idolpro | Eclipse's Heart Game ☉ Session #1

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Eclipse's Heart Game ☉ Session #1

You drift like you're floating in water. It's almost relaxing, actually. As long as you don't think too hard that what you're floating in may be bottomless, because under you lies only a deep darkness that only the ocean can provide.

Then, something grabs you and drags you deeper, down, down, down into the abyssal depths. You can't breathe, but that's not on the forefront of your mind now, is it?

There is a mounting sense of anxiety and dread.

Who do you want to become? Will you even get to see tomorrow? What if all roads lead to ████████? Can you still stay '███'? If people see the ████ you, will they think less of you? Will they feel cheated?

You want to live. Even if it's a ███, even if your hands must be covered in █████, you want to live. You want to be '███'.

Finally, a voice pierces through the darkness. It's a woman's voice.

"My, how unfortunate. Your journey ends before it even begins.

"... Just kidding. That would be terribly boring! I suppose I can do the boy a favour just this once."

You feel someone grab your arm and pull you up to the surface.

...

When you come to, you are standing somewhere else.

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Well, there goes the prayer grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference—so, it's what he can change right now.

And I suppose putting a name to a thing is something of a declaration of intent. That's why I chose the name that I did, after all.

"Something like that. He doesn't consider the current him that different a person...besides the fact he has more burdens on his shoulders, and more wounds than before. Which may be why he's thinking about it."

Well, he could think of it as something like a... do you do milk names, or something like that?

"Oh, we do. At least where he's from."

I think they've started to fall out of fashion a little bit where I'm from, since medicine's improved a great deal in my time... but if it was the name he was received when he arrived here, it's a bit like that, still, isn't it?

If there's an attachment there, it'll still be one name, but he could certainly try others.

He considers this.

"That's one way to think of it. For all that he dislikes the one who named him now, there are memories tied to people he cherishes, some of whom are no longer present."

He drums his fingers against the desk.

"He's been thinking of reclaiming his original name, as well."

Well, if that's an option and he likes it well enough, it seems like an obvious choice. Unless he'd like to start afresh.

"It's why this whole conundrum is, frankly, petty and a little silly."

When a thing inside someone's heart judges the very same person it represents a thing for.

"Since the boy predicts that people cannot help but make references to his actual name, should he decide to take it back, and he's terribly miffed about it. But he's simply going to have to learn to live with it."

He kind of vaguely looks up at the ceiling with a look that is, essentially, "ARE YOU HEARING THIS, CHILD? YOU BETTER BE."

People will find something to criticize about anything. But if it's something that's his and that he likes, then it should be something that's easy to go to the mat for, as it were.

"Rather than criticism, it's more that he doesn't look forward to being called a fledgling again. Even if it is true, in a sense."

This is why it's petty.

"Of course, me telling him that he's being ridiculous doesn't mean much on its own, so thank you for the input."

The light of the torches and the lanterns bathes the alley in a red, neon glow. Light reflects off some puddles in the ground. The stench of stagnant seawater permeates the air.

There are paths west, south and east.

As you walk along the alley, the torches suddenly blow out, and the lanterns flicker and extinguish, leaving you in darkness.

You find yourself experiencing a very vivid hallucination, like you were the one in his shoes when it happened.

"Give it up already, you’re at the end of your rope. You can’t do much like this, anyway. You’ve been trying hard enough, yeah? Just tell me what I want to know and it’ll be over." (cw: torture, graphic violence, eye scream)

It hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts but if you don't do something you'll die so all you have left is to push through you want to live you want to live you want to live --

You have to do it yourself. No one else is going to save you.

... When it ends, the torches and lanterns flicker back to life.

Edited 2021-01-27 12:39 (UTC)

It's a red alley...

[When the hallucination ends, Levity finds himself on his knees, head swimming, the lantern he was given barely upright. He's not certain where he is, who he is, but he remembers the pain and the taste and smell of blood and the shaking from the adrenaline and the weight of the bat in his hand and the thud and the thud and the thud and the horrible single-mindedness of terror and--

His stomach heaves and he falls forward, barely managing to prop himself up with his hands, coughs, throws up. He remembers the... noises of pain and then fear from the man, the crack of his skull, the splatter of blood, the sudden lack of resistance under his blows--but outside of the hallucination he can unfortunately think about what that must have meant. There are no words he could find here, no words at all to describe the primal, overwhelming terror and desperation, the desire to get away, to survive, get away, go back to peaceful days, those that might not have been necessarily happy - but no, that is the one true metric of happiness, the absence of such pain. Everything else is decoration.

Wracked by the aftermath, Levity sobs in helpless terror, curled up, clutching at his head, as though trying to hide. The blue flame of the lantern flickers.

Time passes.

Eventually he feels himself come to his senses, more or less. Most of the terror is gone - not all of it, and maybe it will never truly be gone now, but... but enough to move again. His subconscious works feverishly, trying to process the memory, shelve away the things that are too terrifying to think about, find something to cling to to lead Levity's conscious mind out of this mire. What it finds is spite.

Even within the hallucination itself, that was one emotion that resonated with Levity the most: the anger of wondering just what he's done to deserve this, the fury at pointless cruelty. It's something he's... talked about, with someone... it's hard to remember now, but the feeling is familiar. Levity has no readiness to tolerate this kind of unfairness, and damn whatever anyone else thinks.

He sniffles again, tries to wipe his face with a sleeve - pointless, really, he's a mess at this point, but going through the motions helps. Grasping the lantern with a shaking hand, Levity stands up, legs still unsteady, tries to support himself against a wall, shuffles onwards. He's not going back.

South.]

There are no torches in this stretch of alley ways, only blue lanterns lighting the path for you. There's a stall to one side, unmanned and empty.

The path splits to the east and west, here.

((OPTIONALLY, if you still have a lantern, you may roll a d10 and share your results in your comment. If you roll a 4 or below, a thing will happen that will cause your character to lose their lantern. If you roll a 5 or above, your character will get to see something that isn't entirely awful. You may do this only once in this area.))

At least the blue lighting is almost calming.

[The dicebot was generous! Rolled 5. Narrow escape from Bad Things.

Levity shuffles over to the stand to inspect it - even if he's exhausted and still terrified, clinging to his curiousity helps. But there's no one, and he has to leave it alone after a while.

Slowly he moves on, to the east.]

As you make your exit, your step feel strangely lighter, like you aren't walking through the marsh. In fact, it feels like you're stepping into a dream, and you're seeing it through his eyes.

"They'll never leave you alone if you keep doing this shit."

At the time, you had just blurted out whatever came to your mind and went along with it, because you wouldn't take back your words. You just wanted to make her feel better.

You don't know if it really helped her, because at the end of the day, a balm to try and soothe pains that are inflicted over and over again doesn't amount to much. You don't have the power to change things for her, so this is all you can do; to hope that for a while, she didn't have to think about such things.

... How frustrating it is, to be young and weak.

When you're done, you seem to be deeper in the maze of alleyways.

Edited 2021-01-27 16:18 (UTC)

The smell of the seawater is stronger here, powerful enough that it's almost choking. The stone path is starting to become more sparse, leaving the mud to get all over your feet. The flames of the torches burn in a way that you could swear seems a little menacing.

There are only two exits: west, where you came from, or make a turn south.

As you walk along the alley, the torches suddenly blow outleaving you in darkness.

You find yourself expriencing a very vivid hallucination, like you were the ones in his shoes when it happened.

"Well, not that she ever learns. If all she’s gonna do is make trouble, she should just hurry up and die —" (cw: violence, bullying, strangulation, verbal abuse)

It's not fair.

Yoru head hurts and you can't breathe and you don't know if it's because you're choking on your anger or the hand around your throat. Possibly both. You can't find it in yourself to care about the details because you're mad either way.

It's not fair. She just wants to get through the day. You want her to be able to actually think of tomorrow instead what's just in front of her. What gives them the right to spit on her?

It's not fair. It's not fair. It's not fair!

But you can't do anything about it.

If only you had been smarter. If only you hadn't been so naive. If only you had more power. If only you had been more vicious.

... Lying there, with your blood on the floor, you wish you were like the sea: vast, calm, and bottomless as the abyss.

... When it ends, the torches flicker back to life.

[Witnessing the memory of Soaring Crane was... well, it wasn't entirely nice, given the circumstances in it, but--there was a hope of sorts in that, a desperate, hopeless little hope. Though there's still little and less Levity understands about Eclipse's world, the city within his memories, it feels like a leaden weight on him. To know of a place where people despise each other so much, where children are treated like trash... unlike the sharp terror of the first hallucination, it fills Levity with a sense of dread and despair - exhausting, draining, something you can't fight against because it's as big as the world, urging you to give up, give in, fade away...

The sluggish thought is fitting for trudging through the mire. Levity tries to focus on the flicker of the lantern dully, to have something else to think about...

...when it winks out.

Levity sways when he finally surfaces from the hallucination, gasps and gulps in air before the feeling of broken breathlessness leaves him. But burning more than the memory of pain is the anger. For the first time ever in his life, Levity is angry at someone, and the steely fire of it clenches his teeth and makes his nails dig into his palms to the point of pain. It's not just Eclipse's fury from the remembrance, but something within Levity himself - similar in some ways and different in others. How can someone stand being so cruel to others? How could Xifeng think herself in the right? As if there wasn't enough pain in the world, why in the hell would she just--choose to add to it, then justify it to herself by bringing Soaring Crane and Eclipse down?

Though Levity is yet himself and he cannot help wondering about why, how, what had gone wrong with Xifeng - has she simply never awakened to the fact that she, too, was human, one among many? That others were not better or worse than her? But whatever the reasons and roots for it, it did not excuse her own cruelty.

Levity takes a deep breath, fists still clenching and unclenching as the anger seeks a way out, raises his lantern again. At least fury is better than fear - there is strength and direction in it. He will go on.]

...Her name is Soaring Crane.

[He whispers, as though to himself, glaring ahead stubbornly. Onward. South.]

You telling him so means that on some level he also thinks so, doesn't it?

Some people don't place terribly much importance on their names, but in our situation in particular it's very much connected to the self. So, if it's the self that he wants to reinforce, then people he shares that with should also be made to understand to respect that.

Here, the stone path practically disappears, leaving you to walk through the marsh. You can feel yourself sink in the ground a little, like the ground could swallow you up if you linger too long, but that's surely not possible, right...?

The purple lanterns have an eerie glow to them, less like the neon lights of Tokyo-F and more like ghost lights.

There are only two exits: north, where you came from, and a single yellow door to a building west.

As you walk along the alley, the lanterns suddenly extinguish -- like darkness came down to smother them out and blanket you in its cold embrace.

You find yourself experiencing a very vivid hallucination, like you were the one in his shoes when it happened.

"Look at them! It's hopeless!"

You knew it. You fucking knew it. You should have argued harder and with more confidence; isn't your eye for people and your intuition some of the few skills you could be proud of? Maybe you could have changed their minds to do something less reckless, to understand what was happening as another unit's will and not them succumbing to despair.

... What wishful thinking. You weren't ever going to convince them. Always, always, always, it's about their conscience, about helping others, about wanting to play hero --

As you get sliced to pieces, as you see the blade swinging for your head, more than anything else, fury fills your heart, hot as your spilt blood.

So much for that promise. So much for 'good people'.

(They'd deny it, but in the end, you were still an acceptable sacrifice for the 'greater good'.)

... When it ends, the darkness lifts.

Edited 2021-02-01 12:03 (UTC)

Someone will remember this.

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Page 6 of 8

Eclipse's Heart Game ☉ Session #1

Re: Principles

Re: Principles

Re: Principles

Re: Principles

Re: Principles

Re: Principles

Re: Principles

Re: Principles

Re: Principles

Re: Principles

MAZE: Red Alley 1

FOR LEVITY

Re: MAZE

wowee!!!!!!

MAZE: Blue Alley 1

Re: wowee!!!!!!

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no subject

Maze: Red Alley 2

FOR LEVITY

Re: FOR LEVITY

Re: Principles

Maze: Purple Alley 2

FOR LEVITY

Re: FOR LEVITY