Huh, I thought the Conversation after Hitomi left was telepathic but Ashy's Part wasn't italicized.
That must have looked incredibly creepy from the Outside.
"Sayaka" starring at the Witch and holding a one-sided Conversation but the only audible Part sounded like something the Witch would say, coming from Sayaka...
Ashy did try telepathy once. It didn't work as intended and had no effect on Sayaka, but it did do something. Perhaps it is the basis of the witch's kiss?
However, Ashy never tried telepathy on her thralls. I don't see why she can't silently communicate with Sayaka right now.
I assume Ashy has some kind of Telepathy given she somehow told Shemesh what she wants, without thinking it through.
There also was that Spider Ummashtart that captured Hitomi, not sure if that Interaction counts as Communication though...
She did just need to make a deal so could control her own body. It would be much more concerning if she wasn't desperate. Still depressing, but understandably so.
Holy shit! Sayaka is now suffering the same grief spiral she experienced in canon timelines. I don't think she can really witch anymore, but this may still be magically significant somehow.
I doubt that. She seems a bit calmer after stabbing the fuck out of that one familiar, and while she's still being hype aggressive, it looks like she's moved on from pointless brutality. Like you say later, she's just venting.
Though if she is spiraling in a magical sense, she might unleash a Doppel.
Second of all, why can't Ashy track Sayaka? Even if she has no idea where Sayaka is, can't she find out? Magic leaves traces, especially if it involves souls and other karmic weirdness. Ashy should be able to track Sayaka by following the magical trail she leaves behind, just like magical girls frequently do to find witches.
There's also the fact that Ashtaroth may not be able to use that ability, since magic is usually traced by way of one's soul gem, which is something she's sort of lacking at the moment.
She opened a hole in her barrier like a magic girl. While I'm pretty sure Sayaka's Soul Gem isn't a gem anymore, if Ashy has one of it's abilities she should have the others.
While school life would be difficult and dangerous for Ashy, she might be able to survive. She just has to handle the magical girls who attend.
Kidnap Madoka and drop her off in a different city. Homura might not notice immediately because Ashy never did anything of the sort in any previous timelines. Then Homura will have to waste time finding and returning Madoka.
Witchbomb Mami to either easily subsume her or drive her to despair (and then subsume her).
Sayaka is hardly going to be okay with her best friend being kidnapped and dropped off away from her friends and family. For Mami, while that works it's not significantly better then out and out killing her. Subsuming her while she's still a magic girl would better, but it's still Ash eating her friend.
And both of those things ignore that if Ash is having Sayaka attend school, she'd be doing so for Sayaka's sake. Doing things that would upset and enrage her would be counterproductive to that, or at the very least nonsensical.
Also sorry that Sayaka being stuck in her funk is taking so long to get out of. It hasn't actually been that long in-story (not even three "chapters"), but it feels like forever to me- probably because I'm taking so long to update. We'll move past that soon, hopefully.
Didn't talk about this before, but Sayaka did just have what could've been the best day of her life turn into her worst day ever, in a way that would be in strong contention for the very worst day anyone has ever had in history. Don't feel any need to rush past this.
Didn't talk about this before, but Sayaka did just have what could've been the best day of her life turn into her worst day ever, in a way that would be in strong contention for the very worst day anyone has ever had in history. Don't feel any need to rush past this.
I would feel bothered by Ashtaroth not having tried telepathy yet, but the time since absorbing Sayaka hasn't been that much and yet quite busy with all shocks to everyone (and she has missed things before, like Sayaka's soul gem). On top of that I half expect telepathy won't work well anyways, as Ashtaroth is still a witch and attempting direct telepathy with a witch may be... painful at very least.
I just did some rereading, and I noticed there's no mention of Sayaka transforming back into magic girl mode. So the last scene is of a teenage girl in her school uniform wielding an ornate sword in pitch black maze of tunnels studded with oversized medical gear and gigantic candy bits stuck in the walls, who occasionally stops to talk and scream at herself like a schizophrenic.
...oops. That would actually be a mistake on my part, I meant to have that happen at the start of this update, but somehow forgot to add it in. Technically the scene still works fine without that, but I think I'll be fixing it anyways; thank you for alerting me.
I just did some rereading, and I noticed there's no mention of Sayaka transforming back into magic girl mode. So the last scene is of a teenage girl in her school uniform wielding an ornate sword in pitch black maze of tunnels studded with oversized medical gear and gigantic candy bits stuck in the walls, who occasionally stops to talk and scream at herself like a schizophrenic.
The name of the source material works much better than a more generic horror tag. PMMM has psychological horror, visceral horror, fairy tale horror, cosmic horror, existential horror, fridge horror! All the horrors!
…probably best that you just follow her inside. Sayaka may not want you around in any fashion, be it mental or physical, but you get the feeling that the latter is at least the lesser of two evils in her mind. You doubt she'll be thrilled about it either way, but you'd rather have Sayaka resent you a little more than she already does than let her die for her stubbornness.
Readying a paragraph of shatterwords, you approach the cavern, moving towards one of the only visible entrances large enough for you to fit. With a bit of effort, you slip inside, and descend into the darkness.
Back when you were a magical girl, you commonly found yourself wishing that you had more time to explore the barriers you entered. Dangerous though they may be, the homes of witches tend to be almost wholly unique sights, and ones which you usually only got a single chance to see, at that. Sadly, exploring for extended periods risked people literally dying while you took in the view, so speed always had to take priority… but, now that you're a witch, that's no longer an issue. Affixed to your own barrier and dragged up into the sky, you're free to look around this place to your heart's content, practically all the time in the world at your disposal.
You might even want to use it, if only this particular barrier was a little less horribly creepy.
You shiver as you float through the tunnels just a few inches off the floor, a prickling, uneasy sensation working its way up your straps like an invisible parade of ants. You'd expected your size to alleviate some of this place's eeriness, but somehow it's only making it worse, with everything feeling significantly more claustrophobic than it otherwise would. Focusing on Sayaka's perspective isn't much of an improvement, as the tunnels instead just seem cavernous and foreboding through her eyes, making them unnerving in an entirely different way. High-pitched squeaks constantly echo from somewhere in the distance, sounding as if they number in the hundreds, while other, equally unsettling noises such as creaking metal, rolling wheels, and the distinctive blip of an ECG monitor occur seemingly at random, mixing with the ever-present ambiance to create something truly disconcerting.
You bend down and hold Tome partially closed in order to maneuver up a relatively tiny staircase. Exiting into a slightly less enclosed area at the top, you straighten back up, relieved to have the extra space — but, peering past the darkness, you notice what seems to be a collection of large white objects splayed out across the floor a little ways off. What are...?
A nearby, broken-looking fluorescent light flickers. The objects are briefly lit up by its glow.
They're bones.
You reel back, horrified. While the remains are gigantic, they're clearly human, the shape of the skeleton unmistakable as anything else now that you've seen it. That's-! You literally just watched this barrier form, how did someone get-?!
The light flickers again. Wait... something's off. Are those really...?
You cautiously float a little closer, and the bones are revealed for what they truly are: patterns. Disturbingly realistic ones, as if plucked straight from some titanic x-ray diagram, but ultimately just images, plastered across the rock of the floor and walls. Of course they are; there aren't any people that big. It's just part of the labyrinth...
You wrap two ribbons loosely around yourself in imitation of a hug. Hell's bells, how is this place doing such a good job of unsettling you? You've been in a witch barrier that was basically a landscape made entirely of pulsing flesh and blood before, and that didn't get to you nearly as much as this one is currently managing.
No longer particularly wanting to linger here, you leave the small "room" and enter the next tunnel. The shadows seem to grow as the passage narrows, the walls constricting around you like the innards of some giant beast. It feels as though the cavern is ready to close in on you at any given moment, just waiting to trap and crush you beneath a thousand tons of stone and darkness.
Which, in a barrier, you suppose isn't entirely impossible...
You stare nervously at one of the walls even as the tunnel widens and stretches again. M-maybe you just need to focus on some of the less horror-oriented aspects of this place, like all the giant candies and sweets you keep going past? This barrier certainly seems to stock quite a variety. Pudding, chocolate, cookies, gummies... you bet if you named just about any confection, you'd find it in here somewhere. You wonder if any of this is safe for consumption? Not that you'd be able to partake yourself, but-
*BANG*
Your forcibly lighthearted train of thought derails as a light pink door set into the wall to your right bulges outward, something presumably having slammed into it hard from the other side. What the hell was-?!
*BANG BANG*
You startle and flinch backwards as the door bulges again. Knowing you're probably not fast enough to run away, especially in here, you swivel your collection of shatterwords in front of you. Great, as if you didn't already feel like you're in some sort of horror movie, now this happens-
*BANG BANG BANG*
You don't have a heart anymore, but you'd guess that if you did, it would be pounding in your chest right now. Gah, this is stupid! You're over twice the height of that door! Whatever is on the other side can't possibly be anything bad enough to-
*BANG!*
You rear up on Tome as the door bursts open... and a trio of polka-dotted mice comes barreling out of it and into the hall. Two of them manage to slow themselves down in time, while the last one keeps going and crashes into the opposite wall, sending itself sprawling.
…stupid jumpscares…
Nonetheless, you keep your shatterwords at the ready. Normally, you're all for leaving familiars alone so long as they seem willing to leave you alone in turn — but the last time you did that, they ended up being huge pests during the fight with the actual witch, to the point that they could have easily gotten you killed. As such, while you doubt you'll make much of a dent in their numbers if these familiars are as populous as you suspect, you're still going to try to be proactive about this.
You loose a roughly circular volley of projectiles, intending to hit the familiars from all sides. They react more quickly than expected however, scampering out of the way before your attack even reaches them. Your shatterwords impact the floor and do as the name you've given them suggests, causing the sound of a thousand pieces of fragmenting runes to reverberate throughout the cavern.
...great, now you're the one making a ton of noise. Sneaking around might not really be your thing anymore.
One of the familiars darts around a bend, too fast for you to realistically pursue in these cramped quarters. You manage cut off the other two as they try to follow however, a well-placed shot sending them scurrying into a corner. With nowhere to go, the shrapnel from your follow-up attack shreds effortlessly through their tiny bodies… as well as a nearby blood bag, causing the bright pink substance within it to spatter itself all over the immediate vicinity. Eww.
You float closer, cautiously avoiding the almost neon-colored fluid as you lower yourself the remaining few inches to the ground. Admittedly, you did have a secondary motive for wanting to kill these things, as it seems as good a time as any for you to test something.
The vortex forms without ceremony as you shove Novella downwards towards the deceased familiars. Their bodies dissolve in an instant, reduced to tiny swirls of writhing color that are quickly vacuumed up moments later. Once they've been fully absorbed, the pages clear themselves of any trace of ink, and you float back off the floor and wait.
…
…
…
You cross both your front and back ribbons, trying not to pout as it soon becomes apparent that nothing is going to happen. While you weren't really expecting any particularly grand change from that, you were expecting something. Familiars are basically nascent witches, so you thought for sure that subsuming them would work… which it did, technically. It's just that compared to Saar and Sayaka, taking in those Pyotr was like the magical equivalent of eating a couple of crumbs off the floor: highly unsatisfying, and not remotely filling.
You pause. Though, you do seem to know what they're called now. Perhaps you did gain something after all...?
Looking down at Novella, you focus your thoughts on the newly-named familiars, curious to see if they have an entry in it now. The book obliges, flipping open to a spot near the front this time… but what you find isn't anything like what you expected. Aside from appearing to have been set up as a profile for the witch rather than the Pyotr themselves, the pages are almost entirely blank. There's no picture, and what few runes there are on the paper offer only a brief description of the rodent-like minions and a few odd sentence fragments, most of them revolving around cheese for some reason.
After scanning over what little is there, you flip away from the incomplete entry, still disappointed, but slightly less so than before. Information is still a good thing, you suppose. At the very least, you now understand why the mice familiars are so prone to running into things — they're apparently blind — and one of the fragments gives you reason to suspect that there's at least one other type of familiar in here. Maybe if you subsume one, or perhaps just some more Pyotr, this page will fill itself out a little more coherently, and give you some information on the witch herself? That would definitely be helpful if so.
You continue onward, hoping to test that, but the incident doesn't repeat itself. Surrounded by relative quiet, you notice that there's been almost complete silence from Sayaka's side of things for the past several minutes. You should probably check in on her.
Doing just that, you find the magical girl walking through an array of giant needles, plunged into the floor and strung together with stitching string to form stanchions leading the apparent way forward. You can feel that her expression has relaxed a little, and she's at least slightly less tense, so you assume that she's finally cooled off a little. That's a relief...
…well, except that now you have to actually confront the prospect of informing her of what you're doing. You considered alerting Sayaka that you were coming in after her when you first entered, but thought it would be better to wait until she wasn't beating familiars into the ground like stress balls anymore. Now that she's not though, you're still not certain you should. Sayaka definitely won't like it, and ideally you won't even be needed, so maybe you shouldn't reveal yourself unless it actually becomes necessary? But if it does, and you haven't told her before then, you can't imagine the subsequent conversation going well…
[-] Tell her. You need to be open and honest if you're ever going to get Sayaka to trust you, even if she dislikes what you have to say, and how you have to say it.
[-] Say it through her. You'll be quick and to the point, so it shouldn't be a big deal.
[-] Write it out. Probably better than speaking through her directly, but you'll have to figure out something to write with.
[-] Attempt to do it telepathically. You… still haven't tried this…
[-] Refrain. This whole excursion is supposed to be for Sayaka's benefit, so if you keep making her angry during it, it'll all be pointless. You'll stick with being the secret cavalry, and only make yourself known if there's trouble.
[-] Write in.
Description: ________________________________________the cheese that she loves most_________________________________________________________________ a piece of cheese _________________________________________________
Familiars:
-Pyotr, whose duty is to search for cheese. Because their faces are eyeless stamps, they cannot truly see, and operate almost entirely by smell. As such, one shouldn't expect much from it.
______, whose duty is to nurse the cheese. _____________________________________ encounters cheese ____________________________________________________________ the Pyotr, who commonly hurt themselves ___________________________
ooooo. delightfully creepy and atmospheric, I'm really hoping that charlotte is more coherent than the other witch, she and her barrier just seem more depressed than anything
[X] attempt to communicate with her telepathically, if that falls through use your illusions to make words she can see
-[X] "this barrier is managing to give me the creeps worse than any I've seen as a magical girl, how is that even possible?"
under no circumstances are we to talk through her, she needs all the bodily autonomy she can get, the fact that we can use her body is the reason she's in this funk
also if we don't say anything I think she'll get even more upset at us *stalking* her
[X] attempt to communicate with her telepathically, if that falls through use your illusions to make words she can see
-[X] "this barrier is managing to give me the creeps worse than any I've seen as a magical girl, how is that even possible?"
Witchstincts-sensei approves, so I guess Ashy is doing something right.
Back when you were a magical girl, you commonly found yourself wishing that you had more time to explore the barriers you entered. Dangerous though they may be, the homes of witches tend to be almost wholly unique sights, and ones which you usually only got a single chance to see, at that. Sadly, exploring for extended periods risked people literally dying while you took in the view, so speed always had to take priority… but, now that you're a witch, that's no longer an issue. Affixed to your own barrier and dragged up into the sky, you're free to look around this place to your heart's content, practically all the time in the world at your disposal.
It appears that Ashy was always an art lover at heart. This is probably a key part of her character.
You shiver as you float through the tunnels just a few inches off the floor, a prickling, uneasy sensation working its way up your straps like an invisible parade of ants. You'd expected your size to alleviate some of this place's eeriness, but somehow it's only making it worse, with everything feeling significantly more claustrophobic than it otherwise would. Focusing on Sayaka's perspective isn't much of an improvement, as the tunnels instead just seem cavernous and foreboding through her eyes, making them unnerving in an entirely different way.
So the labyrinth is simultaneously too big and too small for comfort.
Nonetheless, you keep your shatterwords at the ready. Normally, you're all for leaving familiars alone so long as they seem willing to leave you alone in turn. The last time you did that though, they ended up being huge pests during the fight with the actual witch, to the point that they could have easily gotten you killed. As such, while you doubt you'll make much of a dent in their numbers (particularly if these familiars are as populous as you suspect), you're still going to try to be proactive about this.
Unless the familiars think Ashy smells particularly cheesy, I wouldn't worry about it.
You cross both your front and back ribbons, trying not to pout as it soon becomes apparent that nothing is going to happen. While you weren't really expecting any particularly grand change from that, you were expecting something.
Well, none of these familiars actually have souls yet. At present, they are just little bundles of curses. While Ashy might be able to restore her magic reserves by eating them, they won't make her bigger and stronger.
Familiars are basically nascent witches, so you thought for sure that subsuming them would work… which it did, technically. It's just that compared to Saar and Sayaka, taking in those Pyotr was like the magical equivalent of eating a couple of crumbs off the floor: not filling, and utterly unsatisfying.
[] Subsume ALL the familiars! By gathering enough crumbs, you shall have the entire cookie.
There's no picture, and what few runes are there offer only a brief description of the rodent-like minions and a few odd sentence fragments, most of them revolving around cheese for some reason.
So now Ashy should know that this witch is fixated on cheese, at least.
As much as I want to try the telepathy this second...
[X] Refrain. This whole excursion is supposed to be for Sayaka's benefit, so if you keep making her angry during it, it'll all be pointless. You'll stick with being the secret cavalry, and only make yourself known if there's trouble.
You shiver as you float through the tunnels just a few inches off the floor, a prickling, uneasy sensation working its way up your straps like an invisible parade of ants. You'd expected your size to alleviate some of this place's eeriness, but somehow it's only making it worse, with everything feeling significantly more claustrophobic than it otherwise would.
[X] Refrain. This whole excursion is supposed to be for Sayaka's benefit, so if you keep making her angry during it, it'll all be pointless. You'll stick with being the secret cavalry, and only make yourself known if there's trouble.
We want sayaka to adjust to being our familiar, and giving her the space we told her we would is probably the best option.
As I recall (through second hand information), Madoka was the one that informed Mami of the barrier, and she was at the hospital because she was visiting Violin-kun with Sayaka. I have strong reasons to believe that visit didn't happen.
I have full confidence that these tunnels don't have any consistency to their size, and there will be one that fits her after the fight, whether it was there before or not.
As for the vote, tough call. For me it comes down to what Ashtaroth wants most out of this witch hunt. If she's committed to testing Charlotte's sapience, then she might as well tell Sayaka she's coming because she's going to have to stop her from attacking Charlotte. If she's fine with losing this particular opportunity, staying silent and letting them fight is fine. What's more important right now to her, Sayaka or Charlotte?
[X] Refrain. This whole excursion is supposed to be for Sayaka's benefit, so if you keep making her angry during it, it'll all be pointless. You'll stick with being the secret cavalry, and only make yourself known if there's trouble.
That said, no reason we can't try telepathy just to see if it works. It'll piss off Sayaka bit, but knowing Ash has a way of talking to her when she's outta sight that doesn't involve making her a puppet should give her some peace of mind.
[X] Refrain. This whole excursion is supposed to be for Sayaka's benefit, so if you keep making her angry during it, it'll all be pointless. You'll stick with being the secret cavalry, and only make yourself known if there's trouble.
[X] Refrain. This whole excursion is supposed to be for Sayaka's benefit, so if you keep making her angry during it, it'll all be pointless. You'll stick with being the secret cavalry, and only make yourself known if there's trouble.
[X] Refrain. This whole excursion is supposed to be for Sayaka's benefit, so if you keep making her angry during it, it'll all be pointless. You'll stick with being the secret cavalry, and only make yourself known if there's trouble.
As I recall (through second hand information), Madoka was the one that informed Mami of the barrier, and she was at the hospital because she was visiting Violin-kun with Sayaka. I have strong reasons to believe that visit didn't happen.
...
That just simply means where going to be dealing... wait.
Homura showed up after/same time as Mami, so she was propyl tracking Mami at that point.
We might not run into either of them unless of course if Madoka has somehow ended up in the barrier anyway.
