RECORDING 13: THE FIFTH WEEK.

[foundationmods]

A fifth week in this place begins, with less of your number among you. It's practically routine at this point, isn't it?

Routine, also is the feeling when you wake up - it's clear the Miasma has gotten even thicker. Now everyone is at level 4 - barring the two 'lucky' negators among you, you are all suffering the effects, your eyes flashing a deep, dark purple when experiencing negative emotion.

Any magic that touches the house itself will corrode over time, just like last week. If a barrier is put in place and touches the floor, walls, or ceiling, in a few hours it will be completely consumed by the miasma and fizzle out. Spells or seals will also give off miasma, and healing is still reduced to even the most powerful of spells only healing minor injuries.

You will not be able to save a grievously injured person from death through spells anymore.

The Temperature has taken another dip. It's now in the 50's, and nippy to need a layer or two. As before, the rooms have changed, so hopefully you kept anything essential in the static area.

17 of your number still remain.

...What new horrors await you this week?


WARNING: Some investigations of new areas will contain traps that may be harmful or even lethal.
MIASMA LEVEL: 4
Monday - Tuesday - Wednesday - Thursday
Main Navigation - IC rules + info so far - Dossiers - Locations

Comments

[foxetious]

....You realize, don’t you, that your’ friend’ kept this barrier plan secret until we found his book after everything with Subete happened.

[cw_suicide]

Yeah. My friend was killed because he invited a person he wanted to protect over for a drink.

Funny how that goes.

The barrier plan is clearly a last-ditch effort. He didn't want to discourage people needlessly.

[foxetious]

[maybe if he speaks clearer...]

My point is not that he’s dead or how he died. My point is that you’re arguing “Subete waited until the miasma was too strong,” except the plan you compare that to is one we didn’t know about until afterwards.

[cw_suicide]

Because Ango's was a last-ditch effort, I said.

Subete's power was so insanely powerful, who could say what he could have achieved at the start? But instead, he waited until the miasma was more powerful?

But then, I'm myself. I would have likely tried to test the limits of my abilities at the start once it was established how dire our situation was and then work around my limits. But Subete is Subete and I'm not much of anything, so what do I know, really?

[reanimania]

Not much of anything.

[cw_suicide]

[he sighs.]

And there we have it.

People get so fussed whenever I talk... over nothing at all...

[foxetious]

Quite easy to say that now, hm?

Subete was not one to use a needless show of force at the first chance. No one with half a thought in their head in an unknown situation uses overkill at the first opportunity. If you use everything in the beginning, what do you have to help you later?

[clean off your pragmatism, Dazai, it’s developing a mold at this rate.]

[cw_suicide]

Clearly nothing since it ended about the same for him.

Even you didn't do anything to help him at that time, Gin-san.

[foxetious]

He seemed quite fine right up until the end, Dazai-kun. You certainly weren’t jumping in to help take out the vessels either, which you’ve proven to have some success at before.

Or were you too afraid once your power showed the slightest sign of weakening to try again?

[If Gin had drawn his sword in the trial, there was a high chance he’d take out Dazai as collateral, considering the heightened feelings of animosity and rage held no kind of distinction in “friendly fire.”

He’ll play your game, Dazai, but he knows you still never addressed his original question.]

[cw_suicide]

I was perfectly willing to jump in and assist stopping something that ended with more lives lost than strictly necessary. As someone who has the ability of negation, a simple touch would have put an end to the situation before the Vessels had reason to terminate Subete before the votes--which would have meant Crow's life may have been spared. And then we could have had a nice debate over whether or not Subete would be allowed to go free of this game and, potentially, this place.

However, I can't fault the people who prevented me from charging in without a plan, either. It was reckless, and likely, I could have been caught in some kind of crossfire, though I'm not sure what since it was a magic-based fight.

[foxetious]

[His voice is disdainful and cold when he speaks.]

You’re grateful to those that stopped you, aren’t you? No need to let yourself make actual decisions if you’ve got others to do it for you.

We both know you’d have never tried letting someone take his place in the vote, whether you managed to save Crow from his own foolhardy attempt or not. For all we knew, the girl named Tohsoka Rin would have died the next day from the miasma and how affected by it she was. [The slightest uptick in his voice, a faint curiosity] Yet you got continually up in arms about her volunteering herself to save others, and when others disregarded your choice and made their own.

[Gin’s original point he was speaking up about (Dazai retroactively changing his ideas over Subete) has gotten away from him now— frustration boiling over with the miasma constantly grating on his nerves ensuring that.]

[cw_suicide]

People can make their decisions as they like. I have never once tried to prevent them, though I have argued against them.

[though, of course, he'll say nothing about whether or not he would have taken action into his own hands if they had voted to let Subete go]

But as for Rin-chan... [here, Dazai's voice goes flat and cold, the usual cheeriness and foolishness he puts into his tone absent, though his smile stays on] I even said when I had those names that I could see the logic in why people voted for her. But, to play the role you insist I have been playing: her levels in miasma were about what you're suffering now, aren't they? Perhaps with more time, she would have been a danger, but what does that say about you currently, Gin-san?

No, the reason I was upset about Rin-chan was personal. And I never once said that people were wrong for voting on her. I was simply unsurprised at who was named on that list. And the reason I myself didn't vote on her was because she told me herself that for all her bravado, she did not actually want to die.

[accessorytomurder]

I held him back.

[Her voice is quiet, but firm.]

The miasma had us all... r-really high strung. He was nearly hysterical for a moment, so I held him back from doing anything impulsive. ...that was my high-strung impulse.

[foxetious]

Does that make you brave, or foolish I wonder? Going by his argument you should have let him go and attempt something before he loses all of his power. Or the vessels become too strong for it regardless.

[His voice dips down from its usual soft tone to something much colder. Instead of a purple flash in the eyes, it’s like it drips from each syllable.]

Do you know what my “high strung impulse” was? I was ready to take out any threat to myself and what plans for survival I’ve considered. The most glaring one? The man you choose to defend, even from useful ideas.

[cw_suicide]

How uninspiring.

[accessorytomurder]

...Have you ever had feelings for somebody, Gin-san?

[Her gaze is still and steady on him. Her voice is almost gentle.]

If so... were you ever able to weigh that person as a disposable tool, or a chess piece that you could toss away for the right price? For a good gamble?

[foxetious]

[His silence is frosty and his smile has long abandoned him. He waits, two, four, fifteen seconds of wordless, blank, staring.]

...you’re one hundred years too young to think of comparing our situations.

[He’s sacrificed his morals, his life, his soul for even the idea of ridding the world of what the biggest threat to her is.

Thanks for playing Yachi, but he’s just leaving now. Fuck the meeting, they can squabble and mess up facts all they’d like without him.]

[accessorytomurder]

Maybe so. ...But, that means you should know better than anyone not to boil a choice made in that moment down to something like 'brave' or foolish.'

[Caring doesn't bow to the cost-benefit balance.]

[sageking]

[ ... He's actually not impressed this topic had been brought up as an argument. ]

[accessorytomurder]

[Valid, but she is at miasma level four. She is sixty percent internal self-esteem shut down and forty percent panicked preservation of the people she cares about above all else.]

[sageking]

[ Oh Yachi...but also fair. ]