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Ghost of the Department (Solo/NPC)
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Post by Ryosuke Yoshida on Feb 3, 2023 18:44:27 GMT
Ryosuke was exhausted. Not only he has to endure some paperwork back in his office, but he has to deal with several meetings located nearby in a day to satisfy the quota. It was a bit of a grind and it would be a long day. Adding to the mix were his two Digimon asking for food when they woke up. He was relieved to discover a unique feature of his Digivice that let him store them inside, allowing him to take them around without leaving them home while risking their discovery by his son after school. However, he still needed to fulfill their needs, which meant trying to find a window in his packed schedule to feed them convenience store bento or ramen nearby.
For now, he has to worry about it later because the next meeting he has to do was in a 3-story office building where their client was located. On the second floor was a department store associated with his office and as a consultant, he was in charge of aiding the management of the employees and inventory. But as he was on his way to his meeting place near the backrooms, he heard several customers murmuring something unsettling.
"Hey, did you hear about the rumored ghosts hiding in those old fitting rooms?"
"Yeah. I heard several of the customers ran away or got injured by something inside."
"Well, I also heard they were about to remove them because of those rumors."
"At least that's good to know. It might be bad for the store's PR anyway."
A ghost in the old fitting rooms? Like that ever happened. Ryosuke decided to ignore the murmuring and headed to the office behind the store.
Once there, he met several people inside for the meeting and spent an hour discussing management topics and marketing for the upcoming sale. Once they had a break, Ryosuke decided to go out and get some coffee from a machine nearby. But as he did, his Digivice in his pocket started to vibrate.
"Ryosuke! Ryosuke!"
The salaryman quickly gasped to hear Taiyo's voice, forcing him to take out his Digivice to see the said Koromon.
"What is it, Taiyo? I told you I'm going to give you lunch in an hour," Ryosuke whispered as he tried not to gain any attention.
"But Ryosuke, this is serious! I smell another Digimon! And it's nearby!" Taiyo warned.
A Digimon? Nearby?! This was not good, especially when he was in a middle of a meeting.
"Wait, how can you smell that from my Digivice? And what do you mean there's another one?" Ryosuke questioned. "I thought Ken is with you inside. I double-checked."
"Yeah, he's with me." Taiyo moved a bit to the right, revealing a blue furry slime with a blue and white tail and metallic horn helmet, quietly sleeping on the side. "I didn't even leave the Digivice as you wanted."
Looking at them, Taiyo was telling the truth. So if his words were true, then were those rumors of a ghost in the old fitting rooms connected? And if it was, was that ghost a Digimon?
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Post by Deleted on Feb 9, 2023 2:37:26 GMT
As if almost on cue, by the time Ryosuke would finish his brief exchange and heed his Digital companion's warning, a scream would emerge from one such supposedly haunted fitting room. Assuming Ryosuke went to check it out (it would be weird if he didn't at this point, but I guess that would certainly make this a short thread, wouldn't it?), they would find a young employee scrambling around on the floor outside of the fitting rooms, surrounded by the floor manager, several curious customers, and a couple of concerned coworkers. The employee (I'll leave how familiar Ryosuke is with the crew to your discretion), was tugging at a long, crimson, muffler scarf wrapped around her neck. It eventually came loose as the employee tossed it away from her as if it had been on fire.
"What's going on?" The floor manager demanded. If there was any sense of personal concern, it didn't seem to show.
"I... I'm not sure!" The employee pleaded in a gasp, her eyes still aghast after coming down with what seemed like an awful fright. "I was in the fitting room, umm... cleaning, and then all of a sudden..." She pointed towards the long muffler resting motionless across the floor. "That scarf suddenly appeared and wrapped around my neck and I thought someone was trying to... but..." She turned back towards the fitting room's curtain, shoved open in a panic, but there wasn't anything in it that shouldn't have been there, save for a single phone haphazardly discarded on the floor.
Other than a couple of gasps and murmurs from the crowd around, with some customers leaving to go about their general hustle and bustle, no one seemed to make much sense of what happened. But there were at least two people present that Ryosuke knew that would be able to discern the faint digital signal the from the scarf. It seemed innocuous enough, but it seemed like it wasn't made in this world.
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Post by Ryosuke Yoshida on Feb 12, 2023 18:10:38 GMT
Ryosuke gasped as he heard a scream nearby. Taiyo was right. There was another Digimon beside him and Ken, but the question was what. Regardless, he needed to defuse the situation before it escalates.
"You two continue to observe the area from my Digivice. I'll see if I can find out our mystery 'ghost'," Ryosuke instructed.
"Be careful, Ryosuke!"
Ryosuke nodded at Taiyo's warning. He left the backroom and as he arrived, he gasped at the strange, but horrifying scene. A panicked employee he knew from previous meetings was on the floor and a crowd was formed from her screams. From her story, it seemed that she was attacked by someone or something in the fitting room. And what was weird was the muffler scarf that was left behind from the attack. Looking at it more closely, the scarf didn't seem like it was part of the inventory of the store and he has never seen it before in some magazines or news articles he saw on the internet. What was more perplexing was the fitting room was seemingly empty when the employee checked it.
Okay, this was too much of a prank or coincidence, Ryu thought. He needed to investigate this before the rumors escalated or worse. First things first, he noticed a phone fell on the floor, so it should be a good start to investigate.
"Excuse me, Mina," Ryosuke said to the employee. "Sorry to butt in, but I want to ask a few questions. Did you use your phone while cleaning the phone? And was that scarf there or was dropped by the culprit?"
He was unsure if they could answer his questions. Regardless, he needed a closer look if he wanted to investigate this further.
"Manager, I'll check inside the fitting room. Make sure that no one gets close to the fitting room regardless if they are an employee or customer."
Even if the manager could protest or not, Ryosuke entered the fitting room with the scarf in hand and closed the curtain behind him. He didn't want to be too private, but there was no way he could investigate this without his Digimon's help.
"Sorry to keep you two waiting," Ryosuke whispered as he took out his Digivice and faced the screen in front of him. "Realize."
The Digivice's screen glowed and it released his Koromon and Kapurimon from it. The two looked around, confused at the dark, cramped room they were in.
"Why are we in the small room?" Taiyo asked.
"It's a fitting room. It's only meant for anyone to try out new clothes before they buy them," Ryosuke quietly explained. "But right now, this is the source of the smell you picked up. Can you still detect it, Taiyo?"
Taiyo sniffed around but frowned. "I'm not sure. But I'm sure it's nearby."
Ken, on the other hand, noticed something in his Tamer's hand. "...What is that?"
Ryosuke wasn't surprised at his sudden question, but he was surprised at his sudden interest in the strange scarf. "One of the employees here found it. It seemed like someone used it to strangle her. It doesn't look like it came from this store. But can you check it just in case, Taiyo? And a bit more quietly? There are some people outside the fitting room and I can't have you be exposed to the public."
Taiyo nodded with a smile. "Sure, I can do that." The Koromon started to sniff at the scarf, trying to find anything strange in it.
Ryosuke then turned to Ken next. "Can you look around and see if there are traces of Digimon or any hostile intent against the employees?"
"I will." Ken then quietly looked around as he followed his instructions.
Despite all of this, Ryosuke was concerned. From Mina's statement alone, someone deliberately tried to hurt her. If that was so, then he had a feeling the culprit would return again to harass the employees and customers from here.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 14, 2023 1:47:49 GMT
As Ryosuke began questioning Mina, she looked back to her manager and then back to Ryosuke. "I... I wasn't... Doing anything like that!" She insisted, blatantly lying. She put her hands around her neck, as if the removed scarf were still there. "And I don't know what happened... I just remember the cloth going around my neck, after that I panicked and don't remember anything else... I'm sorry..."
Well, that seemed to be bust. Ryosuke went inside the fitting room, while the manager could barely follow along. "Huh? Oh, yeah, sure. Just holler if you need something." Clearly he had manager things to do, or something, as Ryosuke and his companions could hear the manager tell the employees to get back to work, and assure the customers that everything was alright, so if Ryosuke was worried about any of that part in particular, that might make him feel a little better.
Ryosuke was quick to act and plan, and wasted no time in gathering information. Taiyo sniffed the scarf, and while there wasn't anything particularly unusual about it, it was definitely comprised of data, rather than and human-world material. It was most likely either part of a Digimon that had been removed, or some creation made from a Digimon's ability. Either way, it was clear that Ryosuke, Taiyo, and Ken were the right ones for the job.
As for Ken, he wouldn't feel much malice from anyone outside the fitting room. Yet, he would feel hostility towards the inside of the fitting room's curtain itself, as a eerie voice, barely audible, whispered, "Unforgivable..."
And it was at that moment a silver gleam would shoot out of the curtain, to what looked to be a giant sewing needle the length of a baton shot out directly towards Taiyo. It was a good thing that the Kapurimon was on high alert, because it looked like it'd do a good deal of damage to the poor, unsuspecting Koromon.
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Post by Ryosuke Yoshida on Feb 17, 2023 18:12:31 GMT
Ryosuke sighed. Guess asking more questions to Mina won't help him further in his investigation. At the very least, he might as well push forward with his Digimon and see if there was anything they could find.
Speaking of which, Taiyo finished sniffing the scarf and turned to his Tamer. "Ryosuke! I got it!"
"What do you mean?" Ryosuke asked. "Did you find something from the muffler scarf?"
"Yeah, yeah! I can't tell whose scarf it was, but I know this came from the Digital World or a Digimon who wore it. I can smell signs of Digimon on the scarf."
"A Digimon?!" Ryosuke quickly caught himself by covering his mouth, realizing he raised his voice when he shouldn't do so while in a public area. "If that's the case, then there is a chance they might attack again if we let them be. We need to incapacitate them before they leave the fitting room."
"How are we gonna do that?" Taiyo asked. "We don't know where the Digimon is."
Ryosuke hummed as he stared at his Digivice. "If we can scan it with my Digivice, it might be a bit easier for us to find it. We already know that it already has the ability to store you guys in while we're in public areas."
"That we don't know, Ryosuke. We're just as confused as you do."
He sighed at Taiyo's answer, which was a good point. They were still young children (at least he thought they are considering their behavior and how they were hatched from the egg a month ago) and there was no way they would know more about the Digivice and other Digimon.
But just as he could say anything else, Ryosuke suddenly heard a faded voice. He could barely recognize what it was saying and just as he could trying to decipher it, he heard Ken's voice.
"Ryosuke, Taiyo! Duck!"
When he heard it, Ryosuke turned around and gasped to see a large sewing needle coming toward his Koromon. But before it could reach it, his Kapurimon jumped in front of his surrogate brother and took the needle. Thankfully, his metal helmet minimized the damage Ken endured, but he ended up falling on the floor after he did the deed. Taiyo froze at what he witnessed. His serious surrogate brother shielded him from a large needle that should have killed him if he didn't do that.
Ryosuke, on the other hand, rushed to Ken's side and quietly shouted, "Ken! Are you okay? Say something!"
Ryosuke waited nervously, fearing that he might lose one of his Digimon so early and young. Thankfully, Ken's red eyes slowly opened, and said, "S-Sorry, Ryosuke, Taiyo. I-I'm okay."
Ryosuke sighed in relief once he saw him opening his eyes. "Thank goodness, Ken," he said. "But until you are strong enough, please don't do that again. I can't risk letting kids, human or Digimon, get hurt themselves because of me."
"Again, sorry..." Ken muttered. "But forget about me for now. Someone's here."
"Yeah, I noticed. Rest up." With Ken still in his arms, Ryosuke stood up and shouted, "Alright, Digimon! We know you're out there! Your days of haunting these fitting rooms ends here! Show yourself or I'm going to approve removing them this instant!"
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Post by Deleted on Mar 7, 2023 15:23:28 GMT
"Unforgivable..." The voice repeated as the needle retracted back inside the curtain, merging with the fabric like it was absorbing a droplet of water. As the gang recouped themselves from the sudden attack, they could hear the creature whisper the same words over and over again. But Ryosuke gave the creature his ultimatum, the whispers would abruptly cease. "S-s-stop your yelling... I'm right in f-front of you..." The The curtains stretched themselves out to reveal the image of a bizarre-looking monster, its large eyes, containing no apparent malice, betrayed the vitriol in its soft voice as it stared down at the Koromon it had just attempted to assassinate. "G-get that f-f-filthy, n-naked creature out of my sight... It... It d-doesn't belong in this world!" And with that, the muffler scarf would start to move on its own, lunging at Taiyo and, if unperturbed, would attempt to wrap itself around the baby Digimon's body like a constrictor snake. All the while, the creature would continue to chant the word, "Unforgivable..."
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Post by Ryosuke Yoshida on Mar 11, 2023 19:10:12 GMT
Ryosuke grew paranoid after shouting his ultimatum to their mysterious attacker. He, Taiyo, and Ken watched as the needle started to float and seemingly absorbed into the fabric of the curtain. He knew that wasn't the end of its attack and it was only the beginning. His Kapurimon was already prepared to defend both him and Taiyo despite his small stature, but was it enough to stop their attacker?
But then, the curtain stretched opened and a small and bizarre humanoid creature emerged from it. To Ryosuke's eyes, he was a bit disturbed just by looking at the creature in his first impression. But then again, Taiyo said before that it could be a Digimon, so that must be the culprit behind the rumored hauntings. Now how would they stop it? He thought.
He took out his Digivice and scanned it. He was able to learn Taiyo and Ken's species with one of the features installed in it, so why not against a mysterious Digimon that looked like a ragdoll?
Once he scanned the Digimon, his eyes widened to see what he found from the Analyzer. "Dressmon? And a Rookie-level?! It's one level stronger than Ken and Taiyo! What's more, this fitting room is too cramped for them to fight in." He then stared at the Digimon as he noticed her muttering. "What's more, it's muttering that it was unforgivable. Just what is it implying?"
But just as he could figure out their next step to stop the strange Digimon, the muffler scarf on Ryosuke's hand suddenly came alive and started to wrap itself around Taiyo like a constrictor snake. Ken tried to stop it, but it was too late as he and Ryosuke watched the poor Koromon suffocate by the scarf that was controlled by Dressmon.
"Taiyo!" Ryosuke shouted, not caring about the volume of his voice anymore after seeing one of his partner Digimon suffer. He then turned to Dressmon and growled in anger. "Let him go! He has no grudge against you!"
"R-Ryo... Ken... H-help..." Taiyo pleaded in pain.
Hearing this made Ken growl, fully snapped out of his quiet persona, and quickly attempted to charge at the Digimon with his metallic helmet pointed at it. "Hard Tackle!"
Whether his attack succeed or not, Ryosuke was still horrified to see Taiyo in pain. He knew he couldn't do nothing at this point unless he wanted him to die. Without any hesitation, the Tamer quickly rushed to Taiyo's side and tried to yank the muffler scarf off of his Koromon.
"Ryosuke!" Ken shouted as he noticed his Tamer's reckless charge.
"Don't worry about me! Just get away from Dressmon while I save Taiyo!" Ryosuke ordered.
"B-But..." Ken looked at Taiyo and then, at Dressmon. If only he had a sword and a pair of arms, then he would help them with no problem...
As for Taiyo, he noticed Ryosuke trying to remove the scarf and muttered, "R-Ryosuke..."
"Don't talk. I'm going to get you out of here," Ryosuke said as he continued his attempts to save the young Digimon. "Don't worry, I'm here."
Unfortunately, he was so focused on Taiyo that he exposed himself to an opening that Dressmon may or may not take advantage of.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 6, 2023 3:52:22 GMT
Since it had merged with the fabric, the Dressmon was most definitely a hittable target. Ken's tackle slammed into the dressing room curtain as he too was enveloped in cloth while the Dressmon let out a soft grunt as if they had just bumped into a dresser or they stubbed their toe. It obviously wasn't very effective, but it did get the Dressmon's attention for a brief period of time.
Time enough for Ryosuke to get to Taiyo and start unwrapping his little blob of a buddy. With the outside help... as well as a pair of handy-dandy opposable thumbs, Ryosuke was able to stop the muffler from strangling the poor Koromon. Besides, it'd be a jerk move for the author to actually try and murder a literal baby. But human world adults? They seemed to be fair game as the Dressmon's upper body appeared out of the fabric with its large, pointy needle in hand, its metallic tip glimmering under the fluorescent lighting.
The stab itself wasn't intended to murder the poor human, as that would also be a jerk move.
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