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Only if we want to pursue Uehara's and Amanozaki's routes, and even then, for different reasons for each of them.
Mori or Taketatsu or Kayano could not care less about this supernatural nonsense. Mori would be interested in finding what happened to his daughter as well as all the dirt he could muster on Shinoharas and Kaimei. That would necessitate searching Ikei for clues.
Characters have their own goals, and solving existential questions may not be everyone's cup of tea.
She would have to display a certain resemblance to the family members. We have recognized Tendou miko's strong likeness to Uehara, and that was, what, five? six? generations back. We did not recognize Ei.
Anyway, I doubt the Baron would experiment on his own children.
That said, it was mentioned that
Subsequently, his interests in the paranormal expanded, and Dr. Sakaguchi was reportedly one of the first practitioners in the country to attempt a merging of European and Japanese occult practices.
so some kind of experiment did take place. The name Ei is likely related to the Book of Eibon, and it didn't come to Japan until the Baron's return from Europe in 1888. It is likely that the Ei we know was given form back then.
No. No ties to the Baron's family that we know of. Maedas are Maedas.
Other that that, yes, A is the thing to go for if one wants the answers to the mysteries regarding this particular plot.
It is interesting, though, that we didn't get to see the Baron's face. Even more interesting that there is no mention of our - well, Seiji's - father anywhere. There may yet be other surprises in stock for us.
Anyway, I doubt the Baron would experiment on his own children.
That said, it was mentioned that
Subsequently, his interests in the paranormal expanded, and Dr. Sakaguchi was reportedly one of the first practitioners in the country to attempt a merging of European and Japanese occult practices.
so some kind of experiment did take place. The name Ei is likely related to the Book of Eibon, and it didn't come to Japan until the Baron's return from Europe in 1888. It is likely that the Ei we know was given form back then.
I continue to do the same mistake.
However this means that Sagakuchi started all this and one of his descemdants is also responsible for the situation we are in.
It is interesting, though, that we didn't get to see the Baron's face. Even more interesting that there is no mention of our - well, Seiji's - father anywhere. There may yet be other surprises in stock for us.
For what is worth another connection is though St, Xavier school.
Sakimura, Uheara, their three friends, Maeda, ex alumn and another one, probably Seiji.
And Sakaki remains the one we know the least.
I confess frequently succumbing to reading comprehension failure for this particular LP, but treave's clarifications help.
To me the goals that are important is to try and break this curse (that traps us all in the sphere, and the additional mindfuck that we/Seiji are going through), and secondarily, save as many people as possible while achieving that goal. I'm less worried about ensuring this never happens again or whatnot - humans will be humans, and we should focus on our current predicament.
Do we have a good sense of what we'd be able to reach with A as opposed to B? A will help us get to the root of the mystical curses aspect, I suppose, while B is more about the specific experiments and happenings at the hospital.
Sakaguchi Mansion
Baron Skaguchi returns from Europe with the Book of Eibon, probably our Ei.
Uses it to fuse together Western and Japanese esoterism.
Funds his mansion for the purpose to take advantage or control the Juunimon tree, sacrifices the builders.
For his plans he gets the help of the Uehara family, mediums/exorcists.
Ward 169
Sakaguchi Mansion is now a military facility, possible human experiments carried out on children, possible involvement of doctor Maeda.
Kaimei Hospital
Funded by doctor Maeda(with nazi gold?),possible child abuse, dismembered bodies in black bags start to appear, director of the hospital is the possible culprit, he kills the nurse Kaiano(pool ghost) for covering his crimes, instrumental to the murder is someone resembling Shinohara Seiji, possibly his father Shinohara Juuzo.
Director goes nuts and burns the hospital to the ground.
Ikei Hospital
The hospital is rebuilt, Maeda family trying to regain their fortune finance an experiment headed by Juuzo and his son Seiji.
Children start to disappear again.
After Seiji disappearance Taketatsu takes his place.
So the chronology/ genealogy goes like this:
Ei.
Amazomaki, Seika and Shizuka Uehara.
Maeda Nami.
Kaiano Rina, Shinohara Juuzo.
Shinohara Seiji.
Taketatsu, Sawada, Tokigawa, Okouyama, Mori, Sakimura, Sakaki, possible connections to previous eras are possible but unknown.
Do we have a good sense of what we'd be able to reach with A as opposed to B? A will help us get to the root of the mystical curses aspect, I suppose, while B is more about the specific experiments and happenings at the hospital.
I can only speak for myself, but I have very little idea about the war-era hospital. Just some general assumptions based on what we learned in the Museum.
The buildings in all eras are connected to the hospital in our time, just in different ways that affect different people.
The happenings in the Sakaguchi Mansion were no less specific than the ones in Kaimei or Ikei Hospitals, but they would concern the ones involved with the occult side of things more. The Kaimei story might shed information about the involvement of Kayano, Maeda and Shinohara families in the whole plot. The war era might give us an idea about Maedas' rise to power and the gold, which is something that motivates Tokigawa, etc etc.
The situation we are in has both supernatural and artificial origins, and I think it can be tackled from both ends.
To me the goals that are important is to try and break this curse (that traps us all in the sphere, and the additional mindfuck that we/Seiji are going through), and secondarily, save as many people as possible while achieving that goal.
What do you mean by breaking the curse? Making the escape possible?
It is likely that what keeps us here is not a curse, but something that the Seiji's an Juuzo's experiments might have induced. The curse simply makes the environment we find ourselves in that much worse.
He keeps her in the psychiatric ward for 5 years, alive, before 'terminating' her. I wonder what for. Supposedly, the killer is Shinohara Juuzo himself (?).
It does not look likely that Maedas are relevant or have enough money to fund anything at this point. They marry Nami off to Taketatsu because they are broke. And before that, they tried to marry her off to Shinoharas.
The funding supposedly comes from Shinoharas who are the top dogs in the Kaimei group by now.
There are some connections that we don't know of yet, too. I suspect there is one between the Sakaguchi-gumi and the Kaimei group, between the Kaimei group and St. Xavier, and there is still someone important to Okuyama that we didn't reveal.
The LP was supposed to feature a lack of explanation for most things, only hinted at through background documents and bits and pieces in the updates. Unfortunately that really hasn't seemed to work too well so far, particularly since it makes the choices a lot harder and obscure than it should be.
Well, you know, the room where he receives, his clothes, his manners, all smell like nineteenth century, also, even if blac magick is involved logic dictates to base our reasoning on the known facts, until now all that happened can be traced back to physical persons, there's no reason to think that Fox Guy is different, furthermore there is this:
Dance, Witch
The eleventh night falls
Cast off your blood for the Maiden
So that she might feel warmth in her beloved’s cold arms
Dance, O pitiable Witch
Dance, O miserable Witch
The twelfth night falls
The sacrifice is due
Cast off your soul and open the twelve gates
For the Maiden’s return to the world
Seems that the witsch is as much of a sacrifice as everyone else, so the goal of the thiirteenth person, the one who benefits from the ritual, is to become the Maiden lover, hence some kind of minot lord of the underworld, or something like that.
Seem reasonable that being the Baron the first to attempt this he is the most probable candidate for being Fox Guy.
European XIXth century, mind. At first we considered him to be Bryan Cooper due to his strange manners that are a bit different from what you expect to find in Japan.
And we know the Baron was to Europe just prior to his big experiment. Hmmm...
Baltika9 B
ERYFKRAD A
Kz3r0 A
Akkudakku A>B
Lambchop19 A>B
Nevill A
Grimgravy C>B
Rex Feral D
oscar C>B
Jester A
Kayerts A
Oh man. I think you are spot on or very close indeed! The fox mask is a Japanese occult thing (connected to spirits) and the guy wears western clothing and all!
European XIXth century, mind. At first we considered him to be Bryan Cooper due to his strange manners that are a bit different from what you expect to find in Japan.
Your knowledge of Manga history is weack, after Japan was forced to open its borders at gunship point many in the upper classes started to adopt European customs, for us certain clothes look like nineteenth century Britain or France pre-Revolution, for Japanese remind them of the period that ended the Bakufu(military governement, the Shogunate in essence) and started a new era.
The LP was supposed to feature a lack of explanation for most things, only hinted at through background documents and bits and pieces in the updates. Unfortunately that really hasn't seemed to work too well so far, particularly since it makes the choices a lot harder and obscure than it should be.
Yeah, and I think that's definitely how it should be for this kind of story. It'd have been fine in a book, or even a game. Unfortunately LPs are much more drawn out, and I personally am poor at retaining and synthesising information in a horror / mystery setting or a science fiction setting. I love the updates, I just haven't been able to speculate about stuff with as much competence as before.
For the current choice, I guess to me it's more important to break the current predicament of our Eternal Return + Body Possession + Other Mindfucks, and in doing so also relieve the predicament of other souls who as far as I understand it are also trapped in a similar but not identical way. Justice or whatnot don't really seem important to me, only saving the souls that are suffering now (including us). To that extent I still wonder if B or C wouldn't give us things more relevant to figuring out the actual set of experiments conducted in this place. I guess it's a question of whether we feel the original curse stuff would give us more information or not.
Yeah, and I think that's definitely how it should be for this kind of story. It'd have been fine in a book, or even a game. Unfortunately LPs are much more drawn out, and I personally am poor at retaining and synthesising information in a horror / mystery setting or a science fiction setting. I love the updates, I just haven't been able to speculate about stuff with as much competence as before.
This is a summary of my understanding of the whole situation:
Baron Sakaguchi tries to use an ancient ritual in a rural village.
The ritual is centered around the Juunimon tree.
I speculate that the Baron wanted to gain control of the tree that acts as a gate between the world of the living and the world of the dead.
I assume that he succeded and become Fox Guy.
Seiji and Juuzo Shinohara tried to do what the Baron did, a conflict erupted between them and now Seiji is trying to disrupt his father plans while pursuing his own.
So we are stuck in a three side struggle, the Baron/Fox guy, Juuzo and Seiji, by possessing Seiji and thwarting Juuzo schemes we are basically acting as an agent of the Baron/Fox Guy.
Point is, are we ockay with that?
If not what are we going to do?
Far as I see it, Adachi is not human, though he appears to have a mind and emotions of one. He has the capacity for compassion, though, which, combined with both his lowered self-esteem due to the personality he assumed and no pressing reasons to return to the world of the living, leads to our martyrdom complex.
We were given no incentive to escape. We have no reason to believe that we ever existed in a physical world, or that we would be able to exist in one if we got out, though treave was kind trollish enough to provide a Beirut snippet.
Our body, our thoughts, our feelings are not entirely our own. We seem to exist through the force of will alone, by defining our goals in spite of what the other selves tell us. We lose that will, we lose ourselves and dissolve back into the Abyss of Souls.
The only reasons I can see for our continued existence that are strong enough are a drive for knowledge (who are we, why are we here?), and a drive for helping others (since we chose to feel bad about their predicament back in the first chapters). That was how we defined ourselves this far.
Seeing how the Shinoharas do not seem to hold the interests of people we like close to heart, and seeing how the Fox Guy is urging us towards a direction that kind of aligns with the one we wanted to take anyway, why wouldn't we listen to him?
In fact, I see no signs that he has a particular agenda, as he simply encourages us to think for ourselves. You only think that it is a three-way struggle since you already consider Seiji and Juuzo your enemies, and the Fox Guy is lending you a helping hand.
Dance, Witch
The eleventh night falls
Cast off your blood for the Maiden
So that she might feel warmth in her beloved’s cold arms
Dance, O pitiable Witch
Dance, O miserable Witch
The twelfth night falls
The sacrifice is due
Cast off your soul and open the twelve gates
For the Maiden’s return to the world
Seems that the witsch is as much of a sacrifice as everyone else, so the goal of the thiirteenth person, the one who benefits from the ritual, is to become the Maiden lover, hence some kind of minot lord of the underworld, or something like that.
I think that on this you are wrong, Shinoseki Adachi was a writer of the occult, we found his book in a very telling location, the Kaimei Museum.
We are him, until now we considered ourselves as being external to what's happening, that was a mistake, we should try to gather informations on Shinoseki Adachi as we do with the others and umcover what connection we have with this place.
You urged us to be logical, despite all the strange stuff happening why we should consider ourselves different from the others, until now there are always been a connection to concrete actions done by actual human beings, why we should be the exception, assuming that Fox Guy is the Baron?
And even if Fox Guy is not the Baron why we should consider ourselves an exception as well?
This is an important point, until now we possessed Seiji's body, but is he alive?
If he wants to become the new master of the Juunimon tree is obvious that he dpesn't care to get out of this place, double plus so if he is dead.
Our options here are:
Hoping that after thwarting Shinoharas' plans we will go back to the world of the living or that we will find peace in the afterlife instead of eternal torment.
Us becoming the new master of the Juunimon Tree, maybe with the help of Fox Guy's maid.
Detroning Fox Guy while thwarting the schemes of the Shinoharas and hoping that everything will be fine afterwards.
Our body, our thoughts, our feelings are not entirely our own. We seem to exist through the force of will alone, by defining our goals in spite of what the other selves tell us. We lose that will, we lose ourselves and dissolve back into the Abyss of Souls.
If we have fallen in the Abyss of Souls that means that we were once a living human being.
Also, the fact that we didn't inquire about our connections with this place and who we really are didn't help to define our character more.
Seeing how the Shinoharas do not seem to hold the interests of people we like close to heart, and seeing how the Fox Guy is urging us towards a direction that kind of aligns with the one we wanted to take anyway, why wouldn't we listen to him?
In fact, I see no signs that he has a particular agenda, as he simply encourages us to think for ourselves. You only think that it is a three-way struggle since you already consider Seiji and Juuzo your enemies, and the Fox Guy is lending you a helping hand.
Ah. It appears that my initiial impression was incorrect, and that the current choice does not have to do with getting a complete version of the story.
1) Where the members of the initial 12 might end up?
2) Is there a particular character-related route we want to pursue?
3) What might be our end goals?
My own considerations are as follows:
- Taketatsu is interested in his own survival, and to the less extent, in surpassing Seiji. He will likely be in Ikei trying to shutdown or reprogram the supercomputer that he might suspect guides this experiment.
- Kayano is more likely to be found either in Ikei, trying to get out, or sticking close to Juuzo in hopes he will let her tag along when he escapes.
- Uehara will try to reach Seika at the heart of the labirynth, wherever that is. It might not be in either of those places, but it is implied that Sakaguchi Mansion is the closest.
- Sakimura will be following Uehara.
- Juuzo will be following Uehara and probably Mitsuki.
- Mori's interests lead him to Ikei - he does not seem to have an agenda other than locking Shinoharas behind bars and preventing them from harming children, but his quest might lead him towards Mitsuki and Ward 109, which I think is connected to the dismemberment mystery.
- Tokigawa will be found either in Kaimei, or in Ward 109, depending on where the gold is. It is implied that it was buried somewhere in the hospital, but it was put there during the war. Is that a source of the Maedas' power?
- Okuyama will be with Tokigawa. The doc shared his plan with her, and it's not like there are many others in this place she'd rather be with. Although there is this 'external factor' that was mentioned earlier...
- Mitsuki - as a key figure she is likely to be on the two lower level of the hospital. A possible captive by Juuzo. Not sure if pairing her with the doc changed anything.
- Sakaki and Amanozaki will be getting to the bottom of the story surrounding Yomiki village and its curse.
- Maeda has no strong ties to either time period, only to us. Perhaps linking her with Uehara and Sakimura tied her tighter to the main plot?
- Sawada will be where Seiji is.
Do we want to stick to a certain route? I am not talking about romance here - after all, even Mori has his own, and I doubt anyone but Baltika wants to enter a relationship with him. What I mean, are there characters whose goals we are ready to share and assist them, even to the detriment of other characters?
Personally, I am still strongly on Uehara's side. She has the deepest connection to the overall plot (or at least to the part that we managed to discover), and following in her footsteps is bound to lead us to a crossroads where we'll find Seiji, Juuzo and Mitsuki. Every one of them has some business with Seika or another, it is unavoidable. It is likely that we will come to the same crossroads anyway by following a different route, but hers offers the most involvement with this particular plotline, and it so happened that I care about it more than about others.
Or we can align ourselves with Mori and fix the reason children go missing in the area. It will likely involve helping Mitsuki and crossing Juuzo as well. Or we might choose someone else. Our goals do not even need to coincide with those of the chosen character, but I assume our chances to achieve a proper ending would go up dramatically if they do.
The question is, what is our goal? I can draft a few:
- To save certain people.
- To screw our detractors and make sure they fail. Perhaps it's Juuzo, perhaps it's Seiji, perhaps it's their goons Kayano and Sawada, or perhaps it's all of them.
- To lift the curse and purify the place.
- To prevent a similar tragedy from happening again.
- To escape.
- To become the one who controls the place.
Some of them might sound similar, but they can be mutually exclusive. For example, if we forever lock this world from the world of the living, we might prevent further incidents at a cost of trapping both the 'living' and the dead in this hellhole for eternity. If we save Seika, it might mean dooming the others to die for that purpose. If we save the others, Juuzo might still come out as a winner, etc etc.
So what is it that we are trying to do? Sure, we have only been gathering information so far, but it would be good if we start considering our potential future as well based on what we have learned.
1) Where the members of the initial 12 might end up?
I don't think they end up anywhere, this choice I understood is about gaining insight about the hospital in different epochs.
2) Is there a particular character-related route we want to pursue?
I want to pursue a Maeda route since she was one of the most bro characters we met, even ofering to stay behind just for us to escape.
Unlike Uehara who wanted to kill us (yes she might have had a reason and I did vote to be nice to her and not kill her or enslave her, but that doesn't make me care for her). Or the other people who don't give a fuck about us.
But that's just me. On the way I'd like to save Mori since he seems bro enough although he hates our guts, Amanozaki since she helped us too and maybe some others like Sakaki, Tokigawa even Uehara and Sakimura, too as long as they're ok. Who I don't want to save, as in deliberately not save, are Taketatsu and Kayano. Fuck them, they've been a pain in the ass all this LP.
3) What might be our end goals?
To get the fuck out, of course, and help a few others escape with us.
Shinoseki Adachi is just a name we assumed. That name is not different from all the others that we have found on the covers of the museum books, yet those people aren't us.
Many personalities went into what became an entity known as the Shinoseki Adachi of today. Perhaps one of those was the occult author. However, it does not make us human in a sense that the others are. We can choose to behave similar to one, but we are different from them in a number of ways.
We lack a sense of self, among other things. For one, we are in love with a girl we have never met before - Seiji's thoughts and feelings seep through into our own body and mind. We feel urges that aren't ours, do things we would not normally do if we were left to ourselves. And when you add the other voices to the picture... we are quite a mess. It's not like we have a case of amnesia, either - it appears that we have memories, they are just not our own.
Ask yourself this - do you consider Ei or the Fox Guy humans? Perhaps they were once, but not anymore. The concept of immortality alone is bound to change how one perceives reality, and that's just one of their differences.
Something was alive to greet Uehara in the hospital. But Seiji was a marked man for two years now. Wasn't he due to lose his soul just as Maya did? If he were alive, there would be no needs to resort to notes, to use Sawada.
I am getting into bizarro speculation land, but I think they have infused Seiji's body with an artificial soul. That's us - or one of our 'other' selves. Perhaps this was the result of the OMOIKANE Project.
We are but a single stray personality of this Frankenstein monstrosity, who assumed dominance through sheer luck and persistence.
Yes, but why do you oppose their plans? What are your stakes in this? Isn't this something that we chose for ourselves?
I suppose that Juuzo was an enemy because he wanted to destroy Seiji, who shares a body with us, and therefore he wants to destroy us. It's a survival instinct on our part.
Seiji, though, we chose to oppose (?) of our own free will. It isn't something that the Fox Guy told us. A case could be made that only one of us can exist at a time, so our halves are incompatible with each other. Hmph. Does the mere fact of our existence necessitate our resistance?
The Fox Guy was fine with our decision to quietly disappear into nothingness, though. Doesn't look like he has a concrete goal in mind but to observe. Besides, isn't he outside the 'world' of the hospital in the first place?
Ask yourself this - do you consider Ei or the Fox Guy humans? Perhaps they were once, but not anymore. The concept of immortality alone is bound to change how one perceives reality, and that's just one of their differences.
My point is that they were living human beings, I think that this is true for Shinoseki too, Fox Guy said that we managed to reconstruct our psyche, not that we built one, even if in the last encounter he said that we have been 'forged' for a certain purpose.
Something was alive to greet Uehara in the hospital. But Seiji was a marked man for two years now. Wasn't he due to lose his soul just as Maya did? If he were alive, there would be no needs to resort to notes, to use Sawada.
Uehara couldn't distinguish anymore between the living and the dead, is still ambiguous if Seiji is alive or dead, but if we consider that we possessed his body he is probably alive, not sure yet.
I am getting into bizarro speculation land, but I think they have infused Seiji's body with an artificial soul. That's us - or one of our 'other' selves. Perhaps this was the result of the OMOIKANE Project.
From the dialog with Kaiano, as you pointed out, seems that is expected that the thirteenth person will be possessed by the souls of the dead when the ritual begins.
I think instead that when the confine between this world and the spiritual world was removed by Seiji's doing many wandering souls tried to take hold of his body, that we succeeded above the others implies that we are a definite personality not just a patchwork, remember as some of the voices seemed obsessed or prey of violent emotions, like the people overtook by the malice, probably they are more broken than us.
We found a book written by 'us', maybe getting more information on the previous eras will reveal more about Shinoseki Adachi, the book was not recent, so probably he is from Ward 169 era.
Good point, but if I am correct about the three side struggle to become master of the Juunimon it's possible that the Shinoharas succeeded in 'unseating' him in some way.
My point is that they were living human beings, I think that this is true for Shinoseki too, Fox Guy said that we managed to reconstruct our psyche, not that we built one, even if in the last encounter he said that we have been 'forged' for a certain purpose.
It makes sense to me. First, we were sewn together from different soul pieces, then the Incident went down and we shattered back into fragments, one of which became Shinoseki Adachi. Now we are reconstructing our psyche, slowly absorbing the knowledge and experience of our other selves.
Thing is, Shinoseki Adachi was the author who wrote the book about Western occult practices in Japan. It is exactly what the Baron was attempting (and what we suppose led to the creation of Ei), and what Seiji and Juuzo seem to base their research on. It is reasonable to expect Seiji to be familiar with that name and his work.
The first name that came into our mind when we were asked about it was Shinohara Seiji. Not Adachi. To me it looks like we have no name at all, and we named ourselves after yet another of our borrowed memories.
From the dialog with Kaiano, as you pointed out, seems that is expected that the thirteenth person will be possessed by the souls of the dead when the ritual begins.
If we are just a vessel for the souls of the dead, why would Kayano be surprised to find Seiji inside, whom she thought to be exactly that, i.e. dead?
To me it suggests they were in control of which souls comprised us - that's why they were shocked to see an extra passenger who wasn't a part of the plan.
that we succeeded above the others implies that we are a definite personality not just a patchwork, remember as some of the voices seemed obsessed or prey of violent emotions, like the people overtook by the malice, probably they are more broken than us.
I believe the 'voices' were in charge of our body in all the other nights that we do not remember (but Uehara does), and they didn't behave too strangely for Uehara to notice that something was amiss and that we are more real than others. She thought our personality to be just another mask. That, to me, suggests that the others were just as good at being 'human' as we are.
We were simply there when the last of the Seika's talismans was found and the Abyss was crossed for the 12th time. That's my theory.
But I admit there is something that does not add up. The Fox Guy was definitely following our story, counting the nights as we saw them (our Third Night was probably the 500th for our body). That makes us special, though I am not sure why that is, yet.
Yes, but digitizing the soul was what they were working on. You might argue how successful they were, but our whole situation is a testament to some of their breakthroughs.
The soul may be too difficult for them to create from scratch, yet not to difficult to edit or sew together, as the OMOIKANE project proves.
