Kirumi Tojo's Palace | The Ultimate Maid's Failures

[kandata]

By now everyone may be used to find themselves in bizarre locations, between going into palaces and visiting Nekyia. It might not come as a surprise that it has happened again.

What might come as a surprise, though...is how empty this place is.

All around you there's nothing more than a large, gray, featureless expanse. In the distance there seem to be bars, curving upwards to gather so, so high above you, possibly hundreds of miles above, so high it’s hard to distinguish.

It’s a cage. So unfathomably large. You could escape, were you to get to the edges of the cage, but...it would take forever. No matter how you look at it, you're trapped. The atmosphere is so...hopeless. Devoid of anything even remotely positive.

Not that you want to hang around for long, do you? After all, this is someone's palace. Not a place to stick around at. What to do, though?

It’s all so...empty. Silent. Featureless. A flat expanse of hard gray tiles.

Gather together, everyone. Gather and choose a direction. North, East, West, South. All directions look completely identical, but could it affect your time in this place, somehow? Probably not. But all treks start with the first step. Perhaps, if you get moving, you'll progress?

Comments

[vogelfrei]

[ Coming over to snoop at this paper... ]

So it's some kind of aptitude test? Did Kirumi take part in something like this as well?

[ She certainly seems to have gotten around a lot of different jobs, so it would track?? ]

Alright, let's see what may happen with a passing grade.

[ McGillis will step in front of a camera. ]

[kandata]

[Just like it happened to Argenti, only McGillis hears the exact same voice Argenti did]

Name?

[Regardless of the answer, the next question is mired with static, but at least McGillis can make out enough:]

--describe--made you the person you are now. Why would--yourself?

[A different question, but in general it feels like it could have come from whatever questionnaire the person behind the cameras is working with. What made you the person you are now, McGillis?]

[vogelfrei]

[ Ah, so that's how it is. It really feels like a pretty standard interview reel... even if he's not clear what it's for. It's easy enough to play along for now. ]

My name is McGillis Fareed. The trajectory of my life was decided when I was nine years old and stumbled upon a biography of the Calamity War hero Agnika Kaieru. I've been inspired by his strength and ideals ever since. My great purpose in life was to return Gjallarhorn to an organization worthy of him.

[kandata]

[.........

Like before, the camera turns off. From the skies flutter down a piece of paper with the same logo. Oh, there you go, your evaluation!]

'Candidate MCGILLIS has an interesting basis to work with. Good plotlines could be achieved. Tell-- [unintelligible scribbles]. Cons: Old.

Rating: 8/10. Approved'

[The camera McGillis had been talking with dismantles itself. From the core of it, there's...a piece of some sort of machinery. It looks like the body of a flashlight, but inside there's strange mechanisms and wiring that don't belong in a flashlight at all.

Congrats, though!]

[prozaic]

Hmm. It values truth and straightforward answers? [Then he looks around, at the collection of people here. Takes a deep sigh. This is going to be painful for him. Very, very much so.

Then he steps in front of one camera.]

[kandata]

[Well, here we go!]

Name?

[Now, what question will be fired at Shalem today.........]

----define----urself in one word. Just one.

[Oh! That was clearer than other questions, probably because it's such a straightforward request]

[prozaic]

Shalem. Falsehood. [Because what else can he call himself? Everything about him is a lie.]

[kandata]

[........

The camera turns off. Oh, there comes your evaluation? Did you get accepted? Did you get rejected?]

'Candidate SHALEM could be interesting to include. Clever. Pending on the rest of the candidates approved. Interactions between SHALEM and other candidates must be evaluated-- [Unintelligible text] --Cons: [Unintelligible text] --about false people are cliché.

Rating: PENDING. Contact at a later date for follow-up questions.'

[......well that's not a rejection? Doesn't seem like a bad thing, at least]

[prozaic]

[WOW that is actually kinda

rude

But at least it's not like Argenti's score.]

[vogelfrei]

[ Old????????????????? ]

I'm only 29.

[ This is even younger to him than to others, given people in his social class routinely live into their late 100s....

Anyway, can he turn the mechanism on? ]

[kandata]

[It seems you can't! There's a hole where you'd expect an on/off switch to be placed, but there's no switch right now]

[moonshaded]

So all we gotta do is get whatever's inside those things out of them?

[Kainé.exe is processing...]

Why don't we just smash 'em? It'd be faster than giving some bleeding-heart speech.

[She couldn't hear the questions from the camera, so she really only knows the half of it.]

[moodwrecker]

I'm not seeing any reason why we can't.