Crow's Thread

"And that was a huge waste of my time. And all for nothing." Spy seems annoyed.

You groan and tell Axel to join you in your search for the dining hall.

Aki approaches Axel from the side of the pool. "Are you alright? There's still a lot of investigating that needs to be done and it'd be nice to have a partner..." She reaches out to him with her hand, trying to cheer him up as he seems upset over what happened.

Sylvia cheers on Axel. "Let's get moving, okay, Axel? We'll make a great team! Together we can all investigate the school and find a way out!"

Claus sighs. "I already told you, there is no way out. I've searched the entire school already. None of the doors or windows open. I suggest you get comfortable or get murderous." He laughs a little to himself. "Although I don't really care which one it is." He then gives you an...intense look. "I plan on winning this game."

Axel climbs his way out of the pool and gives an angry look to Claus. "No! You're wrong! We're going to find a way out of this place together. Nobody is going to kill anyone..."

"Can you really be so sure...?" You notice when he asks the question, it's actually rather genuine. There's no spite behind it. It's...unsettling. Why has he accepted this situation so readily...?

Spy Walks over to Leanne, ignoring Claus. The two of them have a quick and quiet conversation before Leanne leaves him, walking into the girls' locker room.

Spy leaves the room, heading into the locker room.

You tell Claus to shut up and that nobody would consider themselves smart enough to get away with murder.

Claus looks back at Sam calmly. "Dennis seemed rather confident in his ability to kill someone, didn't he?" How? How can he have such an honest face when he says such things...?

"Things... aren't looking bright. But we must not give in. Let's head to the dining hall." Aki gives everyone a smile.

The others all seem to be in agreement. You head off with Sylvia, Axel, and Aki, leaving the gym through the left door. It seems Ashley left the gym while you were all busy.

As you enter the hall, you notice it splits to the left and the right before looping around behind the gym. Ah, that makes sense. The hallway wraps around the gym like a square. If you went around, you'd find yourself at the right exit of the gym. You decide to move straight down the hall instead. Moving along, you notice there's a couple rooms here. A room with double doors and a sign hanging over it that's got a fork and knife crossed. Must be the dining hall. The other one is...a classroom maybe? It's a rather fancy looking door. You're not sure what purpose it serves.

You decide to head into the dining hall. As you enter, you notice the dining hall is actually a large courtyard in a glass dome. There are a few trees in here that go up to the top, where you can see steel beams holding the dome together. There are various picnic tables around to eat at and flowers are arranged along the pathway through the courtyard to liven things up with some color. There's also a fountain here. It makes the scene feel a bit more peaceful despite the circumstances. Finally, there's the kitchen, which appears to be a separate room. You can see the door into the kitchen and a service hatch in the wall next to the door. There's also a clock hanging on that wall. The only wall not made of glass. It's 6:30 right now.

You call out to see if anyone's here and notice James, Sato, and Vicky in here. Sato seems to be stuffing his face full of food while James and Vicky were just conversing. Vicky's prop bag is placed on top of the table for some reason. Well, it makes sense. It probably gets heavy to carry everywhere.

BING BONG DING DONG

What an obnoxious sound.

Nekoshi's voice then begins to sound throughout the area. "Ahem...Attention, please! This is Headmaster Nekoshi! I have an important announcement to make! Everyone should head to the dining hall immediately! I've got a very special surprise for you all! And don't even think about skipping out..."

Great...That can't be good. But...you don't want to see what happens when you defy Nekoshi.

The others soon filter in. Once everyone arrives, Nekoshi jumps up from seemingly nowhere and stands on top of one of the picnic tables nearby.



"Hello everyone~! I'm sure you're all very excited to see what I have for y-"

"Just tell us what you want, you stupid furball." Ashley glares at Nekoshi.

Nekoshi appears to be angry. Can he even feel feelings? "HEY! That's no way to treat your wonderful headmaster! Especially not when I'm about to give you such a wonderful gift!"

"I don't want anything that comes from your grungy paws. I think it would be far better if we just beat the shit out of you here." She takes out a folding fan and opens it in front of her face, looking to the side. Huh. Is she nervous? "...I just was waiting to let the others start first."

"HA! Yeah, right! You're probably just too scared to fight me!"

"...No..." Her face certainly betrays her lies.

"Hmm...You know, since I'm such a merciful and wonderful headmaster, I think I'll give you my gift anyway. You can all bow down and thank me now!"

"Oh. Thanks!"

Amelia sighs. "Do not actually zank 'im, Axel..."

"Now then...without further ado...!" Nekoshi pulls out a small remote with a button on it. He smacks the button with his other paw and you feel the school rumble a bit.

And then...the unthinkable happened.

The doors outside just opened right up. The courtyard's glass doors outside are just...open. Not even locked anymore. Does this mean...?

"Yep! You're all free to go now! You can thank me later! Anyway, have fun explorinnnnggggg!" With that, Nekoshi disappeared again.

Does this mean...is it really safe to go outside now? You can just leave? Even after a display like that?

"...Something doesn't add up." Claus crosses his arms and looks at the exit. "..." He stares at it with intensity.

...It seems you're free to go wherever you like now. The others all start to make their way toward the exit.

You shout at Nekoshi and chuck an apple at the doorway.

You notice...nothing happens to the apple. It's completely fine.

"I see." Claus says this as if he's figured something out.

Everyone is silent for a moment before Dennis speaks up. "So it was just orientation after all. I'm almost disappointed." He hefts up a shovel he got from...somewhere over his shoulder and heads out the door without pause or hesitation.

Everyone waits and watches for a moment, but nothing seems to happen to him.

"Okay then...it must be safe, right? Let's go!" Axel charges out the door.

"..." Claus is silent, closing his eyes to think a moment before walking out.

One by one, everyone begins to follow, seeing as nothing seems to happen to the others.

Outside...You see something you never expected.

Clear, blue skies. Clean air. Growing plants. Running water.

...And a cage.

Everyone stares in shock as they take in their surroundings. This entire school is built...on top of a floating island. And that floating island...is inside of a massive cage.

"...What?" Ashley looks surprised. "...That cat lied to us. We aren't free at all!" She crushes her hand around her folding fan so much it snaps in half.

"Of course not!" Popping up nearby, Nekoshi seems far too entertained by your reactions. "What kind of killing game ends that easily? A booooooring oneeeeeee!"

"You said you would let us go!"

"Ah, no. I said I would let you outside the school. I never said anything about leaving the giant cage outside the school. Or the floating island the school is on! Nyahahaha!"

Ashley looks like she's about to punt Nekoshi. Vivian heads over to her and places her hands on Ashley's shoulders. "Hey. Calm down. We don't know what might happen if you attack Nekoshi. I promise we'll make it out together if you can calm down and think this through, okay?" She gives her a bright smile.

Ashley's rage subsides a bit as Nekoshi continues. "As long as you're trapped inside this cage, you'll never be able to leave! Even if you did miraculously survive the dive off the floating island into the water below, you'd have to climb all the way up that wall over there. So you might as well give up now!"

"Give up?" Vivian turns to face Nekoshi. "We'll never give up! We're gonna get out of here together! After all, we've got Ultimates here! What can't we do?"

Nekoshi laughs at her. "Oh, I see, I see! So by using this as your cover, you plan on escaping after you kill one of your friends and pin the blame on someone else!"

"That's not true!"

"Or isssss iiiiiiittt? Oooooooo~?"

"Gr...There's no point in talking to you." Vivian glares at Nekoshi.

"How cruel! Glaring at me for providing you all with such a wonderful warning? You must all remember...You can't trust anyone! You're all your worst enemy! Nyahahaha!" With that, Nekoshi makes his exit.

There's a short moment of silence as all your hope of escape is shattered.

"...So that's how it is, is it?" Claus stands there, looking toward where Nekoshi disappeared. "He seems intent on having us all participate in this killing game of his."

"...Well we won't." Vivian looks at Claus with determination in her eyes. "I say for now, we should search every inch of this new area for clues or a way out. Then we can all meet back up at the Dining Hall and share what we found! We'll find a way out of here if we work together!"

Amelia nods. "It is far too early to give up now, is it not? Zen I shall give zis search my all!"

Claus still seems to be looking where Nekoshi was. "Hm...I'll help, if that is the command you give me. But this does not mean I trust any of you."

Feeling somewhat renewed with a united sense of hope, the group starts to split up and search around. You notice that Dennis immediately starts to dig for some...unknown reason.

You take a look around outside. The path from the dining hall seems to be a side path that leads back over toward the front of the school. In front of the school, the path heads down a bit more and splits off to the left at what appears to be a dormitory. You can tell because of the giant sign on the front of the round building that says "DORMITORY". Splitting off to the left of the same path appears to be a large garden of some kind. Finally, at the end of the path, leading right to the edge of the island, is some kind of dock. There's a severe lack of water and boats. Well...it seems exploration is in your hands.

"Hmm...Yeah! That sounds like a good idea! Let's go check out what else was inside the building!"

Both you and Sylvia head back inside through the dining hall and make your way over to the gym. From there, you make a turn and take the wrap around hallway to the other side and head down the hall further. As you make your way, you notice the path splits off to the right. A sign hangs over the double doors at the end of that hall. "EXIT". The doors are open and simply lead back out to the island you were on earlier. You turn your attention down the other hallway and find that there's two staircases there. One up and one down. You notice there's also a door with a sign sitting next to it. The school store, huh? Other than that, all you see are two bathrooms. One for guys and one for girls.

You open the door into the school store. Inside, you notice there's a bunch of school supplies hanging around. Pens, pencils, rulers, scissors, and so on and so forth. They're all held behind the counter. You also notice there are small plushes of...Nekoshi here. Bleh. Aside from all that, there's a gacha machine full of...random junk it looks like. There's a coin slot, but it doesn't look like it will take regular money. You check your pockets and find that you don't have any cash on your anyway. In fact, the only thing you seem to have with you is your makeup kit and your student handbook. You get the feeling Sylvia probably doesn't have anything other than whatever's in her bag too. Maybe it would be best to return to this place once you've found some kind of coin...?

After looking around, you confess to Sylvia that you're a bit nervous and not taking the situation very well.

"Huh...? Yeah, I guess it hasn't fully sunk in yet that this place really is the location of a killing game. Or...maybe it has. I dunno. All I know is that...we need to find a way out of here together and there's no way I'm going to listen to Nekoshi. Killing people is...wrong. But...You know, at times like this...I think we need someone to smile, right? It can't be all gloomy here, so I'll take up that job. No matter how bad things get, I'll just keep smiling for everyone else."