System Hunt: Regalia

In ten boring minutes the Samurai ghost vanished after stepping into the twin room with six thrones. And in a few seconds another set of ghosts appeared, this time there were three of them and they were already in motion doing tasks, translucent and spectral as they were, Sam struggled to decipher what they were doing until Yoko pointed out.

“They’re moving the thrones.”

“I was just thinking the same thing.” Yoko#2 said. Sam still marvelled at the identical being, it was perfectly in sync with Yoko in a way that he’d have found unnerving if it were him.

Sam followed after the ghosts, hovering over their shoulders as one after the other, the ghosts of a woman that might have been a maid, a lumberjack or perhaps a construction worker by the helmet and a young girl in a school uniform moved the Thrones to and fro through the twin rooms.

Yoko got off her throne and came to watch with him, her nose crinkled in doubt, disdain and if she were more honest with him, fear. Sam didn’t understand his fellow Wielder but how could he after they’d only been together a few hours going on a day?

He’d observed her reactions as much as he’d felt her observe his and Sam found quickly that she was foul mouthed, snarky and more of a sloth than she was a chicken. When the time came, for anything, to survive. Sam knew he could count on her.

The ghosts continued shifting thrones back and forth, sometimes bending over in odd positions, almost looking like they were possessed except Sam could tell they were entirely conscious while making those awkward movements.

Yoko stepped out behind him and twisted her head at the ground where the lumberjack seemed to drop a throne. “Did you catch that?” she muttered, wiping the floor of the dust, “There’s a mark here, some kind of symbol. I think I know what this is.”

Yoko and her clones collectively groaned and Sam nodded seeing the strange mark. It was some kind of hieroglyph and from its simple, albeit twisted shape, Sam thought it had to be a number. “Let’s get to it, I’ll bring all the other thrones in here, you guys dust the floors.”

Her initial lethargy rinsed off her shoulders. Yoko snapped at her clones and for a moment they seemed to briefly lose their— her— personality before hopping to the task. Yoko glanced at him, eyes narrowing, “Well?”

Sam gave no response and carried on to his own task. In a short few moments the clones moved to help him as well, the thrones were heavy and made a horrid sound if he dragged them in.

“Okay, we only need four thrones with these symbols.” Yoko said when they were done. She shifted her weight and folded her arms at him, smiling cruelly, “But there’s a problem.”

“What?”

“The letters are changing.” She answered and Sam’s brows knitted, “We’ll need to be quick.”

Sam was tense for a second. He crouched by a symbol that looked like an eight if it had three layers of twos on it. He blinked and the symbol vanished, replaced by an upside down guitar of sorts.

“Let’s do it quick then. There are four of us so this should be easy.” He said, thinking up a plan.

Yoko shook her head and her clone spoke, “There’s one more thing, the other thrones have to be out of here before we can start.”

“Why? How do you know?”

She lazily pointed at two of the ghosts leaning at the edge and somehow quickly moving thrones. Upon further inspection and a change of angle, Sam figured they had the thrones close to the door for swift changes.

“Still, we have to try, come on.” Sam pulled his Regalia and it sent a jolt of power from merely touching it. He hissed softly as the jolt and power died down as he quickly swiped away a 100RGP to Bolster.

All Abilities Bolstered— Five Minutes Left

He felt the boon of strength rippling in his muscles keenly, he flexed and cocked his arms to test them out before nodding at Yoko who eyed him critically. She waved her fingers and said, “I’ll let you know which symbols to bring.

Sam and the clones got to work. First they searched the thrones themselves for where the symbols coincided, which was easy as the ghosts had shown them. All symbols on the thrones were etched on their left front leg. With Sam’s energized muscles and Yoko somehow swapping places with her clones in an attempt to quickly match the symbols, they hauled the thrones to the required spot before racing to the next.

It went on back and forth like that until Yoko cried out in frustration, “Just…one more.”

“We’re not moving fast enough between the rooms.” Yoko#2 said, huffing against a wall.

“Whoever made these thrones so heavy…can’t we just break the part we need off? Can’t your glass do that?” Yoko#1 demanded.

Sam shook his head, having already put in fifteen minutes of Bolster and 300RGP into the exercise. “Let’s not break anything we can’t fix.” He panted wiping off the sweat from his brow. He drank from a water bottle and not for the first time, blessed Alex for her immense foresight.

Along with weapons and extra Nuclei, she’d stuffed their bags with provisions of snacks, water and ration packets. She’d thrown him a change of clothes, sandals and boots but couldn’t find anything for Yoko. Didn’t know she was coming.

Sam gave Yoko the sandals since she’d been lacking a pair of her sneakers and walking barefoot since they met. Sam pitied her truly, he hadn’t had a nice first encounter with Belua or the Tower but he’d gotten the chance to prepare, have a second and now third encounter with the devilish monsters. But Yoko’s first encounter simply made his pale if they measured whose suffering weighed more.

“We’re missing something.” Sam said and tossed her the water bottle to drink. Alex had been generous and thoughtful in her preparations but she couldn’t count for the unexpected second Regalia Wielder. They’d have to ration until they escaped the room and found fresh water.

“Yeah, what?” she groaned, emptied the bottle and tossed it in the corner.

Sam got up from his resting spot and moved to the room with the crucified Belua, looked up at its gore with the Nuclei shimmering in the fist-sized hole in its chest.

“What if we’re doing it backwards? What if we need to lock the thrones in here first?” Sam thought, running a finger along the layer of dust on the ancient round table. He wasn’t sure what it was made of but it only had grooves where the symbols on the floor appeared while the rest of it was black, smooth and thick enough to afford space as it circled the crucifixion it seemed to honour.

“Then let’s do it. I don’t have any ideas and I don’t want to sleep here.”

Sam snorted, “The ghosts seem to have a good night’s rest.” Some of the apparitions had appeared only to curl up against a wall and do nothing. Not all of them were useful.

“Night?” Yoko’s head rolled against the wall to gaze at him, “Will we ever know if it is day or night? What if we get out of here and it’s another windowless room?”

That couldn’t be it. Not all this effort to get our attention and then trap us in a room without any Belua coming for our necks. Sam shook his head, firm in his doubt of such paranoid thoughts, “That won’t happen, now help me.”

Once more they got to work and as they did, Yoko, despite her lethargy and loss of enthusiasm of any kind, noticed that four symbols stood still amongst the rest twelve spots the table could accommodate.

“That actually narrows it down. If those are fixed values, then we only need to work for eight more. Come on, I think this is the one.” Sam grinned, hoping to spread the hope to Yoko and succeeding as she cracked a crooked smile.

This time with the emotion of a man out to conquer, Sam listened to Yoko’s instructions, bought another Bolster and moved the hefty thrones while sweating like a fowl before Christmas.

He heaved the last throne into its place and on cue, Yoko’s clone snatched all he’d set aside. For the first time they’d done it, caught all eight symbols and aligned them correspondingly.

Their reward came swiftly. A strange, disturbing pressure blanketed the room. Sam and Yoko winced as their ears popped but neither missed the coat of blackness that fell between the gap between the Thrones room and the main where they were summoned.

It was pitch darkness and it severed Yoko from her clones. She shrieked horribly, her finger nails digging deep in her palms as she repeated desperately, “Not again, not again, not again!”

Sam had no time to console her in any form or even acknowledge her sudden spiral as the floor between the thrones, the circle they formed rippled like a bubbling sand. Before he could truly understand what he was looking at, a replica of the table with the crucified Belua rose from the bubbling floor.

Replica or the original? Sam thought as he saw the form of a crucified Belua, unlike its fellow it was neither dead nor dehydrated. Like the one in the other room it had eyes like ET, angled around the side of its head, a small body with only three digits on each limb, not forgetting the fist-sized hole in its chest.

This one had more colour than last and it breathed despite having a chest full of Nuclei. This Nuclei glowed stronger, brighter even than any Sam had ever held to absorb and it seemed to be the source of the immense pressure and creeping cold.

Before he could speak the Belua looked at him with a milky yolk of a pupil. Sam flinched but his and Yoko’s Regalia once again ripped from away from them and placed themselves in front of thrones.

Sit

Sam blinked and gulped. Whatever he’d just understood hadn’t been spoken out loud but the instruction flashed in his head and Yoko’s as well because she shook out of her stupor and found the throne her Regalia had chosen for her as he did.

You have been invited, though you are not welcome.

If you wish to return, you must first conquer a Regalia.

To claim Domus itself, bring me four Regalia.

This place shall serve as your rest, your passage, and perhaps your final reprieve.

Do you accept?

Sam only had a second to catch the glint in Yoko’s eyes before she screamed, “No! Let me out, let me out right the fuck now!”

“Yoko!” Sam hissed but waited with bated breath for the entity's response. After a couple of seconds, it asked again.

Do you accept?

“Yoko stop.”

“No, I don’t fucking accept. Let me out, keep him if you want but let me out!”

Again there was no response except another ear popping—

Do you accept?

There was only one answer and as much as Yoko screamed and banged the table, cursing in Japanese and Filipino, the crucified Belua did not change its question nor answer her pleas or threats.

Do you accept?

“Yoko, this is it, either we go in and we maybe see the sun again.”

She flashed a sick look at Sam, lips curled in disgust, “And hunt people for their Regalia? For this…thing!?” she ruffled her hair in frustration, pulling strands out as she groaned, “You know it means danger, our lives. Those ghosts weren’t bleeding because they’d gone through a Manila, no, they’d gone through this fuck Tower! They’d tried, tried to give it what it wants and what it wants is—!”

“Murder, yes.” Sam admitted. He’d studied the ghosts and reached a parallel conclusion. The first hint was in the first damned message the System Regalia sent, its felicitations on being one of a hundred to get this invite to power.

Do you accept?

The second was just how many Doom Towers there were, it felt excessive and more than enough to end the world in the year it spent hovering over it instead. This really is all a game, a death game. Sam thought, his mouth had dried long ago but he could taste the bile at the back of his throat at the thought of hurting someone enough they bled the way the ghosts did.

She shook her head at him in total disbelief, “You’re already…you’re already prepared for this aren’t you? Doom Suppression Force did their job grooming a messiah huh?”

Sam winced at the accusation, “It’s no such thing. I doubt they even know anything about this Belua else they’d have warned me. I just know that it’s going to be us or them out there, wherever there is.”

Do you accept?

“Them or us? Twelve hours ago you and your buddy Alex were on the same page, Regalia Wielders are the only hope, the only recourse, heroes chosen to save us. And now the truth is that we’re martyr’s or killers. You wouldn’t know this because you’ve never asked, but I’m a fucking doctor, I took an oath!”

“Huh, didn’t think doctor was where you fit.”

“You think this is funny?”

“No, I think we’re desperate and we literally have no choice. So what is it Yoko, are you going to die in a windowless room or will you see the sun again?”

Do you accept?

Sam and Yoko stared down at one another from their thrones and then, with the light of hope and obstinacy dying in her eyes, the creature entity said—

Your Returnal Begins.

Sam’s Regalia, a broken, battered phone that barely looked itself despite being perfectly preserved rose as Yoko’s rickety glasses did. Their Regalia split into pieces before them, then like Nuclei did when absorbed, it sublimed and invaded every opening, pore, nostrils, mouth, ears and even eyes.

Sam blinked severally as he coughed and sniffed at the scent of metal and ozone, blinking once more he notice all the knowledge of his Regalia hover before his very eyes, every last bit of information accessible via thought.

Regalia of Fractured Glass

Assimilation Level: 2

Progress: ▰▰▰▰▰▱▱▱▱▱ (2,794 / 5,000 RGP)

Next Assimilation in: 2,206 RGP

Regalia of Fractured Glass

Energy: ▰▰▱▱▱▱▱▱▱▱▱▱▱

Returnal Days Left: 12:23:59

▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰

Available RGP: 2794

Total RGP Absorbed: 4,394

Abilities

Ability

Description

Evolution Path

Status

Regenerate

Heals all Wounds for Equivalent RGP

Nil

Active

Bolster

Temporarily Bolsters all Abilities for 100RGP

[Locked: Assimilation Level 5 Required]

Active

Fortify

Reveals Defensive Potential of Fractured Glass 100RGP

[Locked: Assimilation Level 5 Required]

Active