You are Satori Komeiji.

You have just awoken, and are currently snuggled down inside your bed-covers, with no part of your body extending outside of your cocoon of warmth, as is fitting for a sleepy satori. You feel comfortable, safe, and sated.

It is dark in the bed.

You slowly realise that your memories of the previous night are very clouded; the only thing you remember is that yesterday was your birthday.

>

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The input parser for A Text Adventure understands both complex and basic commands. A basic command consists of one action, usually a verb or verb plus object; a complex command is a string of actions. Entire plans that encompass a series of reactions to possible outcomes of previous actions are beyond the computing power of the input parser, and will be ignored.

Examples of basic commands:

“TENSHI IS IN THIS STORY”

FINALE


Where it ends.



※ ※ ※

Lanternlight flickered across the pale flat panes of her cheeks as he turned.

The charcoal-black flagstone grated under the soles of his boots. Walls dark glistered alight. The flame winked then flashed as it caught more oil. A huff of hot air came out between the shutters, reminding him how chill otherwise was the black hidden place. The boy lowered the lamp to the floor. Brass clattered on the rock. The small person on the chair gave him no favour of startling. Still she sat, still and ever still, her bare toes suspended inches from the ground; gagged and bound and helpless. An image of pity, but there was none of that left in him.

​

Ｓｏｍｅｔｉｍｅｓ， ｓｏｍｅｔｈｉｎｇ ｅｌｓｅ ｈａｐｐｅｎｓ．

Ｍａｙｂｅ．

You are Parsee Mizuhashi, a Persian (hashihito) who became a bridge princess (hashihime) for the sake of a wicked pun, although it's also likely that it actually goes the other way around. You're no longer sure which is which.

That's it, though. While the whole Hell - Hell whole? - knows you as the sulky, jealous overseer that tends to that fancy bridge yonder, they tend to overlook your single passion in this dark, musty place: cracking awful puns. You could even say that it's more than a mere passion interest to you, considering that your species and/or your cultural identity is somehow based on a play on words.

As usual, today's not a very exciting day to guard the sole passage between the surface world and the Old Hell. Even though you're going to turn away any coming visitors anyway, you can't help but feeling a bit lonely being here by yourself. Sometimes you just wonder if you and the bridge you're guarding are separated at all, both of you having to stand in the middle of nowhere for all eternity.

Well, you then quietly assess, the bridge is probably better than you, since she can't feel angry - nobody crosses her anymore, after all.

And there's no "have to" on your part to guard the bridge too, you further thought. This is a self-imposed task you're placing on yourself, isn't it? If you want to, you can totally go to the surface or deeper to the Old Hell. Maybe you should...

[ ] ...go higher, find that spider and insult her mother.
[ ] ...go lower, find that oni and see if she'd like to play card games.
[ ] (Write-in*)

---

>Calm. Like you could go to sleep like this.

Soothing. Relaxing. Calming. This is what it feels like. For some reason, you almost forgot what it was like to receive a hug when you were on the brink of collapsing. It's not long afterwards that it dawns upon you, you're really tired. All this running around, worrying, screaming, both your body and your mind have reached their limit, and they need to shut down and rest. There's more you want to do, but after a while of struggling, you submit to the feeling and decide that you can do this stuff when you're not feeling like insanity is knocking on your front door. The hug is just so nice, you can't help it; you drift off asleep without much warning, wondering how long this period will last before your life is turned upside down yet again...

---

"Ah...she fell asleep." You say this shortly after noticing that Satoko became rather comatose. Even shaking her a bit doesn't seem to wake her. She's really out of it.

"Leave her be, Souya... she needs the rest." Alice walks over and picks Satoko up from her chair after you stand back, and takes her upstairs into a bedroom, presumably. You just stand there, feeling quite helpless in it all, like there's really nothing you can do about it, and you're merely forced to watch those you care about suffer because of it. Such an empty feeling. "You know, that was pretty brave of you." Your attention is regained when Alice seems to have come back down from upstairs.

"Huh? Oh... uh, thanks. Why do you say that though?"

"Hugging someone out of the blue like that, especially someone like Satoko. I don't think even I could have done it myself." You look down towards the floor a bit.

"I don't really think that's true... you care a lot for Satoko, and she just... really needed that, I think." After a short moment of silence, you feel Alice's hand rest on the top of your head.

All the bullets you want? Now you're excited, too! The warmth inside of you feels all tickly, and it jitters all around just like her warmth does, but you can feel another warmth coming down from Aunt Koishi, and keeping all the bubbles in you from pouring out. It makes your chest feel all tingly, and hot, and you just feel all... all...

You feel all good, and your warm feeling runs all the way up your arms and out your hands, and the bubbles dance all around your fingers. Aunt Satori's warmth slides around her arms, too, and it tickles you like Mama Okuu's feathers. Mama Okuu's feathers...

Shiny, glittery, sparkly black, and very soft. They feel extra warm when Mama Okuu puts her big, big wings into big, big hugs. The feathers are big, too, big and kind of like really pretty leaves with the branchy part that gets all scritchy and scratchy at the end when she picks out her old feathers so that you can play with them! Sometimes you can see the softy feathers under those, the ones that curl, and tickle...

"Kouji, dear," Aunt Satori says in a whispery way, "open your eyes."

Yes, Aunt Satori! You open your eyes, and...

So pretty!

It looks just like Mama Okuu's feathers do! Sparkling and black, and big, and it even has the little scritchy part! It floats right above your hands, inside a little ball of all the warmth that Aunt Satori helped pull out of you. When you think about it, it spins, and points, and lots of the little, even softer feathers from Mama Okuu flutter-fly around it. This is your bullet? It looks so nice!

"Yes," Aunt Satori nuzzles against your hair, and it feels so nice you giggle. "It's a wonderful first bullet."

I ran. It was all I knew at that moment; the feeling of lead feet and heavy breathing, the pain and terror wracking my body as I moved. One foot after the other, I ran as fast as I could.

The tears were flowing down my cheeks, pressuring me to close my eyes or wipe them away but I couldn’t. Stopping was impossible when I had to keep moving. Tiny scratches littered my arms as I swung them from side to side, smacking aside branches and other foliage as I barged my way through the forest. My eyes flickered side to side, watching for towering tree trunks even through my tear fogged vision.

I tripped and stumbled plenty of times, my clunky boots catching on all sorts of bushes and roots in the darkness of the night. I had landed on my face countless times, dirt filling my mouth and forcing fresh tears to fall. I sobbed and whimpered but didn’t cry or scream my frustrations even as I pushed my bleeding arms underneath myself. I simply got up and kept running.

My mind raced as quickly as my legs did. Why is this happening? Why me? What happened to momma? Why are they doing this? Why? Where are they now? They’re coming, they’re coming! Why? WHY? THEY’RE COMING!

The branches above me shook so I screamed in absolute panic and pumped my legs harder. The branches above continued to shake. I felt them above me, flying or hopping or something right above me and ready to pounce and dive and swoop on me just like they did to daddy, cackling with glee as they ripped and tore at the screaming pile of flesh. I would have been gone forever so I ran faster and faster!

A sudden grip on my leg startled me, tripping me and sending me to the forest floor once more. I sobbed as fresh pain shot through my limb, a claw having ripped away at my exposed calf. I flipped onto my back and stared up at the creature in horror.

Its eyes were a sickly red – demonic and hungry. Its dark form was large and hunched, clawed hands and crooked legs unnoticed because of those eyes, those eyes! Wide, pointed teeth gleamed in the moonlight that managed reached through the trees as it spoke.

“Ahaha, don’t worry little girl. I’ll take real good ca

Finally, you all are gone. Intruders, fighters, you don't belong here. A life of peace and harmony I hoped to live seamlessly here was destroyed, if only for a moment, all because you had something you deemed important. You overlanders.

Because being "under" someone is something that you humans strive to avoid.
Because being "under" someone is deplorable to your selfish hearts.

I know that the youkai in your realm would never be like that It doesn't matter whether I am underground or not; we're all equals, whether it be food, or as friends. It feels weird, but after being trapped down here with nowhere else to go, those who I’d been taught were enemies are the ones that I now trust.

A loud voice interrupts my thoughts.
"Hey, Naikan!" It's that boisterous oni again. She's probably at the entrance to my burrow; her voice is so loud I can hear it in my bunk.

She was the first to befriend me, and only because I was interesting to her. But, I wasn't acting this way to please her. I choose always to act on my own thoughts, and to reveal myself with my actions. There's nothing I don't hide.

I reply back. "Did you need me for something, master?"

"Get out here, loner," Yuugi exclaimed. "It's like you're trying to kill yourself or something! I haven't seen you in days!"

[x] Ask Kaguya:
-[x] About the Royal Family and how it works. Is she Yorihime's cousin or something like that?
[x] Try to contact Renko or the fox lady.
[x] Try to contact the reanimated Miko.
-[x] Ask for information and/or assistance.


“Okay. So one more thing, Kaguya.”
“I'm listening.”
“You said something about Yorihime being part of the Royal Family, and you're a princess yourself, so are you blood-related?”
She chuckles for a bit.
“In a way, we are. But 'Royal Family' is rather a loose term, as it applies to every lunarian noble.”
“So it doesn't mean anything?”
“Actually, it means something. How to say it? Lunarian nobles who aren't part of the Royal Family are more or less outcasts.”
“Oh. So Toyohime and you aren't related?”

“TENSHI IS IN THIS STORY”

PART TWO

Where Tenshi may at last be put into prose
and where comes to completion the journey of “Garion.”


※ ※ ※

NOW A TIME CAME when even his feet gave under him of the day’s wear.


The young, stern-faced man halted and heaving fell beside a stout dripstone spike bulging from the rugged stone of the cave-floor. The caves had those in many: even as mushrooms sprout after rain, these also grew in each such place where water seeped from atop through the porous rock. ‘Twas the only sound in these dark passages; the water came down in drips from the jet-black ceilings and almost sonorously crashed on the cold stone floors. And it came to pass just so, that one such drip had made its life-goal to reach where none had reached before: down the young traveller’s collar.