CHOSEN ANSWER: To save everyone else

"I'm doing this to save everyone else here, Etce," I reasoned, staring at his straight in the eyes, hoping that it would intimidate him enough. "If I don't do anything about this killer running around the house, who knows when he'll strike next,"

I crossed my arms. "Given the opportunity that I have, I might as well do that now."

"And that is very much appreciated, Agent 3," Daniel commended, walking towards me with GG behind him. "I knew you guys were alright when you called us cool,"

"We're really grateful that you're taking up the responsibility, 3," The pink inkling added, smiling as well. "Thanks, really,"

*Gabriel Gaming and Failboat will remember this.

In the midst of the conversation, I could see Etce's surprised face. Aha, take that, Etcesona. My triumph was short-lived, however, as his facial expression hardened once more and he crossed his arms.

"Well, given how you've been pretty nice to us so far, I guess I can say that I'm..." The octoling hesitated, searching for the right words. "Glad you know what you're doing," He declared. Though he was still stern, his eyes softened.

*Etcesona will remember this.

As the atmosphere in the room returned to being tense, 4 took a step towards the gang of Splatubers. "Alright, everyone." She announced, hands on her hips, clearly taking charge. "3 and I will take a look at the living room again. Until we come back, you all stay here, okay?"

At those words, Vic started to panic again. "Wait, how can we be so sure that we're fine in here?!" She spoke at such a fast rate that she began to take short breaths between each word. "What if the killer comes in here, and-then-and-then kills us all one by one b-by one-"

Before she could continue, Queen placed a hand around her shoulders, gently comforting her. "Vic! Calm down..." She spoke with the same amount of warmth as a mother would. "Hyperventilating isn't going to help. Just...breathe,"

Vic took in heavy, deeper breaths, her legs giving way, causing her to crouch down a little. "Okay, okay, okay... Okay..." She muttered to herself.

I could only frown sadly at her predicament. Truth be told, everyone else in the room appeared just as nervous as she was. "Queen's right, panicking isn't going to help anyone. Trust me, I will find an explanation for this,"

"Trust her, Ms VicVillon," 8 perked up, stepping forward bravely. "And you can trust me, as well. I'll stay back to keep an eye on everyone, 3," She informed me, resolute in her eyes.

A smile found a way to my lips. "Thanks, 8," I thanked her, a small sliver of pride shining within me, before I turned to 4. We both simultaneously nodded before we headed back to the living room together.

~~~~~

"Poor Fyrus..." 4 mused softly, her somber eyebrows creasing as we strolled back to the main hall. "He seemed like such a nice guy, too. Honestly, I can't think of any reason why someone would want to kill him,"

Her amber eyes could easily summarise everything she was feeling. For a girl like 4 who was really transparent about everything, the emotions she felt were easily contagious; I could feel my heart sinking too. "It is pretty sad," I admitted. "But that's all the more reason for us to find out why, and who did it to him,"

"I guess you're right, as always, 3," 4 replied in agreement. "I just hope that no one else disappears or... dies tonight," She was visibly struggling to utter that 'd' word, and I could understand why. "The last thing we really need for a night like this is a catastrophe,"

"Not to mention how this is going to change them..." Despite not experiencing the loss of a loved one, it was no closed secret that the others were going to have a hard time moving on from their dear friend's death.

I sighed. "Let's just focus on finding who did this,"

As we arrived at the living room again, I told 4 that I would be examining where Fyrus died. She then informed me that she was going to look around the whole living room as well as the many hallways stemming from the place. With our tasks assigned, we both got to work.

~~~~~

On the ground laid three noticeable things, too little for me to use for any deductions at all. Still, I took a quick glance over everything.

Fyrus' black beanie; there was nothing too important whatsoever with it. Though I could recognize it from Inkopolis, I could not remember its name. Given that the murderer had no need for the thing, I decided on my own to pick it up. Maybe I'll find the chance to give it to one of his close friends later.

A splotch of golden ink near the coffee table; surprisingly much smaller than I thought it would be. As I recalled the mechanical sounds and thumping noises that I heard when the lights went out, it hit me that Fyrus could have been hit once, then he screamed, then got dragged away... The theory felt implausible, however.

Finally, I took a glance under the coffee table which, thankfully, was not too low-lying for me to crouch down for. Under the black panels, my eyes spotted a white item that stood out from the dark carpet: a piece of paper?

I reached in and grabbed it, standing up again. "Hey, 4! I found something," I called for my junior as I unfolded the memo in my hands, revealing a handwritten note in the exact same writing as our invitations...

"Read this as if your life depends on it! One of you is too cryptic to be telling the truth."

"Cryptic?" I muttered to myself, confused at that diction. "What the heck could he be talking about?"

4 shot me a strange look ."Bold of you to assume that the killer is a 'he',"

All I could do in response was look at her back with the same expression she had. "Is that really necessary, 4?"

"You never know!" She shrugged nonchalantly before her tone returned to being a serious one. "But about that, yeah. I have no clue. Maybe those splatubers know a thing about it?"

I nodded. "Let's get back to them,"

~~~~~

8's eyes brightened up as we walked back into the Picture Room. "You're back! Did you guys find anything?"

"We sure did. It's not a lot, but it's something," I informed her. "How were these guys by the way?"

8's head lowered at that. "Everyone is on edge. They all keep speaking amongst themselves. I couldn't talk with them no matter how hard I tried,"

Meanwhile, Jay trotted to us. "You two are back! Did you find anything about Fyrus' death?"

"We did but..." My hand made its way to the back of my head as I sheepishly sighed. "We can't understand it-"

"Let's hear it then," The octoling proposed, glancing at everyone in the room, who have noticed our arrival.

Without a moment of hesitation, I took out the note we found. "Underneath the coffee table where Fyrus died, I found this weird note. It's written in the same handwriting as our invitations-"

"So whoever wrote it is the same guy who invited us?" Callie predicted. I could only nod in response.

"That's right, Callie. And they start the message with the same upside down text on our invitations: 'Read this as if your life depends on it',"

Vian tilted his head. "I'll be honest, I don't understand what this guy's trying to tell us with those words, but... continue."

"The message on this note is, 'One of you is too cryptic to be telling the truth'. 4 and I couldn't figure out what that meant, so we thought you guys would." I finished, pocketing the note.

One by one, the splatubers spoke up. "You think this is talking about... channel lore?" Skul suggested, getting some nods from the crowd.

"Channel lore? What's that?" 8 asked.

Sagaci was the first to answer. "You know the stories that you read in fairytales and stuff like that? Just imagine that, but this time, involving real people." She explained. "Lore for any content creator basically means that you're trying to tell a story through the videos you make and post,"

"And the audience is left to decide whether or not something big is happening." Daniel finished. "It's kind of like this thing that we're doing right now,"

I froze. "Excuse me, what?"

"What?" He replied, his voice full of confusion again. Maybe that was my imagination.

"What does this have to do with 'cryptic' people though?" 4 inquired, trying to get a clearer idea of the topic.

"See, that's when content creators like us tend to act like when making lore," Vian answered her. "We try to act like nothing weird is happening even though something clearly is,"

"And depending on how much our videos show about what's happening, the more 'cryptic' we are, the more tension," Etce spoke up.

All of the sudden, there was a silence in the room that no one dared to interrupt. Slowly but surely I could see everyone diverting their gazes to the last two that spoke, the purple inkling Vian and the navy blue octoling Etce. A lump formed in my throat; this could not be good.

"Hey, now that I think about it..." Callie wondered aloud, clearly in the earshot of both of them. "Weren't you two part of something really big on both of your channels some time ago?"

"Yeah!" Sagaci added, turning to the slicked-haired inkling. "Vian, didn't you post a bunch of videos about... who was it again-"

"Future Vian! You were posting about Future Vian!" Vic finished, staring daggers at him. "And you were hurting Bridgett so much in those videos that people got really REALLY mad at you, you told us!"

Vian had his hands up in surrender. "Woah woah woah, now hold on, that was-"

"And what about Etce?" Skul cut him off, shifting my attention to the octoling. "You had that really strange saga on Twitter too, don't think we didn't notice,"

"What are you talking about-"

"It was something about your character Marshall, wasn't it?" GG asked, hands on his hips as if he was demanding for answers. "Your posts were all... weird and cryptic, and you weren't around for our discord calls too!"

Etce retaliated quickly. "Now hold on! That's a whole different story!"

"Etce is right," Vian quickly agreed, hoping to knock some sense into their friends. "Our channels have nothing to do with this right now, you can't be thinking that we killed Fyrus, could you?!"

That line got me to think. In my mind, I was leaning on the fence; on one hand, what the splatubers were saying was quite reasonable, and if the killer really was cryptic then maybe it was always part of his nature, even before coming to the mansion. On the other hand, the note was clearly made for us to find it, so unless our killer is an idiot (which I highly doubted), he or she... or they wouldn't have staged something to call themselves out like this.

There were a lot of pieces missing but I just couldn't figure out how to piece them together...

"Agent 3!"

A deep male voice called me out of my thoughts, snapping me back to the reality of a glasses-wearing octoling, Jay, looking at me. "The note said that 'one of us' is cryptic, right?" He demanded, an angry look on his face. All I could do was nod.

"Well then," Callie began, crossing her arms. "Maybe we should start with these two," She suggested, her eyes pointing arrows at the two 'guilty' cephalopods.

"I'm telling you, we didn't do anything-!"

"And how are we supposed to trust that?!" Vic cut in. "The note specifically suspected you two, and I don't want to take my chances,"

The more I listened, the more I wanted to scream until Mount Nantai fell down. Could they even hear what they were saying? Was I the only one capable of logical reasoning at this point? Maybe this whole murder thing had gotten to their heads...

In search for help, Vian tried turning to GG, pleading him. "Gab, you know me, right? You know I would never do something like this!" He begged. "Please, tell them that I have done nothing wrong!"

Under his hat, GG hid his eyes. It was the first time that I saw him so quiet. Really, this was nothing like the GG that I met back in the living room.

" ... Oh... I see."

8 bit her lip, worried about the outcome of their squabbling. "This cannot be good..."

"But, it's our best lead so far, so honestly, what else can we do?" 4 faced me with concerned eyes and I easily could echo them back. My eyebrows furrowed at the thought of what could happen.

Boy was this going to be a long night.

Soon enough, 8 tapped my shoulder. "So... who do you want to interrogate first, 3?"

~~~

~ A DECISION TO MAKE ~

(Underlined and bold indicates the final answer determined by my Twitter poll)

Interrogate Viantastic

Interrogate Etcesona

(Note: There was a tie in the voting. Due to this unforeseen result, I had to change my story a little...)