the clock tower

[groundrules]

Happy Hallow-elevator! The clock tower event lasts between 22 October and 8 November. ICly, the tower incursion stretches around a week, and you’re welcome to have your character investigate something else, if they finish early!

THE CLOCK TOWER

---

ALL IS AS ALL WAS| TRIAL & NO ERRORS | THE TOWER

Image source.

ALL IS AS ALL WAS

Play it cool, as Serthica’s customs officers pore over your passport papers, before grudgingly allowing you overground. Minaras, you hear, is hunting a delinquent.

Both it and Eidris fare well, with no sign of the damage that preceded the Unwinding. Locals no longer behave eerily, dragons and clockwork droids roam freely, and everyone hates taxes.

Yet perfect strangers insist they know you. Your assigned address leads to a different house. The roads, buildings and architecture look ‘lived in,’ but changed.

No one remembers the Unwinding.

■ Burlap mannequins sometimes watch from mirrors, windows and reflecting surfaces.

■ You might hear shifting and scratching in Eidris walls.

■ Minaras has doubled its bounty for a man not unlike Leonard McCoy.

■ Black fungal spores are found on the increasingly voluminous experiment vials, specimens and supplies thrown out by Minaras medical facilities.

■ Frail and confused, Ellethia survivor Zenobius finally awakens. A short thread is up for RNG grabs.

Image source.

TRIALS & NO ERRORS

The guard troops that Eidris and Minaras assign to the Neutral Zone now protect King Thivar and High Councillor Arabella during the annual Sanctuary Reckoning trials. Both adjudicate cases that violate the ceasefire.

Prolonging the trials buys time for your companions in the clock tower.

■ Create a distraction — flood the judgement hall rooms? Fire? Illusions?

■ Pose as trial participants: perhaps you are of Eidris, and you caught this wicked Minaraian raiding your home? Mayhap this wretched man of Eidris stole your girlfriend? Wait, you’re a Minaraian who wants to kill King Thivar?

■ …organise breakouts, if Thivar or Arabella have your jailed. You are first imprisoned in makeshift Sanctuary cells — all but poorly locked, glorified closets. Get a trial sentence!

■ Thivar and Arabella treat the trials as a box-ticking exercise.

Image source.

THE TOWER

As Eidris and Minaras play court, you can infiltrate the Neutral Zone clock tower of Vassarizhia.

■ Only token security remains. The door is unlocked.

■ Karsa supplies paper talismans that must be burned in the watch fire at the tower’s top level.

■ Each burned talisman amplifies the reveal spell that Karsa activates. Link a finished burning thread by 8 November to help the cause.

■ A November mod post will describe how much of Serthica’s ‘undeath’ characters can see.

■ Placing Magnus’ dragon eye before the tower’s telescope will allow characters to always see Serthica’s undeath, moving forward.

Image source.

✘ ELEVATOR ETIQUETTE

Imperfect stillness dominates Vassarizhia: your footsteps do not click, words die in your mouth. The tower’s rickety gear slither silently. Your heartbeat aligns with the clock’s tick… tock.
You have the growing, gnarly certainty that you have invaded something ancient and alive.

The tower’s entryway level is large, deserted, stacked with gears. At its core is a dilapidated open elevator shaft.

A large sign says to find and pull the floor lever, if elevators stop.

■ There are two elevators. Each narrow lift can hold up to four people, crammed. The upper half of the carriage is chain-link fence, while the floors contain hatches that sometimes open mid-travel for 30 seconds. Hold on to ceiling-bound leather straps.

■ The ropes holding the elevators are thick, but tattered.

■ The elevator’s creaking squeals can awaken swarms of 1m-tall bats and bat wyverns. They rattle the lift, but ultimately withdraw.

■ The elevator can stop at as many levels as you want (or none!).

■ Beyond the second level, you feel intensely paranoid and see your companions as the persons you most hate/fear for five to 10 minutes. Reaching the top, you are tempted to cut the lift ropes of those who follow. (The ropes and elevators recover, after crashing to the bottom. )

■ On each floor, as you exit the elevator, a nearby wall shows a different scratched instruction, signed by DAVID.

LEVEL I: THE LABYRINTH| LEVEL II: THE ANCESTOR | LEVEL III: TAG! YOU’RE IT
LEVEL IV: THE ROOM WHERE NOTHING HAPPENS | LEVEL V: IT’S RAINING (AGAIN)

Image source.

LEVEL I: THE LABYRINTH
CONTENT WARNING: MINOTAUR, BODY HORROR

Step into a jail maze, flooded to knee level. Confusing corridors narrow, widen and contort, while wall torches dim.

Intermittent howling reveals you’re not alone. Hiding, you see child-like chalk drawings of forest animals on walls — and a great minotaur. Keep silent.

■ David S P’s wall scrawl says, IT RUNS IN THE FAMILY.

■ Collect some of the many discarded daggers or axes. Rope bundles float in water — use them to paralyse your captive or briefly force them under your control.

■ Don’t linger in one place: rotting, bodiless hands surface to restrain you.

■ Bad news, if you swallow water when the minotaur or dead hands try to drown you: your skin stretches and bursts, while your bones pop and extend. You mutate into a half human, half woodland creature, all bloodlust. ( Inspiration, anyone? ) Your companions should still recognise you; between hazy memories and constant pain, you might struggle to remember them and even attack.

■ Morphed characters can (painfully) return to normal within minutes of re-entering the elevator.

■ A smaller and distressed three-headed minotaur also roams the labyrinth. Two of its heads sob, while the third urges you to hide with it when brother approaches. It tries to throttle you with a noose to make brother happy, if you follow. David did say.

■ The minotaur and its sibling have poor sight. They cannot enter a corridor where you’ve drawn or laid down a line.

■ Pull the lever, and a straight corridor leads you to the elevator.

TOP | LEVEL II | LEVEL III | LEVEL IV | LEVEL V

LEVEL II: THE ANCESTOR
CONTENT WARNING: GIANT SKELETON, BLOOD DRINKING

Here, only barren stone and thin rivulets of fresh water pouring from wall fountains with sharp-tipped ornaments — your spilled blood quickly infects the basins. Knives, pins and bowls have been abandoned nearby.

High pressure and vertigo overwhelm you. Follow a rhythmic heaving to where the upper half of an enormous skeleton — the Ancestor — has broken through a wall. White, silk thread fetters it. Dried blood rims its cracked mouth. Before it, the stone floor has been tarnished, up to a 5m radius.

The Ancestor appears dormant, a crown of iron thorns on its head. It clutches the lever tightly in its right hand. Above it, an engraving urges, SPILL WINE FOR YOUR ANCESTOR.

■ David S P’s elevator scrawl says, WATER TO WINE.

■ Dally staring and you feel dizzy, nauseous, depressed and compelled to share your close-death encounters. Before you know it, you are stepping into the Ancestor’s radius…

■ …where it plunges for you, if you don’t bear a filled cup. The silk ropes keep the Ancestor from reaching beyond 5m.

■ Two carvings under his fists read HONOUR THY FATHER and DISHONOUR THY MOTHER.

■ Quickly distract the Ancestor from crumbling his captives, tearing their arms or attempting to eat them.

■ The Ancestor is instinct-driven, consumed by thirst. It cannot see or smell, and only remembers taste. Sounds divert it.

■ Improvise: there is no actual wine here. Infuse water, spill blood, or vocally pretend you are delivering wine, and the Ancestor might spare you.

■ If sated, the Ancestor releases the lever.

TOP | LEVEL I | LEVEL III | LEVEL IV | LEVEL V

Image source.

LEVEL III: TAG! YOU’RE IT
CONTENT WARNING: SCARECROW, SKINNED CREATURES

Enjoy pitch dark, dread and bile spreading in your gut. Take a candle from near the elevator and roam through small, unlocked rooms that feature tattered beds, strips of tanning leather and blood or wax spilled on the floor.

■ David S P’s wall scrawl says, O CATCHES IT.

■ Ahead, you see candle-bearing mannequins that dance a hora to the same song played by Jim Kirk’s music box: “Up the mountain, in the grove, hand in hand to Ke-Waihu, fresh harvest’s a treasure trove, each fall we feast anew.”

■ The creatures are patched abominations of wax, skinned flesh and burlap. In the middle of the hora is a wiry scarecrow, eyes blazing with candle fire as it points a large cleaver. In certain lights, the scarecrow’s face briefly contorts into that of your mother. It wears priestly robes that Arc III survivors may recognise from the House of Ravens.

■ As the dance finishes, you notice the lever in the middle of the circle, where flame spells out TAKE THEM, NOT ME. The game begins.

■ The abominations run, gleefully manic and screaming TAAAA~AAAAAG. YOU’RE IT! The scarecrow unflinchingly cuts them down while pursuing you. Hide in the abandoned rooms, or risk snuffing your candle to avoid detection.

■ Some abominations slap you, hold you, or alert the scarecrow. Others offer shelter. A few peel off wax skins from their limbs — showing black fungi beneath. They murmur, IT NEVER GOES AWAY.

■ Parchment strips fall from the scarecrow’s sleeves, reading, HAPPY NAME DAY, MOTHER KNOWS BEST, THE SIN RAN DEEPER THAN SKIN, IF YOU CAN BEAR IT, IT’S A GAME.

■ Bless David: draw the scarecrow into a drawn or makeshift circle to trap it.

■ Intense, paralysing fear arrests you, if the scarecrow catches you. The wax abominations chant, TAKE THEM, NOT ME. One might even take pity and move your numbed mouth to utter the words. Say them — and the scarecrow lands deep cuts on your arms, then pursues your companion.

■ If you betray someone, the abominations take the appearance of your worst version: whether physically mutated, with a temper that amplifies your worst features, or both.

TOP | LEVEL I | LEVEL II | LEVEL IV | LEVEL V

Image source.

LEVEL IV: THE ROOM WHERE NOTHING HAPPENS
CONTENT WARNING: MANIPULATION, MENTAL COERCION

You enter a quiet room. The lever sits on a table, beside rope and a dagger. As you approach, your surroundings transform: perhaps your dearest dead appear to warmly welcome you. Crowds of your doubters celebrate your success. Or you are in a calm oasis, where nothing hurts.

■ David S P’s wall scrawl says, THIS DREAM IS A NIGHTMARE.

■ Whatever your deepest wishes, the room’s vivid illusions provide. With time, your beautiful dreams deteriorate into horror. Sometimes, you hear whispers of, Make a wish.

■ The room increasingly drains your life force. Within half an hour, you have gaunt flesh, brittle bones and a hunched back. Or you might feel compelled to harm yourself, clawing your arms and face, or pulling your hair out.

■ The damage comes undone minutes after reaching the elevator.

■ The room focuses on one person: if someone joins you, they see fainter echoes of what the room shows you, but they are not enthralled. They must coax or drag you away.

■ If you are under the room’s influence, it forces you to make any later intruders stay.

TOP | LEVEL I | LEVEL II | LEVEL III | LEVEL V

Image source.

LEVEL V: IT’S RAINING (AGAIN)
CONTENT WARNING: PLAGUE, THE CHILD

At the tower’s open-sky top, fire crackles from a small stone pit, shielded by a familiar, immovable blood-spattered white umbrella. Nearby, discover an immense rusted telescope and other discarded astronomy tools.

You trip on rain-battered yellowed bones at every step. One skeletal hand holds a watch piece, engraved for Mr. David Sebastian Pumpkins.

■ David S P’s has only scrawled his signature.

■ You might reach the flame easily, or be overwhelmed by sickness, black fungal spores blooming on your fingers, while you cough blood and experience intense fever. The symptoms wane once you reach the fire.

■ Burn paper talismans and link finished threads to help Karsa’s spell.

■ The child with a fox mask from the Unwinding could appear. Sign up for one of three short threads, which must finalise by 3 November.

NOTES

■ Some of the bigger plot clues have been emphasised, to help navigate through the horror details.

■ You can hit up some NPCs during the trials.

■ Check out plotting posts for last-minute team-ups.

■ Back to the top.

QUESTIONS

Comments

[weifinder]

( He doesn't flinch, not at the pinch, though his lips twitch, considering a smile. Or a frown. Or nothing, in the end, but a neutral line and a languid blink, before he brings his hand up, rakes his nails through his husband's hair and all the dirt, the blood, the sweat and oil that has found a home there, and holds. Doesn't lean in for the kisses he's sought now, with an appetite that grows larger than his body contains, pubescent in a way he hadn't been when he'd lived through those moments in truth. It is not lust, not desire, not something easily identified that coils through him in that moment: a hum he doesn't feel, but senses, in himself.

They would consume each other, but for moderation. Finding their footing again and again to stay in step, for all they stumble, and err, and break, and reform again, still whole despite themselves. )

I want every feeling, good and unpleasant, because every feeling you inspire in me affirms to me that I live. Let's find our reasons to laugh together, Lan Zhan. When I'm sad, or when you're sad, we don't let that live as all we remember. But we allow that it will happen, because we care, and we are not each other.

( His sister's lesson, echoing down the decades, out of a darkness as vast as sixteen years within a death that wasn't dying, in a hell that couldn't end. )

We're men, and men are terrible at this sort of thing anyway. Ask any woman. We'll suffer more, but we'll persist. We'll see happiness.

( His fingers gentle; his hold loosens, then tightens, Wei Wuxian leaning in to his husband, a man of great kindness, great pettiness, so many great things, and so many small ones. He's so much more human like this, so much easier to be with, with all his strengths and flaws in their ugly-beautiful metamorphosis.

Lan Zhan is not perfect. He is beautiful. Wei Wuxian would taste of him for a century to keep his stomach warmed, basking in that edge of him, and the awareness of his kind turns, his awkward pauses, the heart that cares in ways more awkward than Wei Wuxian's, but cares, deeply and genuinely. )

Trust grows, Lan Zhan. So let it.

( Or calcify and shatter before the rebuilding begins, and be on bone shards and bloodied knees, strangling in the silence of a tongue too heavy, for words too fraught. )

[weifinder]

Good.

( Because if there is a man who knows what that is, it is Wei Wuxian. It is the deaths on his hands because his arrogance in thinking he controlled unilaterally what he did, and he did not. He was blind to what his push to seperate those he loved from his decisions did for his stability and safety, for those who depended on him. He was blind to the political manipulations in the shadows.

He didn't need to lose his eyes to suffer from these things. )

You start feeling that shame, and you acknowledge it. You examine it, and swallow it, and cultivate out of it the drive to keep facing yourself. To face those who died because you thought you understood the world, and you trusted, and you trusted wrongly. The world was not there to be kind. It was there, uncaring, and cruelty found its way in, and swallowed more of you than you could stand to see taken.

Then you accept those mistakes, and you cultivate the strength to give to the world the knowledge you've learned. Make things right, Xiao Xingchen. You aren't alone in it. Not here, and not in your world. Only fear, and grief, makes you believe otherwise.

[binghua]

[Wei Wuxian is kind, but in a hard way. Not cruel; he does not take pleasure in telling Xingchen all of this but rather is expectant. Like he knows Xingchen can do better, should do better. He's right, but Xingchen doesn't feel up to the task.

He shifts how he sits now, pulling his knees up to his chest and wrapping his arms around them, curling into a ball subconsciously, becoming small, feeling small. It's like getting a lecture all those years ago on the mountain. The world was not there to be kind. Baoshan Sanren would agree. It's almost frightening how similar Wei Wuxian sounds to her, considering they have never met. Had his mother been the same? The stories he's heard never detailed her personality too much, only her tragic fate. Had she somehow passed down Baoshan Sanren's lessons to her son through a mother-son bond? That's probably not possible. Xingchen doesn't know. He doesn't know much, only that Wei Wuxian's words weigh heavily on his hunched shoulders.]

...I just wanted to save people.

[There's a tightness forming in his chest, so he buries his face in his knees, trying to wait out the discomfort.]

[spoilers]

Touched a nerve, has she. Well, that doesn't especially deter her either. She's always had a disinclination to learn people's names.

"Something like that." It's a fair enough assessment. She wants answers. Any reasonable person would, she thinks. She also loves a challenge, and that faint spark of excitement has never quite left her eyes. It won't be the first trap she's willingly walked into, nor is it likely to be the last if she survives it, as long as she remains here. "I've died before. I'm not afraid to do it again."

For the right reasons. Or the right person.

"But to tell you the truth, this is where the Doctor will be, it's what the Doctor would do." Her personal motivations might not be so noble, but the Doctor's presence, even the shadow of it, has a tendency to drive her actions. "And if he gets himself killed now, I'll never forgive him."

[kahl_175]

[Kahl nods, with a tired smile.] Clara have good family. [He doesn't understand everything Clara's talking about, but he understands enough. Telling stories, seeing new places, and doing big things together. He'd liked doing that with his brothers too.]

Kahl's turn. [He coughs once, the bad stuff in his throat finally losing its hold.]

In army, Kahl part of Eight Squad. All grineer. All brothers. [Eight Squad didn't stay exactly the same the whole time. Some died and got replaced with new Eight Squad. Some got hit bad, and it changed them. But they were all his brothers.]

Kahl do everything with Eight Squad. Go lots of places. First saw planet with brothers. [He pauses, trying to figure out how to explain to a brother who isn't Grineer.]

Grineer never children. Grow in tubes, not see outside until done. [Just the teaching pictures, and the other tubes through all the water and glass.] Eight Squad get deployed, too busy to think. Then we stop, see how big planet is. Whole squad just... look at place. [He chuckles.] Hurag look at sun too long, see bad for three intervals after. [They hadn't known each other well then, or even known themselves much. They were fresh from the labs, still smelling like new armor.]

Kahl and Eight Squad go everywhere. Fight together. Sit in camp and watch clouds. Talk. Tell stories. Everything. [They were told that Queens and Empire were supposed to be more important, and he'd tried to believe it for a long time. But when he'd really needed something good to think about, he'd chosen his brothers.]

[weifinder]

( He wouldn't know, only has the faded recollection of their laughter, walking down a road. Yet he is, in so many ways, his mother's son. His father's son in devotion, as well, but his mother's son, to the eyes of anyone who's met him and knew her.

He has not. Xingchen has not. Neither one of them can know what elders might, and that is the way of the world, and its orphans, time and again.

Wei Wuxian crouches down, then kneels, his hands settled and pressing on his martial uncle's shoulders. He remembers more at times just how young Xingchen is when he can pause, reflect on how he too did what he could, failed, and gave in. But it's why, in this time before Xingchen has taken his own life in the rushing grief of understanding, that he can speak with the experience to say, not like this. That his hands can be warm and heavy and grounding, his presence tangible. )

So did I. And we did, and sometimes we didn't. That we had to pick ourselves up after and keep moving forward, that we have a chance to save people now, by our actions and choices, that's a justice we can bring. Living on, saving others, is atonement.

The dead can't act. The dead can only linger, screaming, and it changes next to nothing at all.

[clavesregni]

[Finally, finally, they make it, and Caitlyn allows herself to collapse, dropping her arm from around River as she holds her talisman to the fire. She makes sure it's caught before letting it fall inot the flames.

There's a decided bit less fanfare than she would have expected as the papers curl up and blacken. Did that really do anything? Will it help get them the information they need? She has to believe so.

Maybe it's the fire's warmth, but her throat starts to clear a bit, and her chest no longer feels tight.]

Now we leave, I suppose. Regroup with all the others. [She starts to get back to her feet, not yet ready to rest.] Thank you. For helping me. It was kind of you. [She probably wouldn't have made it to the fire if not for River's help.]

[scrapgege]

Oh. You're back.

[Xie Lian is still... talking to the mannequin, it looks like, and commiserating with it, which at least has kept that one in place through sheer bewilderment that this is happening.]

If you're trying to go to the lever, can't you just teleport directly where it is? Or are there too many of them around it?

[scrapgege]

[Okay, well, they're both more or less not too banged up and on the mend, so Xie Lian also gets up and dusts himself off.]

... I think we need to find a way to go back up, but I didn't see any stairs. So we might have to try the elevator again and hope the same thing doesn't happen one more time.

[matermali]

Another exceedingly attractive blonde enters the scene, and Vanessa cannot feel more out of place with her dark, tangled hair and bloodied person. Perhaps the blood is difficult to see against the darker still dress of ripped satin and frayed lace. The leather accessories and her boots are warped from the dampness they still carry. If she feels awkward, though, it's more for intruding upon an apparently very specific fantasy of Mr. Hargreeves. She certainly has nothing like these women to try and lure him out of it, but she'll need to try for his sake. He may not be of close acquaintance, but she is not heartless (if she can help it).

"No, thank you, I really will be on my way just shortly."

Despite moving away from what he perceives as the door. The interference of the one called Grace leaves Vanessa bowing her head to try and move around her. She may be able to walk right through her, but it feels disrespectful, somehow. The visions themselves aren't malicious, not yet.

She manages to yank the lever before Grace can turn around, and Vanessa hopes that it's something that isn't even visible in the vision. As for how to take Five with her when the exit opens up, she keeps the rope in her eyesight, but she already knows that catching him could prove most difficult even with it.

[matermali]

[ With her own knife folded and hidden back in her pocket, Vanessa will cede to taking a sturdier dagger nearby, but there's just something so strange about the same weapons lying about wherever she goes. Why? Would solving that mystery help anything at the moment? Can't know which ones matter any more. She'll take a rope. Can they make snares? She might not have the time to tie any.

Vanessa had expected more refusal from him, as people often do like to protest, and his acceptance is appreciated. It also leaves her nerve-racked while weighing her options. Why had she offered? She doesn't know if she can do anything that matters with all of these people-who-are-not. There may be cause for a further catalyst, but she has no shortage of blood.

Didn't learn your lesson, girl? Vanessa can feel the slap of an angry woman's ghost, a different mother, for offering herself up without any real plan. She shudders, but it's strangely warm here.

She ought to say 'God be with you'. Something for comradery. ]

Be well.

[ Now Vanessa just needs to figure out how to divert all of their attentions, or at least enough of them to make a difference. She'll creep around to distance herself from Lan Wangji, wondering if her intrusion on the ritual will be enough to trigger their attentions. Can't she hope that they'll never look over at either of them? ]

[matermali]

[ The last thing she wants to do is cause Fei any further hardship, but how can she continue to humor this fantasy? Her sigh is shallow, for the pain in her ribs, and her words are weighed down into the dirt and gravel. Too often has Vanessa confused reality and her visions, and she can't allow her friend to suffer the same confusions.

The illusion is far more beautiful than any vision Vanessa has ever had, though. It's a shame that it can't be real. It's a rush of nature and engineering functioning in harmony, and it saddens her that she'll never see it in person. Such an invention seems as gorgeous as it must be deadly.

If Fei is ever going to return to such a place for her dangerous acrobatics, however, Vanessa needs to free her from the illusion. ]

You could never offend me, but I am not your Uncle. You have nothing to prove to me.

[ The lever is pulled, but the opening of the exit only brings some relief. She can't just leave Fei. She seems to be worsening by the moment. ]

Please, come with me. We will go for a walk.

[matermali]

[ The stargazing remark garners a wan smile as she limps around the fire to reach for the umbrella, though she's surprised to find she can't lift it or move it. Staring at it, Vanessa knows there's more to this venture than just the talismans. There's more up here.

A glance for the telescope, then back to Marcos. What is he fighting for? Does he do this because he was told to, or for his own reasons? He doesn't seem to know much about what's going on, but then even for Vanessa's investigations, she remains woefully ignorant as well. ]

Stargazing, no. People gazing, however...? Mr. Bane has a dragon eye through which the dead can be revealed. Imagine how useful it may be with such a telescope.

[ She's never seen one of that size, but Serthica has been a city full of firsts. ]

I will stay for now, but I do not fault you for going. May I ask a question, though?

[matermali]

[ The movement from Red draws the Minotaur's attention back, but another dash of wings and claws impedes it's progress. The giant's booming cry momentarily deafens as it flails to keep the massive bats and wyverns at bay, but they grow in number and they are ceaseless. They bite, they claw, they shriek in its ears, leaving the half-blind monster to spin almost endlessly before it finally grabs one its attackers to rip it in half. It's chaos after that. They swarm. For their kin? For Mother?

Flecks of the bat's blood are caught in dark beads of water as they trickle from her hair─part of which is unbound and tangled by now─but she doesn't blink as the cloudy water drips into her eyes. They stare wide, but unseeing of anything happening before her. ]

Etsoo lipieem adzigrosen. [ Unleash their anger. ] Itsi yenvagreni wesrat an sha’ami entsai khedekareb. [ Give me the power to make them kill. ]

[ As the words are flung out, an ugly snarl with every curse, her nails still drag, up and up as she rises to her knees. She can see the miasma, she can feel it like a soft cloud. The kind that little girls would laugh about dancing on as they waltzed in their rooms with their favorite doll. Vanessa was never like that. This cloud, this deadly smoke would swallow that girl, all while pricking at Vanessa's feet to lift her higher. ]

Etsoon kaamplen sha’am tweraam. [ Fill them with hate.

The Minotaur roars from its wounds as the bats fight and die for their mistress, and her chants rise in pitch until the spell is shouted, screamed, insisted upon. ] Itsi yenvagreni wesrat an sha’ami entsai khedekareb! Khedekareb.

[ Kill. She writhes. ]

Khedekareb!

[binghua]

[Yes, sometimes it is best to barrel onward.]

I do not believe so. That is, I have not noticed anything out of the ordinary for myself.

[He might have felt a little cold up here, though.]

There is a chill in the air here. Perhaps it would do us some good to linger by the fire.

[Xingchen clears his throat and then carefully kneels down next to the flame, holding his hands out to gain some of the warmth.]

[fushichou]

[Look, he's not thrilled to stay on that rickety-ass elevator, either, but give him a second to move, wolf buddy! It's just that when he does, he sees the roof covered with all those mismatched bones which is, you know, awful, even for a sword who has cut through countless bodies in his time. But okay, okay!]

I'm goin', I'm goin'! You have four legs here and I've just got two. Just hold on a sec.

[But when Kanesada takes a few steps forward, trying to find the least disrespectful places to step, he suddenly feels dizzy. Nauseous. He pauses, closing his eyes against it all. Then another few steps, followed by a scratching in his throat. Some more steps follow until he can't help the cough that erupts.

And blood.

Kanesada isn't human at heart and he hasn't had thus human body for very long, but he knows they're not supposed to cough up blood. That's what got Okita Souji. Consumption. Tuberculosis. Whatever anyone wants to call it. That's what got a lot of people back in those days.

He looks down at the dark red staining the sunbleached bones at his feet, almost not comprehending the sight for a second.]

Fuck.

[thedreamer]

[ The Doctor has danced with death so often that he recognizes its whispered embrace, the chill that roots beneath his soul. They're old friends by now, and so the courtship is a known one, complicated and ancient. As he tries desperately to cling to consciousness, the pain an entity unto itself, his thoughts turn towards the promise of warmth soon to be unraveling the threads of his long (too long) life. No. Not today, not now, not before he knows they're safe. They're not safe.

Something lurks, something dark and almost familiar. He can't open his eyes, can't focus enough to hear every sound, but it comes to him brokenly, pieces of words he should know.

Beasts - field - dark

He's still cold - good. The cold, the pain, he wants more of it, wants it to consume him, wants it to hurt like it never has before, needs to be so alive with it that it drives him forward, beyond every compunction that yet remains for mercy, to do what must be done for their sake alone.

Vanessa - Red - he hears them faintly, growing louder. He's being held, then shifted, as the darkness encroaches.

Anger - hate - kill (...Vanessa's voice?)

Up, up, up, he has to get up! Now. His body is stunned, bruised, but intact, and his strength grows rapidly as consciousness prevails. It will always be the threat of harm to those he loves most that pulls him back, and he trusts his biology to do what it must, to heal him, because he's getting up regardless. For them, anything for them.

As his eyes flutter open, he rolls to the side slowly, fighting for and finding purchase against a slick rock jutting from the water. Bringing himself to his knees now slowly, he rapidly takes note of their changed and charged surroundings, and for a moment, he almost can't comprehend what he's seeing, doesn't know where to focus first. ]

[growlies]

( There had been a switch inside of her that Red could not figure out how to turn, how to press, how to become. She was too human for it, too afraid of what would happen in this mortal realm, too uncertain even when she wanted to become violence made flesh, even when she wanted to so she could save them. As the spell continues, she does not have to figure it out any longer - Cerberus is louder than her, stronger than her, feral, and the mother of darkness is calling.

It (she) obeys.

There is no need for a switch any longer. There is Cerberus breaking free.

The transformation is swift, powered and urged forward by the dark power of the spell echoing in this small space. Her body shifts and changes and breaks and elongates and becomes in a flash of dark magic, Underworld magic - light blue and dark shadow.

And Cerberus stands in the place where Red had kneeled - three heads, open and poised to bite, a long sharp tail out from behind it. Cerberus is larger than what Red would be able to manage on her own - roughly the size of the minotaur, matching it. Fire roars from parted mouths and heat from every cracked part of the monster.

Its own sounds fill the Labyrinth in place of the minotaur's as it lunges forward to tear at the minotaur, obeying the call.

Kill. )

[clavesregni]

Caitlyn's just about ready to roll her eyes in response to his irritatingly vague 'other reasons,' assuming he doesn't plan to elaborate. But then he does elaborate, and her irratation vanishes.

A young boy, apparently alone and recently separated from a family member? She can't help but feel sympathy for him. It's difficult enough for her being trapped here away from her parents, she can't imagine being that young and having someone she cared for disappear like that.

"Have you got any idea what happened to your brother? Where he might have gone?"

[binghua]

[The next few moments seem to pass on so slowly. He just sits there, half-wishing he could disappear and be done with all this, feeling as if he were shrinking with every beat of his heart. Down, down, down to nothingness. Just a shard of bone, like everything surrounding them here.

Then comes the touch.

It's simple. Not overly comforting like an embrace, but neither is it reprimanding. More like a reminder that someone is there, someone is listening. Xingchen raises his head slightly, taking in what Wei Wuxian tells him. It's...odd to hear someone he had never met before speak of him so easily and know so much about him. Yes, there is that discrepancy that Xingchen hasn't been able to figure out, not that he's tried particularly hard, but it's still a little unnerving.

It also makes this a little simpler. None of this is easy for Xingchen to talk about it, buried under the weight of his shame and his , so for Wei Wuxian to present it like this and relate to it on his own personal level...

There are, of course, other people who know Wei Wuxian far better than Xingchen ever could. People who understand what Wei Wuxian went through beyond just exaggerated and biased rumors. But he does think he can relate enough. He does feel a renewed sort of closeness to this man.

Slowly, he raises a hand and reaches up to gently grasp one of Wei Wuxian's own, tilting his head to lean against it. He does not say thank you. He does not say please, don't leave me.]

...I...think I understand.

[He swallows.]

Does the...does the guilt ever become more bearable?

[matermali]

[ Something in her senses the Doctor's subtle movements, but it's too late to stop now. Vengeance has been enacted and they must ensure the way forward; always over bodies, when it's something that matters. This matters to Vanessa, to every bit of her, including the dark Thing that lifts her up from unsteady ground and guides her tongue over jagged, broken words. The Verbis Diablo uses words that have been stolen, twisted, and put back together all wrong. The language of night creatures, the savage and the forsaken.

And so the appearance of Cerberus is welcomed, but the pulse of a blue glow pulsing through the miasma in her eyes still draws a gasp of awe, and Vanessa's hands fly up, nails biting into the lace of her collar. Through the bats, the wyverns, the great three-headed hound, Vanessa tastes blood. Her teeth gnash and she gasps for more, tears brimming. The chanting continues, though it becomes more broken and rabid while she repeats pieces of the curse, shoulders jerking from her light convulsions. The halls of the labyrinth are filled with the howls of two great beasts, the flapping of bats, and the incessant undercurrent of Vanessa's wailing mantra.

The minotaur is sent crashing into a wall from the attack, but is quick to tank the hit and try to swing the other beast around to gore the hound's belly. Instead, it's knocked back against the wall when a giant, shrieking bat, having caught fire from the great Cerberus' initial transformation, flies directly into the Minotaur's face to completely blind it for a moment. No matter the torment they suffer, no matter the threat of death, they will not stop while she commands. ]

[thedreamer]

[ Awakening fully now, even with his mind a bit more sluggish than usual, it doesn't take the Doctor long to piece together what's happened. He'd heard and felt it growing, building to a terrible crescendo while he lay there prone, desperate to move. Still, nothing quite prepares him for the chaos that has dominion around them, the deafening roar of swarming bats and wounded beasts, the madness given power and life, like nothing at all that he's ever set eyes upon in a thousand years. It leaves the Doctor bewildered and uncertain of himself, of what he doesn't know and can't control. If he trusted that he could speak with full authority now, he wouldn't even be heard and he can barely comprehend his own thoughts enough to gather them.

Red - Cerberus has been summoned by Vanessa's own tongue. He may not recognize each word, but he knows enough to understand, and the context of the moment fills in the rest. When Red had allowed him into her mind, he'd seen Cerberus, of course, just a glimpse, but it couldn't have prepared him for what stands before them now. Magnificent, he thinks, because it's Red, it's part of her. They need her now, but at what cost? The toll it takes on her, the fear he knows she felt at having Cerberus unleashed, he worries at the same time he pities the minotaur for its own hubris.

Look what you've done, he thinks of the minotaur, you deserve this; the dark and terrible part of him, the monster inside his own soul, the moment his sense of mercy quiets. The monsters are scared of me, he'd told someone once, long ago. It feels truer now in this moment than it has in a long time. This flicker of a moment, where the dark doesn't unsettle him as absolutely as it should, perhaps because it's so familiar and because he knows it must live for them to survive.

He watches from his kneeling position, fear mounting every time the minotaur lunges at Cerberus. Can he stop this? Should he? To interfere now, to miscalculate and disrupt, could risk them all even further.

Vanessa - He turns his attentions to her, so near to him. Minutes ago (was it longer?), her hands had lifted, cradled his head, moved him with a tenderness that contrasts sharply with the taut and convulsing visage now promising, welcoming, bringing violence. He fears for her, too, his hearts constricting and slamming discordantly in his chest as he watches helplessly, questioning himself second by second. She's fully in her power, the beast at her back has her, and this is everything she'd tried to explain, but that he couldn't understand.

Vanessa and Red - his beautiful monsters. His. He will see them through this, one way or another.

Lacking complete awareness of what will happen if he interrupts, the Doctor hesitates, urgency growing. This will build and build and break, this could destroy them both, take them from him. Yet, if he's not careful, his own desire to help may be their doom.

It's taking from Vanessa, though, taking everything she has, and he can't let it consume her. He has to trust and hope that Red will come back to them, that she'll be safe, if he can disrupt the signal that's beckoned Cerberus. He has to believe that the message he left for her in her mind will anchor her in some way.

Carefully and slowly, the Doctor reaches out, trying to wrap his hand around Vanessa's wrist. ]

Vanessa, please-

[spoilers]

[ Even after the talismans have become indistinguishable from the other ash and debris in the small fire pit, River watches the flames, but her attention shifts back to Caitlyn as she starts to stand again. She's surprised she's even able to stand. Now that she looks at her, though, she does look...better. ]

Well, you know, sweetie, it was on the way. [ But she's smiling. ] And you can call me River.

How are you feeling?

[valeas]

Emilia is perceptive enough to notice her gesture is met with tension. Under any other circumstance, she would withdraw. But these are not normal circumstances, and if the tension alone can help tether Wrathion to their reality as opposed to the one this room is doing its very best to conjure...

That there is history between these two is apparent, its own sort of tension that thickens the air. She looks between them both, aware there's a great deal of context she lacks.

She is less certain of whether or not she can actually interact with this mirage, so she goes about testing that. If this goes sideways, she wants to know that she'll be able to do something about it.

"If your offer of friendship is sincere, why not help all the same?"

Why withhold it?

[valeas]

Emilia removes her hand from the flame, swallows roughly as she stares down at it. She's no longer surprised her flesh does not bubble or welt, does not so much as char. But the spores that'd bloomed on her fingers are gone as if they never were, and that does alarm her, reminds her of the potent magics of this world.

Potent enough to have rendered Wrath vulnerable, once.

Licyn alludes to him in all but name, and Emilia lifts her brown eyes to meet his. Fire and ice, light and dark, a snake winding through a bed of wildflowers: balance. Scales of justice tipped and a choice still hanging there for her to decide, to right a wrong or damn their realm along with themselves.

"He simply is," she answers after a moment, not delving any deeper than that. Almost certain Licyn doesn't mean for her to. But it's the truth. Neither good nor evil, Wrath simply exists, a soldier following orders.

...She is not mortal, for all that she was raised around their ways. It's her mortal sensibility that initially keeps her gaze from lowering past his neck, even as she knows this sort of nudity would be commonplace in the Seven Circles. But she shrugs it off and focuses on what matters, says in earnest, "Thank you."

Licyn could have grabbed her talisman and left her to her fate. He did not.