[Impossible scenario. Hajime's face screwed up with shock and frustration, Maya behind him, he's not real. (He could be, but,) Maya is. There's no puzzle and no solution there's just a monster wearing a face for the sake of pain. It's not a puzzle it's a fight.
Erika's pacted blade jumps into her hand. The blanked out shocked part of her tries to assemble control, remembering lessons and practice and tracking Hajime struggling with Maya so she can hit the target. It braces itself for unpleasantness, builds a model of the hollow creature that paints over the body it's wearing.
Deep deep breath.]
I'm not playing this game, [she whispers to it/herself,] these memories are mine.
[She dives in and strikes. The shadow gives her the sensation of metal piercing fabric and skin and scraping against bone; she closes her eyes for a moment to neutralize the weight of the memory, diluting it down and thinking he's not real and pushing again with cold determination.
She misses the moment that Hajime stops being Hajime. The monster jolts. Maya's hands reel back from Maya's shoulders, and Maya's eyes snap wide and jump up past Maya's head to the ceiling and beyond, sharp with fear.
Erika opens her eyes again. They go wide too. She sees blood and purple fabric and black hair around Lethe's blade and knows, immediately and distantly, what's going on; she won't look elsewhere, won't give the shadow any further ground in this chapter of her life. It's claimed enough. This, on its own, is....pretty bad.]
"i should roll for this" i said and the dice said face your fate
Erika's pacted blade jumps into her hand. The blanked out shocked part of her tries to assemble control, remembering lessons and practice and tracking Hajime struggling with Maya so she can hit the target. It braces itself for unpleasantness, builds a model of the hollow creature that paints over the body it's wearing.
Deep deep breath.]
I'm not playing this game, [she whispers to it/herself,] these memories are mine.
[She dives in and strikes. The shadow gives her the sensation of metal piercing fabric and skin and scraping against bone; she closes her eyes for a moment to neutralize the weight of the memory, diluting it down and thinking he's not real and pushing again with cold determination.
She misses the moment that Hajime stops being Hajime. The monster jolts. Maya's hands reel back from Maya's shoulders, and Maya's eyes snap wide and jump up past Maya's head to the ceiling and beyond, sharp with fear.
Erika opens her eyes again. They go wide too. She sees blood and purple fabric and black hair around Lethe's blade and knows, immediately and distantly, what's going on; she won't look elsewhere, won't give the shadow any further ground in this chapter of her life. It's claimed enough. This, on its own, is....pretty bad.]