[elevator] [kraken]

[guillotineroom]

[ When you open your eyes again the first thing that you, and your teammates, may notice is that you are confined within an iron cage, rectangle in shape. Further inspection will reveal that outside of the cage is a large structure of sorts, reaching far above you. It kind of looks like an unfinished clock tower, really... there are spots that look finished and bolted tightly, and others that look like they had been left once and the work never thought of again.

Also, it's pretty chilly. You might get to notice that.

It's foggy and windy—the kind of wind that howls and roars, jostling your cage against the tall shaft, and every so often you feel as though you might have had the ghost of a raindrop on you. The tower-like build creaks horribly ominously in the wind, and you can see the rusted metals swaying slightly. But if you decide to look around...

Flapping above you (and not helping with the wind) is a harpy-like creature, iron chains wrapped around their talons. Though, maybe it's more like a lion? The chains are bolted to the top of your cage. There are also little indicators on the structure, the same distance apart, that seem to be declaring different levels or heights. They look horribly unhappy to be here, but they're also impressive at ignoring any call you might have for them.

There's a door to the cage, but it won't open, even if it's just a simple-looking locking mechanism. If you peer out, it's too foggy on the ground to make out very much, but you can make out nine other, tower-like structures with similarly flapping harpies. Each one, including your own, has an emblazoned emblem of every team's patron monster, so that you can see where everyone is—it's just difficult to make out exactly who may be in each one. Even more difficult to try and communicate like this.

Attached to the door is an aged metal panel with a screen and four buttons; two to choose between the team names that appear on the dark green and black screen, and two to choose whether you wish for that team to go up or down.

After a moment, a little speaker in the corner starts playing an incredibly bad quality version of this.]

Comments

[trueholy]

Can you really blame them, though?

[nailedthelook]

Yeah, not really... it does help in getting a clearer head if someone else is doing the reflexive response.

[trueholy]

So, what thoughts are you having? Assuming you are mostly clear headed?

[nailedthelook]

I wanna make sure we're all on the same page in terms of how we want to play. To survive or to win.

[trueholy]

I would like to survive, at least.

[nailedthelook]

If we're aiming to survive, we focus on our protection by lowering ourselves a majority of the time.

[trueholy]

And if we are aiming to win? Just so I know both options.

[nailedthelook]

... We'd focus our attacks to try and take out someone faster.

[trueholy]

Neither is great, is it.

[ sigh. ] We should ensure that some of us remain level headed. I am not against doing what we need to do to survive.

Though, I have discussed with Tsuruno a few options.

[nailedthelook]

Yeah? What are they?

[trueholy]

That if we raise a team this round, we lower them the next.


Though, even with this we are balancing risk and reward.

[nailedthelook]

Yeah.

I'd bet some teams are gonna go that route too, so we'll have to be mindful of that as well.

[trueholy]

Of course. Perhaps we should save the “lower” on ourselves for later.

[ if there is a later. ] Unless you think it wise to use now?

[nailedthelook]

If we want to play it absolutely safest, we should lower ourselves every time.

If we wanna minimize our damage to others, we lower with our raises.

There's no real way to do both though.

[trueholy]

I would choose to minimize. If I had to choose.

[nailedthelook]

If everyone's in agreement, we can do that. Or alternate between the two, depending on our own situation.