The team entered the castle, seeing halls that looked familiar to them.
"It really is like Yukiko's castle…" Chie looked around.
"Maybe this TV World is lazy and didn't want to go too crazy, so it pulled from an old set." Yosuke joked.
"Um, isn't this a dead-end?" Yukiko pointed forward.
The hall completely ended, with only a chest at the very end.
"Well, that's not suspicious at all." Yosuke said.
"Maybe it's a treasure?" Teddie suggested.
"Or a trap." Kyoko said. "We need to remain wary. Rise?"
Himeko scanned the chest, and Rise raised a brow. "Weird… I'm not sensing anything dangerous. But it feels like… eight energy sources?"
"Eight?" Kanji repeated.
"Yeah. It's hard to really explain." Rise said.
"But it is safe, right?" Chie asked again.
Kyoko decided to take the initiative and opened the chest. The moment she did, eight lights burst out of the chest and entered each of the Investigation Team members.
"Whoa whoa whoa! Get it out!" Yosuke shouted, clawing at his chest.
"What the hell?!" Kanji yelled, patting himself down.
"Is everyone alright?" Kyoko asked, trying to keep calm.
"I feel… okay." Chie said, looking over herself.
"Everything is all in order!" Teddie nodded.
"Weird…" Rise had Himiko scan them all. "I'm not sensing any major changes. The energy is spread through our bodies, but not much has changed for us…"
"Hey, this wasn't the hallway we started in." Yukiko looked around.
The entire hall had changed, and the empty chest they opened was nowhere to be found. They were in the center of a crossroad, with four halls going in different directions.
"Okay, what the heck is this?" Yosuke said, confused.
"It looks like this Celeste girl has a completely different dungeon compared to everyone else!" Teddie said.
"Would there be a reason for this?" Kyoko asked.
"Well, I'm not completely sure about it, but if the emotional issues and secrets are really, really big, that's probably distorting the place." Teddie guessed.
How much was Celeste hiding from us? Sayaka wondered.
"Well, we can put that aside for later." Chie said. "Which way should we go?"
Kyoko's eyes briefly turned red before she raised her hands. "Somnium scan: activate!"
The others watched as what appeared to be an aura of blue electricity expanded from Kyoko. Suddenly, the entire area around them became highlighted. Several parts of the castle now had labels on them, and they looked above the halls to see they were labeled differently.
"That way." Kyoko said, pointing at a hall that was labeled "the right way."
"H-Hold on, how did you do that?!" Yosuke asked, looking up at the label.
"I'm not sure." Kyoko admitted. "I feel much smarter and focused now… Was it that light that entered me?"
"That's it!" Teddie said, the realization hitting him. "That is what those lights were! They're to help us progress through the dungeon!"
But why would Celeste want that…? Kyoko wondered.
"Alright, let's go!" Sayaka said.
The group made their way through the hall, with a few Shadows running in their way. But with their superior numbers and new members, they made quick work of the enemy. Sayaka shot down a few with her bow, while Teddie clawed through a few.
"So this is how it's like." Sayaka said.
"I've been with the team longer so I know how they fight." Teddie said. "But actually doing it is something else!"
The team stopped, arriving at a large pit. There were spikes down below, and a door on the other side.
"A spike pit…?" Chie said, looking down.
"Damn, those things could skewer you in one go." Kanji gulped.
"Was this a dud?" Sayaka turned to Kyoko, who looked rather confused.
This should be the right way. Kyoko thought, before looking up. "There's a hook up there…"
"We don't have any rope." Yukiko said.
"Hmm…" Kyoko put a hand under her chin.
"What if I use Jiraiya to blow us over to the other side or something?" Yosuke said, taking a few steps back for a run.
"Wait, Yosuke-!" Chie held out a hand.
Yosuke jumped off the ledge summoning Jiraiya… only for the wind to barely push him. "Oh crap!"
"Yosuke!" Kyoko shouted.
Almost instinctively however, Yosuke threw out a hand, shooting a fluid from his wrist. It latched onto the hook above, letting him swing over. His landing was a bit shaky, but he made it over.
"Whoa… Whoa!" Yosuke looked at his hands. "What the heck was that?!"
"Why you asking us?!" Kanji called over. "You're the one that pulled a Spider-Man and shot web!"
"So we all get something different to help us make our way through the dungeon…?" Rise realized.
"But why is it so different here?" Yukiko asked. "What makes this place so different from all of ours?"
Teddie put a paw under his chin. "I'm not completely sure, but I think we'll see more as we keep going."
"Then let's keep moving." Kyoko looked over to Yosuke's side, narrowing her eyes. "Yosuke, can you try interacting with that lamp on the wall?"
Yosuke nodded, reaching over and pulling it. A platform extended onto the gap, filling it in and making a path.
"This one was pretty simple." Sayaka said. "But knowing these dungeon-thingies, it's gonna get a lot worse as we keep going on."
"Do not jinx us." Chie muttered.
The team progressed further down the castle halls, Kyoko constantly keeping the others informed as they fought the occasional Shadow. It was a significantly different experience in spite of the familiar castle walls. Eventually they found a large door which they assumed led to the next floor. It was locked with steel chains, without a lock in sight.
"Locked." Sayaka pulled on the chains to double check.
"Should I try melting the chains?" Yukiko suggested, on standby.
"No." Kyoko shook her head, looking at the door and the labels popping up. "The door's made out of very tough wood, and the fire could likely spread out of control if you tried heating it to the melting point."
"Any ideas?" Chie asked. "Cause I can't kick through a chain unless… maybe if I got a really long running start-"
She raised a hand, before a flash of light dropped a single-edged black short sword in her hand.
"Whoa!" She looked at it. "The heck is this?"
"You could probably use that to cut through the chains." Kanji pointed out. "Thing looks hella sharp."
"Is that the trick that this Shadow is pulling on us?" Yosuke asked, looking at the blade. "Just giving us what we need at the right time?"
He has a point… is the Shadow purposely trying to trick us? Or is there something else? Kyoko wondered.
"Well, we won't know it till we try it!" Chie said. "Swords aren't my style, but I'll give it a whack!"
"Don't you mean take a cut at it?" Teddie asked.
"Shut up." Chie muttered, raising the sword above her head and aiming at the chains. "Hwatcha!"
She sliced down at the chains, shattering them in a single slash. It was rather impressive how clean the initial cut was.
"Well I guess a sword only does everything." Chie said, as the weapon disappeared.
"Can you call that thing whenever?" Rise asked.
Chie raised a hand, and the sword appeared once more, before disappearing. "Looks like it!"
"This place just gets weirder and weirder." Sayaka said. "Kind of like Celeste herself if you keep talking with her."
The team walked up the revealed stairs, only to come in front of a wall. It completely blocked off their progress, as they saw a timer counting down for around 18 hours.
"The heck is this?" Kanji asked.
"It appears to be a timer…" Kyoko put a hand under her chin. "Rise?"
"On it!" Rise scanned the timer to check for anything dangerous. "It doesn't look like a bomb or anything like that…"
"I can tell that this door will open after the time hits zero!" Teddie said. "It's something about this place where that Celeste girl is really trying to keep us out!"
"So what should we do?" Yosuke asked.
"I think retreating for now is our only move." Kyoko said. "We'll return here tomorrow and see what to do from there."
She looked up at the steel doors as the timer continued to tick down. What awaits us once this door opens…?
Tomorrow had arrived and the team entered the TV once more. While the others suggested taking a break, Kyoko and Sayaka insisted they enter again before doing so. They returned to the steel doors, seeing the timer had reached to only a few minutes away from zero.
"This never happened before with all the other times." Yosuke said. "What's up with this?"
"We're about to find out." Chie said, seeing the timer get lower and lower.
With a beep, the timer hit zero, falling off the door and shattering on the ground. Yosuke and Kanji pushed open the doors to the next area.
"Oh, this was what we saw on the TV!" Yukiko recognized.
Bright lights shone from everywhere, as they saw the casino from the broadcast. Unlike the castle halls, this one was a completely open dome-like area, being a massive circular room. There was gold practically everywhere, dotting every single corner. All the machines were on auto, playing by themselves. As the team stepped forward, a spotlight shone on top of several machines piled up together. Sitting on top was Celeste, looking at a pocket watch.
"Celeste!" Sayaka called up.
"As expected, on time." "Celeste" closed the watch, before turning to look at them with a smirk, eyes glowing gold.
"Her Shadow…" Kyoko narrowed her eyes.
"Allow me to congratulate you for making it this far." The Shadow said, standing up with a mocking clap. "But I'm afraid you'll run out of luck, sooner or later."
"We've got plenty more to give!" Chie declared.
"Luck shmuck whatever! We'll keep going!" Kanji shouted.
"We shall see how far you can keep betting, though the house always wins." Celeste's Shadow said, before tapping her foot twice. The platform she stood on started to rise towards an opening in the ceiling. She tapped her wrist, as a coin fell out of her sleeve into her palm. "Let's see how you do against this. Ciao."
She tossed the coin down as soon as she disappeared through the ceiling. The coin hit the slot machines, before duplicating into two. They hit the next slot machine, turning into four. Another hit and it doubled to eight. Soon there was a fairly large group of coins, all falling towards the ground. Upon hitting the floor, the coins rattled and expanded into Shadows, resembling gold hands.
"Whoa, that's a lot of them." Yosuke gripped his kunai.
"Wait, they're not attacking." Sayaka lowered her bow. "What the…?"
The ground shook, as a much larger Shadow stomped towards them. This one resembled a large robot, almost toy-like in design.
"The heck is this Super Sentai ripoff doing here?" Kanji scoffed.
He got his answer when the giant Shadow drew its massive blade. Getting hit by that would be like getting rammed by a truck.
"Everyone, focus on whittling down the numbers, and stay wary of the larger one!" Kyoko ordered.
The team split up to deal with the swarm of Shadows. The gold hands were rather cowardly, running around and aiming for underhanded attacks. The team were slowly taking them down, but the size of the horde was overwhelming. The giant robotic Shadow was not helping either, with its huge slashes making it impossible to fully ignore.
"Any ideas, Kyoko?!" Yosuke asked, as Susano-o shredded through a row of Shadows.
"We need breathing room." Kyoko said, slicing through a Wealth Hand. "If we made a large enough impact…!"
"What, a bigger impact than Chie-senpai and I can do?!" Kanji shouted, as Take-Mikazuchi zapped several of the Shadows.
"A big impact…" Yukiko said, before she started to glow. Looking down at her hands, she noticed the sudden surge in power. "Oh!"
Kyoko looked at her friend, seeing she was slowly being lifted into the air. First it was me, then Yosuke, then Chie. Is it Yukiko's turn now?
A blinding light glew, stunning the Shadows. As it faded, standing there was a large orange humanoid that was nearly as tall as the room. It was translucent, allowing one to see through it, with the interiors having multiple mechanical wiring and gears.
"What the heck?!" Chie shouted, seeing Yukiko sitting in the huge construct's cockpit.
"Okay… what does this one do?" Yukiko pressed a button, as the machine pulled out a massive assault rifle. "Whoa!"
"Everyone, get down!" Kyoko shouted.
The huge construct made a sweeping motion, gunning down all of the smaller Shadows. The bullets didn't pierce through the mechanical Shadow, but the strength of the shots were enough to stagger it.
"Okay uh… this next!" Yukiko pulled on a lever, as the construct ran forward. It smashed its fists into the robot Shadow, making wide swings. The robot took the blows and pushed back, aiming its sword.
"Yukiko, look out!" Chie shouted.
Yukiko's construct jumped back, pulling out a massive gatling gun. The barrel started to rotate, utterly shredding the robot Shadow and even breaking through several of the slot machines behind it. Once the barrel stopped rotating, the huge Shadow fell over with an almighty boom, dispersing into nothing.
"Holy crap, Yukiko!" Chie's eyes were wide.
"That was freakin' awesome!" Kanji whooped.
The construct around Yukiko faded, and she was lowered to the ground. She took a small bow. "That was something, wasn't it?"
"Something insane, yeah…" Rise admitted.
"Alright! Let's move!" Sayaka said.
"Wait, where?" Yosuke said.
Looking around, the dome-like area they were in had only one door, and it was the one behind them.
"Maybe through the ceiling?" Chie suggested, pointing up. "That's how Celeste's Shadow got out."
"No, it's too far up and none of us can fly." Rise said. "Even if Yosuke-senpai used his webbing stuff, I don't think he'd be able to get through the ceiling panels."
"But there has to be some way out of here. It wouldn't make sense otherwise." Sayaka said.
Kyoko looked around, trying to look past all the broken slot machines and cracks in the walls. She narrowed her eyes, seeing a segment of the wall that seemed untouched. Looking closer, she walked over and saw her answer.
"That wall is breakable." Kyoko said, seeing the label appear above it. "But…"
She put a hand on it, feeling the density.
"It's made up of a material with a similar strength to diamonds." Kyoko said, tapping it and feeling the toughness. "It would take a lot of strength to break through."
"Then maybe it's my turn." Kanji said, walking up to it and letting Kyoko step back. "Takemikazuchi!"
His massive Persona was summoned, and started smashing its lightning bolt into the wall repeatedly. However, each one of the blows made minimal effect, bouncing off the walls and making tiny sparks. He kept hitting it, but each hit did about the same as the last; nothing.
"Gah, stupid wall!" Kanji shouted. "Ora!"
He slammed his own fist into it, but for a split-second, Kyoko saw a purple glow, before Kanji's fist made several cracks in the wall.
"Holy shit…!" Kanji took a step back. "Did that seriously work?!"
"Kanji, hit it again!" Chie said.
"Heh, you got it!" Kanji pulled back his fist, the same purple glow appearing. "Ora! Ora ora!"
His fists became blurs as he rapidly punched at the wall.
"ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA! ORAAAAAA!"
With one more mighty slug, the wall practically crumbled to dust.
"Oh yeah!" Kanji raised his fists in victory.
"Awesome, Kanji!" Yosuke grinned.
"Straight out of JoJo!" Chie whooped.
"There are the stairs!" Sayaka pointed. "Nice going!"
The team went up the stairs, arriving on another floor of the casino. It was nowhere near as bright as the initial room, so it was better for their eyes. There were still rows of slot machines and even the random pachinko machine corner here and there.
"Damn, this girl really likes gambling, huh?" Yosuke asked.
"Oh you have no idea." Sayaka sighed.
"But we shouldn't fall down the same trap." Kyoko said. "I think it's best to call it for now."
"I agree there, Sensei!" Teddie said. "I've been sniffing the place the whole time, and something isn't right about this place!"
"Whaddya mean?" Kanji asked.
"There's multiple layers of this place." Kyoko said. "It started with the castle, and then the casino. If my guess is right, the casino will change to a different location after several more floors."
"I've been scanning the place." Rise said. "And it's true. Something on the floors above… It's all dark. I can't see anything."
"That can't be good…" Chie muttered.
"Alright. Then we leave for now and prepare for the next move." Yosuke said, as the others all nodded.
Kyoko looked back at all the slot machines, hoping that Celeste was alright.
Getting home, Kyoko couldn't really fall asleep. Her mind was stuck on Celeste, planning the team's next move, and countless other tasks. She realized she might also have to call her friends back at Hope's Peak if Celeste is gone for too long.
Call her friends… Well, that was an idea.
Pulling out her phone, she scrolled through her contact list. While she wasn't planning on calling any of her former classmates back at Hope's Peak, so as to not worry them at such a late hour, there was someone she could call. Someone she knew was also up at this moment.
She dialed Sayaka, having a good feeling she would pick up. It only rang twice before her friend was on the other end.
"Hey, Kyoko."
"Sayaka, sorry to bother you at this late hour." Kyoko sat on her couch.
"Nah, no issues. I couldn't really sleep." Sayaka said. "So, what's up?"
"I think you know why I called."
"It's about Celeste, right?" Sayaka asked.
Kyoko nodded, even though Sayaka couldn't see her. The silence let Sayaka know she could continue.
"Yeah, it feels completely different now… like Rise was one thing. She was an associate of mine from idol business." Sayaka said. "But Celeste… she's our friend and classmate. Someone we've known for years."
"I understand the stress, Sayaka." Kyoko said. "Any situation escalates when it's someone you know about being the victim. I know the others felt this way before with the previous victims."
"It sucks pretty bad, yeah." Sayaka sighed. "Have you ever felt this way before?"
Kyoko silently thought back to Yui. "Yes."
"How did you deal with it?" Sayaka asked.
"Suppressing emotions." Kyoko said. "Until the case is over."
"That… doesn't sound very healthy." Sayaka said.
"It's not." Kyoko admitted. "But it's the only way I can stay focused on the mission."
"...I guess that's why you talked to me, huh?" Sayaka chuckled. "You needed someone to vent or traumadump to?"
"...I do not understand those words." Kyoko said.
"For an Ultimate Detective, your lingo dictionary is out of date." Sayaka said. "But anyways, if you need to talk about this, I'm always up for it. …it'd help me too."
Kyoko smiled. "Alright then. We should probably head to bed. We'll need all of our energy if we're to save Celeste."
"Yeah… we got this."
The call ended. Kyoko's worries didn't magically go away as she laid down to sleep.
But a strong determination filled her. They would save Celeste.
She just knew it.
Kyoko's Social Links:
Magician (Yosuke Hanamura): MAX
Chariot (Chie Satonaka): Rank 9
Priestess (Yukiko Amagi): Rank 7
Emperor (Kanji Tatsumi): Rank 4
Star (Teddie): Rank 3
Lovers (Rise Kujikawa): Rank 1
Hanged Man (Sayaka Maizono): Rank 6
Justice (Nanako Dojima): Rank 5
Hierophant (Ryotaro Dojima): Rank 6
Fool (The Investigation Team): Rank 7
Hope (Hope's Peak Academy Students): Rank 4
Kyoko's Personas: Izanagi, Mada
A/N: And thus we finally enter Celeste's dungeon. We have a very different scenario this time around, which I had been planning for quite some time. It wouldn't be right for an Ultimate to have a straightforward dungeon or something like that, so I decided to make something a little special here.
A lot of the gimmicks for this one focus on the various different aspects and personalities of Celeste. She has a lot that makes her tick, and we're gonna be diving into that as we go on. Try to spot the little nods here and there, see what you can pick up.
More details will be given as we keep proceeding, so look forward to that.
Feel free to leave a review. See you all next time.