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?

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PHASE 0.5

[kandata]

Take a moment to gather and note who you're with, and your surroundings! Once you're ready, move in any direction.

You're also free to examine or perform actions if you wish. This is generally just to establish the arrival and current conditions of the palace!

[destage]

[Sayaka looks around this strange, featureless place and pauses; the people here are definitely ones she's comfortable with if nothing else, but this is definitely not what she's expecting.]

...I've got a bad feeling about this. I've never seen a place so...blank. Please keep your guard up, everyone.

[It's strange. It's really damn strange.

But with a small sword in it's sheath on Sayaka's back, she'll be going to the East to check out what's going on.]

[vogelfrei]

[ McGillis spends a moment looking around, though there is nothing much to see. Hm... ]

Mafuyu's palace was fairly featureless, but this has it beat.

[ Nothing personal. Nothing identifying. Just a feeling of being trapped.

He's going to join Sayaka in moving eastward. ]

[chimken]

[ Falin was very worried - Kirumi had sent that message that she was taking a break but she didn't think it had come to this...or she had hoped it wouldn't. She wanted to help her friend as best she could so she walks around with determination in her eyes, trying to find anything in the Gray, open space that could give them any information.

She seems almost buzzing with worried energy, as well, but she is trying to find something that could get them to Kirumi quickly. ]

[finalmix]

[ well joshua is heading north! or, well. it should feel like north but it's so... empty. ]

It's such a blank slate.

Even the Higher Planes don't look this dull and they lean so much into the monochromatic look.

[bloodweapon]

[Huh... This certainly isn't what Fray was expecting of a palace. There's no time to waste, though, so he's heading south.]

[emptyself]

[ soujuurou has had his rough set of past few days, so when he sees the nekiya as some barren wasteland, he’s barely shaken.

but he is concerned. ]

I’ll go with you guys.

[ safety in numbers and all! he’ll go eastward with them ]

[moonshaded]

[The emptiness is oppressive - and all too familiar. As soon as they appear, Kainé briefly trails her arm through the air, as if testing that it's real and thin.]

... There's nothing. [Nobody.] These places aren't usually empty like this, right?

[It's weird, right? It's a brief moment of being unsettled that she quickly tries to downplay by moving on. She looks to the west, where it seems she intends to move. Already restless, she doesn't want to linger in the empty plane for too long.]

[kandata]

[Featuereless indeed. This probably doesn't speak well of the owner of this palace.

Sayaka and McGillis move east. There's a faint breeze the farther they move. Nice and calming in any other circumstamces, here it only serves to remark how desolate everything is.

Oh! Wait. There's something small fluttering in the breeze. It's carried in the breeze, away from McGillis, Soujuurou and Sayaka -- but it's something. Seems to be a piece of paper? As if the palace itself felt such an object was felt, the breeze intensifies, trying to carry that away from the interlopers]

[kandata]

Safety in numbers to the east!

[kandata]

[There doesn't seem to be anything at a first glance. The advantage of this being an open space is that it's easy to see far into the distance, and the air is so clear!

Thinking of Kirumi, though...is it her Palace? Is--

Oh. There's a vague shape in the distance. If Falin thought of Kirumi at any point, that shape was visible, but the moment she loses focus, it vanishes]

[emptyself]

Hey, look!

[ soujuurou will run after that piece of paper!? maybe it’s a clue? or maybe he just likes running (no he doesn’t). ]

[kandata]

[Go North! Best of luck!

Walking to the north, the atmosphere turns foggy, hard to see through. Odd, since there had been no mist visible from anywhere before! The floor seems to turn from tiles into a dirt ground. Still very gray, but there's unmistakably dirt. Hm?

A portion of the dirt seems to be...a little raised. Curved upwards, a mound about the size of a person.

Ahead, a yard or two away from it, there's something in the fog. Joshua can see a silhouette of something big and wide, about chest-size for him, but it's hard to see what it is through the fog]

[kandata]

[It takes a bit of time to encounter something to the south. When Fray does, though, he'll find...

...are you familiar with TVs by now, Fray? Because it sure is one. There's a TV in middle of the gray nothingness. Looks dusty, the screen has a crack.

It's turned off]

[vogelfrei]

Ah...

[ TIME TO JOG ALONG?? You're not getting away, paper friend. ]

[kandata]

[To the west you go, Kainé!

To the west there's...there's something on the ground. It's a red marker. Not too far away, slowly sinking into the solid ground as if it's trying to phase through, there's a teddy bear, it seems. Hard to see its features when it's disappearing little by little!]

[kandata]

[The breeze makes the paper dance, changing directions, from going forward to upwards, hovering at about ten feet above you all.

It's like it's taunting you all. It's just out of reach even for a tall person like McGillis. One person alone sure wouldn't be able to grasp it]

[finalmix]

[ ......... a raised dirt mound about the size of a person?

joshua is like 90% sure he knows exactly what that is and he is not touching that. nope! someone else can go dig if they want to but it will not be him sorry not sorry,

anyway, at least there's something else to investigate, which is perfectly fine by him. time to venture into the fog then - which under regular circumstances would just be danger flags all around and within a palace even more so.

if he uses a bless spell to form a pseudo ball of light torch, does that help to dissipate the fog a little and what does he see-- ]

[bloodweapon]

[Yes he is! Thankfully he can probably figure out how to turn it on, assuming it has a power button.]

[kandata]

[Funny! When Joshua formed a pseudo ball of light, suddenly something closes around his hand harmlessly. It's a wood lantern, the sort you'd see lighting up temples and the such. Making light materialized the lantern.

Perhaps it's fitting, because once that happened, the shape in the fog can be seen.

Yeah.

The name is unreadable, faded away. There are no plants on the pots. It's as if nobody has bothered to take care of this at all.]

[moonshaded]

[The teddy bear catches her attention - more for its mode of disappearance than any of its features. Instead of being buried, it's more like it's phasing out of existence - like a memory lost.

Is Kainé able to pass the red marker and approach the sinking and totally harmless teddy bear or does it phase through her, too, when she tries to stop it from quicksanding out of reality?]

[kandata]

[Sure has a power button! Press it away!

Fray's perhaps newfound familiarity with the wonders of modern life enable him to turn on the TV, displaying static at first. It's hard to see, but there's something in the static.

It's some sort of round logo. Impossible to make through what it is, beyond the general round shape.

For just a brief moment, the environment changes. It's for just a fleeting second, not giving enough time to gauge the surroundings, but Fray would feel something different. He's sitting on some sort of seat, the TV in front, and there's this overwhelming sensation of excitement, of joy, before it all vanishes as if nothing had happened.

The screen of the TV, though, it's rippling like water. The static moves along with it, round waves from the center of it upwards to the edges of the screen]

[emptyself]

What should we do?

[ soujuurou stares at the piece of paper, hands on his hips and wondering if this is really worth it. it has to be, right? ]

Should we climb on your shoulders, McGillis?

[chimken]

[ Falin looks hopeful for just a second before stopping her walk. She knew she saw her friend but it was clear that this...Palace was not going to be easy. Not that any of them were. ]

Kirumi, can you hear me? Are you there?

[bloodweapon]

[How ominous... Is there anything else noteworthy about the TV? Anything on the back of it or anything else?]