He tried to grab Haruka as she left but, he only managed to grab the strap of her backpack as the ran off and the friction had burned his hand pretty bad. don't let the others see it he pressed his hand against his shirt and ignored it. "Haruka don't run in there!" Crap, great the only time he can open his mouth is to pointlessly shout at someone.

she looked up at him. She also turned to Toby, "Did..did you know?" She was confused, and she worried about Haruka, but Suzume going alone would make everything worse. "Toby... what are we going to do?" then again to Sho.

"G-gotta go find her in there. I-isn't much of a choice is there?" He may not like crowds or know how to speak around girls but, he was a far shot away from being a coward and he wasn't gunna be left out here to wonder what happened to the others. "N-no Suzume it wasn't your fault. Wasn't Sho's fault ether. S-stuff happens sometimes it's hard to t-tell."

Suzume took off inside and he was right behind Sho as he followed. He kept the lighter on still unsure if using up phone charge was a wise idea, then again using up lighter fluid was probably just as bad they both had their uses. Sho suddenly took off and Toby sprinted off after him stumbling over some of the wrecked parts of the building and almost falling right before the door. I have had way too much of that today thank you very much, floor he thought to himself.

as Sho was opening the door he whispered. "Careful sho god only knows whats laying around the floor or living inside."

Haruka could safely say she didn't she this coming.

She looked through the door for a good few seconds, trying to process what she was seeing.

First of all, it was very red. The floor, the ceiling, and the walls... everything was made of red, pulsating flesh. The smell was horrible, and she imagined this was what a slaughterhouse would smell like... but a thousand times worse. Even from the doorway she could feel a warm wind softly blowing through the room. That didn't help the smell at all.

She gagged, backing away from the door, and falling back into a chair in the classroom.

She heard something coming from the other door.

"Wh-who's there...? Is... is that you guys? You'll...never guess what I... f-f-found..."

She swallowed, suppressing the small amount of bile that threaten to come up her throat.

She let Sho go ahead of her, while hearing he wouldn't take her no for a answer anyway. She kept thinking, She must have liked Sho... This is my fault. Suzume followed his lead, and called for Haruka.

They soon came across a room, and Sho began to open it. She listen to Toby telling him to be very cautious. With this, Suzume gently reached into her backpack and pulled out her knife and braced herself. A drip of sweat came on her forehead, and she was waiting for something to fly out the door. She looked at Sho, then grabbed his hand quickly and held on tightly. I really like him, but I can't because he and Haruka. She almost let go. But then she heard Haruka's voice and she pushed Sho out of the way.

She stepped inside and her knees became weak. It smelled absolutely awful. Her eyes became to water with the smell, and she pulled her shirt up to her nose. She reached out to Haruka and gabbed her arm because her eyes stung. "How...in the world did you get here?" she said with a cough. She gabbed a little bit, but she breathed to make sure nothing was going to happen. After letting her hand slide from Haruka's arm gently, she waited for Sho and Toby to walk towards them. She stood beside Sho and gently held on to his wrist with her small hand. She thought Haruka didn't want her to be touching her. "I'm sorry I pushed you. I've been pushing you around a lot, huh?" she smiled at him in comfort. She held on to him a little tight and leaned closer for balance. The smell was making her quite ill. It's not everyday you smell decay. she laughed at herself.

So much for that. Everyone was running off with barely a second glance thrown Kozue's way. Normally, he wouldn't mind, but this situation was twelve kinds of Nope, and he'd already made himself responsible for the underclassmen. He had to keep an eye on them, regardless of where they all skipped off to.

"Let's go after them." A few distressed noises drifted out from where the first group had run off to, and Kozue's heartbeat quickened. "Like, now."

"Oh my god what is that smell" For the first time in his life Toby was thankful for having already thrown up. I don't think I would be able to keep anything down in here anyways, not with this smell at least. "If it comes down to it, and we step into a room full of rats, I'm sorry guys but I think I might lose it."

the one thing that overpowered his fear of girls, fear. "Don't go running off like that Haruka what if something happened! We can't even get a damn signal and we can't run for the ambulance!" His small face was red and tears welled. He didn't want to see anyone get hurt, his parents were enough. don't cry though stupid that's not the way to make a point! too late for that though.

"Maybe we should look for a body it smells like something died in here . . . " He remembered yesterday's events with the red splatter, maybe something did happen in here.

Sho saw Haruka in the same moment Suzume did. He stepped out of the way as the girl rushed past him to get to Haruka’s side. He entered the room after her, but immediately reeled back at the unbearable stench of rotting flesh. He looked around through tear-filled eyes to find the source. On the other side of the room, there was a second door. He inched closer to see inside. What he found made no sense to his already overloaded mind, so he turned away and approached the girls instead.

“Haruka,” Sho said, his voice a bit unsteady. “Are you okay?” He felt Suzume’s tiny hand grip his wrist. The gesture only served to remind him why they were here. He looked down at his feet and kicked at the ground halfheartedly.

“Listen,” Sho started. “I know this is obviously a bad time and all, but I feel like something needs to be said.” He paused, searching for words. He didn’t want to spend a lot of time with drama, since they were standing next to a door leading to what looked like the stomach of some gigantic monster. “I’m sorry about what happened. I didn’t know how you felt, but it’s still my fault. I was inconsiderate to your feelings, and for that I sincerely apologize.” He bowed deeply to further express his apology.

“I hate to cut this short, but obviously we have more important things to deal with,” Sho straightened up again and moved towards the door. He made a face at the nauseating odor. “What is this?”

On the other side of the door was an impossibly large room made of what seemed like pulsating red flesh. Sho peered past the doorway, looking left and right, but he couldn’t see the end of the room in either direction. The layout of the room kind of reminded him of a subway station. There was also something positioned alone in the middle of what would be the platform. Sho was curious what it was, so he took a hesitant step forward. His foot sank into the mysterious substance with a sickening squelch. He hastily backpedaled into the classroom.

“If this is Heaven, I think I just found the gateway to Hell…”

Yori stayed silent for awhile as the rest of the group began to explore. Kozue was trying to get their attention and assume some form of authority, but they were all off in their own world. He held on to his hand tight as he waited, assessing the situation.

"Very well," he said quietly as Kozue tried to draw him into the building. He didn't like the idea of moving away. Whatever this was, it wasn't natural, and it made him feel heavy. Out of place. But they could look after the others. No harm could come from investigating the building, even as strung out as they obviously were.

As they moved forward, he spied the text the underclassmen has been panicking over earlier. It was...unsettling, to a degree. Unpleasant to dwell on. He moved past it quickly, spying the group down near the end of the classrooms. Before he could try to pull Kozue along to meet them, however, he found himself pausing at the first door in the hall.

Saturday, April 11th, 12:10AM - Old Classroom 1-1

It might be useful to explore one room at a time. Space their travel out between examinations. Give the drugs time to wear off. The others could do what they liked, but he would look after Kozue's livelihood and his own first. He slowly slid the door open, and examined the room inside.

Suzume was a little lost, looking around the room. She saw Sho apologize to Haruka, which made a warm smile spread across her face. Good. She spun around, looking, embracing the room. She still had her knife in her hand, though it was sheithed. She found something odd... she could no longer smell the decay. But she wasn't complaining, really. "Hey guys, do you smell that? I think the dying smell is gone, to me. I think it killed my nose." she laughed. She noticed other people coming in the classroom, "Hey guys. Come on in, don't mind the smell." she joked. Always trying to keep this cheerful. She noticed Sho opening the second door and then backing way which she began to step forward to his aid, she heard something about hell. Hell she thought. Her eyes dimmed, some of her curious light faded. "I think hell is what we make it. Own our personal nightmares that mess with us, torturing us." she paused and looked at her feet,

"My hell isn't like yours."

She rambled, not thinking that she was speaking aloud that people could possibly hear her. But realizing this wasn't the topic they needed to hear, she perked up and smiled. "We should probably get back to saving the world from monsters, right?" and she started walking back to her friends because her spinning got her more feet than she thought. Suzume turned to look at the second door and her face when pale. Sho was the closes to the door.

"Sho. S-Sho. Don't move..don't. Don't move. Don't move. Don't move."

Suzume wanted to scream at him, but her voice felt like lost wind. She blinked, three different times looking at the door. It wasn't there anymore. "T-Toby, H-Haruka..did you see it?" She turned her head behind her to see if anyone else behind them saw it. That was the coldest sweat Suzume had felt, yet. She stood straight as a board, and somehow her face got whiter. "I'm not going crazy.." she said aloud.

That room is so red. It beats like a heart, pulsing like a organ. Blood, bleeding, like veins that we have in our own bodies. And there was a thing in that room.

Mitsuki blinked.

Did Rika just call her Akira's sister?

"Right, but," she said, "see, he got dropped on his head as a baby - that's why he has really high self-esteem and he doesn't look much like me. We just keep him away from mirrors."

She nodded. It was a satisfactory explanation if nothing else.

"And duh, let's take them with us. Stalker-senpai, too-" She jerked a finger over her shoulder. "He'll probably follow us."

Of course, by the time she was done saying that the biker guys had forged ahead on their own. She jogged after one of them. Ended up peeking over his shoulder into room 1-1.

"Just an old classroom." She stifled a yawn. "Boring."

Then she edged past Yori and began looking in the desks for loot.

Ow, that was a sick burn. Even sicker than Akira's had been. Sick enough to justify a hashtag. Mitsuki - 1, Akira - 99. That was totally a legitimate score, and not one acquired from finding the universe's cheat code that allowed you to attain max score in arbitrary and imaginary conflicts. Boy, would that be incredibly silly.

Akira sighed. He was being stupid. Again. That seemed to be a recurring theme. Whatever.

He casually trailed behind Mitsuki as she blazed the trail ahead, like a good protagonist. The biker guys had rudely gone ahead without them, but Akira would not be ditched so easily. The building mostly normal, for something that apparently contained a world-eating evil or some shit like that. Kind of creepy, but only the mundane weirdness that any abandoned building had.

The others had apparently stopped at the very first classroom, room 1-1, where Mitsuki was already busy looting the place. Again, like a good protagonist. Classic JRPG hero of justice. Akira would make her realize her true destiny yet. For now, though, he settled for looming directly behind Yori. "Boo." He said unenthusiastically.

Watching Yori walk past them not really noticing them, perhaps due to all the shadows, the shock of reading the creepy message on the wall, or just plain lack of interest, he then wondered into Room 1-1, very close to where Rika was standing just by the start of the hall.
She listened to the small girl's explanation and smiled, she sure seemed like a nice little sister... uh?
Placing a hand over her right eye she had a flash of a scene very vivid in her memory, the dead of her little sister, taking a moment to gain her composure she quickly stood up, sweat coming from her forehead if only a few drops as she room was cold and hot.

"w-wait guys... you shouldn't be wondering off on your own..."

Rika said following after Mitsuki, somehow subconsciously fearing something bad would happen to her if she was left unchecked.
Entering through the door to room 1-1 she saw the young girl searching through some of the desks and turned to see Yori and her big brother.

"Mind... if I tag along... I don't want to be left alone in the lobby..."
She asked timidly lowering her head, already giving up to the chaotic flow of it all, at least if she had a group thing would be easier on her, and how knew, it might give her a chance to show up just how brave she could be.

Haruka shook her head at their words.

"No... it wasn't your fault. It wasn't."

She thought she had calmed down, but the sight of the room beyond them, and seeing Sho again, somehow...

No wait, the room beyond them. That was the more important thing right now.

"Is this... what that message was talking about? We need to-"

She noticed Suzume staring at the door. She was rambling about something, and asking them if she could see it.

"See what? Suzume, what did you see?" she asked, putting her hands on Suzume's shoulders.

Whatever it was, Haruka hadn't seen it.

"Yay new nickname." Masato said in response to the girl calling him stalker-senpai again. He rolled around behind. Gliding down the hallway he saw a message scrawled across the wall. "Chaos, panic, a void and the imminent destruction of reality. Man this weekend will be the best." As he continued down the corridor the younger girl stopped to peek over Yori's shoulder before getting bored and moving on. Masato chose not to follow her, she'd be fine with Akira, and he was trustworthy. Plus she didn't seem to be that bothered by the message on the wall, if she had even seen it that was.

Drifting to a stop behind Yori he poked his head over his shoulder.

"Found any death yet?"

Yori may have barely reacted when Akira popped up behind them, but Kozue almost jumped out of his skin. "Don't do that!" He snapped, whipping around to glare at Akira. "Do you want me to have a heart attack? Is that what you want, Akira!?"

Shock and stress was serving to make him more talkative, even if that talk was mostly just babbling and grasping at straws as he tried to keep the situation under control. In fact, he should probably just give up on the whole "control" thing right now, going by the way that freshman girl had just shoved past them to root around for whatever probably cursed school supplies had been left behind here. He didn't even know where the rest of the underclassmen went, so they were probably long gone, in one way or another.

Kozue's morbid train of thought was briefly interrupted as Masato quite literally rolled up to look into the classroom with them, and then immediately resumed when Masato made a dumb comment. "No. No death yet, no death ever. Death is illegal, nobody's dying here. I'm not allowing it." He huffed.

Assuming it was fine for her to tag along and wanting to do more things than just baby sitting Rika spotted a blackboard on the back of the classroom next to the teacher's seat.
Walking towards it she noticed some stuff pointless stuff where written on it so she quickly erase them to record more important things, like the wall message on that room or the one on the lobby, like who was teaming with who... those things.
"Please do not touch the exhibits. Failure to comply will result in the removal of offending patrons from the premises. And death..." she repeated as the rewrote the words onto the blackboard, thinking to herself as to what sort of exhibits would possibly cause death... probably something very dangerous like a tiger... was this just some sort of message left there from a visit to the zoo? bizarre but likely.

"uh?" She looked up, seen the blackboard move, quickly moving back she dodged the big thing as it came crashing down, the tiny movements on it causing its bolts to come loose from the rotten wood behind them, causing the blackboard to slam hard where she was standing raising a cloud of dust all around her causing Rika to run to the nearest door, opening it to help the dust escape as she could hardly breath within the room.
"cough cough... i-is everyone alright?" She asked as she opened the second door to the room, expecting to find the hall...

But hey, expectations can be wrong, you know.


Immediately the faint smell of paint made itself known, as the door opened to what looked to be the lobby of a gallery. The room was bathed in a warm homely light, but the room itself was old and dusty and covered with splotches of paint.

The walls of the room showcased three large paintings. One showed a mannequin hanging from a noose; another showed a scene of a street, with rain falling and creating puddles of red; the last one showed a wilting purple rose, surrounded by green numbers.

There were two hallways leading from the lobby: one was opposite the entrance and showed stairs leading upwards, while the other was off to the left side.

A PA speaker sit at the top corner, looking like it hadn't been used in a while, but when the door opened it immediately crackled to life.

"Ah, visitors?" the voice inquired. It sounded like a teenage girl.

"Oh, goody! Welcome to the gallery! I hope you find something here that tickles your fancy. I've poured my heart and soul into making these pieces and I think the effort really shows. I am regrettably tied up in making another masterpiece, but I hope you are entranced by the quality of my works. Ah... make sure you don't touch anything, though. If you mess something up, I'll get angry, okay? Toodles!"

And then, silence.

Mitsuki coughed as the chalk dust billowed into clouds.

There was nothing special in the desks. They were old and battered and had not been used in a long time. As the dust settled and Rika opened the other door, she bent down and caught one of the chalk sticks sliding on the floor. Rolled it between her fingers. Not very profitable loot. But loot was loot.

She perked up once the announcement played.

"Toodles!" she said.

"Looks like we found one of those world-things that we're supposed to seal..." She stifled another yawn. It was late at night. Even if the pinkish sky outside thought otherwise. And art was boring. But whatever. Time to make the most of it.

She hopped through the door, turning to face the others with her hands on her hips.

"Who's up for some exploring?"

Yori continued to be the stoic son of a bitch that Akira knew and was pretty okay with. Kozue, however, proceeded to be Kozue. Damn. "Sorry. You were just collateral damage." Akira said, giving him an apologetic nod as he squeezed past him into the classroom. Masato and Rika had also come along for the ride. Looks like their group would be the super senpai special. The younglings with their love rhododendrons would have to be fine by themselves, he guessed.

Akira was in the middle of examining the Ominous Wall Words(tm) when Rika managed to get the blackboard to come crashing down. "Judging you." Akira said, pointing at her. And judging. The dust seemed to be too thick for her to notice, though. In any case, the judging and shit ceased to matter after she opened the door, revealing a hella cool art gallery. Art was rad. Akira smiled slightly as the nice girl on the intercom gave them a veiled death threat. She seemed pleasant enough.

Mitsuki was in an adventurous mood, as always. "I'll come along." Akira said as he walked over to her. "Someone has to keep your natural kleptomaniac instincts in check, protagonist-chan."

A gallery.

Kozue was safe in hand so he didn't care too much what the others did. They could explore and tamper as much as they wanted with the strange room. The words on the wall, bidding them to touch nothing, seemed irrelevant, simple graffiti exaggerated by their altered state.

Until the gallery appeared, and the voice began speaking. That was the moment he snapped. The moment that everything started to become too real. As the others began to move forward to explore, he hissed out "Freeze!"

He held out a hand to the encroaching pair of Akira and Mitsuki. "Don't move. Don't touch anything. Don't go anywhere until we sort this out." At least Rika, Masato, and Kozue had the sense to hold back and not charge head long into a room threatening to kill them. Hopefully with their hesitance cooler heads would prevail and they could come up with some sort of plan.

Suzume felt Haruka's hand on her shoulders, and she turned to look at her and blinked. She quickly jerked her head back to the door of the room.

"Do... do we have to go in there, Haruka?" she whispered it because she didn't want the other two hear her sound scared. Because most likely no one else saw it either so, she was going to attempt to play it off as being paranoid to not scare them. Suzume was never the kind of girl to get people to get in a fuss. She was a little ashamed of herself because she felt very much like a child asking this. She leaned closer to Haruka to whisper in her ear, "Just... there's something in there. I saw it. But I don't know what it was. Haruka I've got a seriously bad feeling about this meat locker.." She leaned back up and looked at the door.

"What if the place eats us? This place could be a stomach." she whimpered. Suzume could be strong at times when needed, but she could not handle blood, gore, organs, and etc. She never told anyone though how afraid she was of these things though. She didn't realize by her reaction, it was obvious. At the moment, her fear was getting the best of her, and she stood behind Haruka.