Something just barely in time for Halloween~

[Moonlit Naiad]

The Haunted House, a choose-your-own-adventure-style story in the manner of Love-Love 4/5 (which was submitted to the MSF story contest last year), but with a wildly different theme.

Enjoy~

(btw: apologies in advance to the French-speakers out there, the couple little bits I embedded came from Google translate, so any butchering of the language is unintentional. Though I did back-translate from French to English to ensure that the intended meaning should be accurate....)

[Ookalf]

Pretty neat. I played through it a little while ago (getting most of the "bad ends" in the process) and eventually left unscathed. However, I have a question. How do you get the ending where you leave as a shape-shifter?

[Moonlit Naiad]

Rather than flat out answer, I'll provide a couple hints, highlight to see them. But if you've already read the ending from the "congratulations, here's a link to all the endings" page, there isn't much of a need to do so, other than satisfaction in figuring out the 'puzzle'. The ending replaces the good ending you've already seen with the path to each identical. (In the penultimate area, only one of the actions leading to the good ending will be displayed.)

Hint #1: --> The order in which you explore determines which of the 'good' endings you get <--

Hint #2: --> Completing an arc/area updates the 'key' field in the page address (which makes it so the relevant arc isn't replayable) <--

Hint #3: --> A name is mentioned when you're leaving the garden <--

Hint #4: --> If you explore in the order so that the key matches the name... <--

Hint #5: --> Pay special attention to the exit/action "names" when in the foyer, top-down order is not necessarily the proper order to explore. Bonus hint: reading aloud and slowly may help. <--

If the hints don't help, direct answer is below, again highlight to see.

Spoiler: --> key words are "first," "to," "three," "for," and "five." Use the actions in that order. <--

[Ookalf]

Yeah, I already read the endings. I was just sorta curious.

[Kyunji]

Nifty. I enjoy the high quality of your writing, even though all the inani stuff isn't exactly to my tastes. I doubt anyone would ever find the "best" ending without those hints or a whole lot of luck. Thanks for bringing a little life to the seemingly-dying Stories forum.

[Helel]

I had a good time with that, good job, Naiad.

[Queen Octavia]

It was a fun read, I went through all the endings.

My favourite line was the bit about the stairs not creaking

My favourite ending is when you look back at the house as you leave

I really <3 these interactives muchly!

Really!