Chapter Text
The clock had struck, and bells had rung. Another round had ended in the realm. Most everyone died this time around, leaving only two survivors, that being Elliot and Chance. The two survivors found themselves at the table that they respawned at after a round, hearing the chatter of the others in the next room.
“Huh, nice job there, pizza boy!” Chance said with a grin, already flipping his coin once more. Elliot rolled his eyes and stood up from the table, with Chance following close behind.
“Yeah, thanks, Mr ‘my gun blew up twice last round’” Elliot teased back. “Anyway, I’ve gotta get started on dinner, wanna help?” He offered with a warm smile. Chance was about to respond with a quip when the two of them heard a loud thud, followed by the sound of wood shattering and an unfamiliar voice yelling out.
“MON DIEU MY FUCKING BACK!” A notably french voice echoed throughout the halls of the cabin, causing Elliot and Chance to rush in. The table they had just respawned at was shattered in half, and between the two parts of the broken table was a man. He was dressed formally, a suit, a big black hat and a mask covering half of his face, a face that was pale white with makeup. The masked man rolled around a bit, squirming in pain, which had Elliot worried.
“Woah, woah dude! Are you okay?” Elliot crouched down next to the man, putting his hands on him to try to survey the damage. The masked man tensed at the touch, wrenched his arm back, and smacked Elliot with some large sort of… wand? Elliot flinched back, rubbing his hand where he had been smacked, only to see the man standing up in a defensive position, his wand pointed straight at them both.
“Listen here, I’ve had enough of you people hounding me, and I-” The masked man’s words were cut off by Chance’s loud interruption.
“WAIT! I’m sorry, but we don’t know who the hell you are. Listen, I know what it’s like to be hunted too buddy, but you’re safe here…” Chance looked over at Elliot, who grimaced slightly upon hearing the assurance of ‘safety’. “Relatively speaking. Whatever, just… Drop the, uh, wand I guess, and we can talk.” The masked man shifted slightly, still defensive, thinking to himself. They don’t want to kill him immediately, that’s a plus. They didn’t seem like the usual civilian militia coming for his head, another plus. However, one of them had his hand on his waist, looking like he was going to reach for a gun… That’s definitely a danger point. He’d been almost shot one too many times for him to feel comfortable with that.
“Drop the gun.” He said, causing a bit of confusion for Chance.
“What? Oh, this?” Chance said, pulling out his flintlock, causing the masked man to shrug.
“You know what. Nevermind. I’m not dropping my wand though. Not until I know what the hell is going on.” He said, then looked around at his surroundings. “And where the hell I am, too.”
“Well first, how about some introductions! I’m Chance, that guy you smacked in the hand is Elliot, and you are…?”
The man hesitated. What would he say? If he revealed his stage name, they could recognize him and then they’d surely try to take him in… but… He already was in full costume, and the one he had learned was named ‘Chance’ said he didn’t know him.
“Artful. My name is Artful. Pleased to make your acquaintance.” Artful bowed, taking off his hat in respect, leading to Chance tilting their own. Elliot soon shakily followed, nodding his visor.
“Artful, huh? What kind of name is that?” Okay, either this guy was really good at lying, or genuinely didn’t know who he was. Either way, Artful decided to let his guard down, these people seemed harmless enough anyway. Why not perform a trick to show off?
“A name for the greatest performer of the magical arts robloxia has ever seen! Watch this!” Artful’s tone changed to one he hadn’t been able to use in a while. His theatrical performance voice. Artful flipped his wand in the air, once, twice, then caught it on his finger, with sparkles floating out of either end. “Eh? See? Magic!” Chance and Elliot stood, both looking at each other with a little caution. They already knew someone with magic, Dusekkar, and these… party tricks they’ll say, were not impressive to them.
“Ahh, I can see you’re not impressed, well don’t worry! This next trick is sure to amaze!” Artful spun his wand around again, and tapped chance on the head lightly with it, then, struck a pose as the gambler shifted with nervous anticipation. Soon though, something magical did indeed happen, as a puppet held up by strings descended from the sky out of nowhere, and this puppet bore a striking resemblance to Chance.
Immediately, both Chance and Elliot switched on a dime. They both applauded at the trick, Chance a little harder as he got to see something that looked exactly like they did.
Artful beamed like a little kid immediately. Applause? He hadn’t heard such a sound in oh so long… They liked him. They truly, truly liked him. He bowed to the applause, and while there were no roses thrown for him, at least there were no bananas either.
“So um… What is this place, exactly?” Artful asked, still a bit gleeful about the performance he had just done, but his glee turned to nervous apprehension as Chance and Elliot winced. “What. What is that facial expression? Why are you doing that?” Artful began to tug at his collar a bit, starting to worry about where he’d ended up. He was so absorbed into his show that he hadn’t even considered that he could be somewhere terrible. What if he was in a prison? A dangerous cult?
“You’re in hell, essentially.” Chance said, causing Elliot to smack him lightly.
“Chance!” He whined out, but Chance only shrugged.
“What? It’s true! And it's a hell of a better way to learn about what it is than by going into a… a…” Chance began to get dizzy, vision fogging at the edges, a sensation he knew all too well. “Well, one of these… So, artful, we’re gonna see what you can do! Find one of us and you’ll be-” Everyone’s vision went black for just a moment, before they all woke up in the cake factory they’d come to know so well… Well, except Artful. He was freaking out. He had spawned alone in the back room of the factory, carpet under his shoes with a generator right next to him. Why was there a generator in what looked to be a meeting room? It was so confusing. Even more confusing was the voice of a child behind him.
“Woah, I’ve never seen you before, mister! You look like a clown! Do you know any tricks?” Artful whipped his head around to see a tall, muscular… red child? He had a big smile on his face, and some sort of childish writing on his chest, leading Artful to believe this was the source of the voice.
“Uhh… I’m no clown… I am a magician? P-Pardon me, but do you know where your parents are, dear child?” Artful asked, moving closer, to which C00lkidd smiled and giggled.
“I mean not right now! Dad’s hiding cause we’re playing tag! Speaking of which…” The red child moved closer, fists balling up, to which Artful tightened his grip on his own wand… He didn’t want to hurt a child, but to protect himself, he’d do anything…
Elliot was in full reconnaissance mode, trying to find this new ‘artful’ fella. The killer was C00lkidd, and Elliot knew how much damage that little guy could do in just a short period of time. He needed to find Artful as soon as possible and help him learn the ropes of these games and-
“WAAAAAAAAGH!” C00lkidd screamed as he flew past, backwards. Elliot was astounded, and sat there stunned for a good bit. “You cheated! You threw a brick at me!” C00lkidd landed with a thud, then stood up and stomped his foot.
“You tried to set me on fire! Don’t think I didn’t see that sword of yours! I’m no idiot, you petulant child!” Artful yelled back, moving forward as if he was about to fight C00lkidd. But no one could fight a killer one on one, not even guest… right?
C00lkidd growled and moved to lunge at Artful with his walkspeed override, and as he sped forward, Artful slammed down his wand, causing a wall to raise up, leading to C00lkidd crashing face first into it with a grunt.
Artful quickly capitalized on this, and moved in to tap the kid with his wand, the same poof that Elliot and Chance had seen earlier emanating from the tip. Artful then posed, and down from the sky came a puppeted replica of C00lkidd, that immediately began to box with the real one.
C00lkidd grunted in exertion as he slammed his fists into the fake him, eventually grabbing the thing as it stumbled from a hit, and tore its head off. Artful however, was using the time he had gained to rush forward and smack C00lkidd in the back of the head hard with his wand. C00lkidd fell to the ground with an ‘oof’ and Artful immediately capitalized on this, moving to pin C00lkidd to the ground, and then he began to strike.
Over and over, hit after hit, Artful brought his wand down onto the kid, striking his bright red flesh, leaving welts that soon turned purple. Elliot sat at the sidelines, stunned and horrified as Artful brutalized the most innocent thing in this realm.
“A-Artful, s-stop…” He muttered out, moving closer to try to stop the assault, but Artful could not hear him, drowned out by the hitting of flesh and the cries of the child asking for his father. “ARTFUL!” Elliot yelled, grabbing the wand as the masked man raised it up for another strike, causing him to look at Elliot. His face was contorted into a snarl, a face full of rage, and Elliot stepped back. He’d seen that look before. It was the same face of rage on someone like 1x. “S-Stop! You’re hurting him! He’s just a kid!” Artful froze, then looked down at who he’d been hitting. A sniffling, sobbing child, begging out for his papa to come save him. Artful dropped his wand and stumbled back, horrified at his actions… he’d… he’d done it again. He’d…
Artful didn’t have time to think until a strong fist slammed into the side of his face, then the same arms pinned him down to the floor. He couldn’t look to see his captor, but around him he could see everyone. Elliot, Chance… several unknown people, and one he assumed to be the boy he had just attacked’s father, as the man with the burger hat was kneeling next to C00lkidd, petting his head as the child sobbed into his arms.
“We don’t know who the hell you are, but after this round is done, you have some major explaining to do.” The voice belonging to his captor rang out, tone serious and demanding. Artful gulped. It looked like there was no running from his past after all.