Lost Souls

[shimmershimmer]

[You don't wake up, exactly, but at some point you come to. There's something wrong with you, a numbness and translucency. Should you try to touch something, your hand will pass through it. Why, it's as if you were a ghost. So that's the bad news. Sorry about that. The good news is that mentally, you've woken up entirely. You remember the real truth of who you are, your relationship to your so-called "family," and all the other lies you've been fed by the Shimmering Lady.

You can move freely around what you will soon realize to be the village. The reason why it may take moment of realization is simply because it doesn't look anything like you remember it. The sky is black, the grass is dead, and the cottages are run-down and shoddy concrete buildings. The pond is dirty, and there are no animals whatsoever, anywhere.

And the temple. It's more like a storehouse than a temple. The Shimmering Lady is there, or that mass of flesh and tendrils that calls itself the Shimmering Lady...

She doesn't seem to see or hear you. When the others exit their "homes," neither will they. And there's some strange force keeping you within the walls...]

((Popcorn, mingle, curse the Lady, etc! Also! There will be a special thing for you to do here once Night 01 starts. Watch for it~ :>))

Comments

[thefinaltarget]

That's what I was shown. Even if he isn't, he is not going to get away with this!

[ill_hearted_gentleman]

The way the argument is going, he very well might. Did you truly leave no record of your dreams?

[tellurianterror]

[Lexaeus' eyebrow just rises higher and higher as the Fulbright discussion carries on.]

This man seems remarkably calm and well-versed for someone so 'unsubtle'.

And, for that matter... Skye seems quite eager to move the group away from achieving anything at all, with no apparent reason to do so. [There's wanting to hold off for the purposes of collecting more evidence... and then there's this.]

[ill_hearted_gentleman]

Situations like these tend to bring out hidden sides in people. He is fighting for his life, after all. A demon would not argue so adamantly against Kimblee, so he must be one of the faithful.

...Ema Skye, I cannot say. She may simply be trying to be cautious, but now is not really the time for caution. The path is clear for anyone who cares to see it.

[ill_hearted_gentleman]

Quite a lot, I'd imagine. She must benefit greatly somehow from this cruelty she is visiting upon us.

[steel_over_blood]

Unless cruelty is the benefit. I've met enough human monsters to know a game when I see one, and this monster likes to play.

[steel_over_blood]

Whether she meant to show us this is another question entirely.

I don't exactly have much experience with being knocked clean out of my own body, but it doesn't seem like she knows we're around.

[ill_hearted_gentleman]

A game.... Does she seek to mock us for our desires?

Night 02

[shimmershimmer]

[The Shimmering Lady exits her home and begins doing the exact same thing as the night before, summoning forth the dreamers.

Three are missing from the lineup: The two on night watch, and Tadashi.]

[ill_hearted_gentleman]

[ Well, that's. That's a thing. Just like Lexaeus told him, the whole village is here, faithful and demons alike. Hmm.

He paces around the formation thoughtfully until he spots just the man he's looking for. He's had a few hours to calm down, so he's not quite as livid annoyed as he was during the trial, but he's still pretty unhappy at how smoothly things are going for the demons. Given the way everything else looks, he's got the feeling that the demons are the side that the Lady's actually rooting for in all this, so he's going to see if he can do anything about that.

And okay, maybe it's a little bit of spite, too.

Either way, he's going to grab Kimblee by the collar or the shoulder if he's not wearing a shirt I DON'T KNOW and yank him out of line with perhaps a bit more force than is strictly necessary. ]

[theloneeagle]

I've had more than enough of this.

[Haytham elbows a couple fellow ghosts aside (or his elbow goes through them, rather) to roughly make his way up to the ring of dreamers. He picks out his son and approaches.]

It's about time you opened your eyes, Connor. This ignorance must be put to an end.

[And once again, he punches him in the face. No, he's not holding back.]

AFTER THE TRIAL

[theloneeagle]

This is what happens without order. Even with the choices right in front of them, they've failed to come together to do anything competent.

[Here he'll join the club of VERY FRUSTRATED OBSERVERS.]

[ill_hearted_gentleman]

Truly incredible, that so many people would believe the word of a proven liar.

[ His body language is as calm and collected as ever, but inside, Oswin is seething. ]

[tellurianterror]

That would be true, if one assumes that Kimblee is an actual demon, and not merely a man who likes to see the world burn. [Hey, it's a possibility.]

As for Skye... she has refused multiple times now to give a straight answer to questions, instead choosing to nitpick at an irrelevant part of the question or move onto another topic entirely. It sounds to me as if she isn't a very skilled liar, or doesn't feel comfortable doing it.

[ill_hearted_gentleman]

I am assuming nothing. Lynne was the true Seer and her visions did not lie. Kimblee and his partner are soulbonded demons, there is no doubt of that.

[ They could be Sinners and Kimblee's just the supremest jackass of them all, but Oswin will eat the hat he doesn't own if it's really a coincidence that Lynne told Kimblee her role and then died the same night. ]

It is probably prudent to keep an eye on her, then.

[nuvolo]

Wao.

[Guess who approves of the utter violence? This brat.] Not bad.

[nuvolo]

She doesn't. No one sees us but us.

[... And anyone who's not hypnotized but that's another topic entirely.]

But no one can touch her either.

[steel_over_blood]

Desires, huh? I'll take that as a compliment.

[ Bulat how do you even change gears that quickly... Practice, that's how. They're going to have to talk about this... fake marriage thing eventually and yeah, he's really ticked off about having his head reorganized, but he really doesn't want to take it out on the poor guy who got dragged into it with him. ]

[steel_over_blood]

That's a shame. I don't like the idea of sitting on my hands, waiting and watching for the trials to conclude one way or the other.

You can't touch anything else, right? If you could, we'd have woken up yesterday to find the temple collapsed on her.

[nuvolo]

[Kyouya bares his teeth, half in a frustrated grimace, half in a feral grin. Oh, how he wishes he could have done just that.]

The leech's luck will run out soon enough.

Morning 03

[shimmershimmer]

[Just before daybreak, we have more souls for the pile: let's give a warm welcome to Takano Miyo, Mitsuko, Shuu Tsukiyama, and Isaac McDougal.]

Day 3: "WHAT"

[tellurianterror]

[Kimblee

What???]

[ill_hearted_gentleman]

[ Well.

Uh.

That's.

Nnnnnnnnot what Oswin was expecting.

...Somebody dun fucked up here. ]

[thefinaltarget]

...no.

[thefinaltarget]

[that motherf-]