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onceuponacomm2021-06-28 10:01 am
faentasy) wrote in onceuponacomm2021-06-28 10:01 am
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 5
Almost half of the non-fairy population of Aira Niluc is gone.
Some may be feeling the absence of their fellow participants in this story. Others will stay focused on the wish they want to get. What never changes is that the story goes on, bringing you closer to the end -- and to another chapter. What will it bring this time?
Snow!
Snow as far as the eye can see, a cold blanket covering the new area. Some winter amenities are now available, ready for perusal! But that's not all there's to find: everyone also will find reminders of their homes, of people they know, of happier times.
Of their wishes.
Who will try to reach their wish this time?
[[Welcome to Week 5! Feel free to make top levels at your discretion, and remember to note it in your header if you plan on investigating any locations. However, please try to keep investigations to Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday! You can also privately contact Hamelin at your leisure.
In addition, a reminder that any Murder Proposals for this week are due by Tuesday 3:00 PM EST/12:00 PM PST! However, please note that you have the option of submitting murder proposals for a later week as well.]]
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[He's half-teasing, half-not, because right now this is the best lead they've got to go on, bizarre as the entire premise may be.]
Content Warning: Lots of Bugs
...hm. Read that subject line. I'm so sorry, guys. Thankfully the effect of the salt happening very quickly means the magnifying glass won't be wasted, yup.
"Salt probably shouldn't hurt paper" is a perfectly natural thing to think--after all, why should it? Table salt isn't particularly corrosive, nor is it particularly reactive either.
But this is a land where many "should"s, "would"s and "could"s don't follow the laws that one might be used to. So even with that light sprinkle, something starts to unravel.
Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that the page itself begins to unravel, fibers of paper seeming to unwind as they morph into black threads that begin to dissolve into dust at their tips, dark like ashes. Spreading out from the salt crystals as their epicenters, the erosion also spreads rapidly towards the rest of the page, leaving once-tightly woven matter now unbound and crumbling before Phil and Marcus's eyes. The destruction continues until there's nothing left of the paper but a pile of black dust and the movement of dozens of tiny little insects as they come crawling out from under, like a colony leaving its nest.
It's not marching letter ants, it's marching ants.]
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[ uuuuhhhhhhHHHHHH WOW he's not sure what he expected but it sure wasn't this!! He instinctively drops the book on the floor like a hot potato... but, well, actually he probably still needs that, so he gingerly picks it back up by the cover (in a way that would probably offend Nageki's senses) and shakes it out onto the floor to try to get all the bugs out.
Are they, like, coming for his life here, or are they just minding their own ant business... ]
S-should I have put it on the cover instead?? Or maybe on the glass itselfβ
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[He's up and moving as soon as he hears that startled cry, hand reaching for his gunblade until he spots just what it is that made Phil yell and... oh. Ewww.
Should he squish those? But what if they're important...!]
... did those come out of the book?
[Has no one here heard of pest control!!]
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[ Watching them... ]
They don't appear to be set on harming anything, at least, so...
[ Just keep an eye on them for now, he guesses...? ]
I'm... assuming that wasn't what I was supposed to find, since I don't think the magnifying glass even came into the equation.
So if I want to try this again, I can try the salt on the glass or on the cover... the former is probably less of a risk for a first try since we can at least replace a damaged glass... or just taste a bit of it and see if that does anything, I suppose? "Take it with a grain of salt"...
[ He's just kind of talking out loud to himself as he goes through these options... Well, he doesn't really like trying more than one variable at a time, but he's got limited time and resources here.
So, okay, he's going to stick a finger in the container of salt and lick that quick, and then (with his unlicked hand!!) get another, smaller pinch of it to sprinkle on the magnifying glass.
And he'll open up again to the page after, uh, the former Ant Page. If he glances through it at the book, is that doing anything? ]
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[He's not going to finish that sentence if only because he doesn't really want to think too much about that day and its events, but the point is clear.]
There's gotta be some connection. The only question is what it is.
[Whatever the reason, though, he's on high alert now and is just going to be hovering rather than standing several feet away.]
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[ God damn it. ]
Ugh, this is just the same thing it did last time now...
[ Honestly, he thinks he'd take the ants over this!! At least that was novel!
Sigh. All right, if he grabs some random other book off a shelf and sprinkles a little salt on the cover, is it going to dissolve into bugs too, or was that strictly a paper thing? For future reference whenever he acquires another magnifying glass...
Also, as long as he's out here on the third floor looking for random books to potentially deface, what books are here with "guide" in the title? Just in case that clue was more blatant than it seemed. ]
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[The fact that anything happened at all would seemingly indicate that they're on the right track to something, but...]
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Salting the cover doesn't do anything, but any stray grains get the same effect. Seems it's limited to the pages, indeed]
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[ Hm... Well, a little disappointing about the guide stuff, but... all right, maybe he'll have to give it another try on the cover when he gets another glass, then, now that he knows that isn't going to make the entire book disintegrate.
To be continued, then..... and unless anything has occurred between when I last tagged this and now that would prevent this from happening, he's going to give that book one more shake in case any ants are lingering and take it with him to be safe. ]
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Phil.
He loves you, but you are NOT bringing that potentially magical bug-infested thing into their room...!]
... please tell me we're not being expected to do something with those ants.
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Anyway, I'm nearly certain I've shaken all the ants out of it now, so it should be perfectly fine to keep this in your room with the other books.
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[This is one thing he's going to be putting his foot down about, sorry Phil. He doesn't want to have to try to get ants out of their stuff!]
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