"Let the games begin," you thought with an alert pair of eyes that observed each and every one of the player's moves. There were 19 other players to watch, and you could not always keep your eye on all of them at once, or listen in to each one of their conversations. However, a sharp eye was good enough for you to notice anything out of the ordinary.
As you had prepared, the bright lights illuminated the dead, abandoned circus, some people squinting their eyes from the brilliance of the glaring lights. The cogs turned, and the multiple circus toys began moving.
The familiar circus sounds with upbeat horns accompanied with children's laughter could be heard from the speakers. As the players all gathered at the first round's venue, which was a station with a huge target, big enough for a human to fit on it. The target had multiple circles surrounding it, until a red circle in the middle of it read "100". It was an excellent game for an outstanding marksman like you, who had experience in shooting, throwing, tossing as well as hurling.
Nothing felt better than a relaxing game of dart-throwing that could let you put your accuracy abilities to the test, the left corner of your lips curving up into an asymmetrical smile of arrogance.
Act calm and cool, you told yourself, it was how you were supposed to feel as a newbie player with all eyes on you. Just as you had acted during your "first game", you, although being curious and awestruck, still remained your composure and worked with caution.
"The first round will be: Dart throwing. There will be ten rounds of dart throwing. A random player will be selected to be the 'target'. As players throw the darts towards the target, if they miss the target, the next player will have to throw the dart, until someone hits the target. When the last player has finished throwing their dart, the round is considered over and the next player will proceed. However, if they successfully hit the target, they will have to be the next person to be the 'target'. The three players with the lowest points at the end of the game will be eliminated. If more than three players have the lowest score, they will die," the robotic female voice explained the rules.
"So even if you earn points, you become the fall guy? That's some crazy ass rules. What kind of maniac would create a game like this? And even after we hopefully survive this terror, we still have five more rounds of this shit? The person who made this game probably just wants all of us dead, because his game is too arduous!" Kazuya exclaimed, placing his hands above his head in the 'why me' position.
You tried to stifle in your laughter. You were neither a maniac or a male. You simply were just a woman who wanted to create a game to put player's wits and physical ability to its fullest potential.
You could see people staring at it quizzically, wondering what exactly could be the 'target' that the lady was talking about. You pursed your lips together, studying the atmosphere around you. Multiple people were biting their nails in anxiousness, nobody seemingly willing to be the first person on the 'target'.
To your utter shock, there was a brave girl from the crowd of people who gladly put up her hand and declared with confidence, "I would like to be the first person to be the target please!" Upon hearing her deep voice that held clarity in it, you wowed at her. An interesting player. You observed her carefully, looking at her coal black hair that had red streaks in it. You could tell her punky style that would be a perfect match for a 90's rock concert.
She had a black V-neck crop top that matched her maroon leather jacket, which she kept unbuttoned for fashion reasons. Her mini skirt that she wore on her hips emphasized on her hip dips, but it made her look even more attractive in an odd way, which suited her fishnets and her sandals that had heels. In a way, she had confidence written all over her, and you had many different feelings about her. Many words could describe her, but the last would be 'normal'.
Her lanky stature swiftly took big strides towards the targets, before she placed her limbs spread apart from each other. There were metal cuffs that appeared through the holes in the target, restricting her from any movement.
Just then, a target appeared with a glowing light, as you had expected. It was in between her legs, nearing her knees. A fatal shot onto her knee, and she won't be able to walk for the next few months without proper medical treatment, you examined it. You feel slightly excited, yet curious about what would happen within this next ten rounds, you told yourself silently, holding in your exhilaration.
"The first player who would throw a dart is," the woman had a long pause, when the screen started randomizing people, choosing a completely arbitrary player, "Player 738."
You watched as a worn-out man with tangled hair slowly took small steps towards the dart-throwing station. He adjusted his circular glasses with his shaky middle finger, clearly breaking out into cold sweat. His single-eyelids stared into the soul of the teenager who was putting her life at a great risk. His hands hovered above the box, before his eyes landed on a dart that had a sky blue flight. It was fairly long, but it was also pretty thin, which allowed for a more accurate throw.
His buttery hands grabbed onto the shaft nervously. He pinched it in between his thumb and index finger, and he aimed at the target with squinted eyes in concentration. He focus on the green circle as she spun round and round in circles.
Then, he released the dart in a straight line, it landing right on the girl's skirt, barley missing her upper thigh. "That wasn't even close..." you heard someone whisper from the background. The man slumped his shoulders, returning to his original position. He nearly killed someone, which was probably what was on his mind at that very moment.
"Next: Player 690," You heard your register number being called out by the robot. Yes, you had decided to keep your initial game number. Different generation of players, but the meaning and joke behind it was the same.
"Damn. That's a cool ass number to have," Kazuya patted your back, before leaving you be to get to the station. The girl, who was facing upside-down, winked at you before she was starting to get red in the face from hanging upside-down and spinning around for so many times already. You knew it all from your research. About three to five rounds, and most of the blood from the organs of the body would flow to the brain. Anything more than that, either they throw up, or they faint.
You wasted no time in lifting up your favourite dart to use, which was a short dart with a cherry red flight. Though it was relatively small, it had a sharp tip and was easier to aim at targets with. You closed your right eye, as if looking into the telescope, peered right into the target, focusing on its location in about .5 seconds, which was where it would be when you released it.
With composure, you flicked the dart from between your index finger and middle finger. It had landed successfully on the target! The girl was put back up on her two feet, and the cuffs temporarily disappeared. When you stole a glance at the scoreboard, you noticed that you had one point, putting you in the lead for that moment. The girl stumbled for a moment, before you caught her feeling dizzy.
"Seeing...stars..." the girl whined, placing pressure on her head with her hand.
You stepped up to the target, letting it restrain it to you. You took in a deep breath, before you closed your eyes and controlled your breathing to prevent yourself from getting too dizzy from churning around.
"The next player is player 239," the woman announced.
Yui, just nice! You assumed. He should be able to hit the target just fine!
However, to your absolute dismay, Yui took a random dart from the box and aimlessly released it to the side of the target. "I don't need points for now," he recklessly went back with his hands in his pockets. With confusion, you had a huge question mark in your head.
Why would he just miss on purpose without any logical reason at all? You wondered just what the heck he was thinking of doing.
Besides, it was not like he had that many opportunities to score points anyway, so what on God's Green Earth was he planning to do? Before it was his turn again, it would most likely have been round 4 already, or worse than that. The best strategy at that moment was to earn points as much as possible.
The wheel continued spinning, and you were sure that you did not know anymore if you were able to differentiate upwards from downwards, or if you were spinning right or left. Your mind was a screw, so you tried your best to tolerate it.
"The next player will be: Player 389," you opened one eye to take a peek at a middle-aged woman who was bony walking in your direction.
"Well, she's most likely going to miss," you brought your hopes down for that woman. She fumbled with her dart, before she bent her back and leaned forward. Trying extremely hard, she released the dart, and as you had assumed, her dart was way off from the target, which was next to your head.
You rolled you eyes, still with them closed. Your hair was in a mess, floating in every direction possible. You furrowed your eyebrows downwards, clenching your fists. Your nose flared widely, and you were starting to see stars everywhere. It was the third attempt of a player, and you were praying that, even if by luck, someone would be able to hit the target. "If I have to suffer this kind of lousy arranging, I'd rather faint right here and right now, because I am not going to be able to endure this," you were unable to think anymore.
(Just signed in, and guess who just hit 10000 reads? EEK!)
Your eyes were rolling in circles, and you had a smile of agony on your face as you continued to spin around faster and faster, beginning to lose your marbles. Oddly, you liked the feeling of your organs churning. Although you could very well handle it, you faked to feel like you were about to puke to put up the act of a weak, desperate player.
As the next player walked up, he seemed to be one of the Mansion's people from Kazuya's team. She had some black hair, and really gloomy clothes that made her look as if she had just attended a funeral. It was that girl who previously shoved you out of the car! That bitch, you thought, yet pleading for her to just hit the goddamn target.
Who was she again? You thought, until you recalled Kazuya telling you during a drink that her name was Miyuki, but she was unwilling to say what her first name was.
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"She's got a really bad attitude, but you'll be surprised to find out that she's an amazing person when it comes to diamonds. She might not be a very welcoming person, but she's kind-hearted deep down. She just needs time," Kazuya seemed a little puzzled when it came to her, "she's like a mysterious work of art, that has a deeper meaning to it than what meets the eye."
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"Eh. I have better times to earn points for myself, but I'll salvage you, since you've been approved by our boss," she picked up a dart and threw it towards the target. It landed directly next to your head. Your eyes trailed towards your right, looking at the dart that had pierced through a few strands of your hair. Finally, you were released from the cuffs that bound you to the huge target.
You plucked out the dart, removing your hair from it. As you fumbled down the stairs and back to Kazuya's side, you were clutching your head in an attempt to still your spinning world. Lightheaded ness struck you like you had just drunk a whole bottle of sake, and you failed to walk in a straight line.
Kazuya rushed up towards you, holding you by your underarms with concern. "Woah, take it easy. Let me help you," he reassured you while you pretended to feel faint. You had to admit that you were quite dizzy from spending approximately a minute and a half on that spinning wheel, but you had been through enough to be able to endure it much better than the average person.
As you soon gained your balance back, you leaned your hands against the railing behind you. You looked around your circus. "No change made by Chishiya...wait!" Your eye caught something that was dangling from one of the doors decorated with ornate designs. You could not point your finger at what it was, but it looked like a white piece of fabric. It had two thin streaks flowing from it, along with a round covering at the top of it.
Wondering just what it could be, you recalled—Chishiya's hoodie!
You smiled, a warm sensation engulfing your heart. You loved how he always left traces for you as a souvenir, or maybe just to say a nice 'hello' to you.
"Is anything wrong, Yuki-san? You look like you're in love," Kazuya questioned, as yet another player went up for their turn after multiple rounds.
You shook your head, returning from your imagination that you had drifted into. "No, everything's fine. I just thought of an old friend of mine..." you lied, chuckling. He raised an eyebrow, clearly suspicious of what you had just said. However, he turned a blind eye on it and did not ask about it.
"Alright. It's my turn..." he muttered, heading towards the station and picking out one of the darts. As he was the last person, that meant that the person who would be throwing the dart after him would be that girl who stood out like a sore thumb.
Since she looked willing to take any risks, especially when the time felt right, Kazuya wouldn't be too scared to hit the target, you analyzed the situation at hand, that was if he could notice it. She looked excited for it to be her turn next, being the stereotypical 'go with the flow' kind of person.
Kazuya hesitantly toyed with his dart, before he hit it directly. Though it was almost a little off from the target, he had hit it within the green circle, saving the person on the wheel from a long life of hell on that wheel of hell. That person thanked Kazuya, before collapsing onto the ground.
Kazuya went onto the spinning wheel, dreading the feeling of wobbling up and down, in every direction possible.
"Since it is a new round, an additional rule shall be added: For every time a player misses the target, an entire round will be skipped. Once a round has been skipped, the player after them will be the next one to throw the dagger instead of the first player to keep the game fair. This applies to every player."
Everybody around you seemed to waver, considering their choices of skipping an entire round, affecting every other player in the room, or throw a dart and risk the chances of them remaining on the wheel and possibly getting stabbed by another player.
There were already three misfortunate people who had been pierced by the needle-sharp darts, each on an arm or a leg.
You quirked up an eyebrow in confusion: I never added that additional rule, so why is it there?
You didn't mind the new rule that seemed to spur everybody on, but you were wondering who could have been the person who tweaked your rules. Then, it hit you: Chishiya!
As you had requested him to set-up your game for you, he must have included it to prevent the players from purposely missing the target and passing their turn and only hitting it on the later rounds as a strategy for the game. Fixing a flaw in my game, huh, you had the ghost of a smile on your face.
"Nice, Shuntaro! I feel proud to have a smart boyfriend like you who can read my mind!" You marveled at the new rule that had been added. You turn around, looking straight into the fake camera that you had installed into one of the clown's eyes, painted completely black to remove any suspicions. You winked your eye, before turning back around.
From behind the cameras, you could tell that Chishiya would most likely be watching the game from the subway station.
"Luckily, I already have one point. Right now, I should earn about 3 points, then skip the rounds on purpose to prevent other players from catching up to me. The players here should be desperate for points, so I should earn one extra before I start sabotaging players, just to be safe," you planned, before walking up to the station for your turn.
Hit. Bullseye!
You were bewildered by what happened next. To your utter shock, Yui, without a second thought, threw the dart at a random corner of the target, skipping yet another round.
"Third round: Start!"
Staying on the wheel, the next woman to go up looked determined to get a point in the early rounds before other players could waste them away. Once she had successfully hit the target, she triumphed, despite having to risk her life on the wheel. You whistled in a low tone, her dart having landed onto your skirt, barely missing your skin.
You sighed, before pulling the dart out of your skirt, leaving the hole be. "I can always sew it later," you decided.
The woman rushed up to you. "Are you okay? Did I hit you on accident?" She lifted your skirt since you had a pair of knee-length tights on. When she found out that you were untouched, she sighed with relief, before she got onto the wheel.
"What a sympathetic woman," you giggled.
Before you could even turn your head back around, you heard a shriek of pain ring through the area. Pictures of all the dead bodies that lay over you flashed through your mind, and you feared the worst for the woman. Spinning on your heels, you caught sight of the woman, who had been stabbed on her upper thigh, nearer to the left side of her body.
The man who had stabbed her, unclear if it was on accident or on purpose to spur the fellow players on, silently travelled back to his place without making a single sound. Just then, you remembered Akira, who had an injury similar to her in the previous six of spades that you had played together.
How ironic, you thought, same injury, same game, different time.
If Chishiya was at the scene, you would've guessed that he would take you lightly into his arms, gently making sure that you did not take even the slightest glance at the woman. However, the only way the two of you were connected was a camera. You turned your head around, consoling yourself and making sure not to take a peek of the scene behind you.
Your heart swelled with pain, and a tear ran down your cheek, staining some of the make-up that you had put on your face to cover the recovering scars on your face. You quickly wiped it away, still shocked like the other people who had gasped and whispered about her, still fearing that the same would happen to her.
As more people went up, they, out of fear, missed the rounds, skipping yet three more rounds. There were still more people who had to earn points, and were getting anxious from the new rule that caused a dilemma for the people.
"Round four: Start!"
"Round five: Start!"
"Round six: Start!"
There were more and more people who were getting hurt, regardless if it was just a simple cut that did not go through their skin, or a major wound that pierced through their limbs that gave them restricted movement.
You could hear Kazuya curse under his breath.
"Sucks to be the last, doesn't it? All the rounds might end before your turn to shoot even comes," you tried to take his mind away from the horrific game that might as well kill him in its first mini game.
He nodded, praying silently that he would get to earn at least a point before the mini-game ended.
Meanwhile, from the sidelines, Yui kept silent, as he continued to remain calm and cool, just like the freezing shivers of a winter breeze.
Since you had earned two points, you settled down with it. Your job, as a game's master, was to betray the other players and kill as many as possible.
Still, as Chishiya had told you, you were emotionally weak and had too much sympathy for people, just as you had for your little brother.
As the rounds continued to go on, the air in the surroundings was thick as candy floss and players were greedy for points.
The circus show had definitely gone off to a rough start.
(No words. Just amazement that I managed to come this far. The games are going to be longer and harder, and only the fittest survive in here.
Goodbye, or not? :)