pray

Once you have all gathered in the snowy woods, the train of Atlas is called. A mist gathers… and, eventually the train’s horns sound. The familiar train comes into the forest, on tracks that were definitely not there before. You recall this strange experience from when you first left the Academy.

Now, you step back into this train on a journey back to the Academy. As if you were going back in time. Back to where it all began, you remember the words.

At least, even on this dreary crimson night, you will be leaving the doll village with a semblance of hope. It’s something you’ve sorely needed recently. 

You are greeted by a small Lou Xiangnan, welcoming you to the train.

Upon stepping into the Atlas, you might find some peace in the fact that the train is unchanged. It is as gaudy and elegant as before. However, this isn’t exactly the luxury train that’s supposedly famous for holding magical auctions.

The train is crowded with people. They don’t seem to be some high class mages as you would expect from the Atlas, but ordinary people. From different times, as Lou Xiangnan points out. These are all refugees.

Everyone, all over the world, all throughout time, is going through the same red nightmare you’re experiencing.

As Rago had described: the world has been ripped into a nightmare.

Once you return to where it all began–once you meet the supposed sleeping goddess–what then? What could you possibly do to fix the world of this? 

Welcome back to the train of Atlas! After everything you’ve gone through, we’ll be taking a bit of a break while we’re here in the train. The break will last until next Wednesday at 4PM EST! The old public channels will be opened shortly, but feel free to do private RP if you wish.

Once you have all gathered in the snowy woods, the train of Atlas is called. A mist gathers… and, eventually the train’s horns sound. The familiar train comes into the forest, on tracks that were definitely not there before. You recall this strange experience from when you first left the Academy.

Now, you step back into this train on a journey back to the Academy. As if you were going back in time. Back to where it all began, you remember the words.

At least, even on this dreary crimson night, you will be leaving the doll village with a semblance of hope. It’s something you’ve sorely needed recently. 

You are greeted by a small Lou Xiangnan, welcoming you to the train.

Upon stepping into the Atlas, you might find some peace in the fact that the train is unchanged. It is as gaudy and elegant as before. However, this isn’t exactly the luxury train that’s supposedly famous for holding magical auctions.

The train is crowded with people. They don’t seem to be some high class mages as you would expect from the Atlas, but ordinary people. From different times, as Lou Xiangnan points out. These are all refugees.

Everyone, all over the world, all throughout time, is going through the same red nightmare you’re experiencing.

As Rago had described: the world has been ripped into a nightmare.

Once you return to where it all began–once you meet the supposed sleeping goddess–what then? What could you possibly do to fix the world of this? 

Welcome back to the train of Atlas! After everything you’ve gone through, we’ll be taking a bit of a break while we’re here in the train. The break will last until next Wednesday at 4PM EST! The old public channels will be opened shortly, but feel free to do private RP if you wish.

You left Lilium on the same ship you came in, that of the Cinnabar. A long, two day sail across the sea, on the way to the doll village. A lengthy amount of time to ponder on what could have happened there. A flimsy hope that these worries will amount to nothing, and that you’ll be greeted by Anastascia’s friendly, welcoming smile.

Nothing happens across those two days at sea. It might be for the best. It’s what you all needed, after everything that had just happened. You were only learning how to heal with each other not that long ago at all.

And now, you are in a world swallowed by red.

Lost, following only the vaguest of hints with a wish that it will lead you to the end of this long ordeal.

Those two long days feel even longer with the unchanging sky. An eternal night.

The coast of the forest where the village lay comes to view, and eventually, the ship docks itself. Once you all get off with your luggage, it takes off into the black sea, back to Lilium. Never for you to see again, likely. There is no path back.

Nothing about this feels right.

The coast’s sand is stained black by the water. The forest is eerily–disturbingly–quiet. The leaves have all disappeared–but that’s probably only because it’s winter. The snow has piled up, so take care in walking.

The dreams and memories disappear.

You are all in the basement of the orphanage you remember leaving, only… there are a number of beds and medical tools in the once empty room. The painting you stepped through has changed as well.

[ Heaven ] : An image of the painter’s ideal paradise. Oddly, it resembles Lilium as you remember it.

Mother once described Lilium to him: a beautiful, kind city where the sun was gentle and magic kept the people happy. A wide, open city for them to go as they please. And the immense world beyond the seas. A freedom they can enjoy together.

You have been left here by Rago, with only a few words to go by.

Go back to where it all started.

And you notice another thing. The girl in Albedo’s arms, Anemone, who you had made such a big deal over trying to decide on what to do with, had disappeared. 

Instead, there is a red butterfly.

It flutters away, flying towards the basement’s exit. With little else to do, and knowing that you would’ve eventually gone through it anyway, you follow.

You open the doors, to find…

A new memory flows into you.

You receive a vision. A dream. Memories flowing in your mind.

(cw: animal death, eyestrain)

As he waited for everyone to step through the painting, Rago took repeated glances at the entrance to the basement. He would be last, he decided.

It’s practically a unanimous decision. They’ve decided that they should bring the girl. Notably, that they should save the girl.

He looks at them all.

“You’ve always been a group who would listen to their emotions rather than reason. And you know, maybe that’s the right way to go about it,” he laughs awkwardly. “Regardless of the result, killing a child could never be the right choice. 

“What am I thinking?”

“But if we’re right and Lily is the goddess…” he sighs, “then you’ll probably have to face this same problem again. I just want you to be aware.” It’s a bridge to cross when they get to it, he supposes.

Rago looks to the others for confirmation. “What do you want to do? We’ve already pretty much confirmed that we shouldn’t kill her, and that we should go through the painting.

“Should we leave Anemone’s body?

Confused as everyone was at how convoluted everything is, Rago listens carefully and takes it all in. He takes to sitting down, looking intently at the body in the pool as he absorbs it all.

They make perfect points.

“No… you’re all right,” he says after a while. “This doesn’t make any sense. Anemone couldn’t be the goddess,” he strokes his chin. He’d furrow his brows but he doesn’t seem to have those. 

“I think you’re all in the right track here. This is a dream–but not Anemone’s. It’s the dream of the sleeping goddess who wished something different had happened. A happy orphanage where they were free to go where they wished, and had a future to live for.

“A dream where she was a different, happier girl, and she was close and friendly to everyone.”

His eyes snap to the girl’s neck, then at Auguste’s. “Anemone’s already dead. Strangled… by hand. That’s what the red butterfly is about.

“Anemone was killed by Lily. Lily is the one who survived the Rite.

“We have always been in Lily’s dream. Her ideal reality. 

“Right now, we stand in the deepest parts of her subconscious, where she buried her memories of their Rite.” He stands up, but is still too focused in his thoughts. He just starts pacing around. “Lily is the sleeping goddess…” and he mutters even more.

Although he can’t help but feel like they’re still missing too many pieces to put the puzzle together, Arthur is very much thinking over everything that is said and everything that has been found. One thing that continues to bother him, though, that no one else seems to fully appreciate is… well… There’s no reaction from the kokeshi, no sign that it’s absorbing any curses or negative energy, so it seems like there is none. The little doll falls when Johann picks up Anemone’s body, and Arthur moves to scoop it out of the water again, shaking the water off gently and wrapping it in a handkerchief before tucking it back into one of his many coat pockets. From another, after a bit of rustling, he produces a vial which he fills with the glowing water, and tucks away as well for later use or analysis. And then he straightens up, approaching Johann, his hands held up and empty to show he means no harm as he leans in to gently touch Anemone’s neck for several seconds. He steps back again, shaking his head slightly. “As far as I can tell, this is a dead body.” He says firmly. “No soul, no pulse, no breath.” If he wanted to he could probably… fortunately he doesn’t want to. “I think perhaps, from the symbol on her neck, she is meant to be a key to something. The way that Auguste was.” That makes the most sense, which is to say it makes a little sense, and that’s more than most of the other theories they have. From the beginning, though… well, Niamh handles most of the recap well enough. There are some details he’s thinking of now that also seem worth sharing.

“Four called herself The Watcher. When the trial for the murder she committed ended, Livia arrived and killed her. However, her body disappeared, afterwards. It simply faded. I have never been able to take a lock of her hair or anything else I could use to call her. That is very unusual, considering the bodies of everyone else killed have always remained.” “Livia was the one to tell us her name was Four, and that she had been one of her students. Later, when we arrived at Lilium, she told us that Four was the twin sister of Lily, one of the children at the orphanage there. This also seemed strange, partly because Four had appeared to be several years older than Lily, but also because there did not seem to be any remaining evidence that Four had ever existed. They remembered that Lily had a twin called Four, but nothing else about her, and there were no photographs of her or belongings of hers anywhere. So once again, nothing I could potentially use to call her. Furthermore, Livia said that only someone chosen by the Goddess should be able to invoke the Rite.” He pauses for a moment, head tilted slightly, caught up in thought enough to have pulled out his rosary to fidget with.

“The project report… is confusing as well. Eidolons are considered transformed, but not dead, is that not so? Yet the children are listed as deceased, when we have both… met them in Lilium, apparently alive and well, and seen the eidolons of several of them here. Would Amelia list them as deceased if they had transformed, even if they were not killed? Or are the ones we are seeing here simply memories, like the ones on the floors below?”

Dreams are such a strange thing. So much of the reality of the situation has been thrown into question, and Arthur keeps casting glances back over to the painting.

After all this time, Arthur knows that Rago won’t do it - not rashly, at least, not suddenly. They’ve worked too hard and come too far to make the wrong decision now. Still, a little tension eases out of him when the sand spear dissipates, if only because that lessens the likelihood of some kind of fight starting.

“This is not…” Arthur starts to say, and pauses, looking between the others, the faintest of furrows in his brow. How to explain? What wording would be accurate? What phrasing would make it make sense? The entire point is that it doesn’t. That’s the problem.

“This… she is not…” He makes a vague gesture towards Anemone’s body, then towards the painting, and then presses a hand to his mouth for a moment. “He painted… a world. But was it this one? Or that one? Is she… ah… I do not know if real is the right…” Arthur’s ears fold back briefly in his frustration, and he approaches the body in the pool, reaching into his pocket again. 

But he doesn’t pull the bee case out, or a weapon of any kind. What he withdraws is… a small kokeshi doll, the one that Halua had gifted him back in the village. And he sets it, gently, amidst the flowers on Anemone’s chest.

“It does not… make sense.” Arthur takes a step back, watching her, speaking softly, almost like it’s to himself. “The goddess in the temple, she had a soul. Her body was dead but her soul was… sleeping, but present. It was there. Anemone, Two, this girl… hers is not. The tether is… snapped. When Auguste dream walks, there is still a connection between his soul and his body. I could use it to pull him back, if he began to stray too far. But with her, it is not there. And it does not make sense. What version of her did we speak to in Lilium? Are Four and Lily twins, or the same person? Why… why do the timelines not… make sense? What is going on? Something is wrong. Everything is wrong. Something about this - it is not what it seems. None of it.”

He looks up, at Rago.

Rago’s eyes narrow wordlessly at the response of the others, and the sand shifts around him. Honestly, he understood them. “Fine,” he says, more curtly than he intended.

The sands whirl around him, forming a spear floating overhead the body of Anemone. “You all don’t want to kill a child. I get it. But I can do it. I need to do it. I’ll do it, so keep that peace in your minds.” 

Sand falls onto the flowers and the water as he eyes Anemone.

He looks back at the others. “My future is already gone. This is for the sake of your present,” he says. “After all she’s gone through, this is a mercy for her.”

But the spear remains still.

Regardless of how the others react to his words, in the end, his own actions are only for him to take. “Convince me. I’ve gone through so much to get here. Much longer than you think.”

Something doesn’t seem right here. Aside from the obvious moral conundrum, that is. Arthur doesn’t like water, he doesn’t like seeing a body floating in it, but it’s nowhere near the worst thing he’s seen today. Everyone - everyone who is left, that is - has gathered around, and he moves forward while they speak, standing over the girl’s sleeping form and looking down at it, one hand absently moves to settle on Rago’s shoulder, as if to hold him back.

“…She is not there.” He says simply, after a moment, quiet enough that anyone not right next to him might miss it under the words of others. And just like that, Arthur seems to lose interest in the proceedings. He lets go of Rago and moves towards the painting on the wall, considering it for a moment before turning to look back at Niamh. “Deirfiúr daor, can you move this for me?” The Irish drops easily from his lips, almost unthinkingly now that he doesn’t have to worry about provoking questions regarding how he became fluent so quickly.

Niamh startles from where she stood vigil over Anemone, unwilling to let anyone get too close, if only to deter any drastic action from anyone involved— though it seemed most everyone was more or less on the same page as her, this time, in regards to murdering defenseless children.

She blinks, twice, glancing behind her between her brother and the painting.

“Ah— so I can,” she murmurs back. A single warning glance back at their party, and Niamh backs away from her, towards the painting, and easily lifts it off the wall for Arthur’s inspection.

Somewhat disappointingly, there’s nothing there. Just a wall. Arthur sighs quietly and makes a vague gesture for Niamh to put it back, starting to turn away again.

Niamh nods, moving to replace the painting… when something stops her dead.

“…Arthur,” she yelps, red eyes wide with panic, “my hand, it— it went into the painting.”

“Into it…?” Arthur immediately turns back around, looking from the painting to Niamh’s hands and back again. Cautiously he reaches out and lightly taps the surface of the painting with a fingertip. His eyes widen very slightly. From one of his pockets, he withdraws a small case, like the kind you might keep a pair of glasses in. But there aren’t glasses in this, as evident when he opens it and… two little honey bees buzz out. They circle once around Arthur’s head, and then zip towards the painting. And… into it.

The lock to the door to the orphanage’s basement clicks open, and you all step in to the dark room. Rago takes the lead, holding his staff up.

The last time you were here in this basement, it was an empty room. Save for the painting of ‘Heaven.’ This same painting hangs at the back of this room.

Heaven: An image of the painter’s ideal paradise. So it should be, but nothing about the twisted, bloodsoaked scenery within the canvas fits anyone’s image of heaven. What could the painter have been thinking?

Right now, there’s something at the center saying that there is something else here. A soft light in a black space.