[Game Opening, Part 2 - A Thousand Words or More]

[stringmods]

Who: (Everyone OPEN LOG)
Where: (City Hall)
Summary: (After arriving you got to mingle a bit but now it's time for explanations! Finally!)
Warnings: (Some guy LIKES TO TALK LIKE THIS!!)
Style: (The text is in prose, but feel free to write back in action tags if you feel more comfortable.)
Suitable Music: This.

When someone finally speaks up...he's rather hard to miss.

"WELCOME! To YOUR NEW LIIIIIFE!" If anything, this fellow demanded attention, what with the costume he was wearing. What a way to get introduced to this new world.



"My name...is DR. BYRON ORPHEUUUUS! But you can call me Orpheus...Dr. Orpheus if you're really insistent. REGARDLESS! It was BY THE FATES that you were all plucked from your lives and brought here to aid this city in its greatest time of need. Yes, all of you will become HEROES! With the power of your PERSONA you shall become the riotous fury of..."

"Is such enthusiasm really necessary, Orpheus?" The voice that interrupts Byron sounds slightly modulated, and comes from the large blue and grey metal man behind the others. His voice is loud enough that he doesn't require the microphone - one of the few perks that comes with being a giant robot in a world like this.

"I am Brainstorm, and I am responsible for a sizeable amount of the work that went into a lot of the tech you all have, or have experienced the beneficial effects of, unknowingly. Those of you with large objects from home have me to thank for that transport system. The Evokers used in the arena? Me again. As well as a fair amount of tweaking and perfecting your COMPs and watches you received. I do hope you manage some degree of appreciation, as crafting devices to fit such small beings was incredibly painstaking for someone like myself. Working on nanomachines at this size isn't easy. Now, I know you organics have short attention spans, but do try and keep up, because I hate to repeat myself..."

"I suppose it's an unfortunate eventuality that some number of you will somehow manage to break something. If that happens, you may contact me about repairs, but I am usually quite busy, and I'm not going to be happy about having to deal with the consequences of your carelessness. However, if it becomes necessary, my workshop is in the Cancer district."

"And with Brainstorm's explanation, I suppose it is my cue to go next. Permit me to introduce myself..."

"Now then, as it was explained, when the Seven of us arrived here, we found out we had been expected, just like you. Unlike you, however, while they knew we were coming...they had little to no where we'd come from. Let's just say it has been quite a learning experience for both sides and leave it at that." He gave them a small smile. Ahh the misunderstandings that had happened...even amongst themselves.

"We wandered around blindly during the first week. Not just to adjust from our worlds to this one, but, quite frankly, we had no idea what to do! Fortunately, a few weeks later, the Three Wise Men appeared and aided us to understand the nature of Persona. Each of them were knowledgeable in the subject. You'll be able to speak with one of them once he's done...with personal things involving family...but that isn't our concern, isn't it? Let's go on with what we've learned so far."

He moved his hand on his watch and a series of images flashed in front.

"Persona can be called forth in various ways. So far our knowledge extends into three methods; the first is a blast of energy from your soul that gives form to your inner Persona. That one will com naturally to you. The second, is made using this..."

His took something from the nearby podium and held it into the air.

"You might think this is a normal handgun, but it is actually an Evoker. It can also be used to bring out your Persona. By giving you a feeling of stress and danger, which can also bring out your Persona naturally, it jump starts your summoning. However, we tend to encourage using the normal summoning method. The device was perfected by Brainstorm, Hazama, the Wisemen and myself. We created it to aid the police force summon their Persona faster during riots but recently...it's even become popular during Persona Duels."



"...But I'm sure you'll find out about those in the city soon enough, what with their ridiculous popularity. We shalln't dwell on those." He put the gun down. "The final method uses arcana cards. You can summon more than your inner Persona, although I am sure this is completely new information to you. Do not worry, you'll learn it soon enough like we have. To do so...you'll need to gain more. I believe next week is when the Velvet room will appear again according to our calculations, Miss Mcgonagall?"

"That is correct."

"Well then!" The man continued on. "We can explain that in due time. Now let's go into something really interesting. Did you notice how you have items from your homeworld with you? Consider yourselves lucky, we didn't have that luxury. It was only through our preparations that we were able to do this. You see, when a soul enters this world, they are still tied to their old world by a special strand. Normal users can't see it, but ahh!...Those like myself who Intel more than fight, well, our Persona allow us to see them. By combining our technology and magic, we devised a system which grabs those things which are near and dear to your heart. Just how we did this would require a few days of explanation, ergo I will spare you the details for now. Those that wish to know more can come to my office later. In any case...you're welcome."

The man shuffled his hands, and grinned. Obviously he had been waiting to explain to them the next part. It was brief and short.

"As for the strands, considering they are your passport to your old homeworld, so to speak, your anchor to your life...we've named them..."

"Destiny Strings."

"Don't worry, you will not be able to see them right away. It took me a week before I could grasp the strings to become visible. Of course there were only ten of us, so therein the challenge....

Not that there's that much to see here currently..." he sighed, exasperated in a way that only a man of his caliber could do (and yet it was so delightfully British) "Is this really what we'll have to be working with? We already have Orpheus who--"

"I BEG YOU PARDON?!"

"Oh you know exactly what I mean. Talking about in that exaggerated manner of yours--"

"Really, if you two are going to continue blathering and arguing like true imbeciles," McGonagall spoke in the middle, coldly, "let someone else speak up. At this rate, we'll be here all night and it is a full moon..."

The two men glared at each other for a second before Q finished, adjusting his tie.

" Yes, well....I do not think of myself as a fool, thank you very much, but there is truth in your words. Ciel, if you please?"

"Okay! I guess it's my turn then!"

The petite girl gave the assembly a small bow. Despite the amount of people before her, she didn't seem the least bit phased. A natural leader, if there was one.

"There is much to discuss." Her fingers moved over her watch and a 3D map of the city appeared before them, glowing green shapes with markings over each district. You might notice a few areas are still in the dark. "This is what we have of the city...so far. Unfortunately, many places still allude us. Hinoto-Ri is vast, and there are a number of areas in each distinct that are currently too dangerous to enter. Those restricted areas are protected by the police force to keep the population out. We hope to finish mapping them out as soon as we can...carefully."

"Regardless, let us look at what we have about each district, one by one."

"Now, are there any questions?"

[OOC - You can start your own threads, speak amongst yourself with the new information or just ask questions to the assembled cast]

Comments

[endears]

['Death clock', huh? While he's overjoyed to hear even more terms that make absolutely no sense to him, he can ask about that later. Right now, there's an obvious line he needs to say. Coughcough.]

Ah, Kihara-kun? I think you might've been right when you said this was a video game.

[otakuro]

Huh?

[Atsuro bats at the weird glasses for a moment or two before they disassemble.]

Oh, hey! ...Yeah! I guess it's kinda turning out like that, huh?

[From the giddy smile on his face, Atsuro is A-OK with this. He'll try and temper his excitement for the sake of those who didn't like games quite as much as he did, but it's hard not to look too pleased.]

[endears]

Mm! It looks like you're adjusting pretty well too, I think.

[He'll start making sense of his... COMP was it? later on.]

[otakuro]

Ahaha... Well. Let's just say it's a big step up from what was going on back home.

And if the big robot was right about all of this, I don't even have to worry about being gone, since I'll just pop right back to where I came from.

[Atsuro glances up, looking much more at ease than he had the first time they had initiated conversation with each other.]

How about you? What're you thinking of all this??

[endears]

Well... I guess I'm still trying to wrap my head round it? There were a lot of things, like returning to when we left like you mentioned, that don't really make a lot of sense to me, and there were some terms I didn't understand that got used a lot...

[Despite what he's saying, the look on his face overall is pretty excited.]

But, the parts I did get all sounded really cool?

[otakuro]

[Because if there's one thing teenaged boys can bond over, it's video games. Atsuro nods.]

Definitely cool. Fighting monsters isn't anything that new for me at this point. With all of these people here, whatever missions they send us on will be a breeze.

And, just FYI, grunting a lot won't make your Persona come out. Not sure how it actually works...

[endears]

[Oh man, the fact Kihara-kun's already fought monsters is so...] Cool...

Ah, noted! [Is it bad that he never even considered trying that?] Maybe we could ask around? I'm sure someone here must have experience with this.

[otakuro]

Yeah, I met someone, actually! His name is Yu Narukami, and he said back where he came from, Personas came out after you, uh... fell into a TV and fought... Shadows.

[beat]

Capital S.

[endears]

... It sounds like Narukami-san's from somewhere pretty crazy. [Aaand he'll end up talking to him later, go figure.]

Soooo, why were these 'Shadows' in a TV?

[otakuro]

Probably because we all come from crazy worlds that don't even really pretend to make much sense. You'll probably want to ask him.

[endears]

I'll make a note of it! Did Narukami-san get around to telling you anything about how to use Personas...?

[otakuro]

He said he summoned his using Arcana cards.

[Atsuro has no idea what that means.]

Just like they were saying up there about the three methods - He also said we could... make more of them in a place called the Velvet Room.

[endears]

The Velvet Room? [The mental image that inspires isn't as impressive as he'd like.]

Ah... Q-san mentioned we'd learn about that place next week, right?

[otakuro]

[He had been thinking of a room filled with plush rabbits for some reason, but upon seeing Aoba's expression, his mind suddenly flits somewhere else.]

...Huh. Yeah. I think he did.

A-Anyway, it's guarded by these people called Igor and... Margaret? I think it was Margaret.

[endears]

[... Hatsuro bro what are you thinking.]

They're guarding it? Do we have to get past them...?

[otakuro]

Oh, I don't think it's like that. They've just got some sort of power to make new Persona, right?

[endears]

So it's like... item crafting in some RPGs? Making new equipment?

[otakuro]

I've got two rat tails and one spleen to trade! What kind of soul-split can I get for that?

[endears]

[-! Oh, how do NPCs act...]

You have unlocked yet another new Persona, my friend! Also, your Crafting level has increased by 2!

[otakuro]

Awesome! OK, so I smush all of this together, and...

Huh. It says the only thing this Persona can do is leak bile from every orifice.

[endears]

This means it can poison the enemy party!

[otakuro]

...Hooray!

Why is this a representation of my soul again?

[endears]

. . .

It represents that you're the kind of person who raids bodies for spleens to make Personas!

[otakuro]

H-Hey!

[Pause.]

Man. I totally would, too.

...Guess I should stick with eyeballs or something that'll actually get me useful abilities.

[endears]

Something more impressive than rat tails might be good too. Video game protagonists can be weird sometimes.