We had known that there were storylines that were essentially death puzzles for a long time, and in fact, we had kind of played through one, Itch.

Of course, we beat it by circumventing the puzzle aspect altogether and creating mutant bed bugs, which was the equivalent of taking the Rubik’s cube apart and putting it back together solved, but a win was a win.

It was nice to get the win based on pure strategy. I almost thought Camden might get his Aspect, but as it turned out, there was no savvy-based enemy for him to compete against. It was just a magic forest bound by its own rules.

Still, I was thrilled not to have died in it, even though it represented one of the most desirable afterlives I had seen yet in Carousel.

It didn’t take long for Silas, the mechanical showman, to pop into existence next to the van Molly had stolen. I didn’t expect a whole lot because even though our solution was risky and we probably cut it closer than I would like to admit, at the end of the day, the storyline could have been easily beaten with a book of matches.

I didn’t get any stat tickets. In fact, most of us didn’t, and since we hadn’t killed anyone, we got no Enemy Collector tickets either. But we did get something interesting, a new type of ticket I had never seen before called a Notice of Trespass.

Notice of Trespass

By affixing this Notice to a Mobile Omen positioned within, or at the immediate boundary of, your designated base, you authorize said Omen to act in an official protective capacity. Upon your departure from the premises, the Omen will initiate a temporary seal over the location, thereby restricting entry and compelling any non-affiliated parties to abstain from intrusion, inspection, or attempted pilfering.

It was similar to how Lucky had described it. It allowed you to take a mobile Omen, of which we had many, and use it to protect your base from other players. I hoped we would never need it, but we each got one, so if we did, we would have it.

That also meant that red wood was likely not an innate storyline to Lark House. It made a lot of sense in the end, because no one in the storyline was named Lark, and while the forest had giggling spirits and a trickster’s personality, the word Lark just didn’t fit.

As soon as I got the Notice of Trespass, I started thinking through all the mobile Omens we had and trying to figure out which one we would set up to protect Kimberly’s loft.

Fast zombies, anyone? The notice had a peel-away piece of wax paper that revealed a sticky spot. We would have to attach it carefully.

I also looked around, trying to find any evidence of Lucky’s former team’s base, but all I saw was the set for red wood.

I managed to get a trope out of the ordeal.

Don’t go in there!

Type: Action

Archetype: Film Buff

Aspect: Critic

Stat Used: Savvy

As the viewer watches events unfold, they begin to pick up on ominous notes and dour inevitabilities. In a proper slasher, they are right more often than they are wrong.

The user can designate a setting, such as a room or entire house, as a location for a killing scene. Once they declare this On-Screen or on Deathwatch, the next character to enter that location will meet their demise.

You know they’re walking to their death. They think they’re only putting away their laundry. If only you could have warned them just a few seconds sooner.

Funny enough, I didn’t get that trope because I was a Film Buff; I got it because it was one of the tropes granted by my background. It could be immensely powerful, a very useful blood control trope. Though I expected it to have diminishing returns with multiple uses, given that it was narrative-based, I was still excited to try it out, although there would certainly be guilt from directly causing my teammates’ deaths.

They would understand.

~

Camden was the lowest-level player on the team, and it was technically his plan that got us out of there. He pulled his weight. Nicole had talked about her Written by the Victors trope, and she claimed it was a pretty fast way to level someone, at least for a while.

I believed her. Camden got two stat tickets.

He also got a trope.

Objectives Mulligan

Type: Action

Archetype: Scholar

Aspect: Strategist

Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.

Stat Used: Savvy

Keeping the audience on board with your decisions can be difficult when they think they’re smarter than you. Sometimes, a smart character has to explain why they aren’t doing the obvious thing before they bother explaining what they are going to do.

When dismissing a good plan in-story for meta reasons, the user will receive news or another revelation to help justify their decision in-character. As a cost, certain elements of the story previously established may also change.

You can’t keep shooting down ideas forever.

It was interesting that, as players of the game at Carousel, we often had to make decisions our characters would never make, and for the most part, we just had to lose points in the audience’s eyes.

Like in this storyline, where we couldn’t burn the place down even though it was obvious, there would be many circumstances where we had to make decisions that made the storyline harder for us. At least now we had a way around that.

~

Bobby also got a trope.

Union Rules

Type: Rule

Archetype: Wallflower

Aspect: Recast/Extra

Stat Used: —

Isn’t it painful when the main characters hog all of the glory? As a side character, your contributions are the first to be left on the cutting room floor.

If one of the user’s tropes is preempted by another player’s trope, the user will be able to fill that slot with a trope from their collection before the midpoint of the film.

Wouldn’t want the background characters to go on strike, would you?

Bobby had brought a trope that would debuff him at the beginning of his story and then gradually buff him until he was stronger than ever at the end. But with Nicole’s trope that evened up everyone’s plot armor, that trope was made entirely useless, not to mention the fact that Bobby was turned into a main character, which undermined the entire purpose of a Recast.

Union Rules also felt like a very exploitable trope. We would have to experiment.

I wasn’t around for a lot of the discussions the others had with Bobby about his decision to pursue his wife. I didn’t want to be. Eventually, it was decided that he would have to go to his farmhouse in the country just to keep everyone else safe. No one felt good about that, but we didn’t have any other choice.

When his wife Janet heard someone knocking at the door, she would always answer it because she didn’t know what was going on. We couldn’t keep her at the loft.

Still, we weren’t trying to exclude Bobby from going on runs—that would be a death sentence—and we would continue to strategize and grow together as players.

A lot of things that needed to be said would go unsaid, and hopefully it would all end up okay.

~

Dina got one stat ticket and a trope.

Pledge Week

Type: Insight/ Rule

Archetype: Outsider

Aspect: Newcomer

Stat Used: Moxie

When someone new comes into the mix, both sides of a fractured social dynamic can seem pretty foreign. Both sides often think they are the good guys.

The user will have interactions with both the protagonist and antagonist before Second Blood, with both attempting to persuade them to pick a side. Interpreted loosely.

First, the vampires try to talk you into joining, then you find out you never had a choice at all.

Depending on how metaphorical this trope was, it could be really useful. A lot of newcomer tropes gave powerful insight into enemies and situations; it was all about crafting a narrative that you could perform well in.

I hoped that Dina would start embracing the Aspect she had chosen. It did seem that Stranger, or even Criminal, was a more fitting Aspect. It was also clear that her use of strategies based on those Aspects was slowing her down. She wasn’t getting much screen time, and her levels had suffered.

That would have to end if we were going to succeed and if she was going to help us.

~

Molly got a simple scouting trope.

Mischief Magnet

Type: Insight

Archetype: Comedian

Aspect: Stooge

Stat Used: Moxie

Tricksters are rarely purely good or bad, but they certainly enjoy a kindred spirit.

The user will be able to detect the presence of trickster characters in storylines by looking at them. In story, the user will be an early target of the trickster, though their pranks will not be lethal until the Finale.

You give as good as you get. We’re all having fun here, right?

I didn’t know exactly how many enemies would be classified as tricksters. Maybe, Benny, the haunted scarecrow would be. Certainly, those laughing spirits might be tricksters in another version of the story where they were enemies.

~

Nicole got one of the more famous Eye Candy tropes.

Rumored Appearance

Type: Rule

Archetype: Eye Candy

Aspect: —

Stat Used: Plot Armor

The anticipation of a character’s arrival can make their appearance that much more iconic.

The user will have a delayed introduction as a main character, but when they do finally take their role in the story, their Center of Attention ability will have a highly exaggerated effect.

And they thought you were just a cameo.

I remembered it from the Atlas. Essentially, you sacrificed a lot of screen time and narrative control, and in exchange, you showed up near the last half of the movie as a very powerful version of the character you were cast as. The problem was that the users of the trope had to get on the ball and get anything done by the finale, because they didn’t have much time.

~-~

We all got a bunch of money from that storyline. After all, that was the plot, a heist, and we had succeeded at it. There was no denying it. We each got between one hundred fifty and two hundred dollars in Carousel’s denomination.

I had to think that, in most runs of that storyline, they probably didn’t get that safe open. The only reason we were able to was that Dina had a trope specifically for that. Anyone else would likely be relying on pure Hustle.

I was satisfied, but it wasn’t the tropes or the money that really did it for me. The greatest satisfaction came when Silas, the mechanical showman, disappeared.

Because everything else went white for a moment, and when I could finally see again, I wasn’t standing in that strange house filled with giant hand-cut wooden boards. In fact, the red cedar was almost entirely gone, replaced by normal building materials that one might expect in a McMansion—a little more stone façade and drywall.

The only red cedar that remained was a large chunk of it displayed in a glass case at the center of the room, where Molly’s van had been.

“Who was it that said museum?” I asked as I stared at it. It was a piece of petrified wood.

“That was me,” Dina said.

“Well, good going,” I said.

The petrified wood was a museum exhibit, and it was also a mobile Omen. They had transformed Lark House by locking it down with the mobile Omen for red wood.

I started laughing at the realization. The hand-cut wood aesthetic just did not fit the neighborhood.

Stuck to the glass was a thin red strip of paper. It was a Notice of Trespass, the very one that Lucky’s team had used.

As I looked around, I realized that the material the house was built from wasn’t the only thing that had changed. The place was now furnished.

I quickly understood that we were now standing inside another group of players’ base, and at that realization, I heard a knock on the door.

And since the large wooden tree segment that had once been the door was now replaced by a normal front door with a stained-glass center, I could see that the person standing on the other side was Lucky himself.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep