The Game at Carousel: A Horror Movie LitRPG

"Nothing has walked in the bowling alley in the last forty minutes," Michael said. "Are we even sure that this stuff happens when players aren't around? Maybe if we went in there—"

"It happens whether players are there or not," Andrew said. "You know that. I know you want to find that omen as much as I do, but you have to be patient. This is a large undertaking."

We waited at the corner of the street across from the bowling alley, in a place where there was very little activity of any kind, whether it be NPCs or omens. I sat under a tree and scanned around, looking for danger. Kimberly had brought the baby doll along, but it hadn't screamed even once.

Antoine came over and sat next to me.

"So, you got any ideas?" he asked. "People are getting a little antsy."

Truthfully, I wasn’t sure, and if I was being honest, I was starting to believe that the omen we were looking for might not be in the bowling alley.

"When we talked to Sal, he said that Stray Dawn was set at a mansion in southern Carousel and that the town footage would be southeast Carousel," I said. Like eastern Carousel, there were other sections of Carousel that acted as separate towns in storylines.

"Right," Antoine said. "You think we need to go look over there? In southern Carousel?"

I shook my head. "No," I said. "I like our theory. The bowlers played basically every storyline within their level range that existed in this area."

"So, do we need to fan out?" he asked. "Figure out where the omen is? Maybe they left the bowling alley in search of new storylines?"

"Yes, but it's more than that," I said. "If the story is mostly set in south and southeast Carousel, I imagine it doesn’t start here because this is basically central, west-central Carousel."

"Yeah, nowhere near where the movie is set," he said. "So what does that mean?"

"Well, if the omen is found here as we theorized, but the story is not triggered here, it could be like those in the library, where as soon as you trigger it, a bunch of NPCs start pushing you toward wherever the setting is, one way or another, through bits of dialogue or some sort of narrative device. Or…"

I paused to think.

"Or?" Antoine asked.

"Or… you could just purchase the omen over here and run it somewhere else," I said.

He nodded enthusiastically.

"A purchasable omen," he repeated. "So we need to look for a shop."

"That's what I'm thinking," I said. "But again, it could just be an omen that is placed in a silly area. Places like the library or even the hospital sometimes had a bunch of omens that weren't set in those places, but that was kind of their gimmick. That was not the norm necessarily."

Antoine stood up and quickly raised his voice. "Everybody, gather up. We’ve got a plan."

Everyone was eager to do something other than wait and watch a bowling alley, so they came from where they had been waiting.

"Riley thinks that the omen might be a purchasable omen, so we need to find stores nearby where the bowlers might have found the omen we're looking for."

We didn’t even have to look.

"What about the For Your Life Flea Market?" Kimberly said. "A block over, there's a whole lot with a bunch of different booths selling clothes and furniture. We could get some more chairs."

Of course, Kimberly knew where the nearest shopping venue was.

"We’ll start there," Antoine said. "But we’re not buying chairs from a flea market. We’re going to steal them from storylines like proper players."

Interior decorating was a high-risk, low-reward pastime in Carousel.

It didn't take long to find the flea market that Kimberly was talking about.

I barely even remembered it being there because the last time we had seen it was when we were loaded into a bus, running away from the black snow, and all the omens were deactivating like bubble wrap popping in a microwave.

"Alright, stay with me," I said, and I must have said it with some intensity because they all got really close to me. When I moved, they moved.

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That was a good thing because the flea market was filled with omens, cursed and haunted objects, as well as lots of trope items. It also had tons of old-looking props and vintage clothes.

"Alright, at first glance, it looks like the omens are constrained to the shelves and the tables, so don't touch anything unless you've really given it a good look," I said. "Even then, don't touch anything."

There were probably lots of items that we could have bought there, but I wasn't looking for them, and frankly, we were running low on cash from our recent shopping spree.

The flea market was one of my favorite types of places in Carousel, in its own way, because a lot of the omens had NPCs interacting with them and adding little narrative flair.

A woman was haggling to purchase an old desk, claiming that it was her father's but that it was sold in an estate sale without her knowledge. She didn’t have enough for the purchase. The storyline was called The Bureau of Investigation, and it was a pretty difficult one. It was triggered by bringing the desk to your base and unlocking its clues, whatever that meant. I liked it because I thought it was a fine name for a storyline and a beautiful desk.

"This is where we need to take Cassie," Kimberly said.

I nodded. "Yeah, there are lots of cursed and haunted things here that she could use for her Curios and Trinkets trope."

"Well, that and the clothes here are just her style," she said, eyeing a clothing rack that looked like it was taken from the set of an early '90s counterculture movie.

There were plants for sale, including one that was clearly moving under its own power—an omen for a movie called Gorticulture.

As I looked around with a mix of panic (because I was surrounded by dangerous omens) and amazement (because I was also surrounded by really cool omens), I started to hear a conversation getting heated.

"I told you," one of the voices said, "I am not here to purchase paintings. I am here to sell paintings; I buy mine from estate auctions and other events where I can check their provenance. I do not have anyone here to authenticate this specimen. If you would like to take it six blocks that way, there is an antique shop that might have more interest."

As if someone selling paintings at a flea market would care about provenance.

"Just 60 bucks," another voice said. "Come on, you're already set up to sell paintings. Just look at it. You don't need it authenticated; it's beautiful, it's an antique. It has to be. It was in an ancient house."

"If you've stolen this painting, do you think that makes me more likely to purchase it?" the first voice asked.

I found myself drawn to the exchange, so I led the others toward the back of the flea market, where a woman had an entire rack of paintings and other paintings stacked up on easels and desks.

A grubby-looking man was holding a medium-sized painting and talking to a woman wearing a large hat—just NPCs reading off a script.

As we approached, the man turned to look at us, and I saw the ancient painting in his hands. It was of a beautiful, regal woman—a close-up portrait. While I'm sure that she was quite a dame, what drew my attention was her necklace.

It was a silver vial on a silver chain. I wasn't sure what it might contain, but it looked like some liquid, like mercury in a thermometer. It was entrancing, and it was an omen.

We had found it.

Stray Dawn. Its danger level was, "Honey, I’m scared." The omen was triggered by bringing the painting to thehistoric Southeast Carousel and placing it in the back of a wood-panel station wagon parked on Green Street.

"That's it," I said. I grabbed the folded-up missing posters from my pocket for Logan and Avery. Sure enough, they showed up on the red wallpaper next to the omen and its information.

We had figured it out.

"Holy hell, we found it," Antoine said, and as he stared at it, like me, he was entranced by the necklace. In fact, as I looked around, everyone was.

"You like it?" the man said. He had no name on the red wallpaper other than Miscreant.

Now it was Kimberly's turn. She had good Moxie and actual people skills to go along with it.

"We're just here to browse," she said. "That is a nice painting."

"You're right, it is," the Miscreant said. "Tell you what, 70 bucks, and it's yours."

Kimberly shrugged. "Like I said, we're just looking."

"Oh, come on. I saw the way you looked at it," the Miscreant said. "Tell you what, take it off my hands, and we can do 65."

Kimberly said, "No, thank you," and turned to the NPC who was selling all the other paintings.

"I'm looking for something pastoral, almost. You know, a painting of nature," she said.

"I think I have a couple that you might be interested in. Just give me one moment," the woman said.

"Look," the Miscreant said, trying to get Kimberly's attention. "This is the painting you want, I can tell. You almost look like the lady in the picture."

In fact, I had not even spotted that, but Kimberly did kind of look like the woman in the picture. But the painting was an oil painting, and it wasn't exactly fine on the details of anything but the necklace. It could have been any blonde woman, but after he said it looked like Kimberly, I couldn't help but notice it.

"Then I guess all I really need is a mirror, then, huh?" Kimberly said.

"Don't be like that," the Miscreant said. "I'll tell you what, just give me what you got on you. Come on, look at it—it's a beautiful painting, one-of-a-kind."

Only then did Kimberly glance at the painting and look it over.

"30," she said, "and that's just because I like the frame."

"We're not going all the way down to 30. What were we at, 65?"

"I thought you said 60," Kimberly said.

"I said 65," the Miscreant said.

"And I said 30," Kimberly said.

"60," the man said.

Kimberly shook her head. "30."

"55."

"30."

"No, you have to go up. That’s how this works," the man said.

"35," Kimberly said.

"I'm staying at 55," the man said.

Kimberly turned back to the woman selling all the other paintings and said, "Do you have any frames like that one?" Then she pointed at the frame with the painting of the omen.

"I'm sure I could find something similar," the woman said.

"Oh, bull," the Miscreant said. "50, then."

"Hmmm… I only have 40 dollars," Kimberly said.

The man growled in frustration and looked up at the air. "Oh, all right. But know that you are really hurting my bottom line for no reason. You don't know what I risked to get this thing."

The man reluctantly handed over the painting, and Kimberly handed over a stack of coins in large denominations.

"Nice doing business with you," she said.

"Nice doing business with you… ripping out my guts," the man growled as he walked away.

And just like that, we had finally accomplished what we had set out to do, what we had walked all over Carousel for.

We had the omen for Stray Dawn.

It was time for the planning to really begin.

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