3spoopy

First topic message reminder :

The Ruined Chateau.... Given Sova had been here once already and explored the interior, it now looked smaller from the outside, all except for the massive double-doors. Then again, given the things he'd witnessed inside, it probably WAS somehow smaller on the outside. Still, this wasn't going to deter or scare him. The only thing he was worried for was anyone else aiming to go there. Today, the one who happened to want to go with him was Varda. This was odd, since the two usually only did missions together, but today.... there was no mission here. Actually, the guild had sort of made it a mission to explore the things happening and this seemed like the place to go, so maybe it was a mission. Just, without the rewards.

He looked up to the sky and stared at the gloomy dark clouds for a moment, as if just making sure the sky wasn't changing before he set his attention back on the Chateau. "Remember, Varda, stay close to me in here. This place will literally change with you in it, so if we get separated, we could have a lot of trouble finding each other. There's also a lot of really dangerous and hostile pokemon in here and since most of the rooms aren't exactly huge, I won't be able to go all out with you here," he explained, relaying his past experience in this horrible house to the swablu.

He wanted his ally to be ready for everything in here, after all. Especially since there was a good chance he was going to need some help.... if not with fighting, then with finding his way around. He would have brought some of his other new allies along, but oddly enough.... the little fluff-ball was still the one he trusted most alongside him. At that, Varda was the only one he trusted to manage to capably and safely navigate this place, and more importantly, to LISTEN to him. Sure, Dusk knew the area given she'd come with him before, but she had mostly just been a hindrance in fights and never listened.

Varda was already on the ground, trying to rather helplessly flop around so he could get free of the hand's grip, but he wasn't really doing much to help himself. He was just being dragged towards the hole, a couple of arms rising from the same hole to grab him as well. If there was one good thing his flailing did, it was dispersing the smoke around him so he could see well – and be seen well! He was already dangerously close to being pulled in the hole, when he started to think... Was the hole itself even bad? The bad thing was probably the ghost-like arms that could hurt him, but the hole... What if it was safer than the room?

A blast of darkness enveloped the bird and the hard, causing the owner of the hand to shriek and let go of the Swablu's leg. As usual, it didn't seem to affect the bird at all... But he was now free, slowly rolling over and pushing himself on his feet. Getting a moment of some calm time, he turned around with a smile to look at his friend, gently flapping his wings to push the smoke away... Only to see an odd purple cloud hovering in place where Sova was! This wasn't normal smoke, not at all! Normal smoke wasn't colored like that, for one, but... Maybe he could try to get rid of it like normal smoke! Varda spread his wings and jumped into the air, flying closer to the odd smoke before he started to flap his wings as hard as he could, flying in place.

Sova couldn't really see anything outside of the dark haze that'd covered his body and obscured his vision, but he could feel a sudden gust of wind.... then another, and another. He soon realized what this was - it must have been Varda trying to blow whatever was suffocating him away! He wanted to say something, like "flap harder," but found that opening his mouth merely allowed the strange gas to get in his throat, which burned and stopped him from speaking, instead eliciting a cough. The smoke hadn't been enough to bother him, but a mere gastly was causing his eyes and throat to burn as well as cutting off his oxygen.

Seeing that his friend couldn't seem to get rid of this thicker, malevolent smoke, the glaceon decided he needed to take matters into his own paws.... He fell to the ground from lack of oxygen, but that was alright, it just made it easier for him to get into his bag now that his good paw was free of its duty of holding him upright. He pulled out an orb, one that he hoped would solve this situation, but he wasn't exactly sure if this thing was a pokémon.... still, he was beginning to realize that it seemed a lot like a gastly. He just had to hope he was right here, or else this was going to be very bad.

As quickly as he could in his current state, he slammed the orb onto the ground and a flash of light erupted around him. Moments later, the light faded to reveal the malevolent purple gas had disappeared, replaced with something the glaceon failed to immediately notice in the smoke. He gasped for breath, finally free to breathe with the gastly no longer choking him.

(energy - more than enough to roll, too busy to calculate it right now. First item rolled will be for itemizer.)

Lord E V carried out 5 launched of one Ruined Chateau :

, , , ,

Varda tried to push the odd smoke away, but it didn't seem to work! It was so odd, he was generating as much wind as he could and the normal smoke was being pushed away, but... But purple fog was still there! Was it heavier than normal smoke? Could it be heavier and still float somehow? This was so confusing and he didn't have any time to be worrying about it, as Sova was currently doing really badly while he was trapped in the strange cloud. But what else could he do? Was this thing... Alive?

"Sovaa!" The Swablu chirped as the Glaceon fell down on the floor, hoping that his friend was still conscious... Or even able to hear things inside the odd cloud. He was quite relieved to see his friend moving, digging something out of his bag... And then slammed it into the ground! A bright flash erupted, but the smoke was quick to block most of it so it never properly lit up the room, but it did cause both Varda and the odd arms behind him to flinch. The bird couldn't move, not wanting to fly when he was pretty much blinded by his closed eyes.

But he couldn't keep his eyes shut when his friend was in danger! Eventually he let his eyelids to part, his wings still pushing the smoke away. There was no purple smoke left, but there was Sova right there... And some odd little orb, but it wasn't very important now.
"Sova, Sova! Are you awake?" He called out, flying closer... And then immediately stopping when he remembered that there could easily be wires in the air where Sova hadn't walked, so he landed. The arms behind him were moving again.

Bird carried out 1 launched of one Ruined Chateau :

Sova took a few deep breaths before getting an urge to swat at his friend for asking if he was awake. What in the world could possibly have suggested he was asleep!? Regardless, he was just happy to be able to breathe again, it didn't matter if his friend misinterpreted him laying on the ground for sleeping. He looked around, his vision proving to be a bit poor at the moment from a sudden flash of light, oxygen deprivation and a persistent haze of smoke. Instead of verbally answering his worried friend, he decided to demonstrate just how awake he was by getting up, because actions speak louder than words.... or something.

The glaceon lifted himself up and nodded to show he was alright, though he immediately regretted his actions as a sudden lightheaded feeling set in, causing him to stumble backwards and almost fall. However, much to his surprise, something caught him and stopped him from toppling over.... though this was not something that made him happy. He would have preferred falling. There was a loud click that sounded from the walls the line had attached to before it suddenly dropped to the ground. This time, the glaceon was ready for it and.... well, he would have liked to say he'd been prepared and ducked, but in all honesty, he just fell as the wire gave out under his weight, which resulted in one of the two grayish metal thorns that'd been fired flying right over him and colliding into the other one mid-air before it could reach him, both of the little stabby-things falling to the ground with a clink.

(Energy - 0 but I'll use the second itemizer orb on the Lampent or Sableye and end up with 10.)

Varda perked up as he saw his friend getting up, starting to quickly waddle his way to the Pokémon – before once again remembering where he was and stopping, taking it really slow. He gently felt his way through the air with his wings to see if there were any wires that could set off a trap, his claws traced circles on the floor to feel for any odd pressure plates. It was really slow to get anywhere like this, but luckily for him, the ghosts behind him would have to come out of their little hidey hole to grab him now, their arms just weren't long enough! Probably...

It was a good thing that it took him a while, though. A very telling click echoed in the room as Sova stumbled backwards, causing the Swablu's blood to stop and his body turn cold as he flinched, knowing that nothing good came out of that noise. A swoosh came from above, but instead of hitting anything, the two spikes managed to hit each other perfectly and clink on the floor uselessly! Varda couldn't help but perk up again, his mouth curling up into a smile. That was more like it!
"Sova, I think there's a room under this floor! Do you think it would be trapped too...?"

"I think this entire house is one big trap," Sova muttered just barely loud enough to hear, becoming agitated by this room.
His own self-restraint was beginning to slip, the air around him grew cold as he once more pulled himself to his paws. He was absolutely sick of this place, he no longer cared if it was going to conjure up things to hurt him, it didn't matter! He began walking toward the door, speaking back to Varda as he did so, "Come on."

A few more various hands arose from the ground, only to almost immediately recoil from the freezing temperature around the glaceon. They then retreated back from whence they came, not wanting to touch the thing that was causing the temperature drop. As he walked, yet another floor-switch of sorts seemed to be triggered by one of his steps, similar to the first one that'd created so much smoke in the room. The first one was just beginning to run out of smoke, too. He looked down as smoke began filling the air through cracks in the floor in a square shape where he just stepped and growled.

Despite knowing it was a very bad idea, Sova took a deep breath, halting for a moment and shivering a bit from the rush of pain in his chest before continuing. He then blew out as hard as he could at the ground, shattering the floorboards protecting whatever was making the smoke and destroying it. He could feel pulses of pain through his body from the exertion, but ignored them for the time-being and looked back to the door.

"Oh," Varda just replied as Sova seemed to suspect that the entire house was a trap, taking his friend's words absolutely, 100% seriously as he considered. Well, yes, maybe. The house was very confusing, and even though some nice Pokémon seemed to live in it, it really didn't seem like the kind of a place that was built as a home. There were also many dangerous things in it. Sova might actually be onto something here!
"Does that mean we should leave? Being trapped isn't good," he continued with a chirp, tilting his head.

The bird was told to follow, and follow he did. Inching closer carefully, he tried to follow the Glaceon's steps exactly so he wouldn't set off anything. Luckily he was smaller, so it would have been quite difficult for him to hit something if Sova managed to avoid it! It took a moment for Varda to realize how the air was growing colder, until his little body shivered and his feathers fluffed up. It took him even longer to realize that it was actually his friend causing it, as another button in the floor seemed to create another steady stream of smoke that started to fill the room, making it very difficult to see.

A loud crash of what he could only believe was wood shattering was heard from in front of him, a blast of cold air causing the smoke to billow over the Swablu, who covered his face with his wings. He could feel how frost was starting to form on his feathers.

Leave? Yes, leaving would be just FANTASTIC, if it were actually that easy. They couldn't just head for the exit considering the place they were in and even if they could, they had a mission, one he intended to see through even if Varda decided to leave. However, he'd learned by this point that arguing with Varda didn't really do any good and since he didn't want to play along and act like.... Varda, he just decided to remain silent on the topic, let the bird wonder.

He stepped over the hole in the floor he'd created and moved toward the door, his body temperature beginning to regulate as he calmed down. Then, as he placed a paw and pushed on it, his temperature dropped again.... it wasn't opening. There was a fancy ring-handle on the door which he bit onto and tugged at for a moment, only to find it didn't want to open this way either. There was... a keyhole. A KEYHOLE. He growled at the door, though he knew it wasn't going to just be intimidated into opening. Still, it made him feel better.

The freezing air made Varda shudder and try to warm himself up with his wings, lagging behind as his little feet started to feel awfully... Stiff and difficult to move. The smoke quickly swallowed him up, his eyes burning despite how freezing the air was, a cough or two escaping his beak. It was impossible to see, and when Sova didn't say anything... Why, it almost felt like he was all alone in the room now!
"Sova, are you still there...?" He chirped, tilting his head. The air was still so cold he didn't want to move his wings away – actually, be felt so stiff he probably even could try to flap the smoke away!

But as the temperatures seemed to rise up again, the Swablu was feeling much better right away! His feathers were still fluffed up and he couldn't help but shudder occasionally, but it was almost feeling like he was melting! And well, he probably was, the frost that had formed on his feathers turning to water. Now he could try to flap his wings again to push away the smoke, though he was being very cautious so his wings didn't touch anything they shouldn't have...

If only the warmth would have lasted forever. This house really had issues with keeping its temperature, the bird thought! At least he had managed to see where Sova was, so he started to waddle closer, stopped by the same door that had stopped his friend as well. He tilted his head and looked up, eyeing the door and clearly wondering why they stopped... Until he saw the keyhole as well.
"Oh, oh no! Does that mean... Is it locked?" Varda cooed, taking a step back. Who would lock doors in a place like this? Considering how big and confusing the house was, it would be impossible to find keys if they were ever put down somewhere!
"I... I don't think I have seen a key around!"

Sova's ears flattened as he stared menacingly at the door, still paying no mind to the door.  Yet, it still refused to move for him.... which he decided deserved a punishment of death.  Or something.  He took a few steps back as he heard his friend talk once more, ignoring the words for the most-part, though he paid enough attention to at least comprehend what Varda was saying.  Worries about the door needing a key.... well, he for one was not worried.  There were two options with which to deal with a lock, opening it.... or just breaking it.

"I am the key," he responded in a bitter tone, his temperature dropping even lower in his ever-rising agitation.
Then, without warning, he ceased backing up and charged into the door as fast as he could, jumping and ramming the door with his shoulder - the one that didn't have a broken paw attached to it - just as he neared the door  It smashed open and he tumbled into the next room, releasing the smoke from the chamber and allowing it to disperse, both increasing visibility in the deathtrap-room and adding a light fog of sorts to the new room, giving it a rather eerie appearance.

The new room appeared to be.... one they'd already been to. The room with the black, spiral staircase that went up into a dark abyss, one from fairly early on in the house. He couldn't help but feel annoyed, figuring Varda would take it as them being close to the exit and push to try and leave.... What annoyed him more, though, was the thought that perhaps they were close to the exit. One good thing about the room this time around, though, was that there was another door to the left that he immediately noticed thanks to the lower area of the room still being lit. This meant maybe they didn't have to traverse the staircase a second time!

Varda blinked as Sova claimed to be the key, tilting his head in confusion and squinting his eyes. He... Didn't see it. Had his friend maybe hit his head? It was possible, it was very hard to see with all the fog around... And Sova was injured! Maybe being that hurt just made one a bit loopy, as a Glaceon was in no way a key! He didn't look anything like one! Maybe he would have understood if there was some kind of resemblance, but no. It was really sounding like Sova needed some rest to clear his head...

And then the Glaceon started to run towards the door, it took a moment for the bird to realize what was happening. But when he did, oh boy did his smile disappear fast, turning into a look of horror as his feathers stood on their ends.
"Sova, n–!" He tried to call out, but it was too late. Sova crashed into the door, actually managing to open it by breaking it, but that couldn't feel good! Considering the injuries his friend had, it was a surprise he even could move, much less run around recklessly like that. The smoke started to pour out now that it was free to move somewhere else, dispersing into the much larger room and covering it with a layer of hazy gray, some light filtering through it.

"Oh no Sova! That's not how keys work at all!" The Swablu chirped, rushing out of the room to join his friend on the other side. Oh, this wasn't good. What would he do if Sova was broken beyond repair now? As he stopped next to the Glaceon, his eyes glanced at his surroundings quickly before he was forced to look back. The room looked... Familiar. He had seen those stairs spiraling into darkness before. Varda had to stop and really think about it, his brow furrowing deep in thought before he got it, his eyes lighting up.
"Ah! What were the odds that this house had identical rooms!"

Sova groaned on the ground to show he was still alive, feeling his adrenaline fading and his body's freezing temperature along with it. As his adrenaline and agitation faded, he began to feel the recoil of his actions.... pain. Even though he'd made sure to use the side of his body that wasn't too badly damaged, he was still beginning to feel waves of pain. However, he couldn't let Varda worry.... and more importantly, he couldn't allow himself to be seen in such a weak state! With that in mind, he forced himself back up onto his paws, doing his best not to make any sounds to indicate any severe pain.

It was odd to him that Varda had apparently suddenly stopped caring about his safety, for some reason more interested in the fact that he'd called himself a key and how this room looked like an earlier one. He sighed.... it just did no good talking to this bird sometimes. Still, though, he felt he could at least explain that this was probably the same room they'd been through earlier. "This is the same room from earlier, Varda. This house makes no sense, don't try to understand it. Just be glad there's a door right here this time," he replied before turning to the left and walking straight up to the door.
He was in no mood to sit around any longer than he had to, despite his body still being in pain and begging for him to rest.

He didn't feel he would get any complaints about Varda for moving along, though, so he didn't sit around and wait for a reply. Why would the swablu want to go all the way back up the staircase of doom when there was a door right in front of them in easy reach? He liked a challenge, but even he knew when it was appropriate to take the easy way out, especially since they didn't really have time to take the scenic rout.

Varda visibly relaxed as he heard his friend's groan, a completely valid and proper answer in determining if the Pokémon was still alive and well. But the smile that had appeared on the bird's face disappeared as he noticed his friend getting up. Well yes, it was a good sign, but... Sova was injured and he knew they should rest rather than push it! But he just never managed to get it through to his friend, Sova just insisted on going on... Was there a way to do it so that the Glaceon would be happy?

"Ooh," the bird cooed at the explanation, his eyes wandering around the room. Yes, this room was more or less identical to the first room they had been to... Well, that didn't mean this was the same room, but it would have made sense if it did. There was a door that wasn't in the previous version, as Sova pointed out. It could have just appeared there like how they seemed to be able to do in this house... Or maybe it had been there the whole time.

"Or! It could be a new room that looks like the same because sometimes things like that happen!" Varda gave his opinion on the matter, hopping after his friend,
"...But... You really shouldn't be ramming doors like that..."

"Uhg," Sova groaned in frustration at his friend, who always seemed to be able to annoy him.
Why did he like Varda so much, anyways? It was a mystery. No, actually, he knew why.... Varda treated him nicely, looked up to him. Like he mattered. That was something he hadn't gotten much of in his life, after his parents.... He'd been looked down on, underestimated and even blatantly insulted just for being an eevee. It got better after he'd evolved, but he still found it difficult to find kind individuals whom he actually liked. Actually, most of the time he preferred the mean ones.... as he felt free to attack them.

"Don't worry about my ramming doors. I'm not even sure how bad I'm hurt. For all I know, my paw could just be fractured or dislocated, and those aren't nearly as bad as a complete break. Doesn't really matter if the ribs are broken, those aren't-," he explained as he reached the door and pushed it open, but what he saw next made him stop.
No, it couldn't be.... this house was just playing a trick on them, right!? He just stood at the doorway and stared through it, baffled.

The door seemed to lead.... outside. It was the entrance.

"That's exactly why you shouldn't try to push yourself too hard, Sova!" Varda chirped as he waddled after the Glaceon, objecting to how his friend seemed to think it was fine to ram things and get hurt because he didn't know how badly he was hurt. Wasn't that backwards? The injuries could easily be worse than one at first thought, so they shouldn't be poked and prodded in case that was Very Bad. Or something. The bird's understanding of medical procedures was kind of hazy, but he thought it was something like that. At least he had always been told to stay back and rest when he let out even the tiniest of coughs.

The Swablu stopped as Sova stopped to push open the door as well, keeping his eyes on the Ice-type Pokémon and noticing his expression once the door was open enough for him to see what was behind it. Varda blinked and then let his own gaze follow, peeking through the door, blinking slowly. A slight breeze managed to ruffle his feathers, but the air still felt as heavy as it always did. He could see... The sky, the dead grass, the dark clouds. That was where they came from, right? This was the entrance – no, now it was the exit.

"Ah, look! We really are back all the way here, Sova! That's so odd," the little bird cooed, tilting his head.


((We should still have that massive huge battle, you shall not pass or leave the house alive etc. Because Sova is still injured and I am a dick. Might be better for us to actually leave and come back for another thread, get Sova fixed up off-screen.))