Week 2

[linkupmods]

WEEK 2

WAKE UP, GET UP, GET OUT THERE.

Saturday rolls around and characters may see that there are notices from Mina, saying that everyone will be taking a trip at noon sharp on Saturday, and to have their weapons. Whether characters pay this heed or not, they will in fact hear a ding from their phones at noon, their screens glowing a sunset red with the word "TRANSFERRING..." the only thing to be seen. And then, just like that –

You all enter.

The new world before you can be described in one word: twisted. It doesn't feel great, but it doesn't feel extremely awful, either, depending on how you look at it – it's a distorted version of the already grim city that you've been brought to, and you are specifically in the shopping district. Everything seems to be darker shades of red, yellow, and purple, if you can see it through the haze ominously floating about.

That feeling of something stirring in your chest seems to grow stronger, more potent, burning with the desire to be let free…

…and you, all of you, are surrounded. Various monsters and demons are threatening to attack you, looking at you like you are their prey. That's because you are…but you don't have to be for long. The moment that you engage in battle with them, no matter who strikes first, is the moment your emancipation begins.

Welcome to your awakening.

You feel a surge of energy rush to your palm – for some, it burns like a fiery blaze. For others, it sparks with electricity; perhaps wind circles around it, or a mysterious frost begins to blanket it. Maybe you have a mysterious pink aura around it, or a bright turquoise light; a dark, sinister glow or a calming light. Whatever the case may be, it drives you to place your hand over your heart.

You latch onto something. It is not your chest, it's not your heart, but it's something deeper than that, something from your being. You pull, you drag it out, and there is no bloodshed or any sort of pain, only a very bright light and some struggle as you unearth what is within. You finally, finally feel free as a new part of you literally stands before you. Say hello to your new friend: Your Persona.

Your new skills feel intuitive, and you feel like you can navigate them well enough to at least try to survive. You don't need to question how or why you understand them just yet; all you need to do is let yourself experience your power, and you'll stand a chance.

And with that, it's time to fight.

(Note: Weapon attacks will always deal Phys damage, but Phys spells will naturally do more than just whacking enemies with your weapons. Go wild, dodge, parry – combat is more freeform here than it is in Persona, so play this out however you'd like.

Furthermore, you'll be able to see everyone's cool Personas! You just won't be able to really interact with them directly.)

???

(Picrew by ~danidoninha!)

After the battle, there's the sound of a whistle. Turn your heads towards the source, and…huh? A cat?

"Alright, newbies, it's time to roll out."

…And it talks???

She says it with a scowl on her face, and soon, she leaps up – poof, and suddenly, there is a cat train in front of you. Weirdly enough, this cat is the one driving it. How did she summon the train…who knows.

"Get in, unless you wanna get your asses kicked!"

And sure enough, she's right, because there seem to be more enemies flocking towards you. She will drag you all in whether you like it or not.

SAFE AREA.

And, after a quick ride on the cat train, you find yourselves back at the dorms! ...Kind of. Much like the rest of this alternate world, it’s distorted in shape, though there’s none of the haze you saw when you first arrived. It seems this area, at least, is safe - characters would be wise to note it as a location to base any Nekyia operations out of in the future.

Mina is also here! She looks, quite frankly, relieved to see everyone show up alive in the train. The train, by the way, is gone, because it seems like your mysterious cat friend is now back to her…first…form? And seems to be on her way out. Back to Mina, though:


“Thank goodness... Okay, um, app hiccups aside...

Welcome to the Nekyia - the world of the unconscious. As you can see, the unconscious version of the city is, um... Very, very messed up. The more commissions you complete, the more connections you forge, the more bonds you repair, and the more Shadows you take out will help return the Nekyia to normal - and with it, the real world!

The people of this world don’t have the power to summon Personas... You’re the only ones who can save this city from the influence now. So please...

Help me fix this city from the inside-out!”

Mina has also set up a folding table set up with divinity cookies and water bottles from “Ambrosial Water Co”, judging by the labels. Characters who partake in these proffered snacks will find them rejuvenating - literally. Using a Persona’s abilities takes spiritual energy, but these snacks replenish one’s energy to full again with a single bite or sip. Any characters who want to try venturing back into the thick of the Nekyia today are free to take some with them, but do take care! Mina is only providing snacks for today, and after this characters will need to monitor their energy levels on their own.

Characters with further questions may ask Mina and she will do her best to answer! You can also try to catch the mysterious cat from earlier, too.

To go back to the real world, all characters need to do is press the "RETURN?" button on their phones. Much like the "TRANSFERRING..." message, this is the only thing on their screen.

All phones will now have a Nekyia app that will enable them to come in and out of the Nekyia at will.

OOC

READ ME!!!!

• Welcome to your Week 2 event log!
• Here is your promised Persona debut. Fighting is very flexible, so please just thread the fights in whatever format you'd like.
  
• A reminder for those of you who have gotten their Level 10 skills: These do not unlock ICly until Week 3, starting on 8/17.
  
• As always, please let us know if you have any questions! Enjoy!
  

ic comm | inboxes | ooc comm | full nav

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Comments

[emptyself]

wake up.

[ soujuurou still doesn't understand what she means by weapons. on the way there, he simply accepts things as they are, carrying nothing but his own self and the clothes on his back into the shopping district.

however, underneath his serene expression, is a growing sense of malaise. a sensation in the pit of his stomach telling him that he was headed towards danger, that he should avoid avoid avoidavoidavoid—

and yet he doesn't. he can't. if it were once again an attempt on his life or a pack of wolves after him, he would gladly turn his heel and find the best place to hide. an animal's instinct is to prioritize its survival above all else, after all. by all means he should be running, but with so many people, he simply can't! he knows he has to help them! ]

Hey, over here!

[ calling out to get the attention of a demon that was sneaking up on someone, he stares it down as it instead chooses to rush towards him, fangs and claws bared to tear him apart. and once it's in his range he inhales, takes a calculated step forward and—

thrusts his arm forward against the demon's chest, placing an open palm punch on the creature's chest. it's enough to send the creature flying.

he does, however, seem to be very unaware of the persona behind him. more important is to make sure that the others are fine. ]

Are you okay? I think we should run.

safe room

[ in the safe room, soujuurou tries to keep himself busy. he's probably been running himself ragged trying to do as much clean up of the area as he can, but even he knows that he has his limits. he's currently sitting down, sipping from a bottle of water. ]

Water really is important, isn't it. It's no good if we get dehydrated.

[ does he even realize the spiritual properties of the water? or how weird this situation even is? ]

3. real world.

[ other than that, you can catch soujuurou in the real world doing...well, average things. he's doing commissions and working part time jobs (which we can make up on the spot tbh). he can also be found in the dorms, especially very early in the morning (think 5 am) as he does his daily workouts or later at night as he's trying to prepare some sort of dinner or brewing himself some tea. ]

safe room

[goei]

[Izou stares at him for a long moment, hunched over in his seat.]

So are you the kinda guy who's gotta say shit just ta fill the air or are you realizing this fer the first time?
[Why is he cranky.]

[emptyself]

Up in the mountains, we didn't really engage in unnecessary chatter, but I've learned that people in the cities prefer to talk between breaks.

[ he doesn't really understand why that's the case, but he doesn't really mind it either.

that said, it seems like izou is not up for a chat. so he shuts up, sitting up straight and almost perfectly still. ]

[goei]

[Damn, sounds like this kids is from even more in the boonies than Izou. He's satisfied with the silence, drinking most of his water in comfortable silence, but he keeps glancing at Soujuurou because... he sure is just not moving at all, huh.]

... Anyone ever tell ya yer real off putting?

[emptyself]

[ ...? he turns around, giving izou a genuinely confused look. off-putting? and wait, why is this guy talking, didn't he just criticize soujuurou for the same thing? ]

I've been called weird, but not off-putting. Is it that bad for you?

[goei]

[this isn't space filler conversation Soujuurou, this is genuine confusion.]

Sittin' quietly is one thing, but the way yer sitting so straight like that ya look like one of them porcelain dolls or somethin'.

[emptyself]

Porcelain dolls...?

[ give him a moment to buffer, izou, as he tries to sift through his Modern City Information to get an idea of what the other man is saying.

wait-- ]

I've never seen a doll made in my shape. And I'm not a doll at all. I'm a human.

[goei]

It's like...
[Izou does not know the words simile or metaphor.]

Not literally. I'm sayin' the way yer sittin' looks unnatural. Like a doll ain't sit comfortably neither.

[emptyself]

Unnatural? Oh... hm. I don't feel uncomfortable, but...

[ hmmm, he leans back against the couch, sliding down just a tad. ]

What about this?

[goei]

I mean that looks more normal. But if ya could do that why weren't ya in the first place?

[IT'S TOO LATE HE ALREADY KNOWS YOU'RE ODD!!!]

[emptyself]

Because I was relaxed enough with the first one.

[ obviously? ]

[goei]

[Hm.]

The hell kinda place you come from where no one ever said that was weird?

[emptyself]

Huh?

[ he turns around, facing him with a flat expression. ]

I've already mentioned this a bunch of times, haven't I? I was raised in a village in the mountains.

[goei]

I mean sure, I'm from way out away from the big cities too, but even I know how ta sit normal.

[emptyself]

But I was just sitting up straight. That’s how I was trained.

[goei]

Ohhh, you were trained ta sit like that. Makes more sense now.

[Trained to do what is anyone's guess, but still.]

god's latest safe room while i try to remember how to rp

[moonshaded]

No shit.

[She's been tirelessly carving her way through whatever got in her way, though it hasn't been out of any particular desire to help this town. The chance for violence is the most normal she's felt in days. Kainé might not have stopped at all were it not for her energy evaporating. Whatever she thinks of her Persona... well, that just figures. They both became a part of each other in some way, didn't they?

Kainé rubs at her bare left leg, propped up haphazardly on a nearby lounge chair, to deal with a superficial pain.]

Gonna hit us with any more one-liners of wisdom, or are you done?

[Please be done.]

is this safe room really safe if we're the ones in it

[emptyself]

[ soujuurou has a few things that he wants to say in this occasion. all of them center around the idea that she doesn't have to be so rude to him, that he was just trying to start a conversation because that's how things are in modern society. people yap, yap, yap away without a care, because they live a life of excess that soujuurou still has a hard time simply thinking about.

and whenever he tries to adapt, it just tends to blow up in his face, like it does now. the only thing that wants to bubble up are complaints, which are quite uncharacteristic of him, but... ]

Right. Pointless chatter really is unnecessary, isn't it?

[ he sits down on a chair, relaxing ever so slightly. he's still sitting up straight, but at the very least his eyes are closed. looks like he has no more wisdom to impart on kainé today. ]

absolutely fucking not

[moonshaded]

[Maybe it's the yappy kids who are wrong; has he ever thought about that?

But when he sags into silence, keeping his posture exactly the same, that silence turns the lobby into a vacant cavern. Ugh.

It doesn't completely make sense to her: She's spent so much time alone that there's no reason to feel like running around completing boring tasks feels empty without ongoing chatter. He lacks Emil's earnest softness, but he's probably someone who makes a habit of doing things for others.]

You're not going to croak over there, are you? [There's the soft clack of her heel hitting the floor as she brings her leg back down. That'd be a problem, and therefore it isn't pointless.]

[emptyself]

[ the sound of her voice, coupled with the heel clack on the floor, is enough to get shizuki's attention once more. he had imagined that he wanted him to shut up, so he had shut up, but is she actually concerned about him? or does she want some sort of idle chatter?

unsure, he decides to stick to simply answering her questions. ]

Not at all. I'm used to fighting animals larger than me back in the mountains, so this isn't that much different. [ they may look a little different, but they're still creatures in the end, right? this is just extermination. ] At least here they're nice enough to give us water and a place to take a break.

[ which is a luxury that soujuurou doesn't really know what to do with. he can sit here and drink water, but ultimately he has that looming feeling of having to go back to continue-- until his next part time shift, at least. ]

What about you?

[moonshaded]

[Yeah? He sure doesn't look it thinks woman in heels and a negligee, but of course, Kainé hasn't secured access to the secretly shredded Sono-G lore.

The impulse to get back out on the field is in her, too, eager to drown out any silence or deep thinking about their twisted kidnapping situation that might come from said silence. It isn't the same, for better or worse, now that she doesn't have to keep up her violent rage all the time. Now that she's human. But if her Persona is anything to go by, she and that Shade were permanently part of each other now, anyway, even in a place like this. She'll never not be a violent killer.]

And it helps that the things they're fighting aren't...]

Nah. [Kainé shakes her head, fitting in response to his question even if it's more forcefully than the blase admission would call for. He might just figure that she's a forceful person. It's not like that'd be wrong.] I'm not bothered taking out a few little ass-weasels like that. It'll take a lot more than that to kill me. I'd still be out there if this "Persona" thing hadn't started wussing out.

[emptyself]

Wussing...?

[ soujuurou tilts his head owlishly, mouthing the word as if it felt foreign to him. because it does, as he's someone that finds slang and lingo far more complicated. it's strange to him, how in people have many ways of saying the same thing. it definitely makes it more difficult for him to understand what someone's trying to say, though context clues is a great friend sometimes.

not in this case, though. maybe. ]

Was it trying to protect you? [ actually, hold on-- ] Wait, are you actually used to fighting things like these? Did you do that where you're from too?

[moonshaded]

Doubt it. [She'll get used to it eventually, the idea that the "Persona" is a part of her and not like the creature it resembles, who she can't possibly wrap her mind around moving to protect her. Right now, it just feels...complicated.

His surprise that she's used to fighting ("too?") makes Kainé lean back a little, arms protective around her chest. Maybe it's not true for him, but it must be nice to live in a world that isn't crumbling to shit.] Sorta. I just have to walk out my front door to find the fuckers, though. Different kind of monster, but killing's all the same anyway.

[emptyself]

We might have different opinions.

[ killing is not just killing for soujuurou. it's something that he, whether unfortunate or fortunate, feels strongly about. he doesn't want to give her a spiel about how he thinks that murder is wrong and should be avoided at all costs. she seems scary, and he doesn't really want to pick fights with scary people.

nevertheless, he thinks that he can see her point of view, so he nods. ]

But what you're describing...it's no different from hunting, right? And that's basically what we're doing here too. Mm, it's been a long time since I've had to go hunting.

[moonshaded]

They're the same thing to me.

[That isn't...exactly true, but it seems more like she's shrugging any deeper nuance or psychological meaning off before she even has the chance to get into it. Hunting is for survival, is the kind of thing she imagines someone making that distinction like he is would say, and killing is for fun. Why split hairs, having done both for either reason?]

... You don't look like you'd last a minute. [And although she doesn't codify it in a "no offense," it's really not given as an insult. She's just saying he looks like an NPC to his face.] You got some kind of special talent?