[F29 | SP] Light in a house that was best left dark | <<To Shine a Light>>

[Acanthus 0]

 

Link to Quest

“I can’t tell if I don’t know you anymore, or if I never knew you to begin with.”

A shaking hand over scraps of paper, delicately rearranged to spell a simple phrase.

I love you too.

—

The mires of Floor 29 gulped down whatever weight rested above them. Ruins, bodies, and players alike were dragged underneath the mud with each washing rain. Only the players had the energy to resist its subsuming call.

Wrenching her boot from the ground, the floor made a terrible sucking sound in protest. Acanthus wondered what the hell she was doing out here. Searching for the labyrinth, sure, but why alone? Any number of people would be glad to offer her help. And groups were the prudent option given the unknowns of this floor. New monsters and new traps could kill her in a moment, and she had no briefing from the shared info guide to prepare her. Being out here alone was foolhardy.

-----

Slime farm used! +10% EXP

Acanthus | Lvl 69 (nice) (34/35) | HP 880/880 | EN 120/120 | No stats (purely RP and puzzle thread. No combat or looting)
 

Edited March 4 by Acanthus
Confirmed that I haven't used Slime farm since 2/3/2025

[Acanthus 0]

But she craved the solitude. Day after day her inbox piled up. Customers needing crafts. New players needing quests. Old players just wanting to catch up. Each thing was a small ask, but as the small asks piled up, it became too much for her. So she turned off her notifications, and disappeared into the wilds of Floor 29. She debated sending a message to let someone know where she went, just in case she didn’t return. But if she didn’t return, they could piece it out themselves. There wasn’t a need to risk uninvited guests.

Acanthus trudged over the next hill, discontent in her thoughts. A small smudge of light appeared on the horizon, growing steadily brighter. Then, it flashed, before disappearing again into the dark. In the direction of the light stood a tall obelisk, which seemed to have materialized out of thin air. Had she already found the labyrinth?

[Acanthus 0]

When Acanthus first took in the form of the far away tower, her mind scrambled to identify it. Given the distances and darkness, she struggled to give it a size. The muted sounds of the sea told her that it stood upon the coast, and the bright flashes signaled a need for assistance. Or a warning to stay away, even. Perhaps it was the start to a quest, or a clue to finding the labyrinth.

As she got closer, it dawned on her; the obelisk was in fact a lighthouse. No wonder it took her so long to recognize the thing. A lighthouse had no place on a floor devoid of both life and light. Such an innocuous thing to find in such a terrible place, like a cupcake in a casket.

Acanthus slogged towards the light, drawn by some unknown counter to her common sense. She sought no answers, but would find them regardless.

[Acanthus 0]

The exterior oak door had a few gouges that raised Acanthus’s hackles. The marks were about the size of a human hand but cut too deeply for human strength. Acanthus drew botan and cracked the door open cautiously with the tip of the blade. The door opened with a whisper and a stale gust of air made her blink. She quietly peered inside.

A resounding <<BLING>> made her yell and stumble backwards into the mud. Frustrated, she stood, wiped herself off, and looked at the dialogue box that had appeared.

Quest located. <<To Shine a Light.>> Accept? Y/N

She almost closed out the box. It probably wasn’t going to help her find the labyrinth. Probably. With a resigned sigh, she accepted. Maybe it will have some useful information about the floor. She pressed yes, and awaited further instructions.

<<Explore the Mysteries of Graycott Point.>>

An exasperated groan escaped her throat. This wasn’t a “kill a monster” kind of quest, unfortunately. But as the storm intensified, Acanthus thought that maybe this place wouldn’t be such a bad location to wait out the weather.

[Acanthus 0]

Despite the humble exterior, the house boasted an impressive panoply of rooms. A brief sweep of the house revealed six in all: The entrance hall, the kitchen, the bedroom, the study, the living room, and the lantern room. Acanthus found another passage in the lantern room, locked by a four digit code. She idled away some time trying sequential numbers. 0000. 0001. 0002. 0003.

“Brute force is always an option, but it is a clumsy one. Unbecoming for a gifted mind such as yours.”

She dropped the padlocked gift with tears in her eyes. Her mom gently rubbed dad’s shoulders. “Honey, she’s six. I know you love your puzzles, but it’s her birthday. Let her have this one.” Dad looked down at the small box, and then to his daughter, a fresh set of sobs incoming.

“... I’m sorry. Let me open that for you.”
 

Edited March 7 by Acanthus

[Acanthus 0]

Dad loved puzzles. It was the one constant in his life. Working through crosswords and sudokus, he would often mouth answers and clues to himself, laughing at particularly good hints. In the midst of puzzle-solving, the only time he ever emerged from his study was to share a rousing success or deeply-held thought about his current predicament. His eyes would gleam with cleverness and curiosity all at once as he talked—rambled, rather—at whoever was closest. Haru enjoyed listening to him, because it was one of the few ways she could get Dad to talk to her. Or at least at her.

* * *

Acanthus held the padlock in her hands, thumbing through combinations mindlessly. She was back in the lighthouse, listening to the rain pound on the glass of the lantern room.

“Maybe I have time to solve this,” she mumbled out loud. “I’d hate to leave unsolved puzzles lying around. Dad would, at least.”
 

[Acanthus 0]

Acanthus returned to the entrance hall to study the house with an eye for puzzles, rather than traps. Nothing caught her eye in the entrance: just a few unattended coats and a painted rendition of Graycott Point. Whoever had left them here must be cold, she thought. Hopefully they left. Acanthus shuddered as she remembered the scars on the door. She changed her mind—hopefully they were still here.

The kitchen was next on her list to visit. Acanthus wound her way around the cabinets to a scrap of paper resting on the mantle of a roaring flame. In real life, Acanthus would have taken this for a sign of life. But in a video game, it was a small thing to make a perpetual flame. It probably never went out, not even if the roof caved in above it. Taking the scrap of paper, she looked down at the jumbled letters.

[Acanthus 0]

“A word scramble?” Her father hummed. “You don’t need my help for something that simple. If you really need help, go ask your mother.”

Haru tugged at her dress. “I unscrambled the words, Dad. I just don’t know what’s next.” Curiosity overtook the man, and he snatched the scrap from her hands. His eyes darted up and down the paper before flashing with recognition. He handed it back. “The words have something in common.” He paused for a second. “This isn’t homework, right? I don’t want you cheating by asking for help.”

“No dad, I’m just doing it for fun.” I just wanted to solve something with you is what she tried to say. She was too anxious to make herself known like that. Her dad looked her over carefully, as if she were a puzzle herself. “Good. Try and discern what the commonality is. If you can’t figure it out, go ask your mother. You don’t need me to solve this.”

[Acanthus 0]

Acanthus jotted down the answer in her notes. The journaling application in her menu would have sufficed, but something about handwriting forced her mind to concentrate. It also felt more comfortable than typing on a strange floating screen. “I didn’t even need mom this time,” she whispered to herself. Glancing around the kitchen one more time, she left to explore the bedroom.

The bedroom was part order and part chaos. The bed was perfectly made, the trunk closed and latched, but not locked. The nautical theme complimented the lighthouse with worn, cozy wall decor. The chaos began at the desk. It held an assortment of objects: a lamp, a telescope, a strange globe with lands she did not recognize… none of the things appeared to contain clues. Only then did she notice the ripped pages scattered underneath a few of the objects. The top one contained a scrambled message and a grid of letters.

Edited March 7 by Acanthus

[Acanthus 0]

“Scrambled messages are either a treat or a bore to solve,” her dad sighed. She had come to the door to ask about her classic literature homework, but she listened patiently. “A healthy mind will embed a puzzle within the key to make it interesting to solve. A troubled mind is content for the easy way out.”

“And what way is that?” She set her book down as she waited outside the study. Maybe he would let her in this time. Six years later and he still kept the door shut. It had only been two years since he returned inside, and even then, he kept odd hours, so she never caught him coming or going. She hadn’t seen inside the place since mom had gone.

“A simple substitution or atbash. Without a keyword, raw force is the only option. A brutish option for a foolish riddler. Isn’t that right?” He trailed off quietly behind the door. Haru strained to listen, but couldn’t make out the words.

[Acanthus 0]

Haru gently tested the door. It was locked. A pause confirmed that her dad heard her rattle the handle. “...I’m busy right now. I’m still working through—I’m still working on some of… Some notes.” What he meant to say was “going through mom’s journals.” Even with the door shut, she could hear him flipping pages, muttering to himself, all the way through the night. A puzzle that baffled even the great Noboru Masuda. Maybe I can help him. Maybe if I ask, he’ll let me in. We can try and solve it together.

“Yes, father. Should I have Ryoji bring you some supper later?”

“I’m not hungry. Don’t waste the food, though, make sure Koji eats it. He looks too thin.”

“Yes, father.”

* * *

A few letters later and the scrambled words had been cracked. Acanthus took the newly-discovered key and solved the grid in front of her, keeping the phrase tucked away in the back of her mind. More commonalities, she observed. Likely connected to the padlock.

[Acanthus 0]

The study was next. But she couldn’t bring herself to enter. I’ll save it for later. There’s probably clues elsewhere that I need to solve first.

The living room proved cozier than the rest of the rooms combined. Another blazing fire beckoned her to the armchair, where she sat down with a heavy *plop*. With the rain outside, she could almost drift off to sleep. This isn’t a safe zone, she reminded herself. And I have no one here to make sure something doesn’t attack me in my sleep. Reluctantly, she stood back up and worked her way through the contents of the room.

More fish on the walls. Acanthus allowed herself to be distracted for a moment by the red herring before resuming her search. An interesting clock, with both hands frozen on the seven. A chessboard missing one of the kings. So I suppose black won? Anything could be a clue here. She strained listening to the music box over and over, the same four notes sounding out what she thought for sure could be connected to the four-digit passcode. Next to the music box, a familiar grid of blank spaces and numbers sent chills down her spine. Nonograms. Nonograms. Just like the ones in the study.

—Tentatively, she opened the door—

No. Not yet. I don’t want to go to the study yet. I’ll settle for the one here.
 

[Acanthus 0]

Acanthus traced her fingers along the shelves of the study, reading the titles of a dozen Scarlet Burbage novels. Whoever had lived here loved this author. Nobody ever lived here. Reality seeped into her thoughts. Just a programmer who wrote a character who loved Scarlet Burbage. But nobody real. A desk in the middle of the room—

—No, dad’s desk was closer to the left wall as you entered—

“Stop that!” she cried out. But her only response was the rain. Embarrassed at her sudden outburst, Acanthus crept over to the desk, leafing through a biography of Julius Caesar. She found a page bookmarked, explaining the eponymous cipher. She could hear her dad explaining it to her. A simple substitution cipher. Move letters over to the left or right. Keep trying them until you reach a pattern that fits. Nearby, a newspaper beckoned her with something that looked like a crossword, except it was laid out in a long rectangle. A dropdown puzzle—dad was never a fan of these. He liked his puzzles to be a little more abstract.

[Acanthus 0]

“It would be a good exercise, father.”

“I don’t need exercise,” he huffed. “I need a challenge. Dropdown word puzzles are just playing hangman with an invisible fiend.” It was a dramatic choice of words for him.

Since mom had passed, his interest in puzzles had waned. In the past, Haru could bait him into talking with her by greeting him with a new riddle or puzzle. But lately, he had been growing disinterested in anything but the study. He would vanish immediately after dinner, leaving the rest of the family to clean up after him. The door would lock, and the children would be left to their own devices for the remainder of the evening. Haru dutifully ensured that they were all prepared for bed. Sometimes she stayed up, hoping to catch a glimpse of him. But all she ever caught was the low thrum of babbling, his individual words lost through that solid door.
 

[Acanthus 0]

Acanthus blinked back to the present. She had filled in the nonogram without thinking.

The nonogram. —tacked on the walls—scrawled in red ink, swathes of charcoal desecrating the paper—

Her heartbeat rose in her chest. She was forgetting something. No, she wasn’t letting herself remember. What was she not letting herself remember? The nonogram was the key. But why? It was a puzzle for a puzzle. Dad would be ecstatic.—he tore through the papers with an ecstatic gleam in his eyes—

Acanthus forced her eyes down to the paper. The shape meant nothing to her. Something about the type of puzzle itself was triggering an emotional reaction from her.

—“I can’t tell if I don’t know you anymore, or if I never knew you to begin with.”—

Fight through this. You’re getting closer. She imagined the waterfall, pounding her into a small cube, letting the equal, comfortable pressure squeeze her and her thoughts into a malleable form.

Then, it appeared. That elusive memory. She reached through the wall of the water in her mind and grasped it firmly.

[Acanthus 0]

Haru tried the door to the study again. Dad was howling in anger. “Dad? Dad! What’s going on in there?”

The howling stopped. “Nothing, Haru. I—Don’t concern yourself.” Sounds of tidying up wafted through the door. She did not press her ear to the door as she used to. She wasn’t a child anymore.

Haru folded her arms. “I am concerned. This is the third time I’ve heard you from my room since I came home for the weekend. Koji probably hasn’t said anything because he lives with his headset on. Are you going to let me in or am I going to call the police for a wellness check?”

“That is unbec—”

“I don’t care. I’m a grown woman. I work my own job, and I pay my own rent. Open the door.”

Silence lingered in the air, broken by the shuffle of papers. Footsteps approached the door, and the lock popped. “Let yourself in,” he grumbled. Tentatively, she opened the door.

[Acanthus 0]

The study of Graycott Point was a dream for book-lovers—

—No, I was remembering something. I was remembering something, what was it—

Rows upon rows of leather-bound novels, in a bevy of genres that appealed to any—

—stop it, take me back to the memory, I need to see my Dad!

SHE DOES NOT WANT TO SEE HIM. OR ELSE SHE WOULD BE IN HIS STUDY, AND NOT THIS ONE.

She choked as the gravelly voice made her head spin.

THE GIRL MUST RELAX. WE ARE HERE TO FREE HER FROM THE PAIN OF REMEMBERING. SHE DOES NOT NEED TO KNOW.

“I want to know.” Her voice was fraught with emotion. “Please.”

Even without a body, she could swear Hatred shrugged. A CHILD WANTS CANDY. ITS TEETH ROT OUT. A DRUNKARD WANTS WINE. ITS FINAL THOUGHT IS ANOTHER GLASS, EVEN AS THE LIVER BURSTS. WHAT SHE WANTS AND WHAT SHE NEEDS ARE TWO DIFFERENT THINGS.

[Acanthus 0]

She couldn’t believe her ears. This thing was… scolding her? It had the audacity to hound her every step through Aincrad. It whispered awful things in her ears. It nearly drove her to the precipice of killing not only herself, but other players. And now it was the one deciding what memories she could remember?

Fury built up in her chest. “You—you don’t have the right. These are my memories! What gives you the right? Or, or the power?!” She drew botan, as if it would do anything. The voice chortled at the display. RIGHT AND POWER, SHE THINKS ARE TWO THINGS. RIGHT IS POWER. AND THE POWER IS OURS.

“You can’t do this. My memories are my last connection to the real world.” She closed her eyes, straining to catch flashes of home. —paper on the walls—a bright red pen—empty eyes, straining for an impossible answer—

SHE RISKS TOO MUCH.

“Risk what?! You told me to fucking kill myself!” A pensive moment passed before the voice hissed.

FINE. INDULGE YOUR MEMORIES.

[Acanthus 0]

Haru was shocked to find that much of the study was the exact same as she had remembered from her brief glimpse seven years ago. Books lay strewn on the floor, the office chair still tilted on its side in the middle of the study. But the differences made her gasp. Her mom’s journals and letters had been nailed, tacked, and stapled across the walls in a garish display, hung like the body parts of Christ in a gruesome display of reverence. Large sections of butcher paper had been strung in-between the notes, scrawled with messages such as “eight nonograms found in pages 78–89” and “possible Vigenère codes: hydrangea (too long), rose (too short), thorn?” Familiar grids papered almost every wall, the hundreds of columns and rows all numbered, each nonogram filled in to resemble either a visage agonizingly accurate to her mother.

A ripping sound tore her attention from the wall. Dad was piling shreds of Mom’s earliest journals on the table, separating the pages down to the individual kanji. Her dad mumbled, swapping the characters around with a feverish intensity.

“Dad, what the f—”

“Don’t swear. Unbecoming.” He remained fixated on the letters, moving them in different patterns and mouthing to himself. The man at the desk was not the man that had allowed her to enter. She had never met this man in her life. His stern, steely tone had been shelved, replaced by a mild, wandering one. His eyes were wide and empty, as if looking behind the paper and not at it.

“If I move the dates around, then it looks like we’re getting closer to establishing a pattern. Once you break the kanji down on alternating pages, the hiragana all start alphabetically. A, i, u, e, o, ka ki ku ke ko—” crazed explanation turned into the alphabet song, and the man laughed to himself.

Acanthus Haru stood in horror, surronded by splashes of paper and mauled books. She’d had a full and sober conversation with Dad five seconds ago. But she had crossed the threshold and entered a world he had created. A world where dad didn’t need to hide from anyone.

Acanthus (SHE IS NOT YET) wandered over to the stack of scrap paper mounding on the desk, silently pocketing what looked to be a spare key. At least three of mom’s journals had been taken entirely out of their covers, as if some ravenous dog had come through and torn them all apart with its teeth. She looked at the massacre of her mom’s handwriting and nearly cried. Her dad didn’t seem to care.

“I think—I think I’ve made progress. January was hard because she wrote so little. Those were the worst months.” Fingers dabbled with the corpse of her mothers work. “Here! Ah, Haru, honey, look!” He grabbed her shoulder, roughly moving her gaze to a kaleidoscope of letters.

I    a m      an END less RiveR

“See? See! I told you so!” He laughed loudly and did a victorious skip to the other side of the study. As he rounded the corner of the desk, he knocked over a small plastic bottle, nearly full. The side read:

CLOZAPINE. TAKE ONCE DAILY, BY MOUTH. MAY EXPERIENCE THE FOLLOWING SIDE EFFECTS:

Dad giggled as he placed his ear to one of the crucified journals. “Didn’t I tell you I’d get there, darling? This was your hardest one yet. But I did it!” He looked at Haru, eyes open and blinded at the same time. “I did it.”

A thousand emotions rushed through Haru, and then a thousand questions followed. She compiled her thoughts, and started asking questions from the top of an endless list. “Dad. How long have you been taking medication?” The man, lost in his reverie, ignored Haru.

“Dad.” She swallowed, hating herself for what she was about to do. “Mom told me to ask you about your medication.” His eyes focused at the sound of Haru’s voice. “Yes, yes. The pills. We tried a few. We settled on these. And they… They work.” His voice dropped in pitch, and his eyes wandered along the trails of paper on the floor. “I didn’t need them while she was around, you know. She was my anchor. She *is* my anchor.” He stopped to pull a journal off the wall, holding the cover in his hand like the arm of a lost lover. “But… She… she ran away. And she doesn’t call. I know it’s my fault. It always is. So I had to stop taking the pills, Haru. I had to.”

Her whole body felt numb. She’d heard about episodes like this. She’d seen patients in a hospital having psychotic breaks like this. But none of them had ever felt real until now. “Why did you stop taking the pills?”

His eyes watered. “It’s the only way I hear her anymore, honey. I don’t hear her when I take the pills. But when I forget… She leaves me messages. She leaves me puzzles because she cares. She loves me, Haru, so she left me puzzles. It’s why she was writing so much those last few months. She wanted to leave me messages. Because she loves me.” And with that, Noboru Masuda broke down weeping, leaning on the chair Keiko had kicked over in her final moments.

* * *

IS SHE HAPPY SHE REMEMBERED.

Haru, now Acanthus, found herself weeping on the floor of the study, poised just like her father. “I don’t know.”

WE TRIED TO TELL HER. Then, Hatred left her to her sorrow.

[Acanthus 0]

The universe felt millions of kilometers away. The rain pounded on windows a million kilometers in the sky as her fingers worked the padlock of a secret passage that someone else had discovered a million years ago. The code slid in effortlessly as it had a million times before. The hatch opened with a shriek that sounded from a million star systems to the left. The bones of Acanthus moved down into the hole, and her soul followed after.

—--

The warped stairway spiraled down in a manner that destroyed her sense of direction. It followed the spiral of the lighthouse at first, but then darted off in a nonsensical direction only a story or two down. Her spiraling descent took an eternity, but truthfully it could have been either the game lying to her, or the result of languishing in her remembrance.

Acanthus recalled the first time she’d seen Dad with any medication. She’d come down early for school, a time usually reserved for Mom and Dad to plan their day. Without the morning sun, she could see the pale green plastic bottle reflecting the dim glow of the kitchen light. Heart medication, Mom hastily explained. Haru hadn’t even thought to ask. Other memories took on a different light under this new lens. Was that the reason they were afraid of getting her a dog? What about Dad’s aversion to her martial arts classes? Even the most innocuous memories became unsteady in her mind.

She arrived at a heavy wooden door, ten stories beneath the lighthouse. A low, guttural moan emanated from behind the door. Haru Acanthus tested the handle. Unlike last time, it turned freely. But the moans behind the door grew louder and more painful, and her confidence faltered. She half-expected to find her Dad back here, pulled out of the recesses of her mind by some awful magic trick from Cardinal. If it could create clones of her to fight, who was to say it couldn’t pull sculptures from memories as well?

I’m not a child anymore. I’m not even Haru. I’m Acanthus. With a firm twist and pull, she let herself into the basement.