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Who: Champions & Losers
Where: The Game Tower & the walk back home
When: Day 78 evening

[ Finally, the elevators open for everyone to leave. As they open to ground floor, confetti balls pop open from the ceiling, with "CONGRATULATIONS!" banners hanging in the lobby of the Game Tower.

The television screens are on this time, broadcasting some choice moments while radio announcers excitedly chatter - they're loud, but you can probably make out the audio from the television if you concentrate. Occasionally, the television also flips to a kill count tracker, as well as a ranking system.

"Listeners, this was sooo hard for us to choose. All the contestants were so good! But there can only be winners and losers, so here we go - "

"Up first, our most vicious underdogs! You cheered and cheered for them, listeners, and they heard your voices! It's ☆ZRAEL in first place, with the most kills! They did so well they even got a second category of most brutal murder - "

"It was the boat, right? It was totally the boat!"

"Couldn't it be the rock!? That was so brutal!"

"Well, that's ☆ZRAEL for you, they're sooo ruthless! So cute, best unit! ♥"

"wwww we have a ☆ZRAEL fan here wwww"

"Next up for most individual kills is avante en garde - Cardigan tooooooootally carried you guys wwww"

"Speaking of carry, did you see Whiskers with those strategic kills on WILD CITY!? He's a sneaky bastard!"

"Fucking bastard!"

"Yeah!"

"But my heart honestly broke when I saw A Bird With Blue Wings . . . AlcheME!, man . . . they just hit you straight in the heart with that most emotional kill. . . Damn. . ."

"Speaking of hearts, Heart Soldier Senshi - they were really good, huh? Best co-op kill of the game! Totally like O●●●wa●●●, right?"

"Yeah, it was like I was watching a match on O●●●wa●●●. I don't usually watch those though wwww"

"Last but definitely not least! sensitIV!"

"You know, they didn't do half bad."

"Yeah, it was honestly pretty average."

"But Nyarlathotep was so great! His struggle to survive! He'd even put more arms on himself to do it!"

"Do you think he could attach even more on himself? I want to see that, now!"

"Hahaha! Well, that's all the time we have for today listeners, but you should definitely watch all these choice moments - the audience picked them! Here comes our highlight reel!"

The chatter goes on, becoming indistinct and eventually fading out. The television screen is still playing the highlight reel, though.

☆ZRAEL, avante en garde, WILD CITY, AlcheME!, Heart Soldier Senshi, and sensitIV will find their wounds healing, leaving behind no scars - they'll also find 800 points in their bank, though ☆ZRAEL will find that they get a bonus for a total of 1000 points from this game. Everyone else will find 100 points in their bank, and they'll also have to get themselves their own healing.

Something to note though, is that Hurricane is missing. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Disappointed, Lucifel?

Just in myself.

[ looking to intensity, with a smile ]

But what about you?

Disappointed in many things that aren't myself.

Going to be a while? I'd like to talk to you. In private.

Oh - no, please go ahead. Where shall we go?

Edited 2019-01-06 23:37 (UTC)

I'd prefer SensitIV's dorm unless one of mine gave cause for one of yours to be jumpy around Future is Now.

Mm, if such a thing happened, I wouldn't be aware - but, well, we can speak in my room.

[ turning to go to the dorms, then ]

That will work.

[To SensitIV's dorm then. And Lucifel's room. Provided Lucifel doesn't want to make any pitstops along the way]

[ he doesn't, though he is taking his phone and then picking up a change of clothes from the mailbox while they're on their way

opening the door for intensity to enter his room when they're in, though ]

[Settling himself on a chair if there is one. The floor if there's not]

You can change and shower if you'd like. I can wait.

Ah, I don't plan on cleaning up until later - though if I'm unsightly, I can change my clothes.

[ there's no chair but he does gesture to the bed ]

Please, make yourself comfortable.

It's not for my comfort, Lucifel. It's for yours.

[But sits on the edge of the bed then, one leg crossed over the other]

So how is this whole thing working out for you?

[ hm

sitting on the floor, on his knees - akin to the way an old person would sit, old fashioned grandpa with his hands on his knees ]

In what sense do you mean?

Let's start with the easiest one. Hopefully. Are you comfortable in how you're playing the role?

[ reflects on that for a moment ]

. . . To be honest, it's easier than I expected it to be.

Ultimately, continuing to play this role is to protect my unitmates - to protect sensitIV. I can't say that I've never wanted to do that, or that the desire is alien to me.

If I had to say there's something troublesome, it would be that I'm not entirely certain how far I should be going - taking care not to be overzealous, but still being effective. Mmm, I'm not really certain that I'm doing it well just yet. . .

My opinion would be to try and remain consistent and believable for the moment. Especially since the audience just got their violence quota.

Were you able to keep up your image at least in the game?

. . . I could have done better, admittedly - but I don't think I did poorly. That is -

[ mmm ]

I didn't want Dia-sama to be sent to Lilith, so I didn't kill her, even though I could have. . . and I didn't fight Shogun-san, though at the time I was more preoccupied with my unitmates being in a fight with other people - so it was, in the first place, unwise for me to start a fight there when Nya-san was being cornered.

Aside from that, since Yasuragi-no-Mikoto is Onii-san's lover, I refrained from killing him, but we got into an altercation with avante en garde and ☆ZRAEL - but I died without being able to do much else.

So it sounds like you're creating the conflict that you want. And that you're prioritizing the safety of your unit over everything else which is on brand, so ---

I wouldn't be too hard on yourself considering the results.

Do you only wish you could have done better because there were so many more brutal things going on around you?

. . . Rather, it's because - my unitmate seems to be having a difficult time. Nya-san was the reason why we were able to win, after all.

Are you worried about SensitIV in future games?

. . . In the sense of 'being targeted or hated', this is something I already came to terms with. There's not really much that can be done but to do our best, in that case.

[ there's a beat ]

Though, to some extent I had thought that it would be a matter of course - that, at the very least, this unit would be difficult to conflict with because of our healing ability. In that case, being in a position where others couldn't retaliate against me would be troublesome, since it would just become like ☆ZRAEL, so . . .

Recently, there's been a trend of "healing all the units that win" - I'm sure you've noticed. It's reassuring to see that, and with this sort of antagonism from the - "white mage" unit, I think people will be more pressured to fight in order to find a way to avoid giving us an advantage.

Mmm. . .

[ touches his chin, looking troubled ]

Well, to be honest, my troubles with sensitIV largely lie in that . . . they're much too kind to hold a similar perspective to mine, so I'll only trouble them in the future -

[ pauses ]

- no, I should amend to say . . . I'm sure it's against their beliefs. For the sake of unit harmony, some compromise should be made, but our perspectives can't have a compromise. In the end, I really am troubling them like this.

Yes, you are. But as you've said, that really can't be avoided if you want to carve a spot out for yourself as the villain. People are going to see you as SensitIV, so your actions will fall on them.

But let's twist this around to look at it from a different angle. What happened in that game was fucking surprising considering that there was no incentive given other than healing. There were no hostages, no threats of permanent loss... just a promise to restore the units who won.

When considered like that, do you need to be the villain that everyone hates? Or can Imeeji cause enough conflict on its own without you needing to be the face of it?

[ reflecting on that for a moment ]

. . . Regardless of what I did or didn't do in that game, there was still conflict being caused everywhere. Really, my own contributions were paltry - not even worth speaking of.

Exactly.

So let's keep the villainy simmering on low to medium for the moment.

And re-strategize to aim a little loftier. Like your actual end goal. What was it you said---

"So long as this world survives, for the people who live in it. So long as those who live here remain whole in their existence, and are able to leave this place of their own accord. So long as that tragedy does not occur again."

Can I get some clarification by what you mean by "whole in their existence"?

. . . It's evident that the existence of this world itself is to the whims of the Producers. To such higher beings, I'm sure that our lives are nothing more than pieces on a game board - toys to be played with however they please.

It is plain that our own existences here are not stable. People will disappear for little to no reason - Santa-aneesan has been gone for some time now, and I fear the worst.

Things like. . . for example, the condition of losing color - or things like having to pay a price to return from death. . . those are what I want to avoid. At least, until we can do something - whether it is leave to return to our respective homes or something else. So long as we don't reach a bleak end, where this entire project is scrapped for another one and all the people here are abandoned to disappear.

Beyond that, I don't have any desires. . .

A reasonable end game.

However.

Avoid having to pay a price to return from death. . .

That's going to be a lot harder to manage than making sure our audience has their full of mindless entertainment. And in direct conflict with that goal.

How do you plan on preventing people from committing suicide while at the same time bringing the conflict that some are trying to avoid?