Backdated Fourth Wall Stuff.

[tastefulheroism]

Just for sake of clarity, here are just some threads that happened during the 2023 Fourth Wall event at Ryslig that I couldn't get to.

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Sange

[nibosshi]

[ Adjusting to life here was... strange, to say the least. Part of it was because of how Karin was used to living on her own and now she's here living with this family that took Yuuna in when she first arrived. They seemed nice enough... but Karin just couldn't really get herself to relax around them. Not when she knows what she knows.

Still, she'd rather keep a close eye on Yuuna, so... she just had to get used to it, right? It did help that Yuuna knew plenty of nice people. That older harpy girl from the Cafe was pretty nice, and she had to thank her for taking care of Yuuna all this time. (Seriously, how does someone almost dehydrate on accident!? Even if you get thirsty faster, leave it to Yuuna to be that person...)

In any case, Karin is currently sitting in her and Yuuna's shared room. She has one of those monster handbooks and is reading up about Merpeople. It's pretty interesting, actually... and Karin is already thinking of ways for her to help Yuuna and her various new "needs" now that she's here— ]

Huh...?

[ ...then there's the glitches. Seriously, they've been annoying, but nothing crazy has happened yet. Briefly getting sent back a few feet and such, nothing too serious... but as she feels the similar stinging sensation of yet another glitch, it immediately feels different. It was already unpleasant normally, but... it never gave her a numb sensation.

Until now, at least.

She lifts her hand up, briefly unnerved by what felt like a sudden loss in feeling... but no, she can still move her arm and hand just fine. She lets out a sigh of relief and starts to get to her feet. It should be around dinnertime right now, after all. ]

Haah... must've been my imaginatio—AAGH...!!

[ Karin's body violently convulses and she falls to the ground, bright colors and fragments of her body fractaling and breaking apart before coming back together again. It hurts. It's nothing Karin can't handle, but her sudden shout is immediately loud enough to be heard throughout the entire house. Karin closes her eyes and grits her teeth, bearing the pain. It has to end soon, right? It's never lasted for more than a second...

Karin is right, it doesn't last long at all. It ends as abruptly as it started, and so Karin starts to open her eyes. ]

...huh?

[ There's nothing. Her eyes... they're open, she knows it. She can feel it, her eyes aren't closed and yet... ]

Y-Yuuna...?

[ ...she realizes a number of other things very quickly in the following moment. One, she cannot hear anything. Not even her own voice. The world has gone completely silent.

Two, she cannot move her right leg.

She can't move her right arm either. She can't feel anything in it, but she can tell thanks to the rest of her body suddenly feeling her right arm as a limp weight on her right side.

She can't get up.

She knows this feeling.

She remembers this feeling.

For however briefly it may have lasted, there was no way she could forget. ]

Aah...

[ She doesn't have physical exhaustion or the ensuing threat of Togo making terrible decisions to distract her this time, so her breawthing starts to quicken. ]

A-Aah...!! Y-Yuuna...!!

[ Even if she can't hear herself, it's not like she's forgotten how to speak, or lost her voice like Itsuki did. She screams out, desperately this time... and what comes out after that is the name of the only other person here who she fully trusts, and thus the first immediate person she calls for.

She's splayed out on the floor of the room, right arm and leg limp as the other half of her body tries to crawl around, desperately grasping at the floor around her to find something familiar, something to tell her where exactly she's fallen and where the door is relative to that. She... isn't finding much success. ]

[tastefulheroism]

[Yuuna's...strangely at ease since Karin arrived. This whole situation is weird at best but somehow her monster self is satisfied. One of her precious people is here. Things were getting better. Even if she knew she shouldn't be happy.

She's out in the kitchen with Mrs. Karlson working on something for dinner when she hears that cry. Whatever moment of peace she had found cracks instantly. She runs into their room.]

Karin-chan?! I'm here--

[Oh no. What... what is happening?] Karin-chan! [She grabs her hand. She... she knows this feeling. It's too familiar, like when she bites into 'normal' food and feels nothing. Did the Fog do this?]

I'm here...!

[nibosshi]

[ Karin can't hear her come in, she doesn't hear her voice as she runs to their room. Because she can't hear it, she keeps calling out... calling out Yuuna's name. What she does feel is the hard thuds reverberating through the floor as Yuuna runs into the room, and that's what causes her yells to stop. ]

Y-Yuuna...!? Yuuna is that you...?

[ Her working arm reaches around to try and find her, but all she can do is grasp around at the floor. The hand that Yuuna grabs is her now-useless one, limp and unmoving in Yuuna's hand. It's warm, decidedly still alive, but for all intents and purposes it may as well be a lump of dead flesh. Karin doesn't even feel that Yuuna is holding her hand, and so she keeps trying to reach out with her other hand to find her. ]

Y-Yuuna...? Yuuna...! W-Where are you...?