occupied by a giant woman. While you realized the statue's stone was covered in newspapers: ads, yellow pages, missing persons. Hilda was already climbing it, extending a hand for you to join her and see what's on the other side, all while the level rained.

The stone got slippery. Newspaper folds stuck to your soles, but that didn't stop you; you reached the top, and realized the corridor was too small for such a colossal woman; she looked sad.

Hilda: Jump!

She leaps and slides down the statue's hunched back, arms up like it's a slide. She lands on her feet, looks up, and waits for you. Whether you go down slowly or take the risk, once below you notice the water starting to rise at your heel, dripping in torrents from the glass.

Soaked, they climb a spiral staircase leading to a series of rusted metal walkways. While below turns into a pond, above becomes a shelter, but there the rain continues. With bangs stuck to her eyes, Hilda pulls a tent from her big backpack and asks for your help to set it up.
With the tent ready, you enter and Hilda partially zips it up so the humidity doesn't concentrate inside the portable tent. Immediately, the sound of the rain turns into a soft, constant drumming.

Hilda: Phew, that was close.

The blue-haired girl takes off her backpack and jacket, and… throws them on you! They land on your legs.

Hilda: Oops, sorry, old habits.

She leans down and takes the jacket off you, but now she doesn't know where to put it. It's not like she did much to you, you're just as wet.

Hilda: I don't... usually share my tent. That's why none of the girls offer to be my partner during group expeditions.

She looks down as she says it.

Hilda: Only Joseph accompanied me... Once... And he left crying. Pff, he never knows how to take a joke.

And what did she do to him? She glances at you.

Hilda: I don't know if you want to know, it's silly.

In case you insist:

Hilda: I asked him to see his... You know, what boys have and girls don't. I had never seen one before... And well... I laughed, that's all. Would you cry if I laughed at your thumb? Of course not.

She starts taking a large plastic bag out of her backpack to put the soaked clothes in. You're left in your underwear, and Hilda asks you to come closer. She lays you on her chest, and with a towel begins to dry you while talking in your ear.

Hilda: And Ashley... Are you feeling better? After taking care of that moth, you should feel more... whole. I don't know how to put it into words, you know I get bored by dictionaries... But I'm proud of you.

The word is "proud," but you understand the message, and the affection she can't convey with her voice, she does with her touch, drying your body with care until you're no longer at risk of catching a cold, and then she hands you the towel and herself, for you to take care of.

Hilda: You only have two more prey left. Two more prey and I'll know you're ready for almost anything.

She tells you without looking at you, pushing her blue hair aside so you can dry her neck.

Hilda: Does your back still hurt?

3/5

>>7313
>level 5.1
Arrangement to differentiate better.

>>5920
>>5922
<Catherine Hills/Ashley Williams (Day 24. Time 21)
HP: 110/110
Energy: 25/70
Hunger: 20/20 - Thirst: 20/20
-Strength: 5
-Agility: 12
-Stamina: 4
-Luck: 1 + 0 Hilda's Collar
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Book: New Horizons and Relative Axes, by C.H. Pickles.
Notebook
Pencil
Handful of salt
-Sack 2/5
Liminal Dictionary
Video camera

Level 5
After long days, it's time to relax in the calm of the infinite hotel room.

In front of the mirror, you hum, and unlike Hilda, your singing doesn't go off-key. You rub aloe on your wrists, which will make you softer, but did you need to be? Surely yes. Sometimes you serve the purpose of being petted.

You return from the bathroom to the bedroom, ready for the movie. Hilda is sitting cross-legged on the immense bed, leaning back with her palms on the sheets, her eyes scanning what's happening on the flat screen with an astonished expression, a mix of surprise and a grimace.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1jEmivkJZM▾
Jason and the Argo-monkeys~♫
With their guitars and hats~♫

At least the rest of the movie is more normal, if you ignore that all its actors are now furry apes.

You take a spot behind your companion, she retracts her hands and straightens up to make room for you. You surround her with your legs, she remains calm and rests her hands near your ankles, accepting your embrace.

Hilda: Hm?

She closes her eyes as you smear aloe on her face. Now instead of Hilda, it's Hulkda. Does she like it? She tilts her head towards you and takes a few seconds to answer.

Hilda: Well, I don't know.

She takes a few more seconds to think about it.

Hilda: If you have a wound, you put on a bandage, and if you're pretty, you use creams, makeup, and all that. I'm not exactly beautiful, you know.

On screen, the giant Talos appears, and Hilda jumps slightly in her seat, her eyes shining with genuine excitement and her mouth half-open, that glow in her gaze highlighting her adventurous spirit, it was your own movie. You took advantage of her enchantment to groom yourself on her, capturing her little arm with your lips, inhaling her lush hair, sharing closeness.

But Hilda wanted more than that, she longed for your company on future adventures.

You assured her that you would be with her.

Hilda: Good.

She says and turns her face back to the television.

You realized that for her, there was no possibility of you leaving her side, she was unaware of your torment, of the possibility of being separated by the whims of fate. But you also realized that it was a whim of fate that brought them together.

Fade to black and credits, it's the end of the movie. Hilda is going to remove the aloe from her face. A minute passes, two pass, three pass, but before you start to worry, Hilda peeks her head over the edge of the bed and smiles at you. But it's not a normal smile, it's a "I'm hiding something from you" smile.

Hilda: Let's see if you can guess what I have on my back. First clue, it's red.

You try, and you fail.
Hilda: Second clue, it's long.

You try, and if you fail.

Hilda: Third try, it's... Eeeeh... Very red, like blood!

Whether you fail or manage to guess, she shows it to you.

Hilda: Ta-da!

She gets on the bed, and with the rapid beating of her knees, she moves until she's a hand's breadth away from you so you can contemplate the bottle. The label looks aged.

Hilda: It's beer! What adults drink. The leader forbade us, but lightning strike me if you don't deserve it! It's a reward for all your victories.

Has she ever drunk beer before? The doubt makes her look away and snort.

Hilda: Hundreds, thousands, millions!

She turns her little eyes back to you, lowers her head, and shows a small, regretful smile.

Hilda: No... It's my first time. But if those pseudo-tough guys at the bar can handle it, so can we.

...

Level 10
The hustle and bustle of the hotel feel distant.

You request a meeting in the second hallway of the house, in front of the windows that overlook the now-snowy field. It's the ideal place to break, or explain, or do whatever you need to do. It's judgment day.

Yodel: For the new one, the European. Anything to tell the ever-reliable Yodel-Adle-Eedle-Idle-Oo?

But since it's a public place, it's inevitable that unwanted visitors arrive. This time, the red-haired farmer carrying a wooden box of milk... Green milk. She offers you one of the bottles.

Yodel: To refresh your throat.

Whether you accept it or not, she would continue talking.

Yodel: You have a face like a worried possum. My aunt Geltrus also worried a lot, I told her, "Aunt Geltrus, no!" because the keas were pecking and pecking the woolly ones and Aunt Geltrus cried and cried-

You didn't know what to say; it was the first time you'd interacted with her so much. You feel like she's trying to help you somehow; it's strange.

Yodel: And in the end, Aunt Geltrus died because the keas also kicked the bucket, shot down, poof, they're gone. So the moral is... Why worry about something that hasn't happened yet? In the end, maybe it won't happen, and it can be fixed with a shot. The last I saw, there were still plenty of woolly ones.

She arrives at Hilda, picking her nose with her finger, and casts a strange look between Yodel and you.

Yodel: I'm outta here, vampire.

Hilda watches her leave with a raised eyebrow, then looks back at you and asks why you wanted to meet. She senses your discomfort.

Hilda: Did Yodel bother you? Do you want me to go find her and hit her?

She lowers her finger and wipes it on her sweater. You close the distance until her surprised face fills almost your entire field of vision, but you can't hold her gaze; your face immediately falls.

Hilda: Okay? I'll go look for her. It's just teeth, right?

She frowns, and her lips form a pout.

Hilda: Wait... I did something wrong, didn't I? No, don't tell me yet. I need to figure it out myself to improve.

The tough girl leaves, muttering with her hand under her chin about the possible mistakes and rudeness she might have committed.

It's impossible to imagine how she will react to the truth you are hiding from her.

4/6

>>10320
<Catherine Hills/Ashley Williams (Day 31. Hour 18)
HP: 110/110
Energy: 70/70
Hunger: 20/20 - Thirst: 20/20
-Strength: 5
-Agility: 12
-Stamina: 4
-Luck: 1 + 0 Hilda's Collar
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Book: New Horizons and Relative Axes, by C.H. Pickles.
Notebook
Pencil
Handful of salt
-Sack 2/5
Liminal Dictionary
Video Camera

Level 10
Upon entering the office, Charmy looks up from her desk and asks your intentions with a stare. She holds a magnifying glass in one hand and has the palm of the other resting on a series of maps and blueprints you can't see from your perspective. You explain that you've come to hang out until whatever is supposed to happen, the cataclysm, occurs.

Charmy: Alright, but don't touch anything without asking first. Some objects in this room are cursed, others are simply precious.

You kept a video camera, but before you open your mouth, you must first consider if you showed it to Hilda, did you?

You scan the room with your gaze. Near you is a globe, and next to it a shelf where they seem to have run out of space, because there's a pile of books and scrolls right beside it. It smells old, of paper, of stories. The same goes for the ivory bust of the bearded man with a hat, for the rainbow conch shell placed in a trophy case, and for the framed photos on the wall, generally of a couple smiling with their features blurred by the lights and shadows of disparate places, be it the clouds of high snowy cliffs or the curves of unknown undergrounds.

Himalaya. October, 1986.

Mammoth Cave. December, 1986.

These are the date and location marked on two of the small plaques you managed to read before Charmy spoke to you again.

Charmy: My parents were explorers... Not of here, but of the outside world, planet Earth.

She puts down the magnifying glass from her desk and gets off her chair. She walks towards you, and since she has short legs, it takes a while, but when she's by your side, she looks at the photos with you.

Charmy: Since they had dwarfism like me, they suffered a lot of mockery and discrimination, people looked down on them... In more ways than one. But that never stopped them, they reached places no small person had ever reached before. They studied a lot, commissioned custom-made equipment, and you could say they took what genetics denied them.

She looks up at a photo where a small version of herself is accepting the yellow hat she is currently wearing.
Charmy: Dad and Mom became moderate celebrities, they even signed with a TV station in Connecticut to have their own educational show, the mini-explorers! That's where we were moving, Mom was driving the truck with all our stuff when suddenly... Poof!

She claps.

Charmy: We almost crashed into a yellow wall. I was about 8 or 9 years old when it happened.

She sighs.

Charmy: The rest is history.

You express interest in the record player. She gestures towards the furniture holding the instrument. While Charmy goes back to check her papers, you open the front of the small cabinet and discover a series of cases containing large, black records, each with a cover that evoked some promise, sensation, journey, or leaves in the wind.

You choose one and present it to Charmy. She brings her magnifying glass towards you, her face enlarged and distorted by the glass. She lowers the magnifying glass, looks at the rabbit on the cover, and then looks at you.

Charmy: Go to the record player. I'll tell you how to get it started.

And so you do. You go to the machine, remove the protective cover from the platter, and carefully, so as not to scratch the vinyl, position it. Once it starts spinning, you gently place the needle. It's like magic, a woman's voice accompanied by mystical harmony emerges from the speakers.

Lately, Here Before, Wayward...

It sounds like a forest.

You can almost see the greenery resurfacing through the windows. But a quick glance outside reveals it's an illusion; the white blanket continues like a heavy slab burying the landscape. But the cold and ice don't stop you from closing your eyes and dreaming.

https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=UNmm1RQF05E&list=OLAK5uy_mS82cu0ZE_S7q_uaGDAjT7JEhoiJlZ0tQ▾
You are lost. You are at a crossroads. But you are not alone, just like when you ran through the forest, you feel connected to the world, and you can see beyond through your eyelids...

Angular mountains that take your breath away, sustained by imagination. Rivers of artificial blues and coasts of fake grass crowned by plastic mushrooms. Caverns of living flesh that pulsate, but you quickly understand that the latter description is redundant.

The labyrinths are alive and they pulse, just like the forest, just like you, even under the intense cold that seeks to numb you. Or is it all a hallucination, a trick of your illness?

You've been here before.

Whispers the intangible wind.

We've all been here.

Charmy: Catherine.

Charmy's voice pulls you out of the spell. You open your eyes. The music sounds distant, almost like an unintelligible echo.

Charmy: Everything okay?

On her serious and serene face, there's a hint of concern.

5/6

>>10321
<Catherine Hills/Ashley Williams (Day 31. Hour 19)
HP: 110/110
Energy: 69/70
Hunger: 19/20 - Thirst: 19/20
-Strength: 5
-Agility: 12
-Endurance: 4
-Luck: 1 + 0 Hilda's Collar
Inventory:
-Pockets 4/4
Book: New Horizons and Relative Axes, by C.H. Pickles.
Notebook
Pencil
Handful of salt
-Sack 2/5
Liminal Dictionary
Video Camera

Level 10
With the touch of the small, cold hammer, you involuntarily moved your leg, and looked at Julia seeking to understand why.

Julia: Yes, you did. It was your reflexes, and good news, they're sharp.

The doctor takes a break to enjoy her unhealthy sandwich, a vulgar marriage of sweet and savory. During this time, you distract yourself by contemplating the lines of the gray brick, or the imperfections in the wooden beams, or the rust on the boiler in the background whose cracks seem almost like a gaze. But the wait didn't help to grease your usual reticence; it was a conscious effort to have to speak and recount your experiences, which you would have generally preferred to keep hidden in the terrarium of your memories.

The leader didn't budge to help you, leaving you the responsibility of narrating your story before the doctor's clinical eyes. Julia eats only half the sandwich before wrapping it in a paper towel, dabs her lips with a napkin, and with her appetite satisfied, turns her attention back to you.

Julia: For now, hearing your voice is a higher priority than hearing your breathing or your heartbeat.

Sometimes Julia's gentle smile seemed forced, as if kindness were a requirement of her pediatric work.

Julia: I didn't combine it, Elvis did. He was all the rage in my time, a true idol. I know it's not the healthiest food, quite the opposite, but I got used to eating it as a child, I consider it almost a tribute to his legacy.

You reveal that you kept a camera.

Julia: You kept it...?

She arches an eyebrow slightly.

Julia: Is the camera important? Did you start feeling unwell after taking it? Physically, I mean. It could have been contaminated, either the device or the photos it holds.

No, your problems started much earlier. You recount your episodes, first how everything stopped and then how everything tore apart. It hurts to try to give shape to an event that your senses scream should never have happened... But it did, you're sure.

Julia continues to watch and listen, attentive. You talk about the incident at the restaurant, how you stopped being you to become a trapped and terrified version of yourself.

The leader and the doctor exchange glances.

Charmy: Could it be psychological? It wouldn't be the first or last time someone trapped here thought this wasn't real.

Julia: I prefer not to jump to conclusions.

The glances return to you.

Julia: Have you been stressed lately, Catherine? Have you considered that perhaps everything you're experiencing is a hallucination or a dream?

Charmy: If she pinches herself, she won't wake up, that rules out the dream thing quite a bit.

Julia: It's not that simple, Charmy.

Again, another of her forced smiles.

You recount an isolated incident: The basket and the monkey. The doctor and the leader exchange glances again, but this time Charmy doesn't come with a doubt but a certainty.

Charmy: Noble families offer babies as tributes to monkeys. We, people outside those circles, don't know the details of the deal, nor the fate of the babies. But what you saw was real.
This is your father's part, he used to see things that weren't there. That's a fragment of information that makes Julia make a face she quickly hides, and Charmy let out a long, tired sigh.

Julia: Do you know why your father saw things? Did you happen to find out about any possible diagnosis he might have received?

After you answer, Julia would step back to talk to Charmy. It's a bit annoying how they talk as if you weren't present, the condescension of adulthood.

Charmy: Schizophrenia, perhaps?

Julia: In men, the first symptoms generally appear between 18 and 25 years old, while in women it usually appears between 25 and 35 years old. It's uncommon to be diagnosed before 13 or 15...

Charmy: Uncommon... But even if that were the case, it would be better than the alternatives, wouldn't it?

Julia nods.

The doctor brought her instruments in a thick backpack, and while she rummages, Charmy moves a nightstand next to your chair at Julia's request. The doctor pulls a bulky device from the bag, it looks like two iron rectangles welded to a cuff. She places the machine on the nightstand, inserts your small arm into the grip, tightens the straps, and turns on the device, which immediately begins to vibrate and emit heat and beeps, you perceive fans and the hum of a motor.

While the doctor sets up the machine: You voice your other concern.

"Tingling in my vagina."

Julia: Huh? What did you say, sweetie?

Charmy is also staring at you. You repeat yourself, and both their eyes widen a little more than usual.

Julia: Does it burn when you pee? It could be an infection, nothing serious, I brought antibiotics.

No infection. The heat comes from your belly. Julia casts a suspicious glance at Charmy.

Julia: Maybe one of Catherine's friends knows about it...

Charmy: She only hangs out with anyone other than Hilda.

Julia: Hilda... I understand she's quite a problematic girl.

The leader frowns.

Julia: Hilda never...

She looks at you, her expression softens, and then hardens again.

Charmy: Catherine, did Hilda touch you anywhere strange...? If she did, you must tell me, it's important, don't worry, you're not in trouble.

She speaks as if Hilda had done something very wrong, something forbidden. You think about your expedition Perhaps it's necessary to wait for the scenes on level 5 to resolve before jumping into this

Numbers and words appear on the dark screen of the morphogenic radar. Julia asks for silence and concentrates on studying the machine's report.

Julia: With the quick analysis, I don't detect anything unnatural, an accelerated pulse, but that's surely from nerves, there's also an excess of sodium... In your pockets? How strange. But if there were any superficial damage, I suppose it would be noticeable at a glance, and obviously, that's not the case.

She glances at you from the corner of her eye, scanning you up and down.

Julia: I'll prepare a thorough analysis.

In seconds, she types a dozen commands, culminating in a louder click on the enter key.

Julia: Catherine, don't move until the machine is finished. The report will be ready in 30 to 60 minutes.

And while you can clarify if Hilda messed with you.

6/6