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

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

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?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It's Kirumi's mind, not my own, so I can't say it with certainty.

But I do believe that trying to establish ourselves as morally superior to her is the wrong way to reach her heart.

[ Or at least it would be the wrong way to reach his heart. Maybe Kirumi would find it inspiring...? McGillis doubts it though. ]

It's functionally no different from killing the shadows earlier, anyway.

[...]

I didn't even consider that. She must want people to accept her for who she is...

[Looks like Shalem's got it covered, at least, though Sayaka bows her head to the Exisal.]

You have my apologies.

Maybe we'd be showing her it was possible to rebel against the dumb bear after all.

[None of this should be surprising coming from her mouth after Mafuyu's palace, surely.]

[...

Guess who's back in the uncertain camp and is just kind of going to let whatever happens happens! Because uh. There's arguments for both sides here, and Sayaka's kind of looking between them both like she's got. No. Idea what to do.]

Would we be showing her that?

Our situation here is in no way truly equivalent to hers. What stood in front of her was a human being, what stands in front of us is an elaborate wax figure. The threat she thought she was facing was to a whole country, while we stand to lose much less.

If we rebel here, are we proving that we wouldn't cave to the same pressure? Or is that just self-satisfied posturing?

She said "joining that world wasn't worth it." If she regrets what she did, why should we show her the same hopeless situation going the same way?

If she gets mad about us acting all superior, then just send her after me. [She adjusts her grip on her bat, slinging it over her shoulder.] It was my idea, so she can be pissed with me over it. Besides...

She once said she wanted to collect information before she returned to her world. Based on all this... I'm guessing it was probably to come up with a way to save everyone.

Wouldn't showing her an alternate option would give her information on how things could have played out differently?

[ There is a sigh. The whole Exisal is sighing, shoulders sagging and all. Yes he's being dramatic with the robot, sue him. ]

If you want to try the pacifist route first, be my guest. But we we cannot proceed that way, I'm going to kill the wax statue.

If we can't move on, then fine, you can kill him.

[She's not about to rebellion them into never making it to the goal - never making it to help Kirumi herself.]

But I want to try. ...For her sake, too.

[Waves. He's right next to the statue, and is ready. He'll just do it when there's a consensus, you pacifist kids can have fun.]

[...]

I think...Aubrey has a point.

[Oh hey, look who else is joining the lack of honorifics club today--]

At the very least, there's no harm in seeing what leaving the situation alone will be, is there? We've been shouting this entire time that we want to take a different approach, than what Tojo-san's mind has been forcing on us. Wouldn't this be a good way of showing her that we truly mean to try something different, that there are other options for her?

...I can't deny that I'm worried that this may push her further into despair. At realizing that we don't understand, or that we could never do the same things that she did in order to save those she cares about. But we've spent this entire time talking about wanting to save Tojo-san, despite everything in here telling us that we need to kill her.

I think that at the very least...maybe we should try to act on that, and show her another path. We can still accept her and her actions and show her a new way, can't we...?

[It's uncertain, but Sayaka's at least willing to speak from the heart here.]

And if we need to do it to go forward, then we can.

Edited 2024-10-03 18:38 (UTC)

[Snorting softly.]

There's people here who have killed before. If playing along with a stupid game is the only proof she'll take that anyone here can understand her, that's a whole 'nother issue.

[She's not looking at McGillis but She's Thinking Of McGillis.]

[ Sitting in his little cockpit thinking about the time he killed somebody by bludgeoning their head from behind with a blunt weapon :D ]

...Exactly. It's something I can understand, because it's what a lot of you told me on that post.

And I...if I deserve that kindness and understanding--so does she.

[Her eyes widen in realization.]

...That was you?

It was.

[She's taken responsibility for it to almost everyone. May as well complete that.]

(no subject)

moodwrecker - 2024-10-04 01:25 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

destage - 2024-10-05 15:39 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

moodwrecker - 2024-10-06 22:59 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

destage - 2024-10-07 00:12 (UTC) - Expand

[There’s not much he could say that she hasn’t already said (also im on mobile), so he just puts a hand on his hip and grins at her.]

Heh. Pretty nice speech. I’d give it a solid 7/10.

[he doesn’t actually sound sarcastic or anything either, apparently this is his idea of a compliment.]

Edited 2024-10-03 19:27 (UTC)

[Oh. ...Looking aside, a little embarrassed.]

It wasn't supposed to be a speech.

[It's just how she feels okay!!]

[ Eavesdropping on this... ]

I...hadn't considered that, either. You may be right. ... Thank you.

[ Much to think about. He still won't be able to (easily) pull the trigger himself, but he is mulling over it, at least. Shalem seems to have it covered. ]

[ Well, Argenti isn't going to be able to stop anyone from hitting the thing, but he does ask: ]

...Is it that we're trying to establish ourselves as morally superior?

Or is it that there's that desire in hoping that we must follow the same script instead? Indicating that in her situation there was no other choice at all?

[ Maybe McGillis is right. But there is the possibility that he isn't, either. This wretched creature seems intent on proving that they're all suitable for a killing game, Kirumi included. Wouldn't this be the very same thing in some sense? ]

So by doing this, we'd be making excuses for her?

[ That line of reasoning does stick with McGillis more than all the hope talk. He doesn't super care to invalidate her choices. ]

[ Indeed, it definitely feels like they're being "used" here for that purpose, and otherwise, which he does not like either.

Still, to answer the question he does nod his head. ]

Yes, I do think so.

[ ...He will wait and see what happens, though. No one can tell what the real answer to this is thus far, but this is Argenti's. ]

It’s not about moral superiority, it’s about not playing this asshole’s bullshit game.

If you wanna tell her that it’s fine to make the same mistake over and over again, then go right ahead. I’m not playing along, though.

[ ....... coming from Aaron, directed at a man who keeps making the same mistakes over and over again, this feels kind of cutting.

Which means the Exisal just. shuts up. ]

[oh my god he didn’t even mean to toss shade on McGillis (mostly)

So right now he’s very ??? about this reaction, especially since Aaron can’t see him while he’s in that Exisal.]

Your speakers malfunction or something?

[okay he knows this probably isn’t it and even if it was, he wouldn’t hear a response anyway but whatever!! let him live.]

[ Extremely rude to call him out on his silence, actually. ]

I know when I'm outvoted.

[ But fine, fine, he'll actually respond to what was said as well then: ]

Though I don't believe recreating her past on a path to understanding here says much about the steps she'll be taking in the future. Your past is simply an inescapable part of you, one that no amount of what-if scenarios can change.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only