[CONTINUE + 3] Week 1 || Act: mingle

[foundationmods]

Monday comes onto the snowy town once more, though it still looks as if it's 'night' as ever.

Then again, you are underground. That's just to be expected, considering no natural light can get down here in the first place. The Monsters around you are just as friendly as ever, despite this being your fourth 'time' trying this monday.

There doesn't seem to be many Monsters here...or at least, you think there was more before? Huh.

Well, whatever.

You still have a mission - And with three trials under your belt, you're now a little closer to figuring things out.

...How much longer will this repeat?

FUN VALUE: 7
Monday - Tuesday - Wednesday - Thursday
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Comments

[dereban]

If the entity is a 'player'... I suppose it makes sense that they'd have limits.

[improbablenotimpossible]

Even with exploiting things, a player is still within the parameters of the game - you can't suddenly turn a beat 'em up into a visual novel no matter how hard someone exploits an error in the programming.

[dereban]

Exactly.

Which means that like, the game's programming - if we're talking in this context, is more than likely, a mixed genre. There are plenty of visual novels with RPG elements and vice versa.

But even then, there are limitations to the programming itself... especially since we don't know how skilled the person is at trying to mess with the game's coding, or whatever. If that's what's going on here.

Since - you remember one of those textboxes from the trial, right? The first one that showed up when we used CHECK looked mostly like a garbled mess, but at the end of it... was a closed bold tag, like you'd see in HTML.

[improbablenotimpossible]

Good catch, it's possible if we know where to look we may get access to the 'code' so to speak.

[dereban]

The UI might be a good place to start...

[...]

But wait - if we're "reloading", and there's a "player", and it's the same place everytime -

RPGs tend to have save points, don't they? Usually in the form of some sort of object. I know some newer games don't have them and are just in the menu themselves, but...

[improbablenotimpossible]

It might be something we're not aware of - some games have autosaving, right?

And older games have checkpoints... now then, where did we end up every time we reset?

[dereban]

That's a long period of time for an autosave, if I'm going to be honest.

[Like, a week? Really?]

The... flower field?

[improbablenotimpossible]

Yes - the "Save" could be located there.

[dereban]

I wonder if we'll be able to actually 'see' it, though...

It might be invisible to us. But I guess you could say it's probably worth a shot heading over there and trying out a few things.

[sageking]

Hmph, a cowardly player at that. They still haven't shown their faces to us despite how overconfident it seems.

[oceanicbutterfly]

Do you often show your face to characters in video games?

[sageking]

...no. But I am no mere 'character'. I am King Gilgamesh, mankind's first hero, and the King of Heroes at that.

They already know it is a great insult to dare hide away their despicable form in the darkness, asserting themselves so far above us that they view myself along with the rest of you as simple 'characters'. I will hardly tolerate this any longer than I have to, and once we've the chance to reveal this enemy, I will end them right when they stand at the best opportunity available to us.

[ he's fukken salty like everybody else. just royally salty ]

[oceanicbutterfly]

[Karen just makes a mental note not to start playing Fate/Grand Order and moves on like she didn't hear anything past "no."]

In any case, if they really are a "player," it seems strange that they're addressing us at all. I wouldn't expect them to have that kind of direct influence over this world.

[sageking]

[ It'll be wise to move on past that, yes. ]

That is not only likely because they fancy themselves in such a role, but I am certain they believe themselves to be akin to a god-like or omniscient being; so powerful that responding to us is more a form of amusement than anything. Otherwise they would've done well to keep their insolent mouth shut instead of laughing consistently in our faces.

[oceanicbutterfly]

That... makes me wonder if our "player" is really a player at all.

[sageking]

We can't truly assume that they've been one in the tradition sense, yes.

But, how about elucidating further on your potential speculations? Since I assume with that line of phrasing you were thinking that they would fit the role of a would-be acting godly being far better, or perhaps something else.

1/2

[oceanicbutterfly]

Hold on a minute, I'm still doing the speculating.

2/2

[oceanicbutterfly]

[...]

We heard about Red-san's abilities earlier. She's a "character," but looking at her in this context, she can do things that would normally only be possible by someone with a "player's" perspective. What if that's what the entity is? Someone from our level of reality, who just has access to things that would normally only be accessible at a "higher" level.

[dereban]

It's possible that the player isn't exactly cowardly - or rather...

It's not that they don't want to show their face. It's that they can't.

[oceanicbutterfly]

...because even a "player" who has the ability to modify the game is still working under limitations. To use an overly literal example, even if I could make the characters in Octopath Traveler aware of myself, I couldn't actually show them my face, because the Switch doesn't have a camera.

[sageking]

[ ... hm. ]

Oh? Perhaps it could be something like that. Though maybe a little more complicated all the same; even something like this entity should be able to have a body that can be located, after all.

And it using it's 'ability' to keep itself hidden from the 'characters' seems to be an explanation as to why no one would be able to find it at this time.

[dereban]

Allow me to raise a hypothetical, though.

Assuming that they do have a physical body, the next question is this: would we be able to locate it and would we even be able to actually access where they are?

Because it's possible that they aren't in this world - but they are using some sort of conduit because from our perspective, there is some sort of entity trying to destroy this world. Yet - there's something... 'off', too.

[sageking]

I assume that it is a body that could be located in the right circumstances, it's just accessing it to where they truly are that could prove to be an issue.

If, for example, they weren't truly in this world and using a conduit to access it...there are certainly ancient beings that can do that. Perhaps even a kind your group is familiar with, though I wouldn't exactly be able to say with a certainty that is the kind of enemy we're facing.

[ There were so many creatures capable of acting as if they were gods, and those below them were their playthings as well. Like witches, from time to time, he supposed. ]

Regardless, putting that speculation aside, what exactly do you mean by 'off'?

[dereban]

Yeah... that's the issue I'm getting at here. I'm not saying I want to do anything bad to the perp, though. Rather - I want to hear them out properly. See what their reasoning is.

[...]

The message at the end of the last trial.

It ended with 'good job', didn't it? The worst part is that it's text. When it comes to text, it's hard to tell what the 'tone' is, so I can't... exactly confirm, if it was being genuine or sarcastic.

A part of me wants to say sarcastic, but...

In the off chance that it's genuine... that changes the implications behind the words.

[sageking]

[ A small chuckle left him at that. ]

I want to see such a creature meet an end for the trouble its caused, but I will at the very least allow them to speak so that we can have knowledge of its motivations.

[ Well, 'good job' could be certainly said non-sarcastically, though he wondered idly at it being genuine; it could be true that it was, though he couldn't help but take it as condescending anyway. ]

...And how exactly does it change anything at all? I'm interested in hearing your thought, after all.