Confringentur 2; a Madoka Magica / Fate/Stay Night sequel

[SVS]

[X] Plan: Investigation Ho!

---

"Anyway, I'm sure whoever made Akemi's aunt had their reason for making a fake aunt for her. We shouldn't pry too much."

Mirai crosses her arms over her chest and pouts. "Well, she didn't seem to mind prying," she says.

"Oh, no, I said we shouldn't pry too much," Saki says with a wink. "If she wants to inquire about Kazumi, I think it's all right if we inquire about her. Just as long as we don't ask any more than she does, it's fair game."

"I mean… I guess I agree," you say. "I don't know if it's really all right to just start questioning her like we know what's going on, but…" Well, that lady had pretty much done the same when she met you, hadn't she? Sure, she'd been right, but what if you weren't a homunculus? What if she'd just asked that about you without even knowing for certain? Who even starts a conversation by asking a question like that in the first place? "But if she started it, then it's probably okay if we also ask her about herself."

Beside you, Lancer nods her head. "I agree," she says. "I too would like to find out more about her, whether she is an homunculus or not. She is certainly brimming with enough mana that it would be a reasonable assumption to make…" Lancer's voice trails off, and you see a smirk growing wide on her face as she says "I recall her mentioning a servant before, yes? A Berserker… I wonder how powerful they are, and whether I might get to test my mettle against them given enough time."

"Is that really what you should be concerned with right now?" Saki asks Lancer. "I'd understand if we were still fighting them, but we're supposed to be on the same side now. Do you really think Akemi would just let you pick a fight with her aunt's servant?"

"Actually, don't you think it's weird that she's even got a servant in the first place?" Mirai chimes in to add. "There's the seven- Er, six of us," Nobody wants to correct Mirai when she accidentally lets Satomi's death slip. "Then there's the Quintet, and they had servants before us. That's how Kyubey even knew we could summon them at all. But what about these other people? Akemi's aunt, and that Matou girl they brought in before, right? Doesn't she also have a servant?"

"A Rider, if memory serves me," Lancer says. "Though her identity is unknown to me. Still, it is… Rather odd, that apparently three groups of servants could all exist simultaneously. That… Isn't normal."

"I wonder how that's even possible," you say. "Just having the one group of servants seems like it'd be enough. How're three of them supposed to exist, and what's even letting them exist in the first place?"

Then again, you hadn't even been aware of servants at all until Niko introduced the concept to you and asked you to summon the missing seventh servant for your team. You smile as your eyes turn towards Lancer; that's how you met her, after all. So you can't complain too much. Then again, that was also the current you's first time meeting Niko, so there's even less to complain about there…

---

You'd love to continue daydreaming about how cute Niko is, but you need to focus, and keep a clear mind so your cowlick can continue doing whatever it's doing. Unfortunately, you think you might have found it.

Saki presses her hand against the hole in reality. "Is this a…?" she muses to herself. "An entrance to a witch's labyrinth? But… I thought MItakihara was a dry city." Saki looks to you, Mirai, and to Lancer, hoping one of you might have the answer as she asks "What's going on?"

"It's obviously a witch," Mirai says. "Maybe it came here after Asunaro was evacuated. Not like there'd be too many people for it to eat there now…"

"This seems… Awfully convenient," Lancer says. "A witch's labyrinth appearing in a dry city, just off one of the city's major leylines, and…" Lancer roughs the ground up a bit with her foot, adding "Just over a massive knot of dark magic, too… This is no coincidence."

"You think the witch packed up and moved here because of the dark magic?" Saki asks.

"Or worse, that the accumulation of curses in this part of the city gave birth to one." Lancer looks to you, and asks "Well, master? Shall we go in and investigate?"

"Yeah." It isn't even a question. If a witch has made camp here – or worse, if this area is so filled with dark magic that it's spontaneously spawning witches – then it's your job to put a stop to it. You look to Saki and Mirai, and the both of them nod their heads. They may not know how this witch got here, but they know as well as you do that it needs to be stopped.

The old you and Satomi would have wanted you to stop them.

"Let me just call it in first," you say to Saki and Mirai. "That way, if anything happens to us while we're inside, at least someone will know where we are, and can maybe send help if they aren't too busy with their own thing."

"Right," says Saki, nodding her head. Back when Saki was in charge, you remember her always insisting on having you call things in if you encountered something, so it makes sense to you that she'd be in favour of it. Mirai nods her head as well, and Saki says "You call Niko. I'll call Kaoru." You can almost hear it, on the tip of her tongue, "Mirai, why don't you call Umika as well," but Saki remains silent.

You wonder what Umika's fate will be once this is all over. Sure, you can't afford to let go of anyone now, when you're so close to the end, but Umika's mistakes have caused serious problems pretty much all across the board. She failed to do a proper memory transfer for both you and Niko's other homunculus, which ended up causing the entire mess you're in right now. She's shown time and time again that she has no regard for other people's agency, and after what she almost did to you…

If Niko hadn't had a change of heart when she did… If she'd been just a few seconds slower…

You aren't sure what you want to do about Umika when this is all over. You'd like to see her face at least some consequence for her actions; but isn't having her jaw broken and being forced to have it heal the normal, slow way, punishment enough? On the other hand, Umika was one of the old you's friends, and with how much leeway you've given to Saki, Mirai, and Niko for all of their respective screw-ups, would it be fair of you to ask anything worse from Umika?

Then again, Saki, Mirai, or Niko never tried to forcibly overwrite your entire existence with that of another person's. Allegedly. If you take their statements at face value, their plan stopped the moment you decided you didn't want Caster to go through with it.

But back to the task at hand.

"Hey, Niko, do you have a moment?" You hope Niko has a moment. "Um, we found something, and Saki and I just wanted to call it in to make sure someone knew where we were."

"That wasn't all you wanted to say, was it?" asks Niko, with an air of sadness and anticipation in her mind's voice. Was she expecting you to say something else?

"Well, we found a witch's labyrinth in the park," you say, continuing where Niko was prompting you. "We don't know what's inside, so Saki and I thought it'd be a good idea to call it in to someone else, like I said." You give it a few moments, letting the anticipation in Niko's mind build, before you say "Um, the park is really pretty, by the way. Maybe even nicer than the park in Asunaro. Definitely nicer than the park in Asunaro looks now. Maybe, if you wanted to, when this was all over we could go there on a date sometime?"

That was what Niko was looking for. "I'd like that," she says. "Um… Do you think we could invite her along with us?" You want to stop Niko right there; you're planning a date. A date's supposed to just be for the two of you, right? "I don't want to make her feel like a third wheel, but I'd also like to start getting her out and doing things, so she isn't spending all of her recovery dwelling on all her negative thoughts. Maybe… Maybe having friends who are willing to support her while she's recovering will help her. Lord knows abandoning her to my parents didn't help at all…"

"It wasn't your fault," you say to Niko. "You didn't know this would happen. I mean, yeah, it still wasn't very nice of you to just leave her like that, but she's the one who chose to act out in her anger." But you'll hold your tongue there. You don't want to play the blame game when you're trying to plan a date with your girlfriend. "Um… I'll let you know how I feel about inviting her out with us. A date's supposed to just be, you know, a date, but we could always plan outings with her in mind that aren't dates, I guess."

You'll still have to think about how you feel about Hijiri Kanna in the first place. Sure, it's Umika's fault for messing up the memory transfer and making her confused and angry, but it's her fault for deciding to use her anger to hurt people rather than to seek out help. Granted, from the way she talked, it seemed like Sidonia had a pretty big role to play in manipulating and abusing her into doing evil, so maybe you can cut her some slack; just not all the slack. Being treated badly doesn't excuse someone from acting badly, themselves.

"Anyway, I should get going now," Niko says to you. "We're hot on the trail of what Umika thinks might be more explosives Sidonia planted along the river and in the major industrial areas, and I can't stay to talk for much longer." Niko gives you some encouragement, and says "I'll see you later, Kazumi," and cuts you off before you can respond back.

"See you later, Niko," you respond, saying it back even though Niko cut you off. "I love you."

"All right," Saki says, coming back to reality moments before you. "I just spoke with Kaoru. She says that Umika's leading them in the direction of what they think might be more explosives. So if anything, we'll probably have to back them up if things go south for them." Under her breath, you hear Mirai mutter "Great," and Saki continues. "But at least someone knows where we are."

"Right," you say, nodding your head in agreement with Saki. "Niko told me the same thing when I got in touch with her. I hope everything goes all right for them over there."

A "Hopefully" from Saki precedes Mirai, who asks "How come neither of you got in touch with Akemi's group? They'd probably jump at the chance to do something that's above-ground, wouldn't they?" Mirai shudders, adding "I mean, who the hell actually wants to go sewer-hunting for a bunch of giant spiders, anyway? Spider's aren't cute at all, and those screaming ones just piss me off."

"That's probably why," Lancer says. "Those spiders are dangerous. Each of the threats our teams are facing are dangerous. Likely, not one of us could be spared from our current tasks to aid someone else." Saki nods her head, and Lancer asks her "Were you even able to get in touch with Akemi?"

"Nope," Saki replies. "I don't know where she is right now, other than 'somewhere in the sewers' but she's probably so far out, and so far underground, that she's out of my range."

"I see." Lancer nods her head, and plants one of her hands on her hip as she conjures a spear into her other hand. "Then it falls on us and us alone to tackle this door to the Otherworld. Come," Lancer says, motioning for you, Saki, and Mirai to join her. "The enemy awaits."

You draw on the fear you felt the first time the current you entered a witch's labyrinth, and steel yourself to face whatever you might find inside. Lancer goes first, and you cross the threshold into the labyrinth behind her, with Saki and Mirai picking up the rear.

Immediately, you're hit by a feeling of intense vertigo, and it's as if the entire world is flipped upside-down. Or maybe it's just your eyes. There's a lake of pure, bubbling black Grief on the ceiling of the labyrinth, that trickles its contents upwards in a light drizzle of black. The four of you are protected from the rain by an upside-down archway; you'd think the archway, being upside-down, would do nothing, but somehow standing on top of its upside-down-ness is shielding you from the rain. You see upside-down trees – it isn't just that the trees have been uprooted and placed upside-down, no; it's almost like they're growing upside-down out of nothing, leaves and branches first, as their roots stretch skyward towards the black lake.

Off in the distance, you see upside-down houses, and the entire effect given off is like if the park you were just in were suddenly inverted. Everything is upside-down from what it should be; shapes and objects are upside-down or turned inside-out, the vibrant autumn colours are inverted, replacing vivid reds, yellows, browns, and greens with blacks and dark purples, pale, sickly greens and yellows, almost non-existent in how muted they are, and overcast greys in places where grey shouldn't be.

"Okay," Saki says, as the four of you cast your eyes in various directions – and your eyesight seems to point in the opposite direction of what you're looking at, "Let's see if we can figure out where the heck to start looking."
​

[ ] Wat do?
​

 

[SVS]

All right, hopefully this one goes over well. I'd prefer if we came up with several different attempts to get past whatever the heck is going on, and not just one. Ideally, I wouldn't mind if everyone came up with their own one or two suggestions, either in place of or in addition to the one main vote. I do want to see variety in the way we approach tackling this labyrinth, and I'm cautiously hesitant in thinking that just one person making a vote will do it.

If you were wondering, yes, the text direction flipping inside the labyrinth is intentional. It's a deliberate artistic choice and not a formatting error on my part. If it's hard to read, then I apologise. I know it's hard to read, and I still made the choice to format the labyrinth like that.

 

[PlaguePaladin]

[X] Plan: Temporary Solutions To Vertigo
-[X] Firstly, spend a minute to make sure everyone's got a handle on the vertigo, and take some time to test out basic movements to get better used to it.
-[X] Next off, it'd probably be best if you just tried to walk forward right now and be careful of familiars.

Don't have a big plan, because we're still mostly in the dark here. Like SVS said though, some ideas would be appreciated.

All right, hopefully this one goes over well. I'd prefer if we came up with several different attempts to get past whatever the heck is going on, and not just one. Ideally, I wouldn't mind if everyone came up with their own one or two suggestions, either in place of or in addition to the one main vote. I do want to see variety in the way we approach tackling this labyrinth, and I'm cautiously hesitant in thinking that just one person making a vote will do it.

Click to shrink...

Ah, so we're basically operating on riot rules now? Even the voting format's been inverted!
Just to clarify, I'm joking. I know the quest rules haven't actually changed.

If you were wondering, yes, the text direction flipping inside the labyrinth is intentional. It's a deliberate artistic choice and not a formatting error on my part. If it's hard to read, then I apologise. I know it's hard to read, and I still made the choice to format the labyrinth like that.

Click to shrink...

I definitely wasn't expecting it, but I think it's really frickin' cool, personally.

Edit: Yeah it isn't as cool when I do it. Changed my text alignment back to left-to-right.

 

[SVS]

Ah, so we're basically operating on riot rules now? Even the voting format's been inverted!

Click to shrink...

Uh, what now?

I definitely wasn't expecting it, but I think it's really frickin' cool, personally.

Edit: Yeah it isn't as cool when I do it. Changed my text alignment back to left-to-right.

Click to shrink...

It's not particularly cool when I do it, either. But I think what you're seeing is that doing it for deliberate artistic reasons is more impactful than just doing it for the sake of doing it.

Actually, what I had originally wanted to do was write everything inside the labyrinth backwards, rather than just right-justifying the text, but that proved too difficult to figure out, and I didn't want to spend twice as long as it took to write the actual update just to map everything backwards to a point where it'd still make sense.

 

[PlaguePaladin]

Uh, what now?

Click to shrink...

Riot rules in some quests are basically when everyone's votes are taken into account. Some of them, like Only Three Levels, basically apply all player suggestions into one vote (to an extent), but retain one character. Some are quests that have the player characters be something like Warhammer Orks or Zerglings, where each vote represents an action taken by an individual in the game.

It's not particularly cool when I do it, either. But I think what you're seeing is that doing it for deliberate artistic reasons is more impactful than just doing it for the sake of doing it.

Click to shrink...

Like I said, I was just having a bit of fun with it; but then I realized that I was just copy-catting your idea because I thought it was cool, something I usually frown upon. Plus, like you said, having to read through my bullshit is different when there's no meaning behind it, compared to reading through it because it helps establish the overall vertigo the characters are feeling. I know it isn't the same, but it reminds me of the Forest of Myth from NieR, where the game goes from action-adventure game to text adventure out of nowhere.

 

[SVS]

Riot rules in some quests are basically when everyone's votes are taken into account. Some of them, like Only Three Levels, basically apply all player suggestions into one vote (to an extent), but retain one character. Some are quests that have the player characters be something like Warhammer Orks or Zerglings, where each vote represents an action taken by an individual in the game.

Click to shrink...

That sounds like it would be really cool, but also really hard to keep track of, especially if somebody wanted to do something that was entirely mutually exclusive to what somebody else wanted to do. I've done something similar in the past, where if I didn't have enough people voting I'd take the votes I did have, and try to make them all into a coherent vote, but even then it was usually more about straightening out minor differences in ideas that were overall the same. This sounds different and way cooler.

I know it isn't the same, but it reminds me of the Forest of Myth from NieR, where the game goes from action-adventure game to text adventure out of nowhere.

Click to shrink...

I've never played Nier, but that also sounds pretty cool.

 

[NMS]

[x] Have Mirai create a teddy bear and throw it to see if it falls up or down.

 

[SVS]

Don't have a big plan, because we're still mostly in the dark here. Like SVS said though, some ideas would be appreciated.

Click to shrink...

It's okay if you don't have a big plan, because I'm going to make you one. Well, kind of. Actually, the others are going to be doing most of the work.

[x] Have Mirai create a teddy bear and throw it to see if it falls up or down.

Click to shrink...

This goes for @K4lepo and @Riku_Furude as well, but could I ask that all of you keep your various ideas under the same plan name? It'll be easier on my end if they're all being kept under the same name, than if each of your ideas is its own heading, even if your ideas are different from one another. Does that make sense? Okay, thanks in advance.

 

[NMS]

Like this?

[X] Plan: Temporary Solutions To Vertigo
-[x] Have Mirai create a teddy bear and throw it to see if it falls up or down.

 

[K4lepo]

[X] Plan: Temporary Solutions To Vertigo
-[X] If walking forward takes you in the opposite direction, try having your back turned and walking backwards instead.

This is going to get real screwy if we have to fight Familiars while not facing them. Maybe projectiles fire in the opposite direction as well?

 

[SVS]

This is going to get real screwy if we have to fight Familiars while not facing them. Maybe projectiles fire in the opposite direction as well?

Click to shrink...

Well, that was kind of the idea. After a few chapters of straight combat in a tense environment, I decided I wanted to throw something at us that was challenging and unusual but not straight combat. Looking back on it now, I kind of wish I'd done that more often, but the challenges we were facing didn't really lend themselves too well to that sort of situation. Or at least, I wasn't smart enough to make them lend themselves to that situation. Hopefully I can become smart enough in time for the final fight tomorrow, or else we're going to be in for a long slog of nothing but combat.

Like this?

Click to shrink...

Yes, exactly like that.

Incidentally, don't feel like you have to limit yourselves to just a single idea. If you've got more than one, feel free to spit them all out. It'll be more fun that way, if we've all got a bunch of ideas.

 

[SVS]

[X] Plan: Temporary Solutions To Vertigo

---

Immediately, you're hit by a feeling of intense vertigo, and it's as if the entire world is flipped upside-down. Or maybe it's just your eyes. There's a lake of pure, bubbling black Grief on the ceiling of the labyrinth, that trickles its contents upwards in a light drizzle of black. The four of you are protected from the rain by an upside-down archway; you'd think the archway, being upside-down, would do nothing, but somehow standing on top of its upside-down-ness is shielding you from the rain. You see upside-down trees – it isn't just that the trees have been uprooted and placed upside-down, no; it's almost like they're growing upside-down out of nothing, leaves and branches first, as their roots stretch skyward towards the black lake.

Off in the distance, you see upside-down houses, and the entire effect given off is like if the park you were just in were suddenly inverted. Everything is upside-down from what it should be; shapes and objects are upside-down or turned inside-out, the vibrant autumn colours are inverted, replacing vivid reds, yellows, browns, and greens with blacks and dark purples, pale, sickly greens and yellows, almost non-existent in how muted they are, and overcast greys in places where grey shouldn't be.

"Okay," Saki says, as the four of you cast your eyes in various directions – and your eyesight seems to point in the opposite direction of what you're looking at," Let's see if we can figure out where the heck to start looking."

A journey starts with a single step, which is exactly how far Saki manages to get before she falls flat on her butt on her face. Somehow, she falls both forwards and backwards simultaneously, and lands on both at the same time. Or maybe neither. You're really having a hard time telling the difference. "O~kay," she says, as she struggles to pick herself up. "Note to self; don't try that again until we've learned how to actually move around in this place."

"Maybe we should just take a minute or two to get adjusted to how… Backwards, everything is around here," you suggest. "At the very least, it would give us time to figure out what a better way to move around would be that doesn't result in us falling down."

"It's obvious, isn't it?" Mirai asks. "If everything is backwards, then maybe we should try doing everything backwards, too."

"That would be too easy," Lancer says. "The Otherworld is not a place where you can merely presume to know the rules of how things operate. There are many myths from my home of people who cam eout drastically different from how they went in. We should be on our guard."

Even though your mind is reeling from the vertigo, you do your best to focus, to concentrate on taking in as much about this strange, inverted place as you can manage. Are there familiars anywhere you can see? You try to look around, but are met with a spinning head for your troubles. Right, you have to look in the opposite direction from where you want. If you want to look to your right, where the inverted houses are, you have to turn your eyes to the left.

The sensation of having your vision track in the complete opposite direction as your head is one you don't think you could ever describe in words. It feels wrong but so much more so than just the word "wrong" can convey. Still, you manage the impossible task, turning left to look right. You don't see any familiars, and so you try to look in the opposite direction; the direction that you're actually looking right now.

This is weird. You'll have to tell Niko about the next time you see her.

When you fail to find any familiars, you decide to take a break from looking, and try instead to adjust your other senses to the strange inverted labyrinth. Your body's movements aren't inverted; you can move your left arm, and manage to touch the things that are to your left, for example, but walking is another matter altogether. Taking a step forward is like trying to walk on a conveyer belt going in the opposite direction. You take one step, and instantly you're behind where you started, but your body still feels like it's moving forward, and the imbalance causes you to fall.

Fortunately, Lancer is there to catch you, and Mirai looks on with a sour expression, as if to ask her "Why didn't you catch Saki?" "Be careful, master," Lancer says to you, ignoring Mirai's dirty look entirely. "We don't want you getting hurt."

"What did it feel like when you tried to walk?" Saki asks, as Lancer helps you to right yourself. "When I tried to walk, it was like I was trying to walk in the opposite direction of a moving conveyer belt."

"Yeah, that's about the same as what I felt," you reply. "So, maybe if we tried walking backwards, we'd move forwards instead?"

"Or we'd just fall flat on our faces," Mirai says. "Do we even know if gravity works the same here as in the real world? I mean, there's rain that's falling up; so I'm not too confident we'll be able to leave this archway safely even if we can figure out walking."

"Perhaps that is something you could test for us?" Lancer suggests. "You can make familiars, can you not? See what happens when you send one of them out."

Mirai taps her heel against the roof of the archway – or is it the floor, since it's upside-down now? – and you and Saki wait with anticipation for her bear to spring up from the ground. It does not. Instead, Mirai's teddy bear falls from the nothingness above your head. As it falls, it hits the invisible barrier of the upside-down archway above your heads, and as it rights itself, it stares down at you. "Hey, look up!" Mirai calls out. The bear hesitates, but when it finally turns its head upwards, it waves its stuffed paw in your direction. "Good job. Now, uh… How do you get down from there?"

"Try having it walk," Saki suggests.

"All right, see what happens if you take a few steps forward," Mirai calls out. The bear takes one step forwards, and is promptly moved one step backwards. "Okay, so we know that's a thing now," Mirai says to the rest of you. "I was kind of worried there for a moment that we wouldn't be able to move at all rfom where we are, but it looks like we can move, as long as we're not being tripped up by the feeling of being shoved in the opposite direction from where we're trying to go."

That's going to be pretty hard to overcome, though, isn't it? Maybe Mirai doesn't think so. Maybe she's more concerned with seeing what her bear can do than the how of how are you going to? "Okay, now try moving backwards."

Again, the bear takes a single step backwards, and this time it advances, moving back to the same space it had landed. "All right, Mirai says, "Moment of truth. What do you think will happen if I tell the bear to walk off the, uh… The invisible roof of the archway?"

"It'll fly upwards."

"It'll fall down to where we are."

"It'll get caught in the rain of Grief and melt," Lancer says. "Or worse, just fall straight up into the lake."

Everyone else looks at Lancer, who shrugs her shoulders. "Everyone who hopes it's anything but what Lancer suggested, raise your hand," you say. You, Saki, and Mirai all raise your hands. "Lancer, please don't say stuff like that in the future."

"I'm trying to be realistic about what could happen to us," Lancer says. "This is the Otherworld. We should be prepared for the worst." Lancer extends her spear out as far as it can go, until its tip just barely passes over the boundary of the archway's protection. The rain of Grief taps gently against the spear, causing it to sizzle as small pockmarks burn themselves into the spear's tip. "See? Maybe it won't kill us immediately, but we should take precautions against being burned alive by that rain."

"Duly noted," Mirai says. "We'll figure that out once we've figured out how the heck to even move from the spot we're in." She and Saki look to one another, and the two nod their heads as Mirai says "All right, bear, move out. Go backwards, and keep going backwards until you can't go any further."

One step. The bear takes one step backwards, and is confidently advanced forwards. It does the same, and again, until it reaches the edge of the invisible boundary where the archway's shadow doesn't reach. It takes one step over the edge, and falls. Oh, sure, it falls upwards, but somehow it still manages to fall up to where you are. You're past the point of questioning how this place works.

The black rain beats down on its stuffed body, but the bear gives no reaction, no sense that it's in pain, as it stands upright, turns its body around until it's facing Mirai, and offers her a salute with its stuffed paw. "Good job," Mirai says to her bear. "Now, walk backwards until you're here with me. Don't want to leave you out in the rain."

The bear does as Mirai tells it, walking backwards until the forward motion propels it to her side. Like Lancer's spear, the bear's fur is marred by black scorch marks, places where the black rain struck it and left a burn. Mirai smiles, and strokes the bear underneath its chin, before turning slowly until her eyes meet Saki's. "All right, we've got at least some idea of how to move around here," she says. "Move backwards to go forwards, look left to see right; basically this whole place is like a hall of mirrors, but wa~ay worse."

"So now what?" Saki asks. "Sure, we've got a general idea of how to move around now, but what are we going to do about the Grief? How do we get past that?"

"Umbrellas, maybe?" you suggest. "I didn't bring any, but maybe there's a way we can make some, somehow?"

"I could perhaps make them, if I knew what an 'umbrella' looked like," Lancer says. Lancer doesn't know what an umbrella looks like? That's crazy; you know you saw some in a store one of the times you went shopping with her. How does she not know what they are? Saki and Mirai appear equally as perplexed by Lancer's statement, but Lancer keeps going before any of you have a chance to say anything. "However, I find myself puzzling over a more pressing question- If we have to look in the direction opposite that which we want to see, and walk in the direction opposite that which we want to move, perhaps it would be easier if we simply… Turned around and walked backwards?"

You hadn't thought of that. "That's… A very interesting point, Lancer," Saki says. Slowly, Saki turns her head away in order to look at you and Mirai, and the two of you turn your heads away to meet her gaze. "What do you think? Would it be easier to continue testing our movements if we tried going backwards?"

"I'm up for it," Mirai says. "What about you, Kazumi?"

"Um, yeah," you say. "I guess that makes sense… About as much sense as anything else in this place makes."

"Which isn't a whole lot, I know," Saki says. "But I think Lancer makes a good point. If everything is backwards for us, then instead of trying to contort our bodies to make basic movements work the way we're used to, we should just turn ourselves around and see if that's any easier."

Satisfied that you've all come to an agreement, the three of you get ready to turn around. "If this works," you say to Lancer, "Have some umbrellas ready. I can tell you what they look like if you need me to. They don't need to be too fancy, just enough to protect us from the rain."

"Understood, master," Lancer says. "All right then, on my mark?" Three heads nod in unison with Lancer. "Then we'll turn on three."

You really don't think you needed military precision just to turn around in place. But in hindsight, maybe it was a good idea; it kept everyone on the same page, so that when the four of you turned around and saw what, exactly, was behind you, you could all be surprised and lurch backwards at the same time. Which, of course, just means that the four of you were catapulted forwards, causing you to almost stumble as you just narrowly avoid hitting yourself in the head.

You don't mean that in the sense of, you would have fallen and hit your head if you hadn't caught yourself. That would be too easy. Instead, you mean that if you hadn't caught yourself, you would have stumbled forward and hit the mirror image of yourself that was apparently standing behind you the entire time. "Are you all seeing this?" Mirai asks. "Or am I just going crazy?"

You don't see what Mirai is seeing, but you do see yourself. "Are you seeing yourself?" Saki asks, causing Mirai to nod her head. "Yeah, me too. What about you two, Kazumi? Lancer?"

"Yes, I'm also seeing myself," Lancer says. "What do you think they are? Familiars? Reflections in a mirror? Some other trick of the witch who dwells here?"

"Or maybe they're the real us, and everything is flipped around for us because we were actually looking backwards all along?"
​

[ ] Wat do?
​

 

[SVS]

All right, we've done our testing, and now even more weird stuff is going on. Does gravity work the same way here that it does in reality? Mirai's bear fell upwards, but somehow it landed down (up?) here with us. Turning around reveals mirror duplicates of ourselves, but we can only see own own duplicates, and not the duplicates of other people. Rain is still falling upwards from a lake that's floating in the sky, and Lancer doesn't know what an umbrella is. I guess the Grail didn't think that was relevant information about the modern age.

So, what do we do now? Same rules apply as before- It's fine if everyone has their own ideas about how to proceed, but I'd like everyone to keep their ideas under a unified plan name.

 

[PlaguePaladin]

[X] Plan: Figuring Things Out
-[X] Try talking and moving around a bit; if your movements sync up, then yeah, that's just a mirror or some perspective trickery.
--[X] If your movements don't sync up, then the familiar assumption is probably in place. Try to interact with them in various ways, like talking to them or something.

Man, some of these descriptions I can't even imagine in my head; I'm going to have to re-read a few times to get a handle on this. In a weird way, I actually kind of like that. On the other hand, definitely glad this is a one-off thing, because I don't think I could keep up with the headache this is giving me for a year.

 

[NMS]

This is kind of reminding me of that one mirror witch we fought in the last quest.

[X] Plan: Figuring Things Out
-[x] Can Mirai's teddy bear interact with those other yous at all?
-[x] Idly wonder what would happen if you dropped your black hole in here.

 

[SVS]

Man, some of these descriptions I can't even imagine in my head; I'm going to have to re-read a few times to get a handle on this. In a weird way, I actually kind of like that. On the other hand, definitely glad this is a one-off thing, because I don't think I could keep up with the headache this is giving me for a year.

Click to shrink...

I'm glad you're enjoying this. If you think it's headache-inducing to read, imagine what it's like having to type and attempt to proofread. I'm glad this is just a one-time thing, but I'm hoping I can make Sidonia's blood obrez just as unusual and entertaining. Because for as much as I'm glad that people are enjoying this, I don't know if I'd want to do this again.

This is kind of reminding me of that one mirror witch we fought in the last quest.

Click to shrink...

Funny thing is, when I came up with the idea for this labyrinth, I was initially afraid that it would come off as being too similar to the mirror one from the previous quest. I might have gone overboard in dialing up the weirdness to compensate, or maybe the weirdness was always going to be dialed up as a matter of course. I don't think I could have written this labyrinth's concept if I'd stuck with doing things my usual way. Still, I really wish I had thought to do this back then, looking back on it. Then again, I suppose I could say that I wish I'd thought of ways to make every venture into a labyrinth unique and memorable.

 

[Riku_Furude]

[X] Plan: Figuring Things Out

 

[SVS]

[X] Plan: Figuring Things Out

Click to shrink...

While I appreciate the vote, I would like to point out that I'm doing things differently for our stay in the labyrinth. Rather than trying to get everyone to agree to a single plan, I'm looking for everyone to contribute their own ideas to how we handle investigation and navigation inside the labyrinth. So if you've got your own ideas, by all means, feel free to air them. They'll be much appreciated.

All I ask is that everyone keep their various ideas under a single plan name. It's just easier for me that way.

 

[SVS]

[X] Plan: Figuring Things Out

---

You really don't think you needed military precision just to turn around in place. But in hindsight, maybe it was a good idea; it kept everyone on the same page, so that when the four of you turned around and saw what, exactly, was behind you, you could all be surprised and lurch backwards at the same time. Which, of course, just means that the four of you were catapulted forwards, causing you to almost stumble as you just narrowly avoid hitting yourself in the head.

You don't mean that in the sense of, you would have fallen and hit your head if you hadn't caught yourself. That would be too easy. Instead, you mean that if you hadn't caught yourself, you would have stumbled forward and hit the mirror image of yourself that was apparently standing behind you the entire time. "Are you all seeing this?" Mirai asks. "Or am I just going crazy?"

You don't see what Mirai is seeing, but you do see yourself. "Are you seeing yourself?" Saki asks, causing Mirai to nod her head. "Yeah, me too. What about you two, Kazumi? Lancer?"

"Yes, I'm also seeing myself," Lancer says. "What do you think they are? Familiars? Reflections in a mirror? Some other trick of the witch who dwells here?"

"Or maybe they're the real us, and everything is flipped around for us because we were actually looking backwards all along?"

Oh, man, all this thinking about stuff being reversed is giving you a headache. You reach up with your hand and touch your brow, hoping that maybe a bit of pressure will ease the headache-to-be from coming on. It also gives you a unique opportunity to see how the mirror you will react. Like a real mirror, it mimics your gesture, placing its own hand onto its head. Does it also have a headache, you wonder? Is your reflection the real you, and you're the mirror mimicking your own actions?

Out of the corner of your eye, you see Mirai interacting with her teddy bear. Carefully, awkwardly, but still interacting with it. You try to peeks a view at what she herself is doing, or what her reflection might be doing, but you're having difficultly seeing anything.

"Hey Mirai, what would happen if your teddy bear tried interacting with our reflections?" Saki asks, as if asking your question for you. "Actually… What does it look like in your own reflection right now?"

"I'm… Interacting with my bear, the same as I'm doing right now," Mirai replies. "I'm not sure what would happen if I sent him over to play with one of you, though…" Mirai's voice trails off, and she looks for her bear instead of her reflection. It's still weird to see someone looking in the opposite direction of what they're talking about or who they're talking to, but you guess that's never going to get any easier. "Um, Saki, why don't you try next?"

"Sure."

Saki agrees to Mirai's request, and Mirai sends her bear over to her, while you return to your own reflection. "Um… Hi?" you say. You aren't really sure why you're talking to your reflection, only that you are. But your reflection can only mouth back to you the silent mimicry of your words. "So, um… What are you doing here?"​

"What are you doing here?"

You only hear your own voice, repeating back to you words you've already spoken. "Can you understand me?"​

"Can you understand me?"

You reach out your hand to touch your reflection, and your reflection reaches back. Your hands meet in the middle, and rather than feel your hand stop at a wall, or a mirror, or at anything, you feel your hand passing through itself, almost like your reflection is painted into the air. You pull your hand back, and your reflection does the same. You examine your hand for any signs of strangeness; actually this whole place is strange, but you've thought that more than enough. But you see nothing. Your hand is still your hand. There isn't a second hand growing out of your hand from where your hand melted into your mirror's hand.

Without looking over to her, because you know you won't see anything, you whisper "Hey, Saki, what's the teddy bear doing with you and your reflection?"

"Just what we're doing now," Saki replies. You try to look, out of the corner of your eyes, but all you see are the vague shadows of Saki playing with Mirai's bear, and nothing from their reflections which you can't see anyway. Come to think of it, why can you only see your own reflections? Lancer, Saki, and Mirai are also here with you, right? They're seeing the same reflections of themselves that you are. So why can you only see your own reflections?

Eventually, the teddy bear moves on from Saki, and meanders its way backwards over to you. Your reflection moves to greet the bear, the same as you do, but when the bear crosses into your field of view, what you see your reflection interacting with isn't a teddy bear; it's Niko.

Okay, that's… A little weird, you think, but you put the thought out of your mind as you greet the bear. Maybe it's part of whatever illusion is causing this. You don't think it's the work of the witch's familiars, because otherwise your mirror wouldn't be mirroring your movements. Right? The fact that it's mirroring your movements, and mirroring the movements of Saki and Mirai as well, is proof that it's more likely to be some sort of illusion or trickery than the work of a familiar. At least it's Niko you're seeing in the bear's place. Your reflection could have chosen anybody, so you're glad you get to see someone you actually want to see.

But it's when Mirai sends a second bear over to you that things get weird. Well, weirder than they already are. Maybe? Definitely weirder. Because when the second bear appears in your field of view, it once again takes on a reflection of Niko's shape, rather than reflecting the shape of the teddy bear it is in reality. Then, if you can believe it, things get really weird.

The first Niko's reflection touches your shoulder, and it's as if Niko is really there, touching your shoulder. It's almost enough to make you look up to greet her, but you stay put, knowing the truth is something else. But your reflection doesn't. Your reflection moves to the touch of the reflected Niko, staring up and looking longingly into her eyes. Your reflection leans up on her tiptoes, and when I kisses the reflected Niko, you can actually feel Niko's lips press against yours.

You can feel Niko's tongue forcing its way into your mouth, and your lips eagerly parting to greet it. Her tongue tastes so sweet; you wish you could stay like forever.

As you stare, the second reflected Niko, the newcomer, grows jealous, and with a much rougher hand on your shoulder, tears you away from the first. Her hand is not the warm touch of the first Niko's, but one that's cold, hard, fake. That's when you see the hand poking through the second's sleeve; it's a prosthetic; and her eyes are red. The reflection of Niko's homunculus pulls you in, just as close as the reflected Niko, and you and she kiss. Her kiss is so much hungrier than Niko's, rougher, so much more demanding of your attention, but not altogether unpleasant, either.

Is she jealous of what you and Niko have? What's your reflection trying to tell you? Is any of this even real?

The real you, of course, isn't moving at all. Neither is the bear – singular, somehow, you could have sworn there were two – who stands still at your side, and has ever since you stopped entertaining it to watch the reflected scene unfold. But do you even have to move? What are you supposed to make of this? No, really, what are you supposed to make of this, when you're watching as your reflection is tossed back and forth between a pair of bickering twins, constantly vying for your attention.

Do you like Hijiri Kanna? Does she like you? Is any of this even real?

Long before you realised that you loved Niko for who she was, flaws and all, you thought that she was cute, and wished that she would smile more. Her homunculus is identical to her in appearance. Does that mean you think she's cute too? Aren't you only imagining this because Niko wanted to bring her along with you on your date? Is any of this even real?

You would have been fine to keep watching if it were just you, being passed back and forth between a pair of cute Nikos who wanted to keep kissing you – and who sometimes kiss each other, as well; oh good lord, you didn't know how cute it was to see two Nikos kissing each other – but it's when you feel the illusion of Niko's hand trailing over your chest down your bellybutton under your skirt that you draw the line. Sure, Niko is cute, and maybe one day you wouldn't be averse to doing that sort of thing with her, but you know Niko wouldn't try to touch you like that before you're ready.

You clench your eyes shut when a cold chill runs down your spine at the illusory Niko's touch, and all of a sudden, the touch of the illusions comes to a stop, and when you open your eyes again, there just you, and a lone teddy bear, standing at your side. "Master?" Lancer's voice draws you out of the cold sweat running down your back. "Is something wrong?"

When you don't give Lancer a response, she asks "Did you see something in your reflection?"

You nod your head, and your reflection nods back. "When Mirai's teddy bear wandered over to me, it was Niko's reflection, not the bear's, that I saw looking back at me. Then there was another one, even though Mirai only sent one bear." You strain your head in the opposite direction, looking for Mirai, and ask her "Right? You only sent one bear to play with me, right?"

"Yeah, the same one I sent to Saki just before you," Mirai says. "Saki, did you see two bears in your reflection?"

"No," Saki replies. "But… What Kazumi's saying kind of makes sense. When your bear wandered over to me, I didn't see it as a bear… I saw you; and when the second one showed up, I saw… I saw my younger sister." Saki has a younger sister? "I… We were… She was…" Saki's words fail her, and under her breath she mutters "Sisters aren't supposed to do that with each other…"

"Yeah," you say. "I saw Niko and her homunculus, and… I don't know if I'm ready for that sort of thing just yet." You shudder, yoru body still remembering the touch you felt as the illusory Nikos caressed your mirror image. "Lancer? Did you see anything like that?"

Lancer shakes her head. "Mirai never sent her teddy bear over to me, so I only ever saw my own reflection," she says. "Perhaps the intrusion of another being into our reflection's spaces is what provoked these… Illusions."

"Okay, that makes sense, yeah," Mirai says. "But then, how come I only saw my teddy bear?"

"Maybe it's because you're the originator for the bear?" Saki asks. "Or maybe it's because you've got the hots for your bears almost as much as me, so the mirror didn't need to do anything else to get you riled up."

Mirai pouts, and crosses her arms over her chest. "That's not true," she says. "But more importantly, why the heck was… This, showing us those kinds of images in the first place? Is the witch horny or something? Was she getting her familiars to mime doing stuff with us because that's how she gets her kicks?"

"Maybe it's just another tactic meant to throw us off our guard," Lancer suggests. "It would not be the first time the Otherworld has ensnared its victims with false images of intimacy."

"How would we know the difference?" you ask Lancer. "I mean, between whether it's the witch or her familiars doing it, or if it's just the labyrinth doing everything it can to throw us off-guard?"

"If you strike at your reflection, and can harm it, that might indicate the work of a familiar," Lancer says. "You wouldn't be able to harm an illusion, but if it were a familiar who had mimicked your shape to show you unsettling images, you could possibly harm that." Lancer gestures with her head to your staff, and you wonder how much effort that took her, to motion in the correct direction of what she wanted to motion towards, while being forced to have her vision track in the complete opposite direction. "Try to attack your reflection, and see what happens."

Actually, more than just attacking it, you're kind of curious to know what would happen if you dropped your black hole in here.
​

[ ] Wat do?
​

 

[SVS]

Things continue to be mind-bendingly confusing as we are now capable of feeling the sensations of our duplicates reflected back at us, while our reflections do things that we definitely aren't. Is it just the labyrinth playing even more sensory tricks on us, or is this the work of familiars? Are there even familiars in this labyrinth? Is there even a witch? We haven't encountered anything else besides our own reflections, even though there's upside-down houses and stuff we could be checking out. Who knows? Maybe there's a familiars in there. Maybe the witch is in whichever upside-down house is supposed to be Madoka's. Maybe this whole mess is just because something spontaneously grew up from the patch of dark magic that's trying its best to corrupt the largest leyline in this part of the city.

Pseudo-chaos vote rules still apply. Your own ideas are requested over voting for a majority-rules line, but keep them under a single vote name.

 

[PlaguePaladin]

[X] Plan: Time To Actually Do Something
-[X] As Lancer said, try to harm your reflection; don't start any big or meaningful attacks in case the damage comes back to you.
--[X] Should it be a familiar, and it doesn't harm you, try to use your black hole on it. If it gets hostile, try fighting it normally instead.
--[X] If it is an illusion, try walking through it and seeing if that does anything.
-[X] If that doesn't work, try seeing if the locations in this world in some part line up with reality and how far it goes; that could clue you in as to what's going on and where to go next.
--[X] Following that assumption being true, try and find the Saints' base to start with.

I'm glad that SVS is giving some ideas to start with, because I'm still having trouble wrapping my mind around some of this.

 

[NMS]

[X] Plan: Time To Actually Do Something
-[x] Use your rune to clear you head and see if that effects how you perceive things in here.

 

[SVS]

I'm glad that SVS is giving some ideas to start with, because I'm still having trouble wrapping my mind around some of this.

Click to shrink...

The short version is, now the labyrinth is trying to mess with our senses by showing us illusions when we try to interact with our reflections. Kazumi's illusions involved her making out with both Niko and Hijiri Kanna. Why is Hijiri Kanna there? Who knows. maybe Kazumi thinks she's cute because Kazumi thinks Niko looks cute and Hijiri Kanna looks just like Niko. Maybe she's just on Kazumi's mind and this is the labyrinth messing with her. Maybe that's reality and the Kazumi whose perspective we're in is the illusion.

EDIT: Now that I think about it, @PlaguePaladin, she's right there once we get back. Maybe now would be a good time for Kazumi to think about what she'd like to see happen to Hijiri Kanna in the long term. And by that I don't just mean "stick her in a box and use her as a battery come the big day", I mean "looking ahead weeks, months, years into the future, what would Kazumi want to see happen to Hijiri Kanna"? I think that's something we should have Kazumi think about, since we've really only focused on what Homura would like to see happen in the immediate future.

 

[PlaguePaladin]

EDIT: Now that I think about it, @PlaguePaladin, she's right there once we get back. Maybe now would be a good time for Kazumi to think about what she'd like to see happen to Hijiri Kanna in the long term. And by that I don't just mean "stick her in a box and use her as a battery come the big day", I mean "looking ahead weeks, months, years into the future, what would Kazumi want to see happen to Hijiri Kanna"? I think that's something we should have Kazumi think about, since we've really only focused on what Homura would like to see happen in the immediate future.

Click to shrink...

Do you want me to put it into the vote, or stew on it for a bit and get back to you when relevant?

 

[SVS]

Do you want me to put it into the vote, or stew on it for a bit and get back to you when relevant?

Click to shrink...

The latter, probably. That'll give you more tiem to let it stew, and it'll give @NMS @K4lepo and @Riku_Furude time to let the question stew as well. I do plan to have us vote on the matter in both Homura and Kazumi's perspectives, but right now we need to figure out what's going on and make it out of this labyrinth alive (which we know we will, so the object here isn't to kill us, just confuse us and give us something to do that isn't just straight combat).