This may seem like it's overdue, but based on a comment I recently received elsewhere, apparently the fact that there will be spoilers to both the Neon Genesis Evangelion anime and the events of various games in the Persona Series (including but not limited to Persona 3, Persona 3 Portable, Persona 4, and Persona 5) wasn't made clear just by how the plot has unveiled.
So I'm placing a sticky post for this message: if you have not watched the original Evangelion anime, or if you have not played the Persona games — especially P3, P4, P5, and their updated re-releases — then take note that this story contains spoilers to all of them. Read at your own risk.
As Titan took lumbering strides, Shinji kept a wary eye on his surroundings, perched from atop his Persona's head. Armisael's throne was nestled onto the right shoulder, from which Mayumi analyzed the enemies around them. Kurosawa, meanwhile, was practically rooted onto Titan's left shoulder, taking shots with Häyhä at the shadowy thoughtbeasts all around them...and it was a target-rich environment.
The bodies were also hard to ignore: of panicked civilians who had been struck down by rampant manifestations of mankind's cognition; of embattled Persona-users that had been mauled after running out of energy; even some vehicles (a lot of which were jammed along the highway near the thresholds of the fog) had been torn open, looking like jagged sets of angles from afar. "This is horrible...what happened...?"
"...it's sort of what it felt like in the Angel's Domain during the last new moon, but different." Mayumi's voice was amplified by Armisael, allowing her to be heard by both Shinji and Kurosawa. "A confluence of both mind and matter..."
"Similar to what happened with the Ai Ferry?" asked Kurosawa, pausing to fire at a crimson tank bearing a yellow mask upon its top; rather than exploding, his Persona's empowered bullet rendered the tank into stray mist.
"No, it's different; from how the others described it, the ferry was pulled into the Metaverse. This feels more like aspects of the cognitive world were forced upon reality...which might explain why there have only been these numerous masked entities instead of any Archetypes." Mayumi pondered out loud, voicing her guesses and observations. "From what I've read...and from what Aida-san has said about the subject...Archetypes are formed by human cognition in a collective sense, based on the common thoughts that traverse a given area over time; it's why Archetypes will vary depending on what area you're in...but these seem to lack those common forms, coming across as rather chaotic; the only common element are the colored masks they wear..."
As Titan kicked a trove of walking masked castles away, Kurosawa said, "they look like the Emanations that tend to emerge within a Shadow's Realm."
"Is Emanation the preferred term?"
"...I think the other accepted terms are 'Fragments' or 'Remnants'," said Kurosawa, shooting down a masked avain of some sort; the trio of birds that tried to swoop down at an angle were swatted down by Titan.
"...but what's the official term?"
"I wouldn't be able to say. It's still an academic question."
"I'm sure there has to be an official one!" insisted Mayumi.
Shinji frowned, peering ahead into the mist. "Uh...I see a fence..." Sure enough, as they got closer, numerous warning signs were affixed to the black metal, cautioning civilians to stay away. "...is this the place?"
"Yes; we're at the boundary of Camp Matsumoto...but I don't like how quiet it is." Kurosawa raised his rifle-arm, keeping it at the ready. "Can you sense anything, Yamagishi-san?"
"...not really," she admitted.
"Then step lightly, Ikari-san."
Shinji nodded, willing Titan to step over the fence...and as his Persona parted the fog, only carnage awaited them.
xxxx
Mana Kirishima hadn't fought alongside Misato Katsuragi in quite a bit...at least, not in the sense of doing battle alongside a singular comrade.
Though they had done some patrols during July (most notably during the incident where Suzuhara gained his Persona), it was an altogether different feeling when they were simply tearing their way through shadowy beasts that were attracted by all the commotion. It reminded her of the massive melee in Armisael's Domain during the August New Moon...and Misato (with her pistol and short sword), alongside her Persona Tokoyo (with her twin blades) was giving as good as she got.
It was strangely exhilarating.
"Rising Slash!" cried Tokoyo, bringing both blades down against a masked golem, splitting it in twain. The masked boulders behind it rolled on, ready to crush the woman...had Mana not been there with LABRYS, bisecting them both.
"Good job, Mana-chan," acknowledged Misato, moving northward at a steady pace. "Looks like we're coming up on a major train yard," she said, eyeing a train that had actually crashed into another, looking like a desolate wreck from some post-apocalyptic movie. "If the trains scheduled to come in just kept arriving...they're probably backed up all the way on both the northbound and southbound lines..."
"How much further to the CPC?" asked Mana.
"Still a bit of a hike for us...hold on." Misato held her hand out, looking warily around the train yard (filled with rail cars as it was); amidst the yellow fog, the long trains looked akin to slumbering monstrosities. "What's with this weird feeling...?"
xx
On the other side of the train yard, a trio of young men sensed Misato and Mana's approach. "...so...I'll take the lady with the purple hair. You'll take the other girl."
"We would have done so regardless."
"Yeah yeah, whatever. Tsukiyomi...let's wreck the place."
xx
"Vorpal Blade!"
Misato's eyes widened as the shout broke through the din. "Mana-chan, get down-!"
Multiple rail cars were obliterated in a torrent of slashes, revealing a Persona with a burning blade and horned helm that blazed with a dark aura; without hesitation, it crashed into Tokoyo — her twin swords blocking its curved blade — and carried her away, out of sight.
Before Misato could even exclaim a word of protest, a young man with crimson hair was in front of her. "See you next fall," coinciding his words with a vicious kick that launched Misato into the air. The madman shot Mana a wicked smirk before taking off, disappearing into the fog to pursue Misato.
...that was Sho Minazuki. That blazing red hair and cocky grin belonged to no one else. "Oh like hell are you gonna-!"
"Mana-neesan."
With that simple honorific, all concern for Misato died. What. That voice was one she couldn't forget...
"Hi, Mana-neesan..."
...and neither was the second. It can't be. Slowly — painfully; agonizingly — she looked back in the direction where Sho and his Persona had attacked from; stepping through the obliterated rail car wreckage were two unnervingly familiar silhouettes. "...niisan...?"
xxxx
/ah
//look at the time
///it's time for pain o'clock
This will be an interesting conversation. I assume they will try to drop the "This is all part of humanities' cognition" bomb on her only to be surprised that she already knows. They are already planning to take Mana by force if need be so any sign of refusal by her will probably result in a fight.
Musashi and Keita were mere meters away. (Mana did not think of their 'surnames', of Strasberg and Asari; much like 'Kirishima', the names had been given to them by Shiro Tokita. Thus did they bear his taint, just like she did.) "Is...is it you...?" As they stepped out of the fog, they revealed themselves to be wearing plan hoodies over weathered pants, but their faces...it was them. (The odd sensation in the back of her mind was chucked aside, because it was her brothers!) "...guys..." Gently placing LABRYS and AIGIS onto the ground, she darted towards the duo and embraced them, and they embraced her in turn, and for the first time in weeks the hole in the bottom of her heart was no longer empty-! "...I...I wanted to find you...I swear I did..."
"...we know, neesan," said Keita, smiling genuinely.
"...where have you two been?" she asked, stepping back to take in their appearance. Aside from Musashi's slicked hair (which was a pretty cool look, she could privately admit), they seemed just the same as before; however, there was a core of stoic strength in their expressions, likely forged from whatever they had experienced since escaping from Tokita's facility. "You look..."
Big Sis bristled, looking somewhat concerned.
Little Sis frowned, a sorrowful expression overshadowing her face.
The odd sense of foreboding was ignored, because it was her brothers. "...you look like you've been through a lot."
"That's putting it mildly," remarked Musashi, gazing up at the red and black sky, shrouded as it was by the fog. "We wanted to get away...and we learned a lot more than we bargained for. But it was important for us, to see what we did..."
"Well...you're here, now." The thought of introducing them to Katsuragi brought an odd little thrill up her spine (wait, would they get along with her teammates? How would Yamagishi, Ikari, Suzuhara, and Aida react to meeting them?). "Come on," she said, grabbing their hands with her own. "If you come with me, I can lead you out of this fog, and then-" Her words came to a halt the moment she tried to tug them along; the fact that she failed to budge them in the slightest elicited a strange anxiety in her heart. "...guys?"
Musashi looked at her with pity, whilst Keita seemed apologetic. "Mana-neesan...we found out about the truth of this world," said the latter.
"...what do you mean?"
Musashi calmly answered, "We found out that this world...this reality...is anything but. It's nothing more than a twisted dream, born of humanity's collective mind and spirit."
...what? "Huh? How did you...?" she impulsively said, because if there was anything she had expected from her inevitable reunion with her brothers, it certainly hadn't been this!
Keita's eyes glimmered with understanding. "So...you know as well?"
"...if we were to ask you to come with us, would you?" asked Musashi.
"...where would we go?" she wondered, even as warning alarms blared in the back of her mind. (This was wrong. This was wrong. This was all wrong!) "No, wait, damn it, I need you to answer my question! How'd you find out about the nature of reality?"
"Does it matter? All it means is that our suffering was born from a collective dream...everything that happened to Big Sis and Little Sis, everything that Tokita did to us, and to you..." Keita clenched his fists with genuine anger. "...it...it sickened us, to find out."
Mana took a step back. (Something was wrong. What had happened? Who had done this?) "Keita-niisan...Musashi-niisan...tell me who told you about reality." (Who involved her brothers in this mess? Who had dared taint them even more?!)
(You failed to protect them.)
"...we met a man named Takaya Sakaki," explained Musashi (no no no no nonononono...!). "He took us in; fed us; protected us...helped us become strong. Strong enough to choose for ourselves...and what we wanted was revenge."
Mana felt the bottom of her world fall away. "You...you're with Strega..."
Keita nodded (confirming it, confirming her fear, confirming her dread). "We've seen a lot of the horrible things that mankind is capable of...and the suffering that we were forced to endure, the cruelty of it all...knowing the truth about reality only made our decision simpler." Smiling sadly, he added, "A species as bad as we are...we don't deserve to live on."
Not that long ago, Mana might have found herself agreeing with them. (Tokita's calculated experiments, done with a cool apathy for her pain; the technicians and scientists who watched her without batting an eye; the dull monotony of the unspoken threat to her brothers, day in and day out, wearing away at her...)
(You failed to protect them.)
Now, thoughts of Misato Katsuragi, of Team Statherós, came to mind...and the thought of them dying made her recoil with a surprising ferocity. "No. It ain't all bad...there are good people..."
"If you were to lay down your arms and refuse to fight, would NERV let you?" challenged Musashi. "If you were to try and walk away...would they ever leave you alone?"
(August the 6th. Within the women's onsen at Nishiawakura, she inadvertently poured her heart out to Mayumi Yamagishi and Akane Hasegawa. "...even Ikari, for all his power, is still shackled by others...so how can I even compare...? Maybe that's why I feel so irritated...because I'm still trying to come to grips with that. I'm...probably never gonna get left alone, am I? Maybe...maybe I'd be better off just leaving my brothers alone...why drag them into my mess? Why draw the eyes of other people to them? Maybe they're enjoying their freedom...and who am I to take that away from them?")
Mana viciously ignored her traitorous memory, saying, "It's not that simple." Stepping away even further, she asked, "What the hell did Sakaki put into your heads?" Another monster in human form had gotten their wretched hands on her family. "What did he tell you?!"
Musashi and Keita looked sadly at each other, as though they had expected this. "...he gave us a choice," said Keita, his eyes suddenly glowing a brilliant yellow as his pale face underwent a colorful change, with the right side shifting to coal black, while the left brightened to a stark white.
"And we took it," continued Musashi, whose eyes glowed similarly; the blood vessels running along his face suddenly glimmered, shining a subtle orange.
Mana darted backwards, impulsively summoning her axe and shield. "This...no..." The sensation was just like what Mayumi Yamagishi had felt like, when she had been possessed by Armisael. "...no...!" The Angels had her brothers.
(You failed to protect them.)
Every single battle-hardened impulse within her was suddenly screaming; the enemy of humanity had taken hold of her brothers, to do with them as they pleased.
(You failed...and they've paid the price for your failure.)
No...no...no...NO! Snarling, Mana raised LABRYS over her shoulder, glaring at the wretched things wearing the skins of her brothers. "Angels...let them go...give them back...GIVE MY BROTHERS BACK!" With a defiant roar, she swung LABRYS, unleashing a searing energy wave-!
CHYOOOM.
The glowing blade of light splashed against a dual A.T. Field, summoned by both Musashi and Keita. The two were unharmed...physically, that is; the mere fact she had attacked them hurt in a way that the trio of orphans could only call agonizing. (For who was hurt most? The two who watched their sister raise up arms against them? Or the one who saw her brothers consumed in essence by monsters that desired their extinction?)
"...there's nothing to let go, neesan," sadly said Keita. "We chose this."
"For the sake of power, we let the Angels combine with us," explained Musashi. "In doing so...we faced our Shadows."
"I faced the fear I refused to let myself feel," muttered Keita, his left hand burning with blue fire.
"I faced the terror I didn't want to acknowledge was real," admitted Musashi, his right hand blazing likewise.
Those azure embers elicited an odd note of bewildered panic in Mana. That fire...do...do they have Personas...?!
"...so witness my fright: Phobos!" yelled Keita.
"And behold my dread: Deimos!" roared Musashi.
Mana grimaced as the two Personas began to take form, even as her heart quivered with anguish.
xxxx
/from Greek mythology
//Phobos is the god and embodiment of fear and panic
///Deimos is likewise the same for dread and terror
////but most importantly of all
/////they're brothers
/from Greek mythology
//Phobos is the god and embodiment of fear and panic
///Deimos is likewise the same for dread and terror
////but most importantly of all
/////they're brothers
Jeez, where's Kratos when you need him? Jokes aside, I bet they'll end up sacrificing themselves to save Mana once they realize the folly of their decision.
/Anti-Terror Task Force Headquarters, Tokyo-2, Nagano Prefecture/
"Speed Riser!"
Gilgamesh barrelled through the hallway, glowing red from Tarukaja as he smashed through the masked Remnants in the way. Whether they took on the appearance of hulking wrestlers, walking hands, or hulking golems, they were still bulldozed out of the way. However, the wretched thoughtbeasts were hardy and persistent.
How fortunate, that Gilgamesh had allies on his six; Toji charged in from behind, smacking Remnants with his Seven Star Stick. Unlike his long wooden staff from before, the Seven Star Stick was more nimble, yet more punishing ironically. Kensuke was hustling right behind him, firing his new Naptime Bolter at enemies before they could retaliate against Toji. Fitting for the name, there was a random chance of the Sleep Ailment being inflicted; likewise, Ozymandias targeted the enemies left over with other Ailments, such as Fear, Dizzy, Despair, or Forget.
This left Ryuji and Seiten Taisei at the very rear, to annihilate the debilitated Remnants with Maziodyne. Those that survived (or were largely resistant to Electric Skills) were quickly set upon by Toji, Kensuke, and their Personas.
Overall, despite the massive numbers of the enemies before them, it was a tactical approach that served them well, even after over a dozen floors worth of fighting.
Reaching a stairwell at the end of the hall, Toji had to stop. "'Kay, timeout," he muttered, exhaling with loud throaty gasps. "We've been going nonstop...!"
Kensuke sat on his rump, running a hand through sweaty hair. "Seriously...how much further do we have to go...?"
"As far as we have to go," answered Ryuji, reaching into his pockets and pulling out some energy bars. "Here, eat up." As the two boys promptly devoured the snacks, Ryuji gazed out the window; the yellow fog was seemingly omnipresent no matter how far they looked. "It's been a bit of a slog..."
(The outside of the A.T. Task Force's headquarters had been littered with shadowy creatures — all bearing colorful masks — that fired at Seiten Taisei the moment they got within range. The ground level was marked by signs of battle from hours ago...and the occasional human corpse boded ill for the defenders. With grim resolve, he ordered the boys to keep a tight formation as they entered the building.)
"...do you think we'll find that Commissioner fella?" asked Toji, looking around with a beleaguered expression. "I mean...we haven't even found anyone alive, yet."
"Probably because after they got overrun by whatever this is, they focussed on trying to get out of this strange anomaly," hypothesized Kensuke, fiddling with his new crossbow. "Depends on how long the fog has been around...but it can't have been more than a day or two, right?"
"Either that, or trying to keep the city's Cognitive Protection Center from falling," murmured Ryuji. "...let's just keep going." Grimacing, he used the stairwell railing as support so his gun-cane could be held at the ready; the elevators had all been without power, and some of the stairwells had been too badly damaged to ascend beyond a certain level. Peering through the haze, he said, "I think...we might be able to take this one to the top."
The trio of Persona-users continued onward, eventually reaching the twentieth floor; as before they burst into the hallway, drawing the attention of more Remnants: towers of rotating heads, a snake looping through Mars and Venus symbols, and fat, donut-eating cops(?) with a key dangling from the hollows in their torsos(??). Within sixty seconds, the premises were clear.
"It doesn't make sense," murmured Kensuke as Ryuji hobbled over towards a specific door. "Tokyo-2 is the heart of the government; not only was the country's A.T. Task Force headquartered here, but there had to be however many cognitive agents in the employ of the state; how could it fall to numbers like this?"
"Who's to say it wasn't worse before?" observed Toji. "If these things are based on the mind like sensei was sayin', then if there were more people...there would have been more of these things. Right? I mean, we've encountered at least a couple hundred just in this building; how many would there be when there were more people around?"
That had unsettling implications; Ryuji opted to ignore them, opening the door...and there was only devastation to be seen. Most of the office looked like a bomb had gone off around it...but what caught their attention immediately was the corpse lying against the wall, bearing the garb of an A.T. Agent. Their face was hidden by an old CRT television of all things, which had been smashed over their head...but it did nothing to hide the necktie with the yellow-and-orange checkerboard pattern. "...damn it. This is Morooka." (This month-long mission to be the babysitters for the Hakone kids had rapidly become one of the worst ever.)
Kensuke and Toji stared at the Commissioner's body anxiously. "What now?" asked Aida.
Ryuji felt, more than heard, the frightened breathing; glancing at Morooka's personal closet, he willed Seiten Taisei to open it up; out stumbled a mousy but familiar man. "...wait, Mishima?"
Morooka's secretary looked up, his face cast into an expression of wearied terror. "Oh...Sakamoto-san..." Looking around at the fog, his face curdled with anxiety. "...so it's not over..."
"Boys, watch the door. Make sure no monsters sneak in." As Kensuke and Toji set about their task, Ryuji knelt down with a pained grimace, wincing from the ache in his bad leg. "Mishima-san...you're the first person with the Task Force that we've seen alive. What happened?"
Gulping, the man nervously fiddled with the rectangular object in his hands. "I...what day is it...?" When told that it was the 21st, Yuuki Mishima audibly gulped. "Ah...no wonder I feel hungry...and thirsty...it...it was the night of the 19th...and I was telling the Commissioner about an incident from Kyushu involving a rogue Shadow, and he suddenly got real serious, and told me to send a message to all the Superintendents about something called Siberian Sunset, and then he told me to go home and-!"
"Mishima. Breathe." Siberian Sunset? As one of the old-timers, Ryuji knew exactly what that term referred to. What could have prompted you to break operational security regarding the Great Northern Tower...? "And?" Reaching into his trusty rucksack, Ryuji handed Mishima a soda can labelled 'SECRET SAUCE OF HEALING'. "Drink up."
The tired man greedily popped the top and downed the contents in a matter of seconds; even before he finished, life returned to Mishima's eyes. "...wow. Thanks, Sakamoto-san-"
"Don't mention. Make with the answers, yeah?"
"Oh. Right. Well...I was worried, because the Commissioner's behavior was unusual. He got real serious all of a sudden...so I followed him back to his office. But when I opened the door, I was swallowed by this yellow fog...and when I opened my eyes, I saw him fighting someone else. Another Persona-user."
"Who was it?"
"...I think this will explain," murmured Mishima, holding up a rectangular VHS tape. "It...it was given to me by...the guy who did it."
...so he left Mishima to be the messenger. "Sounds like a lovely guy," he muttered with heavy sarcasm. "How are we supposed to watch it?"
With a shaky finger, Mishima pointed to the remnants of Morooka's desk; strangely, a tiny VCR-television combo was sitting there. "The killer...he left it there when he finished..."
Grimacing, Ryuji swiped the tape from the rattled secretary, hobbling over to the unusual television set. Despite the fact that there was no power cord, whatever lingering cognition had spawned it served to provide sufficient power; one touch of the power button sufficed to bring forth a screen of static. Let's see who the murderer is, thought Ryuji with vindictive venom, sliding the tape inside. After some mechanical clicking, the old telltale sound of magnetic tape turning coincided with the static fading to a plain blue screen; the 'play' icon flashed a few times before the blue background gave way to a fuzzy image of a man standing amidst the fog. The face...?!
"Hey now," said the man on the TV screen, patting the cameraman with an easygoing grin. "There's no need to be nervous! You got keep it steady, or else the picture will be bad."
...ah hell, it's Tohru Adachi. Just like that, the motive for Siberian Sunset became plain as day. How did he get free?!
I have a vague feeling that he is happily doing whatever he feels like and at some point that is probably going to involve screwing over Strega as well despite supposedly being on the same side.
My guess is, since the world he's living in is pretty much fake, and it's basically, on repeat, he's happy to have the time of his life while spreading the maximum amount of chaos possible. The fact that this benefits Strega doesn't really matter that much to him.
The TV showed Adachi stepping back, allowing the camera to see more of Morooka's office; in the background, the image of Magatsu-Izanagi (damn, how long has it been since you've seen his Persona?) standing atop Leviathan triumphantly. The demonic crocodile was cut all over, bearing numerous electric burns; to add insult on top of injury, Magatsu-Izanagi's naginata was embedded into the reptile's hardy snout. "Okay, now, for the important part..."
Off-screen, a tired voice growled, "Mishima...turn that damn camera off..."
Without warning, Adachi was by the cameraman's — Mishima's — side, sticking his face by the camera; the slight turn showed the left side of his face, revealing a blood trail going down from a cut on his forehead. The overall effect was rather unnerving. "Ah, come on...he came all the way back just to see you in action, it would be mean to send him off!" The nervous whimpers from the cameraman elicited an audible wince from Mishima (not that Ryuji could blame him; it was never fun having your weakness paraded on film). "Now..." Adachi walked towards the wall; the camera panned over, showing Morooka slumped against the wall. "Not a bad fight, all things considered."
Kinshiro Morooka looked up with an angry glare; his dark Agent wardrobe hid bloodstains, but the cuts in his limbs were impossible to ignore. It was taking visible effort for the gonkish man to even lift his head (which hurt, on some deep level; for so long, Morooka had been considered untouchable). "Whaddya want...a prize...?"
"Nothing you could offer me," answered Adachi, sticking his hands into his pockets. "That prison was a bit boring, you know? Being one of the few people who was actually imprisoned there in actuality."
"You're a Persona-user...couldn't exactly stow away your Shadow when you'd already accepted it..."
Adachi chuckled. "By that logic, I could have been thrown away into a normal jail until it was time for my execution. You just wanted everyone to forget me, because I was pretty inconvenient."
"...when you murder Shadows...hide the fact...and then pretend to be some paragon of justice when signing up for the A.T. Task Force...and then kill your fellow Agents after losin' your shit...you can hardly blame us."
Adachi's tiny little grin was a wicked thing to behold. "Eh, slight problem, oldtimer: I confessed to those first murders only after I got caught. You didn't have shit on me."
"...it always bugged me...so why?"
"Because I had lost the 'game'. As the winners, you were free to do with me as you pleased; if that meant spending the rest of my life in some dark little corner of the Metaverse, so be it. But...thanks to those pissants in Strega, I'm a free man. And boy, have I been waiting for a time like this!"
Ryuji growled. Strega...ah shit.
(August the 9th. Following the battle against Sho Minazuki in Okayama, he had gotten a debrief from all of the kids involved. When Shinji asked why he was so angry, his response had been blunt: for Takaya Sakaki and Jin Shirato to warn about a terrorist attack in Okayama, only to let some other kid show up in their place? The whole thing smelled rotten.)
The possibility was all too probable, in Ryuji's mind. If Strega somehow attacked the Great Northern Tower...that would explain how Adachi got free and why Morooka invoked Siberian Sunset...but why is Adachi talking like he's not with Strega...?
Morooka snarled, spitting out a globule of dark blood. "Damn psychopath. If it's all just a game to you, why aren't you working with Strega?"
Adachi flashed a smile towards the camera. "Because their game is boring. I've got something much more...personal, in mind." (That emphasis sent a chill up Ryuji's spine.) "That's just the way I've decided to roll."
"You're...in the heart of the government...you think this stunt will go unnoticed...?"
Gesturing up into the air, Adachi pointed towards something offscreen; the camera followed, revealing a yellow eye with a green iris and crimson pupil. Even before it faded away into the yellow fog, Adachi said, "thanks to my 'patron', this city will be too busy dealing with this little bout of fog to think about me. Kind of crazy to think about what can happen while you're stuck in a life-or-death battle, eh?"
A 'patron'? What does he mean by that? Looking up, Ryuji noticed that no such eye was visible anymore. The fog's still present though...did that eye transfer somewhere else...?
Morooka huffed, looking decidedly unimpressed. "Just another asshole...that's all you are...and this little snuff film of yours is only going to piss people off."
"Funny that you even know what a snuff film is supposed to be," darkly joked Adachi, raising a small television set (wait, where did that come from?) above his head. "Anyhow...that's the point, Commissioner. I'm counting on it." Then, with no flair whatsoever, Adachi brutally smashed the television over Morooka's head.
(At that moment, Ryuji resolved to kick Adachi's ass.)
Mishima's pained whimper was echoed by his cry of despair on the videotape; with very little in the way of reflection, Adachi suddenly stomped towards the camera. "W-W-What are you going to do w-with me?!" yelped the Mishima behind the camera; there was a sound of audible shuffling and struggling, before the viewer's point of view showed Mishima being thrown into the closet.
Adachi, now being the cameraman, jokingly said, "So...I'm not exactly sure what to do with you, and I honestly don't care. If you wanna try braving the cognitive monsters prowling outside, that's a perfectly valid option! Or you could just hide in here and hope that nothing finds you...either way, you're probably gonna die sooner rather than later...anyhow, good luck with that!" The door was slammed shut; the last thing heard was a satisfied sigh from Adachi before the video came to a stop.
"...who was that?" Ryuji and Mishima turned around; Ozymandias and Gilgamesh were at the door, allowing Kensuke and Toji to watch the video from a closer vantage point. Suzuhara continued his question with "Who killed your boss?"
"...an old A.T. Agent by the name of Tohru Adachi," admitted Ryuji.
Ryuji snorted. "Figures a Task Force nerd like you would know the story. But we can swap stories later." Looking back at Yuuki Mishima, Ryuji asked, "Mishima, have you tried leaving at all?"
"...no," he admitted with some shame, his eyes falling towards the corpse of Morooka. "I...the Commissioner gave me a task to complete. And I haven't done it yet...so I wasn't going to risk dying. Not like I have a Persona of my own...so I hoped that backup would eventually arrive..."
Toji winced. "Yeah...for the time being, we're probably it."
"...let's get Mishima out first, then try and regroup with the others." Everything had just become a lot more complicated, as if his life wasn't enough of a headache. Damn it Morooka...you just had to kick the bucket, didn't you? This sucks. The Angels, Strega, the Minako girl that had murdered Ken and Junpei, and now Adachi? What the hell is happening...?
Nah, it's just a common thing: "try to hotlink images from the evageeks wiki" is a thing people keep doing, and it doesn't work because evageeks have hotlinking prohibition stuff set up. they want you to link to actual wiki pages rather than hotlink images.
Nah, it's just a common thing: "try to hotlink images from the evageeks wiki" is a thing people keep doing, and it doesn't work because evageeks have hotlinking prohibition stuff set up. they want you to link to actual wiki pages rather than hotlink images.
That actually brings to mind an old question I've had for some time; I remember from the pre-MySpace days that hotlinking images was once considered the height of rudeness, due to the bandwidth cost on the image holder; it was instead incumbent on the person to upload images to some server space of their own before posting it for consumption.
That seems to have gone by the wayside over the past several years (as we've gone from Photobucket to Imgur, etc), to the point no one seems to bat an eye at hotlinking anymore.
Am I the only one who remembers that little facet of the old World Wide Web?
Here. Have installment twenty sixth installment of Dragon Reviews and (Probably) Overanalyzes SPE. Oh and have it be two days because once again I felt like it but it's fine because one day felt too short for me but I could've just stopped and had another part out sooner but nope gotta keep going and then something else happens to me that actually isn't that serious but feels it is and thus this feels a bit more disjointed than the ones before and...uh...
...
No, I ain't making fun of my own coping mechanisms in what is possibly a poor attempt to spin it in a more positive direction, whatever could you mean?
-puts on review glasses- Let's get started!
7/9 Morning: Hakone Academy - 7/10 Evening: The Metaverse
Shinji's still recovering from waking up so early in the...wait. -double checks that I didn't mix up the time- Okay I wasn't misremembering things. I was misunderstanding things. Anyways! Kenny suggests coffee, but when Shinji apparently he's a coffee purist, as Kenny puts it (which, well good point, but I have never had coffee besides mocha flavored snacks so what do I know?), so instead it's gonna be canned green tea. Well gonna be, as it's then Shinji notices Kaworu's not there and his friends answer and then we cut to Kaworu in the shower before he—
—looks into a meeting for the Substitute SMT Law Alliance apparently. So yeah. They do a rollcall of "I am I" (reminding me of "I am thou, thou art I" though I don't know if that's just me or if that's intentional) before they basically talk about the state of things and what they're gonna do moving forward, which is things are shit for them and Ramiel is gonna go after Shinji next. Oh and learn a bit more about several things.
Like "happened" to Tabris, even though Kaworu can still look into the meeting and they don't notice.
That Shinji has a "true nature" that everyone wants because of course they do. But if it's his "true nature", do you mean...his Origin? Yeah I know it ain't much of a joke if only I get it but still. With all this talk of his discarded "true nature", had this been a Nasuverse/Evangelion fusion, I would've speculated that his "true nature" is like a a—Shiki—Ryougi—situation...
...
HHHHMMMMM. Eh, it's probably not like her situation, but it's food for thought for me.
But the most important thing we learn though is about Phanuel. Who, by the why...
I shall now dub as Monael until proven otherwise.
Actually even if proven otherwise, I may still dub him Monael because of him being the "Angel of Hope" in the Substitute SMT Law Alliance, or SSLA. So yeah.
Anyways, again, with that, the meeting's over and Kaowru goes to school where...
And if I was there, I'd either be smug at not being bothered about the pop quiz thanks to actually knowing the answers or be all "I don't care" over not getting it right.
Most probably the latter though because I was that way about pop quizes whenever they, well, popped.
But I digress. After that torturous day, Shinji plops himself in the Literature Club and, well, tries to continue reading. He reads about a part where Ophelia (... i only think of two other ophelia when i see that name) is accusing (presumably) Hamlet. Aaaaaand...
Were this a normal Persona fic, I'd have simply said Hamlet answered your call from Sea of Souls and call it a day. But this ain't a normal Persona fic! Where instead the reasons are just as much as that as it is a reflection of what you're capable of! And to that my feelings say:
AH HA HA HA HA! AHHH HA HA HA HA HA HA! AH! HA! HA! -laughing mad-
So moving on to the actual bulk of this bit: talking about understand/empathy.
Starting off with simply discussing the art of localization...okay, they're talking about translation but that's besides the point. They talk about how the translation of a work is affected by the skill, intent and bias of the translator(s), which is well, something really important but is also just what comes with this sort of thing. It makes me think of the localization behind the Persona series in general, particularly 5's original release since I heard of a few complaints (okay only really one but still) about the translation for being stiff and/or weird in their wording (the one coming to mind being them changing Makoto from saying "girl of rumor" to "center of gossip" when she first confronts the PT on the school rooftop), and the Trails series' localization, and how they do their best to convey the original script without making it so weird. There's a reason people make jokes of Google Translate. One for one translation doesn't always mean it's a "good" translation.
But more importantly, and to get away from that digression, that conversation leads to the aforementioned "understanding/empathy" talk, with Mayumi noting you can take all the time in the world to understand a book, but with people, to describe it in a somewhat more cynical way, it's a give-and-take. You gotta open up for the other person to think they can open up safely too, but that runs the risk of that other person not reciprocating and instead taking advantage of the drop in defenses. And though it wasn't mentioned in the talk, people also have another factor that unlike a book. Where the contents will (for the most part; censorship and edits can happen and stuff) remain the same everytime you come back to a book, hence the "you can take all the time you need to understand it", people change. The brat you knew in high school might become a kind and apologetic adult who wants to make up for their attitude. That nice neighbor who'd let you use their tools when you needed it you knew might have fallen into debt and turn bitter to everything around them due to their destitute living state. Or maybe that couple you thought were close might have fallen out because they found one thing they disagree over that neither couldn't compromise on. Of course there's a "core" to a person (as Minato oh so clearly illustrated), but the ever changing nature of being human certainly doesn't help make it "easy". Or at least that's what I ended up thinking about from this conversation, even if, again, that wasn't exactly discussed.
Luckily for Shinji, he seems earnest to Mayumi, so at the very least that'll make it easier in some ways for him to get close, especially now that he's putting effort. Aaaand then they drop that to move on Mayumi helping him translate Hamlet. I mean, it's still early on in the link, so of course, but progress is progress, for both the link and what they're reading.
Speaking of progress though. That night, Shinji decides to wander around campus. He can't see 'em, but the soft reboot protags are out too. Yu's doin' origami, Minato's doin' nap classes, and Ren is trying to convince the Atlus execs to make a Persona 5 Guitar Hero spin-off—er, I mean, have a guitar battle with a guitarist. With the (relative) peacefulness of the night, he finally answers Herod's question (that I had completely forgotten about; oh wow when i read that feels so long ago for some reason...oh right. The typhoon) about the whole "if someone you know has to choose between living one fulfilled year or many non-fulfilling years, pick among the choices" question, as well as clarifying why he picked "nothing". When he's done with that, he...says thank you to his sensei for taking him in.
With that, the day ends on a heartwarming note...
So onto the next day!
And it begings with a mystery person in some Velvet Room kind of reality looking for music stuff, specifically a model of guitar (couldn't help but look it up 'cause I first thought it was a casette player or something). I initially thought it was Theo, except you made it obvious it was Theo the last time he popped up, so it realized it couldn't be. Since we don't got more than this, I shall him Herman after Herman Li of DragonForce because why not? I certainly can't think of a better "nickname".
Anyways, with that, Shinji is wakes up and while checking the time...he sees a new question from Pilate! Which is...
PILATE: BUT WE ARE MORE INTERESTED IN HEARING WHAT WOULD FINALLY MAKE YOU DECIDE TO CUT YOUR LOSSES AND LEAVE.
PILATE: AFTER ALL, AS THOSE WHO HAVE USED YOU IN THIS SCENARIO ACKNOWLEDGE, YOU ARE NOT A NECESSITY.
...well, I skipped a bit of context, but essentially the question is "No Good Deed Goes Unpunished" and thus is asking what would be the tipping point to make you leave the circumstances you were in.
[...] "related to plan continuation bias, it is a term used to describe the psychological phenomenon where people are more willing to proceed with a given plan or course of action the more they've previously invested into it. It doesn't have to be capital or any other monetary resource; it could even be applied to relationships..."
Oh. Why thank you for providing the info so that I didn't need to search it up.
More related to what I though of the info though...I was kinda hit with a "oh yeah" because I remember making note of myself of that before, without knowing about the existence of this, mainly in the simple thought of "I'm already this deep, might as well go all the way". And have both fallen to it and broken it.
But that doesn't really answer the question.
Hmm. It's kind of tough for that because all I keep thinking of is all the reasons I wouldn't be ditching my "job" because my superiors got mad at me over something seemingly petty, especially if it's a "job" that I myself got myself into. But that's the point of the question, isn't it? To think about it? So...
...HMMMMMMMMMM.
I think it would be if I'm noticing it's taking a toll on my health, especially mentally, at least as the person I am as of now. Even without stressful and/or hurtful stimuli, I have bad mental habits/thought process that suck for me (well it feels that way to me when they go haywire), and so if something I'm doing or the place I'm in is more often than not stressing me out and making those bad habits worse, then that's it. I'm stopping.
Aaaand saying like that made me realize I actually have done this before. Maybe not the exact circumstances that Pilate is talking about, but rather the action of "cutting ties only to come back later". Not for anything bad, thankfully, but still...it made me remember it.
So yeah.
Anyways! Unfortunately for Shinji, he's gonna be thinking on that for while.
Meanwhile, as Shinji pondered the applications of the "sunk cost fallacy" to his own life, one of the individuals it could apply the most to was having a rather unorthodox meeting.
OH NO KING MOR—I mean...Kinshiro Morooka. Ahem. No, I aint upset he's here. No, I'm more worried for him...even though he's probably fine...for now. That seems to be the case as Morooka is basically there to be "professionally mad" at Gendo.
You mean this fella?
Yeah, I know it's a Digimon, but this is what I default to when I hear "Leviathan".
Anyways, when the meeting's done, Morooka talks to Misato, the latter mentioning Mishima being the former's secretary (god damn it mishima how do you keep findin' yourself in situations like this...), about what Morooka did before moving on to both of their impressions on Gendo, and then moving on to...Morooka going to go "check" on Akechi.
...
I know it's petty...I mean he's not bad after all, as I myself have said so before...but I'm hatin' him right now.
But before we actually see any of that, we got Shinji to deal with! And that that's track club's cancelled for the day because the members wanna study, Toji's gonna go iron out details of his apprenticeship to Ryuji with the man and Sae, and Shinji has free time...which is quickly used up by Hikari offering him to come to her study group and him accepting. By the end of it, it's just the two of them, and Hikari asks about Toji and his Persona. One thing leads to another and...it leads to Shinji figuring out her (maybe not so) slight cursh on the Toji. Understandably, Hikari muses about having been worried since sudden change, especially of a drastic degree, usually meant bad things in her mind. Oh and that she isn't used to having a lack of control in school. ...
...uh huh yeeeeeaaah...that not good.
If I didnt know any better, I would've thought that line from her was a reverse Emperor line. But then I remember empress can also be female authority, even if it more often means nurturing, so still makes sense.
But anyways...
Now I'm back to being mad as Akechi's deals with being the punching bag! Gosh dang it... At least Akechi is as irritated at Morooka as I am. Yeah me too Akechi me too... Also, thank you Gigolo for being the more rational/understanding of us, because I am certainly not in the mood for being either.
Oh well. With that, we get a description of Leviathan and...
[...] Leviathan; equivalent in side to an adult sperm whale, the red beast snorted with a long snout, looking akin to a vicious alligator with far too many teeth compared to its animal counterpart; with purple scales of spikes and mottled bumps running along the top of the spine. Yellow reptilian eyes, hidden behind a plain white mask, glared viciously at his opponent.
-blinks- Wait what? Leviamon is actually close to what it looks like? Well maybe minus the lack of two tails...but still. Yay! Easy visualization of the Persona for me!
Also error that I found. Pretty sure that's supposed to "size".
Continuing on, Morooka goes on talking about Persona evolutions, or what we usually call as ultimate or second awakenings, and being both wrong and right about overcoming your Persona's weakness. When that's done, Misato comes up to help Akechi and is smug—YEAH SHUDDUP MISATO—before they be talkin' 'bout stuff. First about the incident with Misato and Mana, Mana herself and the yoinking of the Shadow of Hanamura (-_-). Oh and Ryuji. After that, Misato goes and it's just Morooka talking to Akechi and then—
"You know why. Yoshida's backup now holds the governorship."
"...that man has no relevance to me," he bit out.
"Tough shit. If Shido starts feeling antsy, he may start using his new leverage as a prefectural governor to get you transferred to a posting in the Kansai region.
"You gave me your word that I would be left alone."
"So long as the man never found out about you," he not so subtly reminded him. "And you're a damn idiot for thinking that the fact you became a Chief Warden at such a young age wouldn't draw curious eyes."
Morooka gives reminders to Akechi about the circumstances he's in now that Shido's "prefrectual governor" despite how much the Chief Warden would want otherwise before the Commissioner leaves. Aaand...
Okay, sorry Akechi, I actually feel better because of that because I have to know: what is the kanji for it?
(also gosh dang it what is it with everyone and having it be that akechi's birthname is actually different
i mean
it makes sense
but gaaah i don't wanna do it)
Ahem. Anyways. Gigolo talks a bit about the situation before Akechi basically goes "people as stubborn as shit and it's biting me in the ass right now" before the day ends. As Morooka said...were you really expecting Shido to not be a problem if he still has free reign, more or less, Akechi? Really? I would thought you'd be at least a little smarter than that...but then again, I don't know the circumstances of why you decided Chief Warden of Tokyo-3(? I think? Not in the mood to double check right now) other than possibly Joker and Gigolo being involved.
That actually brings to mind an old question I've had for some time; I remember from the pre-MySpace days that hotlinking images was once considered the height of rudeness, due to the bandwidth cost on the image holder; it was instead incumbent on the person to upload images to some server space of their own before posting it for consumption.
That seems to have gone by the wayside over the past several years (as we've gone from Photobucket to Imgur, etc), to the point no one seems to bat an eye at hotlinking anymore.
Am I the only one who remembers that little facet of the old World Wide Web?
Well, while I'm certainly not old enough to have seen the part of the internet's history where it was rude to hotlink myself, I did see the whole "upload image to your own site" thing being, well, still a thing when I was still pretty new to the internet...or rather, more specifically, for Fan Art Request Shops over on another forum I went to that would make banners for people and then tell them to "download and host it yourself because it might get deleted for space on my Photobucket account".
Okay when I actually say it, it's not even similar, but the whole "it's rude to hotlink images" certainly made me remember that.
Here. Have installment twenty sixth installment of Dragon Reviews and (Probably) Overanalyzes SPE. Oh and have it be two days because once again I felt like it but it's fine because one day felt too short for me but I could've just stopped and had another part out sooner but nope gotta keep going and then something else happens to me that actually isn't that serious but feels it is and thus this feels a bit more disjointed than the ones before and...uh...
...
No, I ain't making fun of my own coping mechanisms in what is possibly a poor attempt to spin it in a more positive direction, whatever could you mean?
—looks into a meeting for the Substitute SMT Law Alliance apparently. So yeah. They do a rollcall of "I am I" (reminding me of "I am thou, thou art I" though I don't know if that's just me or if that's intentional)
It was basically to introduce their speech patterns amongst themselves. (And low-key provide an easy way for people to identify an Angel in question for future references. Wink.)
But the most important thing we learn though is about Phanuel. Who, by the why...
I shall now dub as Monael until proven otherwise.
Actually even if proven otherwise, I may still dub him Monael because of him being the "Angel of Hope" in the Substitute SMT Law Alliance, or SSLA. So yeah.
And though it wasn't mentioned in the talk, people also have another factor that unlike a book. Where the contents will (for the most part; censorship and edits can happen and stuff) remain the same everytime you come back to a book, hence the "you can take all the time you need to understand it", people change.
You mean this fella?
Yeah, I know it's a Digimon, but this is what I default to when I hear "Leviathan".
[...]
-blinks- Wait what? Leviamon is actually close to what it looks like? Well maybe minus the lack of red scales and two tails...but still. Yay! Easy visualization of the Persona for me!
Oh and that she isn't used to having a lack of control in school. ...
...uh huh yeeeeeaaah...that not good.
If I didnt know any better, I would've thought that line from her was a reverse Emperor line. But then I remember empress can also be female authority, even if it more often means nurturing, so still makes sense.
Okay, sorry Akechi, I actually feel better because of that because I have to know: what is the kanji for it?
(also gosh dang it what is it with everyone and having it be that akechi's birthname is actually different
i mean
it makes sense
but gaaah i don't wanna do it)
To be fair, a guy with detective aspirations naming himself after a famous fictional Japanese detective (i.e. Kogoro Akechi) wouldn't be out of the question for Akechi in canon.
Ahem. Anyways. Gigolo talks a bit about the situation before Akechi basically goes "people as stubborn as shit and it's biting me in the ass right now" before the day ends. As Morooka said...were you really expecting Shido to not be a problem if he still has free reign, more or less, Akechi? Really? I would thought you'd be at least a little smarter than that...but then again, I don't know the circumstances of why you decided Chief Warden of Tokyo-3(? I think? Not in the mood to double check right now) other than possibly Joker and Gigolo being involved.
Yeah I know it ain't much of a joke if only I get it but still. With all this talk of his discarded "true nature", had this been a Nasuverse/Evangelion fusion, I would've speculated that his "true nature" is like a a—Shiki—Ryougi—situation...
