[X] … you really did ignore him for days, though. Does he really expect so little of you?


Ken holds your gaze firmly as his apology sinks into your stomach like lead. You struggle for reply, swallowing dryly before checking on Shanghai. Catching your glance, she rises from the drainboard, her bright red ribbon and cornflower blue dress darkened several shades by the persistent dampness. She crosses the kitchen to circle around your back and take up her station to your right, a few last drops of rainwater dripping from her tiny shoes.

And she probably looks better than you do, right now.

“No,” you say, voice low and thick. You swallow again, for all the good it'll do. “No... no I haven't.” You wait for him to reply, each moment scraping down your nerves till you can't stand it anymore. “I ignored you-”

for days,

“-too long. I haven't been-”

thoughtful, considerate, kind,

Thread One: >>28086
Thread Two: >>28601

[X] Through the back!
-[X] Inform the leg of your plan.

Lucky for you, you've got 'sperience in this “hidin'” biz. In through the back of the shop—and that's some breath catchin' in your throat, the way you've gotta juggle a leg while jigglin' a handle, but then the door gives, and ya basically nearly fall through—and then—

“Check it,” ya gasp. “Do ya trust me?”

The horse's leg doesn't answer 'cause they haven't got a mouth. They twitch and nudge at your arm with their leg, though, which either means, “I trust ya,” or, “I beg ya, please don't dismember me more than I'm already reverse-unmembered; I've got horse leg family.”

Close enough.

“Okay, listen up—I've got an ace hidin' space. The problem is, if ya make with the buckin', you're gonna give it away. How good're you at playin' statue?”

My name is Shanghai.

I'm one of the many dolls in service to my master, Alice. Every morning without fail she comes to our room and wakes us . We dance at the end of her strings, carrying out her every command. She praises us when we do well, scolds us when we don't, and mends us when we break. And every night she returns us to our shelves, and we sleep.



...so why can I see her sleeping?

I hear noises. Dolls falling, plates shattering. But I'm not falling. My vision is getting brighter instead of darker.

Master is lying face down on the floor.

Master!

The violet doll, Hourai, reacts before I do, diving to Master's side. I quickly follow her. Together we carefully roll Master onto her back.

You rouse yourself, focusing your attention as something approaches. It takes you a few moments, as you stare, to realise just what it was that woke you - a pair of girls, snared by the forest, and led astray.

Led to this place, alone. Something follows them, in the darkness, but as you turn your attention towards it, it fades away, into the darkness of the forest. ...At least some of these newcomers know respect.

It's a simple effort of will to lead the two onward, through the darkness, drawing them to the heart of your power, the start of your domain -- The Trailhead.

It's the least you can do for them. They'll be safe here, for a time.

It's just as your torpor is overtaking you once more, just as your attention drifts, that you can feel the thread of power, granted to you.

You shake yourself awake once more, eyeing them carefully.

"Come on, Renko!" The purple girl tells her companion. "We're lost, and it's only polite." Her companion grumbles something you can't catch -- the doubt around her is too thick.

Despite this, it's both of them who leave crackers at your shrine, before withdrawing to argue about which way to go.

“What the-!” I say, still waking from my slumber. The feeling of a vine slowly crushing my leg painfully brings me back to reality. “Let go you twig!” I frantically kick at the vine and eventually tear it off of me before leaping backwards. The vine slowly recedes back into the forest as I retreat far enough away from its grasp.

The forest may be a home of mine, but it doesn't mean it's safe. Scanning the forest with my enhanced sight, smell, and hearing, (compared to at least thirty times better than a normal human's), I pinpoint the different creatures and life moving around me. Thankfully none of them seem to be initially hostile, besides the vine tree.

To the east is the black and white, who hums while she gathers mushrooms. To the west, the sounds of a branch snapping, followed by a shriek tells me the forest has claimed another life. To the south, I hear the sounds of a stream, its gentle waters betraying the danger it brings.

Finally, to the north I catch wind of what I was looking for… another youkai.

Getting ready for the trail ahead, I take a deep breath and stretch my limbs after that little incident with the vine. Looking down at myself to see if anything is amiss, I notice a stray tuft of black fur sticking out on my arms, so I quickly fix it back into place. A professional needs to look good after all. Besides, what kind of cat youkai would I be if I didn’t look well groomed? Finishing my grooming and stretching, I snag my gear before heading off.

Catching up to the trail, I can see the locals weren’t joking when they said the youkai’s nearly as big as a house, it's footsteps clearly leaving sizable prints in earth. The tracks in front of me are monstrous, the creature’s feet being at least a meter long by my estimate. Not to mention looking around the trail, the torn up trees also indicate it is immensely powerful.

Well, that sums up the creature is definitely large and may very well be the one causing the issue. Normally this would be Reimu’s job to exterminate unruly youkai, but since I've shown up offering to hunt down the more dangerous ones, she has grown more complacent and allows me to do

Intro: >>th/186778

I feel... Different, somehow. I suppose this should be expected, seeing as how I now have a body. Instead of my usual, unmoving octagonal shape, I can feel long, fleshy extensions twitching slightly. I suppose those are my "limbs", then.

My immediate surroundings are soft and warm. Not nearly hot enough for my liking, of course, but pleasant all the same. I can also... "hear" something. Like slow breathing, very close to me. Whoever it is appears to be asleep.

Alright, first order of business is to open my eyes. Easier said than done but, after a lot of face-scrunching, I succeed. The first thing I see is the face of a sleeping girl, merely a few inches away from mine, her blond hair strewn about messily. I don't recognise it, of course, but I could never mistake the inner flow of her magic, even as slow as it is presently.

Mistress.

Immediately more comfortable, I start to slowly experiment moving my arms about without waking her, bringing my hand in front of my face and clenching it with childlike wonder. Satisfied with my motor functions, I slowly sit up, still not waking my mistress. Spotting a mirror on the other side of the room, I take a moment to take stock of my appearance.

I resemble mistress quite a bit, with a similar body frame and even similar facial features. I probably subconsciously copied those from her when I created this body. My hair, however, is shorter with a fiery red-orange color that matches my eyes.

At that moment, a sleepy voice rises from behind me.

Thread One: >>28086

[X] Accept.

Problem is, Aya's got a point, too. That first piece isn't doin' ya any favors standin' on its own, not if that whole Keine-droppin'-in thing gives ya anything to judge by. And sure, it's been all quiet on the eastern front since then—nobody knockin' the door down to make sure Rinnosuke hasn't been robbed or chained to the radiator or stabbed in the back with a Swiss multi-tool (he hasn't even got the right pipes for a radiator and it's the gappy kind so it doesn't even make a good surface sideways), but if it happened once, it can happen again, and you're not lookin' forwards to gettin' used to all of Rinnosuke's buds stoppin' by to size ya over for all the wrong reasons.

Plus, it's a matter of principle. If you're gonna have a rep Gensokyo-wide, ya wanna make sure it's an accurate rep. Let 'em know you're awesome, but rockin'-guitar-solo awesome, not Old-Testament-Yahweh awesome, which was loadsa times not awesome at all.

“I'm game,” ya say. “Hit me.”

Aya looks over at the door edge, then at you again. “Hit you?” she says.

“I mean get with the askin' already—I'm agreein'.” And that's the second time in this many days you've dazzled someone with a card game metaphor, not countin' Rinnosuke who always pretends to get it and then goes leafin' through a pair of dictionaries when he thinks you're not payin' attention. It's sorta doofusically admirable, so you're givin' 'im a pass. “Ya wanna sit down or something?” ya add.

Aya does wanna sit down or something. She barely pauses to do the (belated) obligatory Japanese ritual politespeak, and then she's practically rushin' in, strides gargantuan with—

Crossposted here:
https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/march-of-the-failies.24933/

Votes from both sites will be counted.

~*~

In the strange dust and ashes of an abandoned cottage, you are born.

Your first sound is that of the rain pouring down, and your first sight is that of the charcoal blasted ceiling, with a hole in the corner, through which rain falls into and partially floods the simple house you find yourself in. You can smell nature and decay and chemicals unknown.

And your first thought is this: I am a failure.

From my very first moment of life, you realised this, before any other piece of knowledge: That you are a failure, that you were born in failure, that you shall live in failure, and that you shall die in failure. You were born in a building half-broken, beneath a storm.

Decided to do a coin toss for the first two votes. Commencing update.

[c] Stay with Alice. Bonding time with seven-coloured puppeteer~

“If I were to stay with you, could I at least let my family know about this?”

“Of course you can, dear. Why, if I may ask?”

You tighten your arms about Alice’s waist. “I used to take nightshift assignments back in Melbourne. Often had to spend my night outdoors, so yeah.” You’re slightly worried when Alice stays silent, but your doubt is quickly washed away as she gently pats you. “I take it as a yes, then.”

“I already gave you my permission, silly,” Alice giggles. “Hang on. I’ll let Shanghai and Hourai deliver the message.”

“Are they capable of doing that?” you ask, slightly concerned over the fact that Alice’s entrusting her dolls to do the bidding.

“What are you talking about?” So saying, both Shanghai and Hourai appear beside Alice and curtsy to their master. “Like I said earlier, they’re my best creations and I’m very proud of them. Is there anything you’d like to convey to them before I send them?”

You wake up.

Okay, so waking up's not the weird part. You do it all the time, actually. Waking up is your bread and butter, by which what you're trying to say is that you wake up, and then you eat some bread and butter before you jet out the door so you don't get later than the late you already are. A long time ago you were all—cereal! Toast! OJ! All part of this balanced breakfast—but you always ended up bustin' into where you were supposed to be just in the nick of time even when you got up early to bother with toast prep, so you nixed it. It's not like you need something in your stomach anyway, in the mornings. It's all preference. Like shampoo.

So waking up's not the weird part.

Waking up in a forest, though? When you're something like ninety-nine percent sure you didn't go to sleep there? Totally weird. Good thing you've got a system.

First things first—gotta check for immediate complications. You feel around for stitches you don't remember getting and come up empty, which means you probably still have your kidneys. Or was it your liver? Either way, they're all three probably still in you, unless someone's figured out how to do stealth surgery, which is a legit concern but not one you can do anything about right now. Your heart's still beating, so you haven't been turned into a zombie or a vampire or a zombie vampire or anything like that—probably, again. Your vision's keen, and when you say “Testing testing,” it's as clear as it oughta be which takes care of hearing and vocals all at once.

Anything else?

Your head feels fine, which means nobody clocked you when you weren't looking—though that would've meant one mystery down. You run through the vitals anyway. You remember where you grew up and where you went to school. You know your mom's name and your dad's name and the names of a whole lotta other people related to you. And of course you know—

Wait.