SPOOKY HAUNTS AND TRAILS » OPEN

[maskreant]

WHO: the infamous nasty crimeboy, Akira Kurusu, and you!
WHERE: Places in Recolle
WHEN: Spooky Month of October
WHAT: EVENT STUFF and mundane stuff if it comes up. if you would like to plan anything, hit me up via halloway or hei#2323 on discord.
WARNINGS: Persona 5 spoilers for last boss battle and late-game conspiracy unveiling. Will update when necessary!

NOTE!! You can leave an empty comment with the subject header of your choice or even RANDOM for something unlisted/miscellaneous (lighthearted) and I'll write the prompt. For nightmares, it may skip around and make no sense very much like how actual dreams are.

nightmares

[ When you enter the dream, you're engulfed by darkness until you hear a deep and unfamiliar voice. It speaks in a language you are most comfortable with. ]

The contract has been sealed...

You have agreed to provide the Trickster support
in his journey to oppose fate and seek change.

CASINO
It's filled with a variety of gamblers from talking fish to actual people. Shadows are also gambling? But they're aggressive due to their mass losses. There are several elevators and it seems like the treasure is on the VIP level.

If you choose to enter the CASINO, you may appear outside of the structure or on the first floor in costume and mask. Akira will accompany you in his Joker outfit.

VELVET ROOM
Are you a prisoner? Or a keeper? You can stand behind the bars with Akira, withstand the abuse and rebel alongside him, or on the opposite side—ushered by two wardens and a man with an elongated nose to carry out discipline. Rehabilitation is important.

If you choose to enter the VELVET ROOM, you may appear inside or outside the cell. Your attire will change into prisoner wear or officer uniform respectively.

MEMENTOS (SPOILER)
In the city of Recolle, you notice there's something strange. People walk past the blood red rain and the towering skeleton pieces. The irrelevant become forgotten. The forgotten vanish. Is it your hand that's disappearing? Or is it Akira's?

If you choose MEMENTOS, you'll be in your normal attire or in your underwear. Whichever your character feels less attractive in if you want. Once again, Akira is beside you.

CODE CREDIT

fog

[ Akira has been having a hard time with his nightmares. Some of them he remembers bits and pieces (all useless), but he's thinking a jog in the ungodly time where the thick fog rolls in is a good idea? Unfortunately not... He ends up running away from one of these three tormentors in his pajamas. What's with his luck?

As he looks behind him, he crashes into someone. Sorry. ]

TWIN WARDENS (SPOILER)
Their names are unknown to you, but they're two girls with silver hair with a single golden eye (an eyepatch covers the other). As attendants of the Velvet Room, they have this ethereal aura to them, even menacing as they shoot various skills into the fog.

"Come back here, inmate! You can't hide forever!"

"You're only delaying the inevitable."

IMPERIOUS ANGEL (SPOILER)
An angel appears with an abstract body shape. Wings scaling wide and halo spinning over its head, it spreads its several hands that hold instruments. With the rise of the triangle, the angel rings it with a clear ding. In a matter of seconds, a flash of light magic strikes near.

"I am what humanity desires. Why oppose me?"

You can hear the sneer in its voice.

GOLD PIGGER
This silver piggy bank may seem cute, but it's also massively large and rolls without end. What does stop it from rolling are valuable items. Throw something expensive and it'll take a break to appraise it with a series of oinks. The one in control is a half-fly guy throwing out some mad rhymes.

"Yo yo yo! You think you can just walk into my neighborhood and disrespect me like that, dawg?"

CODE CREDIT

wildcard

[ THROW ME WHATEVER! Baby haunts from the new ghosts or even the Retrospec Maze! Even anything normal. ]

Comments

[maskreant]

[ Akira looks ready for a costume party and Minako is ready for... Something entirely different. His outfit is at least snazzy, though. Anyway, he snaps some shots of the files in the strange language before leaving her to peruse on her own. ]

Not sure... Maybe we can make references to it when we're out. Someone might recognize it.

[ And he notices something strange about the building. The last two times he went, the doors have been closed, but this... There's a door that's slightly ajar. He feels his heart stop as he bores holes into it with his gaze. ]

Hey. The door—it's open.

[ Of course he's going to it!! But he isn't going to open it until Minako is ready. ]

[complementing]

[She flips through a few more files, just in case, and then glances up at his call, frowning.]

No way.

[Koromaru reaches the open door before she does, poking his nose into the crack and sniffing curiously...and then just going ahead and opening the door all the way.]

Korochan seems to think it's okay to head in. Let's go?

[maskreant]

[ Akira opens it a little bit more for the Shiba to take more whiffs, but now that it's swung open, he takes peeks for himself. Can't really see anything. Taking the first step, it seems dim, but the lights spark up bright and enveloping. It shows the winding corridor. ]

What are the chances that this was intended?

[ He proceeds with steady pace to survey for their party. The farther they go, the more the walls change. Vines appear and plaster becomes stone. ]

[complementing]

I feel like Retrospec would go for something more obvious than a slightly open door, though?

[She follows after him and frowns at the sight of all the changes to the walls.]

Wonder if this is another one of their 'hallways that lead to another dimension' sort of deal.

[At least they don't have to do puzzles.

Walking farther along, the hallway starts growing dark, no more lights to show the way, and her heart going into double time the closer they walk into the shadows. It's just like that pitch black cave from August all over again.]

Akira, stop for a second.

[Her Evoker rings out, and the darkness is now dimly lit by Pyro Jack's lantern. He cheerfully "hee ho!"s at Akira.]

Much better.

[maskreant]

I guess you're right.

[ He's grateful for this not being riddle hell, at least not yet. He does stop when instructed and brightens up at the little pumpkin witch. He can't help at smile despite their investigation, but he does continue to press forward now that the lantern illuminates their surroundings.

Eventually, light returns to them, but it isn't fluorescent at all. It feels like natural sunlight and—they're suddenly in a labyrinth. ]

I didn't sign up for this.

[complementing]

[Minako looks into the entrance and grimaces.]

What's that one trick you're supposed to do to make it to the end? Always take a right? [A little huff of breath.] ...Korochan, let me have your knife.

[Once she has the puppy's weapon in hand, she walks in and nicks the corner of the first opening they can take.]

Let's give it our best shot.

[maskreant]

I've never heard of that trick, actually. [ IS THIS AN AGE THING? ] Good luck us.

[ But he's kind of upbeat about this. While this isn't the best time to be stuck in the maze, it's a little refreshing... And exhausting at the same time. They're going to take their first right... And another right?

Wait— ]

Do you think we can just fly over the maze?

[ He asks this nonchalantly as something stalks them. ]

[complementing]

...that's. A good idea. We should give it a try.

[And pray that there aren't any invisible electric fields above the labyrinth that'll fry them as soon as they get up there.]

Do you have a flying Persona? All I remember you having is a swordsman.

[maskreant]

I have something that has wings, so yeah. I don't know if I can keep him out long enough to fly to the center, though.

[ He wouldn't mind giving it a try if it didn't mean falling into the myriad and getting lost, so he's reluctant on that front. Important thing is: ]

Though it only matters if this works at all.

[complementing]

Let me try, then. Seth can carry the both of us.

[She's become a pro at flying him. She even brought her goggles!

One gunshot to the head later, Seth is up in the air above them.]

Oh, we could send him ahead and see how far he can go, too?

[maskreant]

So he can scout the area? That sounds like a better good idea.

[ But the state of the labyrinth is shaky... Akira isn't sure why, but he feels anxious every once in a while—it's something about this place. Probably just slipping out of reality.

Having Satanael out to carry them at a reasonable speed may be too much for him, but he can send the Persona to survey quickly. With a quick black light, the demon lord appears. Whichever direction Seth goes, Satanael will take the opposite. ]

[complementing]

[Minako watches Seth fly off, and then turns to address Akira. She feels the same, odd anxiety, the feeling that there's something off about the area they're in. But anything she would've said is replaced with a shout of alarm. She's suddenly falling onto her knees, vines yanking at her ankles and dragging her away from her companion

toward a pitch black portal in the wall, its shadows already starting to engulf her, the area around her getting strangely dark as well. Minako thrashes in a panic, eyes wide and nails scratching along the floor in a desperate bid to get away.]

No, no, please no!

[maskreant]

Minako?

[ Akira turns on the ball of his heel fast to see the vines focusing on Minako. They drag her with all his might into the Shadow-y depths, but he's quick to react. A gun appears out of nowhere into his hand and he shoots at the vines. Some fray and split, letting go of her.

It's not long after he's right in front of her to grab her hands and pull her forward. ]

[complementing]

[Minako kicks furiously once she's loose, clinging to him as he drags her away. The farther she gets away from the shadows, the more it returns to normal, until by the time she turns back to look, it's gone.

But now every shadow along the labyrinth walls look like an enemy, and it's like her nightmares all over again, her fears lurking along every inch of the maze around them. She lets out a gust of breath, rubbing at her eyes and swearing softly in Japanese.]

Sorry.

[maskreant]

Don't apologize. We have to get moving.

[ The longer they stay, the more the maze twists—he takes her wrist and they're going to make a run for it. Actually, he can afford to pull Satanael for a quick skate. The Demon lord appears and picks them both up, zooming through the maze and past the reaching arms that they try to lay one finger on Minako. ]

What are these things?

[ Because Akira remembers Shadows differently. ]

[complementing]

[A choked gasp gets stuck in her throat as Satanael swoops in to get them, who is swiftly followed by Seth, who is throwing small bursts of flame at the shadows of his own accord.]

I don't-- I don't know. They kind of look like the other Minako's Shadows? But those never showed up like that one did. It more felt like--

[She shudders and ducks her head. Like Nyx. Or just like a tunnel of pitch black, never-ending darkness, the epitome of her new phobia.]

[maskreant]

Those don't look like the Shadows that I know—

[ He grimaces as he gets comfortable in the Demon Lord's arms, deciding it's best not to talk when Minako is trying to cope. Is this what she fears? Satanael looks ahead before looking up towards Seth, nodding in gratitude as he speeds ahead. Unfortunately, carrying two people means he can't use his gun and pierce through all that stands in their way.

A Persona with six wings (if he Lucifer) sure is convenient. They're close to the middle, but the mix of dark tendrils are accompanied by red veins as the walls are pained a darker red. ]

It'll be all right.

[ Even if the Shadows hands and darkness are coming after them, even if the red walls pulse like a heartbeat before they're engulfed in darkness. ]

[complementing]

[She nods, wrapping her arms around herself, and then looks up, her Persona's blood-red gaze meeting hers.]

Seth, burn it all away!

[The dragon roars out, his fire sweeping across the walls and searing the inky darkness, lighting up the whole area with fierce and persistent light. It casts away many of the shadows in the area as well as the ones in her face, but perhaps more important is that it reveals--]

Over there! Is that the exit?

[maskreant]

[ The fire engulfs the shadowy hands and the giant blobs that wear masks probably from Akira's own fears. There are also figures that seem like people, engulfed by a black wisp with gold eyes and sinister smiles. They only appear in a flash before they dissipate in the flames.

He shuts his eyes closed for a good moment before opening them again. Satanael skates past the flames, practically fanning them out with speed. ]

Yeah. It is.

[ And now they're out? What waits for them is a bunker, though more modern than the one they used as a base in August. ]

[complementing]

[Seth circles around the bunker, scanning for enemies, responding to the equal spikes of interest and concern on Minako's part.

When nothing seems to want to kill them, though, she pushes from out of Satanael's grasp, falling through the sky for a few moments before landing on Seth, who starts rapidly descending as well.]

Let's go in! It might be another Retrospec base!