If you're safe today, you'll be getting $25. Let's get on to our biggest elimination ceremony yet!
The first ones safe today are Copper Golem, Glare, and Mooshroom. They didn't get any votes.
Copper Golem is suprised. "Wait, Allay isn't the first safe? There must be a mistake!" he exclaims.
Allay, who is sitting next to him panics a bit. "Please tell me I'm safe..."
While I did not stutter when I said that Copper Golem was the first one safe, and not Allay, there is still no need to worry. She's also safe at two votes that were cast near the end of the voting period. The people who voted for her didn't leave any comments regarding these last minute votes. Whatever, she's safe. Allay and her friends are quite relieved at hearing this.
Also safe at two votes are Cow and Axolotl. Now, we're down to our final two - Moobloom and Warden!
The votes were close, perhaps the closest they've ever been, and I've never seen my community so strongly divided about an elimination before. We've got a lot of people that wanted Warden out, mostly for being too strong, but more people wanted Moobloom to leave, perhaps because she hasn't done much.
At a whopping total of 13 votes, Moobloom leaves the game!
The cow runs off before the guards have a chance to take her to the elimination dorm. Well, we'll have to find her later. Hopefully she doesn't try to participate in the game.

Now, I would've featured comments today, but there were so many and I couldn't decide who to feature and it would've taken too long to show all of them.

Thanks to the voters!
Alleviation, you will be heading down to a place of unsettling familiarity. Quite literally underground, you must face your Hollows in the shadows of the lost and now unused Deepslate Primary School. I don't want to get into the history of it, mostly because I don't know why it is there or how long it's been there. All I know is that it meets the necessary safety standards to go inside. If you guys die and respawn in your apartments, feel free to ask a worker and they will teleport you back to the school.

mångfald will remain on the surface and face their shadows on the athletic fields. I'm making it easier for you guys simply because Piglin's leg is still broken, and because you don't have the strongest person here on your team. It is also closer to the dorms, so you guys can just walk back if you die.
Please make your way to your respective locations now.

Allay looks around the empty school and is a bit worried.
Warden turns to face his team. "I advise that you avoid my Hollow at all costs. Let's get into a classroom to come up with a plan, alright?" he explains.
They agree, and Glare quickly flies up to an unlocked classroom. "Let's go in here,"
After the other members of Alleviation find a place to hide behind the teacher's desk, Warden locks the door and heads back over to his teammates so they can make a plan for defeating the Hollows.
'If we could somehow isolate your Hollow from the rest of ours, perhaps we could have an easier time handling them," Copper Golem suggests.
"Makes sense, but how are we supposed to do that?" Allay whispers.
Warden looks around and suddenly turns to his teammates. "Stay still and don't make a sound. The Hollows are nearby and they know that we are in the area," he announces.
Allay flies backwards into the corner while Glare and Copper Golem move in front of her, as she appears quite frightened. Mooshroom and Cow take their spaces in front of the trio, and Warden stands tall in front of them. The Hollows lurk outside in the hallway, searching for any sign of their living counterparts.

On the surface, mångfald has definitely made progress. Evoker has made the decision to take down her Hollow one on one in the tennis courts.
"Ah, a 1v1 against myself, huh? Seems like a tough challenge, but I'm ready to take this on! Come at me and do your worst!" she exclaims angrily.
The Hollow grunts and lurks closer to her before speaking in a muffled and warped voice, lacking any true tone or emotion. "Face me head on...."
Evoker jumps back before preparing to cast a strength spell on herself. Unsurprisingly, the phantom does the same.
"It really is mirroring my battle tactics! I need to up my game and outsmart her!" she says with confidence.
"Here's the thing Evelyn, you can't simply outsmart me," the Hollow explains, preparing another spell to buff herself, "How can you possibly outsmart yourself?"
Evoker thinks for a second before running at the Hollow with a tennis racket, striking her in the back of the head. "That will take care of her for now."
Cat and Wolf are engaged in a four way chase with their Hollows, not intending on stopping until their targets are killed, which soon happens, ending in the victory of the sculk animals.
Piglin is struggling with her Hollow, as the phantom is not impaired by a broken leg.
"Hey! Just attack me already! You have an easy advantage over me!" she yells.
The Hollow is unresponsive and runs off to attack Cat, who had just gotten back from her spawn point.
Piglin groans and wheels herself over to the other Hollows, rolling straight into Pillager's Hollow. It reacts quickly and shoots her.
Pillager takes this as a diversion and shoots the Hollow, instructing Piglin to get out of the way. The Hollow is unaffected by the single shot, so Piglin is instructed to distract it.

The classroom doorknob shakes, but realizing that it is locked, one of the Hollows no-clips through the door and unlocks it. Somehow, the Hollow is undetected by any of the members of Alleviation.
The somehow more sculk covered figure lurks closer to the teammates, and Warden attempts to hold it back. Allay still hides in the corner, now covering her eyes and trembling in fear. Before anyone can react, the Hollow fires its sonic boom attack, killing everyone but Warden, who is now especially aggravated. He too uses the sonic boom attack, and the Hollow temporarily retreats.
Before she requests to be teleported back down to the school, Allay grabs a kitchen knife and a pot lid, among other kitchen tools from her apartment. Copper Golem and Glare are already waiting for her by the time she is teleported down, and she offers them some of the things she brought from her kitchen, including a cast iron frying pan and a rolling pin. As soon as they enter the school, Glare notices one of the phantoms, Axolotl's to be exact, crawling slowly in the hallway, and quickly hits it with the iron skillet. It twitches a bit before dying, and when it does die, it leaves a patch of sculk behind it. The three quickly rush back to the classroom where they were killed to see Warden under attack by his own Hollow.
"Stay away from it and escape while you still can!" he exclaims, struggling to counter the Hollow's attacks.
Copper Golem picks up a pair of scissors from the desk and opens them up before throwing them at the Hollow, causing it to flinch. Unfortunately, it recovered quickly and lunges in to attack. Just as the Hollow is about to strike, Warden blocks the attack from reaching his teammates, giving them time to flee. As they are rushing for the doorway, the Hollow fires one final sonic boom attack at Warden, this time killing him. Seeing that their teammate - perhaps the strongest participant in the game, had just been killed by the Hollow, the trio flees. As she is in a state of panic, Allay quickly finds herself separated from her friends, and files into a music classroom where she locks the door behind her.

Evoker and Vindicator have already defeated their Hollows, and Piglin is in the process of fighting Cat's Hollow.
"I won't allow myself to be killed by this stupid sculk covered animal again," she grumbles.
"Then don't fight it! Go fight your own shadow, or even better, go find Bee and her Hollow!" Enderman exclaims.
"Aight! Less work for me, I guess!" she replies.
Piglin goes back to fight Iron Golem's Hollow alongside Wolf, but it quickly kills both of them, so when Piglin gets back from the dorm, she reluctantly asks Evoker to assist her. Evoker agrees and casts her fang attack spell, hardly damaging the Hollow, so she resorts to doing the same on Shadow Cat, this time killing her target. Then, she, Vindicator, and Piglin collectively attack Iron Golem's Hollow. Iron Golem joins in, starting to attack his phantom as well.

Allay settles down in front of a piano and plays the Moonlight Sonata. From the hallway, her Hollow picks up on the music and peeks in through the window. She attempts to open the door, but after noticing that it is locked, she flies backwards and quickly rushes straight into the door, phasing straight through it. Allay doesn't hear the Hollow, but she feels a cool breeze on her back and turns around, coming face to face with her shadow self. She is reasonably a bit startled and shrieks.
"Don't be afraid... I won't hurt you..." the Hollow mumbles. She has the same muffled and emotionless tone as Evoker's Hollow.
"Oh... I-I was just a bit surprised that you were there. I did lock the door, didn't I?" Allay questions.
"It was locked, but I phased through it. I heard that piano and I was drawn. Most of all, I'm safe here..." the Hollow replies.
Allay looks down and then looks back up at the phantom.
"This sculk that covers my body... It's almost like a tattered dress. My body is in constant pain..."
Allay approaches the phantom, reaching out for her cold hands.
"Oh... I'm sorry about that,' she says.
"I don't like that GoldenScientist lady for creating me!" The Hollow exclaims. "Why would someone bring me into this world just so I'm forced to suffer?! You're here and I'm here, so why don't you just get this over with now and kill me!?"
"You don't want to live in pain..." Allay sighs.
The Hollow flies around her living counterpart to the piano. "Play with me... I don't want to play alone," it requests.
Allay nods and takes her place to the left of the Hollow, and the two play a slow and nostalgic duet.
Once they finish playing, the Hollow turns to Allay, requesting that she kill her. Allay initially denies, but then comes up with something.
"I don't want you to suffer, so I can do that, but before that, I have a small favor to ask of you - if it's alright," she explains.

"We still need to find Shadow Bee! Where did she fly off?" Evoker asks.
"I don't know, but she's the last Hollow left. We need to find her so we can win!" Vindicator exclaims.
"Right. Let's go look for that corrupted bug!" Pillager responds.
The three run off to find Shadow Bee while Piglin and Enderman start a tennis match.

"Warden! If it's alright with you, may I ask that you don't attack my Hollow? I made a deal with her and she's going to help us," Allay explains.
"Got it..." Warden starts, "Wait, did you say that you made a deal with your Hollow?"
"Yes. She told me that she is in pain and that she wanted me to kill her," she replies, leading Warden down the stairway to the cafeteria.
He nods, asking for further explanation, to which Allay replies by telling him that she had promised to kill the Hollow under the condition that it helped her team defeat the other Hollows.
"By the way," Warden says. "Where's the rest of our team?"
Allay shakes her head with a look of uncertainty. "I haven't seen them for a while. I hope they're alright,"
Once they reach the cafeteria, Allay and Warden are greeted not only by Copper Golem and Glare, but also by Shadow Allay and the other Hollows. (save Warden's)

Evoker, Vindicator, and Pillager have come back from their failed attempt at finding Shadow Bee.
"Did you guys find her?" Piglin asks.
"No. Not that you helped at all. You stayed here and PLAYED TENNIS. Perhaps you, Enderman, and Iron Golem can go look for her though," Pillager replies.
"Ugh, fine!" Piglin says, running away.

The Hollow lies on a bed in the school nurse's office, and reaches up to grab onto Allay's hand. "It's time..." she mumbles.
Allay takes the kitchen knife, and quite gracefully moves her arm to kill it, but suddenly stops. "Sorry, I just can't bring myself to do this. I can't kill you in this way."
"You have to." The Hollow responds. "I've never been here before, but for some reason or another, I have a feeling that there is something in that cabinet over there that can help..."
Allay flies over to the cupboard and pulls out an IV along with a bag of some sort of medication. "Why in the world is this here?" she asks herself before flying back over to her corrupted counterpart. "Is this what you mean?" she asks.
"Yes... Now hook me up to that,"
"I don't know how to do that, but I'll try..."
Glare flies towards Allay. "Hey, should we leave, and perhaps get Shadow Warden out of here?" they ask.
"Oh, yes please. I don't feel comfortable with him being here," she replies.
Glare, Copper Golem, and Warden chase the remaining Hollow out of the nurse's office and into the hallway.
Still hooking her shadow self up to the IV, Allay calls out to her teammates. "I'll meet up with you guys when I'm done, alright?"
"Got it! I'm sure we won't be far," Copper Golem replies.
Now hooked up to the IV, Shadow Allay looks up. "Before you turn that on..." she says, "I - I want to tell you something..."
"Go on," Allay replies.
"When we played the piano together, I felt at peace. I felt almost as if I had been reunited with a long lost older sister that I never got the chance to meet. I feel comfortable in your presence, and that's why I wanted you to kill me. I wanted you to alleviate my pain and put an end to my suffering once and for all. Your voice calms me, and your wings and everything... You look so elegant and I wish I could be like that too. In my final moments, you are making me feel complete...." she explains, with tears in her eyes.
"Thank you... I'm glad to hear that,"
Both are silent, but the Hollow is the first to speak. "Ok, I'm ready now. Turn it on."
Allay nods and switches on the machine that delivers the IV fluid to the phantom, and she stays by her side before flying off to reunite with her team.

All the members of Alleviation collectively attack the last Hollow, and Warden finishes him off with the sonic boom attack. Unfortunately for mångfald, no one found Shadow Bee.
Evoker turns around to see Alleviation returning to the surface.
"Oh no! Looks like they finished..." she sighs.
Well, Evoker is right. Alleviation has finished. Looks like you guys are now up for elimination.

---

Poll ended 05/12/2022 10:49 am.