week 0, sunday sometime

[disilluded]

[HEY NICO WHAT'S UP.

Sousei is kind of a little shit, so when he sees him, he...naturally has to go on over to say hello, and:]

... I must ask--do you still feel the same as you did before.

[Two people are dead and two people are alive--

Where's Nico's mentality now?]

Comments

[resumed]

[It's fine. If Sousei didn't find him, he would have sought out Sousei and it's why he stands up straight and looks up at him with a neutral expression. Despite the execution, he doesn't appear to be affected.]

I believe I told you last week, sir. Some deaths can't and shouldn't be prevented. But that doesn't change that some people experienced misery from it while others experienced hope.

[So yes, he feels the same. Maybe leaning a little more cynical than hopeful though.]

[disilluded]

[That's pretty fair.

Sousei just nods quietly, and sighs.]

So it is. What else is to be done about it now?

[That seems to be a rhetorical question, though, because:]

What's done is done. Now, we must decide where to go from here.

[resumed]

Obviously where we need to go is finding a way to dissuade people from killing everyone off for whatever bribe the goddesses are using. [He's going to refer to them as goddesses now ig.] That girl never said what she was promised and she wouldn't explain, but it must have been something important.

I'm hoping now that we've seen what happens to the guilty that might help.

[A beat. He looks at Sousei for a moment before there's a tick of a smile.] It's nice to see you lived though instead of the other option.

[Hope in misery.]

[disilluded]

[... Hm.]

Yes, well.

It proves that not all hope is lost, either way.

[Which is something.]

There is still a way to resolve this. It is not yet time to give up.

[resumed]

We're still early on in whatever game the goddesses are playing, but people's confidence in each other is already shaken. I know there's a way to resolve this, but nothing immediate is coming to mind. That's the only problem with that.

[...] Do you have any idea how, exactly, you and Jae-Ha still got to live?

[disilluded]

I only know what we all were told--that someone, of our group, somehow saved us in that way.

[He only wishes it was something he did, but... nope.]

It is reassuring that it is someone, at least, who would attempt to use that ability to save lives. [so far]

[resumed]

I heard that, but I was wondering if you guys knew how that even happened. It's someone's ability, but I still don't really understand how those work anyway. [People shouldn't be given new powers and have their old ones removed. That's really rude.]

It means it's someone who doesn't believe in this game any more than the rest of us. If they really have an ability to save people and bond people together, maybe they can do more than two at a time.

[disilluded]

No, we unfortunately do not know any more than anyone else, though I would greatly like to know who chose to save us.

[He owes them a lot??]

As ever, we simply do not have enough facts.

[resumed]

At least if it's a role it's likely to happen again...if the person is good enough. We can start seeing if other partnerships are formed and find out if there's a pattern to them. It would be a start.

[disilluded]

It requires a great number of people dying.

[....]

To test a hypothesis like that.

[resumed]

...I know, sir. But it's one of the better ideas we've had so far and that's saying something. It's harder to pinpoint what we can learn about this game otherwise.