Don’t give up, skeleton!

[markingnight]

I have good news and ill.

First, Hosts cannot be returned to their original selves. They are lost forever.
However, I was told that as Vessels, there may be hope to rescue even those of us who have Succumbed.

Secondly, has anyone encountered the three-eyed bird?
I spoke with him. He was Three.

He tried to tell me of rituals and Two's remaining fragment. It seems he's unable to communicate for very long.

T_O'S FRAG__NTS: O_E MO_E LEFT
I H_VE THR_E RI_UALS N_EDED
FO_R, Y_U NEE_ US.

Comments

[dethangel]

Oh! Three! I talked to him. I think we have to say his name to get him to stick around? I think that's what he was telling me, but he kind of disappeared.

[He's happy to do whatever he can to help One's friends, though.]

I tried talking to a bird with three eyes later but I think it was just a really fucked up pigeon...

[Imagine him looking at a weird bird, chanting "THREE! THREE! THREE!"]

[markingnight]

[ Toki...... amazing.... ]

I should have expected that you'd talk to him. Did he give you a riddle, too?

[dethangel]

Yeah! It was kind of hard, but I figured it out.

[...With a little help from Three himself, but c'mon, he's not the best at wordplay.]

Turned out the answer wasn't pizza.

[markingnight]

[ Er... ]

What's pizza?

[potentialman]

[ Ooh. This is good stuff... ]

That...sounds about right, with what I've seen. [ And by "seen" he means "had to get pried out of the depths of my own soul" but you know. ]

So one more piece of Two...

[ Kind of on the nose, isn't it. ]

[markingnight]

Let's hope retrieving the next fragment goes as well as the last one.

[ Even if some of them hadn't returned in the best of condition, there'd still been no deaths, right? Pretty good! In any case, he's keeping his promise to you, Megumi 👍 ]

Still... I must wonder what it means for the future of this world.

[potentialman]

...yeah. [ It's not a happy thought. ] We...might be it, as far as humanity's existence here goes. The plants and animals still seem to be able to reproduce, so they can presumably adapt, but I can't imagine the human Hosts doing so.

[ Zombies are surely not down there making little baby zombies.

If they are, he really doesn't want to know about it. ]

[sorte]

I hate that thing. If I catch it, I'm feeding it to my cat.

[markingnight]

Did he offend you in some way?

[sorte]

[ maybe some people are cool with being harassed by yappy loud and annoying pretentious birds, but Aventurine is not one of them there is actually true irony here. ]

It's bad enough a bird makes fun of you, you know. When you find out the bird is actually a sus kinda guy, offended is probably on the list of the possible feelings.

[ also you probably can't feed a guy to anything when they need rituals to be brought back together... damn. ]

[hongtian]

Yes. Before he vanished, I asked him for a clue.

"The sky above, the earth below."

[markingnight]

That was it?

[ Didn't ethereal beings ever speak plainly? ]

Don't ethereal beings ever speak plainly?

[hongtian]

If they did, then that would ruin half the mystery of being ethereal, wouldn't it?

[ Ruhong's amusement is often dry, and her statement here is no different. His frustration is understandable enough, but she—at least in this moment—is too tired to muster the energy to be so. ]

He also said that One was not himself and he was planning to kick his ass, but I figured the former to be rather obvious and the latter not as relevant. I've the sense he'd say more if he could.

[depressured]

I also met him. He said something about Two being down below.

[ Thanks, bird guy. ]

[markingnight]

Then maybe it's Three who's in "the sky above".

[ Hey, he was a bird, after all. ]

This Three certainly does get around.

[depressured]

I didn't know people could transform into birds, but I suppose if I could, I'd try to move around as much as I could.

[ The world is a marvel... ]

[hallowedly]

( A gentle pause, then: )

Four? ( 'Four, you need us.' )

[markingnight]

There are four of them that I'm aware of. [ Like the beats in a song! ]

Let us hope there are no more.

[hallowedly]

And the fourth needs the other three.

[sculptedash]

Dude. The three eyed bird was awesome. He could sing and dance and say motherfucker.

[markingnight]

If you see him again, he likes fruit. Also, flattery.

...what's this about dancing?

[sculptedash]

Ooooh! Good to know.

So when I first ran into him, I tried to spook him off by jumping at him and shouting "Caw caw motherfucker!"

And then he kind of hopped around in a little dance and kept repeating me.

[vocalistyodels]

Don't feel so bad blowing their brains out now.

[His conscience is clean, whew.]

Huh, who woulda thunk it. Staring us right in the face now. But not sure how much I trust these numbered fellas, considering number one went and gave our lovely host what she wanted.

[markingnight]

One might consider it an act of mercy.

[ Clean conscience club 🤝! Not that, you know, Ironeye would have felt bad either way. But he thought other people would! ]

I've been reading Megumi's notes. From what I can tell, the other numbers voiced objection to what was happening. Maybe the second time's the charm.

[vocalistyodels]

One might.

[Oh Cooper definitely doesn't give a shit either way, but sure, he'll join that club! He's just happy to get rid of as many of those things before Sleep has them rabidly going after them all again.]

I hear third times the charm, but I guess we'll see. Hopefully the others don't go the route of their buddy.