The fact that the door was unlocked, according to Blush, she took as an excellent sign. She had to agree with the woman's assessment that the household likely did not anticipate for them to escape from confinement and venture farther into the manor. It also decreased significantly the amount of time they would have to spend maundering around in the dark in this new room. "Perhaps we burn this place to the ground after the storm has lifted and we have secured transportation out of these woods?" Walnut suggested lightly. She didn't want to be stuck in the cold of the woods with only the flames of the house to keep them alive. She heard an exclamation and a thud from the room she had just vacated and Walnut had to prevent herself from smirking slightly, hoping that it had been the annoying woman Rave. She really hoped the woman gave up and just remained in confinement to die a horrible painful death from the chill.

She moved swiftly, with a certain grace, as she maneuvered her way through this low lighting and came to the door that Blush had just passed on through. Careful not to bump into anyone, Professor Walnut went through the doorway after Blush and glanced around, attempting to adjust to her new surroundings (if they could be seen at all). The room was pitch black, darkness seemed to be its only contents as far as she was aware (as she could hardly see in the dark to see if there was anything else about) and Walnut let out a slight sigh of frustration. At the very least if they could clear through this room and hopefully find another doorway, they would be able to put some distance between themselves and those still in confinement. She liked the small splinter group she was with now and did not care for the annoying questioner and anyone else who tarried behind with her!

It was an interesting and logical observation that the Chanteuse had made. She was a talented singer, he had proven knowledge of literacy and anatomy. Titian was indeed male. (hence he Mr.) The titles didn't seem to lie, persay, but he couldn't help but think that they could be misleading somehow. Or that one or more of the given titles was a red herring of some kind, meant to intentionally lead the others astray. Was Penance a lady of the cloth? Moss a military or seafaring type? Swamp could only guess. It was a thing that bore more consideration, and the implications thereof. A hint to understanding the motives of some of the guests, perhaps, if such a thing could be sussed out from their behavior, much of which went to the erratic.

"I likewise wonder, Chanteuse. Though I debate the relevance of profession versus the threat they might pose. Sadly, this is foremost on my mind, so far as they are concerned. I believe I might have bias... Yes, likely." Getting attacked and subsequently shot would do that to someone. Moreover, what of the identity of their blackmailer? The more Swamp saw, the more he could rule out certain people. Though one question began to nag at him. He had asked this before, but never quite followed up on it. "I do think it would be prudent to find out whose laboratory this is, specifically. I believe it might help in fining out who our collective blackmailer might be, or, having seen the amassing of knowledge in the other room, rule out one or two people."

Blush was sure of very few things in that moment. She was sure the family of the house would not be pleased to see them out and about. They would no doubt try to retrain them, possibly kill them. She also knew that as of right now she would not back down. She was through with the games of this godforsaken house. With or without the others to back her up, she intended to unmask this entire charade. Starting with the three that left them to freeze in the attic confinement.

”I shall give you the matches, petal. I would love nothing more than to see this place burn to ash.” Preferably with the inhabitants inside, but she would not say as much. ”As we traverse this room, perhaps we can talk about more beneficial things. Like why we were brought here in the first place. It is quite obvious we all received the same invitation and came here under certain pretenses, whether or not the family says it is true is beyond the point. We are here, we were invited, and yet we were treated like we had encroached on their territory. I, for one, do not plan to stand idly by and let that pass up. Someone in this house is responsible for bringing us here. And they are, perhaps, responsible for preventing us from leaving.”

She followed the professor person (whatever their name was) through the current room, into the next. It was still dark, so she could not move as quickly as she would have liked, but at least they were progressing. Hopefully, they would have light soon.

Prima Rave took a really deep breath as people were moving about the room, heading to leave. They seemed to have a lot better luck than hers earlier. She was queit as she was testing how much her leg could hold her right about now. At first she assumed that it would be good enough to take a few steps, but as soon as she attempted to put any weight onto it, she felt a stab of pain travel through her calf, her hand moved to it like lightning, as she leaned to the other side to put all the weight onto her good leg in an attempt to stay standing and not fall to the ground yet again. Her shoulder slammed into the wall because of hte speed, but she did keep herself from falling.

"Damn..." She mumbled, holding onto her injured leg. Maybe she should have never attended to that dinner after all. It would have been better ot just keep away from the food and keep her own hands at her lap, pretending she wasn't hungry. Maybe at least that way she should have avoided stabbing herself with a knife by an absolute mistake. Still there was absolutely no way to revert back time and do things differently except for some divine intervention and she wasn't sure if even the gods could do something quite like that.

Still now that the pain subsided and she could once more resume a less dependent on having her shoulder on the wall posture, she took a breath and listened. People were probably already leaving the room more and more. If she wasn't the only one left by now, she would soon be. The leg was going to be screwing her hard, she wondered if by the time the others have left the floor, she might be still trying to leave this damned room.

"I will gladly join you in the burning down of this manor, I'll gladly help you light the place up," she said towards the two who were already talking about burning the mansion down to the ground. That would definitely make things more entertaining, as well as give them a large bonfire to use for heat in the horrid cold that they were in. They needed to find a heat source fast, or try and make a fire of some sort, even just a small one that they could use both for heat and as a light source. However they had absolutely nothing, so they were stuck in the cold, stumbling around in the dark, hoping that they were headed the correct direction.

Hearing Moss' words, she thought for a moment before deciding to answer him. "I honestly do not know how long we'll be stumbling, but I personally hope that we can find a solution to this darkness problem rather quickly," Penance said simply towards him, before she went to follow along after Blush and Walnut, and hopefully she wouldn't run into them. They needed to look for another door in this new room, that much was obvious, and she personally didn't care if the other three followed after them. Though it sounded like it was taking a few of them longer then others to get out of the first room.

"Well, I personally believe that if we do find out whose responsible that we should see about dealing with them, as this is just ridiculous in my mind."

Captain Moss looked over towards both Walnut, Blush and Penance's voices as they all voiced about just burning this place down and nodded slightly. "Guess that makes four of us?" Moss said shrugging slightly as he entered the new room still barely able to see anything right now. "Hopefully we wont be stumbling through this room until daylight comes." Moss said as he kept his little makeshift weapon down on his side trying to find anything in the room that could give them some light. He started to think a little bit if revealing some information would be helpful.

"I guess sharing why we are all here in the first place would be a good idea maybe." Captain Moss said, though he didn't really want to be the first one to say anything. "Does anyone want to say why we are here in the first place, or any other kind of theories?" Captain Moss asked them. "Hopefully we can at least find a fireplace or something to keep all of us warm here as well, it's certainly a lot better than being in that room to freeze to death."

Now, Swamp is figuring out some very interesting things by looking around the room and putting two and two together. But he knows what he knows. (Results for Swamp Pmed) Amaranthine nods slightly to the doctors words but she is unsure of what she can do to figure out what is going on in this place. "I fear unless you wish me to charm my way into answers I may prove rather useless to such endeavors," the woman admitted as she looked around slowly. Her head tilting to one side and then the other. He said he knew things earlier, if this were true then he knew where the majority of her talents lay and perhaps where some other were but things like this was most likely not one of them.

Taking a deep breath she turned and looked towards the door. "It has been some time and it is growing cold," she said before looking back over to Dr. Swamp. It was getting colder in the room. Not as quickly as perhaps some of the other rooms but the fact that the gas lights were out now was starting to have an affect on this room now and she was hardly wearing something that would protect her from the cold. Cloaks had been turned over on entering the manor. A brow raised as she looked away and at the door that lead down the stairs. "Maybe we should move, remaining could just mean freezing to death." Granted she wasn't sure if that made any sense but if they were to run into someone perhaps she could convince them they were just trying to get warm.


*Remember, roll request can be placed at the bottom of the post and results will be posted in the next update. While the door is open now, it is still dark - so rolls will be needed to move around. Those with low light will get bonuses to moving around and such with their rolls.

Now, normally rolling a 1 is a bad thing but in this Rp, of course it is what we are aiming for. Cobalt hits a 1 and is finally able to get the fuck out of confinement and into the next room. He does well enough to get around people and make his way over to the next door on the east side of the room with the windows. Thank fucking god that is finally over because one more utter failure and I was going to put him out of his misery lol.

Sadly for Rave, she isn't as lucky. In fact she fails her movement roll almost as much as Cobalt succeeded. Back on her ass, that wound in her leg, yes, let's blame it on that. It is stiff, painful, hard to move. She was after all stabbed in the leg, let us over look the fact she did it to herself - it is making it hard for her to move. Maybe someone can give the lady a hand? Or leave her there to die. It's up to you, lol.

While Cobalt was hot in his roll, and Rave was cold in hers, Moss seems to be right down the center. I'm suddenly craving porridge. Anyways, nothing big in this roll but he does manage to follow Cobalts footsteps and get to other side of the room and just behind him as he reaches the door and is doing well enough not to run into the man when he comes to a stop. So yay, all good there.


Sometimes people need to get moving and see what they can do to survive. Fight or flight type of responses to dangerous situations. And sometimes people need to stay right where they are or they could make matters worse. It was something that people needed to think on, hard, weigh the pros and cons. Well as we had established, Titian isn't exactly one of the great minds in this world but he does tend to go with his gut and his gut usually pays off. Right then his gut was telling him this bread and cheese was really damn good and the small wine skin he found was just perfect to wash it down with. Hey, a man's gotta eat right? Fill the hump when you can, hell everything with Titian was hump while you can - either fill it or do it. He was a man of action.

And right then his action was swallowing the mouthful of food he was chewing. Thing was, even if he didn't know it, staying right where he was. Somewhere warm with food, was actually a good choice. People were milling around out there. They were talking, gossiping and he was hearing plenty. A lot more than he probably should. It may have been better if others were listening with him, as they probably would have put two and two together faster or at least tried to put two and two together. Right now he was just getting a lot of information. If he could use it later, maybe it would keep him alive. Maybe it wouldn't but hey, no one was bothering him. No one to feed meant people were not checking the pantry. He was save for another round.

Cobalt was on the verge of cursing at his continuing bad luck, even without the stinging that was still radiating from his nose. Almost desperately, he reached out into the darkness, fumbling for something, for anything, and in one of the first strikes of fortune that he had experienced since arriving at the gates of Shadowell Manor, Cobalt's fingers brushed against the door-frame itself. He could have cried out with relief, but the only thought that crossed his mind was the burning desire to be free of the accursed room, so he practically threw himself through the door and, finally, beyond.

There was more light in this new room than the one he had left behind, but it was still not enough for Cobalt to even see his hand in front of his face, let alone where any of the other guests had managed to get to. But he could hear them. The three female voices seemed to have largely moved on from this dimly lit room, and now that he was free, Cobalt certainly didn't feel like hanging around. With surprising dexterity and luck considering his recent experiences, he quickly crossed the room, and found himself standing in front of another doorway. He had heard a male voice talking from somewhere within the room, but they had managed to pass each other in the dim light without incident.

Not wanting to be left behind, and all too aware that he was starting to lose sensation in his fingers, Cobalt moved to step through the doorway, hopefully leaving the accursed Confinement far behind. While he had been languishing in that room, escape seemingly out of reach, Cobalt could have sworn that a malicious spirit was toying with him, but whether that spirit had been distracted, or a more benevolent force had intervened, Cobalt's run of good luck seemed destined to continue. He managed to make his way through the doorway, and what little light there had been in the previous room, he found himself in total darkness yet again. But by now, darkness was becoming familiar.

He heard footsteps behind him, and judging by the fact they sounded regular, he guessed it was the other male guest. With the three female guests somewhere ahead of him and the male guest behind him, then as far as Cobalt knew, that left only one. 'The planner' was nowhere to be seen, or rather heard. In truth, Cobalt didn't feel particularly remorseful about the fact, and for now, he was too cold to think about the long-term implications. The group had managed to escape Confinement, although Cobalt could hardly claim much credit for that, and it may be wishful thinking, but Cobalt could have sworn that the room they were in now was a touch warmer than the one they had left behind them. No matter what else, they couldn't stand around and wait, not in this chill. Warmth lay beyond this room. It had to.

---

Dr. Swamp nodded toward Amaranthine in a conciliatory manner. His own contributions to society came in the form of scholarly pursuits; just as she had many talents that he did not, he had his own ways and methods about him. All the same, the curiosity expressed earlier about the laboratory had not been sated. Whomever the master of this place was, he or she was able to accrue works of knowledge unparalleled to his experience. Possibly to anyone else's experience, either, so far as he knew. Swamp's eyes went to the table he had been working upon, noting its construction and details of its workmanship, then comparing it to the other furnishings. He noted the papers and noted the tools, took a glance at anything with lettering upon it. After a moment he stopped, straightened, and proclaimed, "This is getting more interesting, Chanteuse."

"Indeed, indeed it has been some time..." agreed Swamp. Longer than he would have thought the houseman would have been away, but apparently their presence in this place wasn't as loathsome a prospect as he imagined it might be, all things considered. It further reinforced his observations from the room.

All of that aside, now that Amaranthine had mentioned it, it was getting colder in this room. Moreso than he preferred, especially with the amount of blood he had already been deprived of so far that evening. It was curious that he didn't fully notice that before "Yes. Perhaps we should. The lab coats that we procured should give us some additional protection, as will this lamp," he surmised, holding the device aloft. "Though I believe we would fare better in more insulated environs. I recommend the stairwell behind Door Number One," he said, walking to the first door they had opened after Quinton had left. "I doubt that we can get anything more from the Lord's remains nor the room itself." But that library... Swamp was not done with this place yet. For now, for his sake as well as the Chanteuse's, he had to leave it be.

Rave liked to think of herself as somewhat optimistic person, but reality was trying really hard to mess up with her right about now. Having managed to fall flat on the floor once because of her leg numbed and stiff leg, the pain of which was really unpleasant and uncomfortable, she hoped that she wouldn't feel the cold floor so soon once again. Well luck was a fickle mistress and just as she was attempting to take another step, the cosmic dice rolls of luck decided it was time for her to have a close meet up with the floor once more!

In just a moment between her trying to take a step and her realizing what was happening, her entire body just lurched to the side and as the injured leg gave out she just fell on the floor once more, hitting hard to the side. Her hind areas were starting to hurt from falling this often. She laid down, breathing heavily as she was gritting her teeth to keep the pain and frustration from escaping her lips. The Ferret realizing that the pocket of the coat wasn't the most safe of locations right about now, had already vacated the premises, instead choosing to sit by her, tilting it's head and then do a lap around her before sitting on her torso instead as she was laying there. It was dark and she had no idea about it, but felt it as it hopped onto her chest.

"It's been a bad couple of days..." She mumbled to herself, breathing deeply, trying to gather her focus and strength in attempt to stand up once more. One more attempt and she swore silently to herself that she was going to crawl her way out of here if she had to..." Maybe the place's cursed... people seem to be dying in this Manor like flies." She whispered quietly as her eyes stared into the darkness." Alright now one more time. Three times is the charm..."

Blush managed to find her way around the darkened room to the best of her ability. She was growing tired of the darkness now. It seemed that those with her, only a few of their number, agreed with her to an extent. However, did she trust these people and share freely why she was there in the first place? After all, she knew why she was there and it stood to reason that the others were there for similar reasons, if not more heinous. That made them dangerous. Dangerous and capable, perhaps? She didn’t want to be the first one to speak on such matters, but it seemed she had little choice since no one else spoke up.

”I imagine we are all here for similar reasons and I will not press matters on that front, petal. However, as for theories. I surmise we were all brought here for one reason and one reason only. Blackmail. Whoever sent us the invitations knows something on all of us, otherwise I imagine we would not have shown up, dressed in masks. So someone has knowledge of us here, whether they are a member of the household or even one of the guests remain to be seen, though I have my suspicions. I intend to find out what I can before I burn it all. I won’t let secrets sleep in the ashes.”

With that, Blush moved into the next room. Still dark, but different at least. She would press forward. Hopefully finding stairs or someway to get to the lower floors where there would hopefully be light.

"Perhaps we should contend with the possibility that our blackmailer will not travel to these hallowed grounds at all," Walnut mused. "For all we know, we could have been summoned here with the assumption that the people of this household would dispose of us, if the blackmailer wished to cease the game for one reason or another." Of course, this struck her as unlikely. "Yet your discovery of the list with our names does strongly suggest that the blackmailer must be here... or at least, someone here serves their interests." She did not feel like she had gotten very far just from these conversations. She wanted to find more things along the lines of what Blush had uncovered, as they had more or less formed firm opinions on everyone here and groups had occurred naturally. She also knew whom she hated and wished to kill - Amaranthine, Swamp, Titian, and then the annoying woman Rave. The order of their deaths was negotiable.

Moving through the darkness, Walnut followed after Blush and emerged into the latest in a seemingly never ending series of rooms. There was still darkness here and Walnut very much wished that they could have some sort of light source, as she did not care for this endless night they were in. She then thought more on the question of why they had all been assembled here. "Well we have all been summoned here for our common connection of being blackmailed - but who summoned us? Did the blackmailer insist that we arrive - or was it someone in these walls who wished to bring down that soul?" There was then another question. "Perhaps as we move beyond these dark halls, we might find the intention of this gathering... At the very least, we know those who cannot be trusted already - namely the ones absent from our current company. Swamp, Amaranthine, and Titian."