Saturday, November 21, 2020

Hyperdimension Neptunia: Land of the Goddesses: Ep. 5-Celestia.

Episode 5: Celestia.
Purple Heart opens her eyes. She is hanging on the wall with her limbs in shackles. There is a gate blocking the entrance to the room. She turns to her left, and sees Black Heart and the others in the same predicament. She calls out to the others to wake them up.

Purple Heart: Noire! Guys! Wake up! 

Black Heart wakes up first, followed by the others.

Black Heart: Huh... What happened?
Green Heart: It seems that we've been captured, and are now in a dungeon.
White Heart: You don't say?

IF wiggles her right hand, but then she and the group hear footsteps coming towards them. It's the witch, Arfoire, from before. She opens the gate and walks towards them.

Arfoire: Welcome home, my four goddesses. 
Purple Heart: Home?
Arfoire: Yes. This is Celestia. To be clear, this is the Basilicom. Rei Ryghts and I use to live her years ago. This is also where Histoire and I created the four of you. 
Purple Heart: Histoire... Give her back!

Arfoire giggles.

Arfoire: I think she's better off with Rei and me. The last time she was with you, someone kidnapped her.

Purple Heart grits her teeth. 

Arfoire: You girls better get use to being her for the rest of your lives because you're not going anywhere. It's unfortunate that your human counterparts are stuck in this mess as well. You never should have brought them along.
Compa: It's better to be stuck here with them than let you destroy our home. 
Arfoire: Oh, really? And how is that working out for you? Hmm? 
Compa: ...We'll get out.
Arfoire: Good luck with that. I took all of your weapons while you were passed out. You're going to have to hope for a miracle to break out of here. Oh, and don't worry about your lands. Rei and I will take good care of them.

Arfoire turns around, and begins to leave the room.

Purple Heart: Wait!

Arfoire stops.

Purple Heart: Why are you making these monsters? 
Arfoire: Well, in order to take over any land, you'll need an army right? With the goddesses out of the way, the monsters will destroy the four lands, along with every man, woman, and child. Then, Rei and I can reshape Gameindustri into one land again by using Histoire's powers. The monsters also served as a great distraction for you four goddesses while I snuck into your Basilicom and kidnapped Histoire.
Green Heart: But how can Histoire help you?
Arfoire: Histoire is a tome, a book that records the history of the entire world. She is time itself. That is the power that Rei and I gave her when we created her. However, we can also use Histoire to rewrite the past. I can write all of you girls out of history, and place myself and Rei back where we belong: as your lords and masters! The past will be erased, and a new future can begin.
Black Heart: Heh! Seems to me you're just trying to hide your failures from when you two were in charge!

Arfoire turns around and slaps Black Heart!

Arfoire: I don't know what my past self was thinking, creating you four girls so that you can take Rei's and mine's place. You don't ever let a girl do a woman's job.
Purple Heart: What did you do? What happened that led you to do this?
Arfoire: ...Let'a just say I said something that hurt someone else, and I ended up causing a lot of heartache and damage in the process. The humans became afraid of me and Rei, which lead to the Sharecite losing its power. The world began to fall apart, which lead to the creation of you four and your lands. 
Green Heart: I get it. We were created to help regain the people's trust in the goddesses again.
Arfoire: And that would make your Sharecites more powerful, leading to a new age than was better than the previous one. At least, that was the idea. How stupid was I to think that could work.
Purple Heart: You should give your past self more credit. I think that plan can work.
Arfoire: Yeah... Right.
Black Heart: Just what did you say that caused all that damage anyway? I mean, words aren't weapons.
Arfoire: Really? Well, let's just say, Noire, I took a page out of your book and it didn't end well.
Black Heart: "My book?"
Arfoire: Hiding your true feelings can prevent you from finding true happiness. 

Arfoire turns around and leaves the room. Black Heart is left bewildered. She looks at Purple Heart, and then turns her head away when Purple Heart looks at her.

IF starts to wriggle her hand again. A bracelet on her right hand turns into a pickpocketing knife. She inserts it into the lock keeping the shackles on her wrists closed. 

IF: Compa's right. We'll be free in a bit. Arfoire didn't take "all" of our weapons... 
Green Heart: You're full of tricks, aren't you, Iffy?

IF blushes.

IF: I-I-It never hurts to have a secret weapon in case of emergencies. 

She wriggles her hand a little more until she hears a clicking sound. The lock on her shackles falls down onto the ground, and the shackles open. Once her hands are free, she leans down and opens the lock to the shackles constraining her feet. She jumps down to the ground and begins to free the others. Once the other women are freed of their bonds, they try to come up with a plan.

Purple Heart: Okay. First, we'll need to get our weapons back. Second, we need to find Histoire.
White Heart: Then we can take down Arfoire and Rei Ryghts.
Purple Heart: I don't know. I think we'll need to regroup and come up with a better plan. We should just get Histoire and escape.
Green Heart: I'll have to agree with Neptune. We don't know how powerful those two are. They are the original goddesses after all. 
White Heart: Hmph. Fine. I guess I'm outnumbered here.
IF: Then let's make our move.

IF walks towards the gate, and pickpockets the lock. The gate opens, and the ladies move out. They walk down a hallway that leads to a room blocked off by a gate on the left, and a staircase on the right. Their weapons are in the room. IF cracks the lock to the gate, and they gang retrieves their weapons. They walk up the staircase, and see a door. It's slightly ajar. There are two voices coming from inside the room. One of them is Arfoire, but the other is unknown. It is a woman's. The women peak through the door. They see Arfoire standing up, talking to a woman who is sitting down in a chair next to a table. A book is on the table.

IF: Is that Rei Ryghts?
Purple Heart: She's wearing goddess-like attire... Yeah, that must be her.

Purple Heart turns to the book on the table.

Purple Heart: That's Histoire on the table. 

Rei Ryghts: Is it finished?
Arfoire: Yes. However, I still think it would be best to just kill them.
Rei Ryghts: I know you see them as a mistake, but I think we can use them to our advantage in case we can't use Histoire to change the past. If we can brainwash them, we can use them to help us take over Gameindustri. 
Arfoire: Hmm... I don't know. I say we should just use Histoire to erase them from history.
Rei Ryghts: Every weapon we can get our hands on will ensure our chances of success. 
Black Heart: "Weapons?"

The other women shush Black Heart. 

Rei Ryghts: Trust me on this. We always need a plan b in case plan a doesn't work. Besides, once we take over Gameindustri again, we'll erase the goddesses anyway. Right now, though, we need all the help we can get.
Arfoire: ...Okay... I trust you.
Rei Ryghts: Just focus on the mission. Once we take control of the four lands, we can return to the glory days. 

Rei Ryghts stands up and walks over to Arfoire. She puts her hand on Arfoire's cheek.

Rei Ryghts: Just you and me.

Rei Ryghts goes in for a kiss. Black Heart gasps. Purple Heart puts her hand on Black Heart's mouth, but it's too late. Rei Ryghts and Arfoire turn towards the door. 

Purple Heart: Attack!

The group bursts through the door and attack the two goddesses. All, except for Purple Heart. She lunges towards the table and grabs Histoire. Arfoire notices. She leaps towards Purple Heart! Purple Heart kicks Arfoire in the skull. Arfoire bends backwards from the blow. Black Heart swings her sword and hits Arfoire in the abdomen. She lunges back and hits the wall. 

Rei Ryghts: Arfoire!

Rei Ryghts raises her hands and lightning appears out of her finger tips!

Rei Ryghts: I'm going to fry you all to a crisp!

White and Green Heart are caught by lightning. Black, and Purple, Heart run towards Rei and try to attack her. Lightning catches Black Heart, but Purple Heart manages to elude the attack. Purple Heart kicks the table towards Rei and it hits her in the back. She falls to the ground, along with Histoire. The lightning disappears, freeing the three goddesses. Purple Heart picks up Histoire.

Purple Heart: Let's go!

The group runs towards the door. Arfoire gets up and sees the group fleeing. She opens her mouth and fire emerges from it! It heads straight towards the group! Green Heart uses her spear to deflect the flames from her and the others. The fire turns to the left, hitting the wall on the other side. Sunlight comes through the opening. 

Green Heart: There's out exit!

The group turns around, and heads for the opening in the wall. Arfoire chants a spell, and dark magic comes out of her hand. The dark energy heads towards the group! White Heart turns around, and starts to twirl her axe. A snowstorm appears and collides with the dark magic. An explosion appears, creating smoke that covers the entire room! The group fly through the opening in the wall. They were in a castle. They head back down to Gameindustri. 

Arfoire and Rei clear the smoke and peak through the hole in the wall. The group is gone.

Rei Ryghts: Okay. This didn't go entirely according to plan.
Arfoire: Don't worry. We can get Histoire back. I gave them a little "going away present" while they were locked up in the dungeon.