[Week 5, Tuesday: Belph]

[doublecrows]

[SUP BELPH. it's just the detective you wanted to see!!]

Did you enjoy your week off?

Comments

[doublecrows]

Shall we rectify both of those problems now?

[axilium]

We can try.

[doublecrows]

I've already told you the majority of how my second title works. We are players form a previous game, survivors drawn into this one to encourage the completion of objectives. There are five of us-- we originally had no idea who the other four were, as our memories of the previous game had been stripped from us.

Now that we've found each other, every week during our meeting with the Crafters, we regain one memory from the previous game.

I imagine our role in this war game is reflected in our title: we are to encourage the completion of everyone's objectives, while trying to piece together the stories of the past. For every objective we help see through, the Crafters will answer questions about this game and the one prior.

There isn't much else to it.

[axilium]

[...]

Mine is pretty much what you've probably figured out. I get to confirm one person each week: I learn which faction they belong to and whether or not they have an additional role.

I get half an answer to my question if I correctly nail a role; I get another half of an answer if I figure out what role they have, exactly.

[he shrugs.]

If I don't hit a role, and if I didn't get anyone to 'fess up anything over the past week, then my weekly meeting with the Crafters is pretty useless.

[doublecrows]

[Akechi nods]

Who here have you confirmed to have a second role? For that information, I'll tell you about the last two memories the Historians received.

[axilium]

Sousei. [he doesn't need to explain the results of that one.] Souji and Ion—the passive-aggressive one—are clear.

I hit another role this week, but I'll be talking to them first. Can't give you their name yet.

[doublecrows]

[. . . . . lol]

All right.

[. . .]

Last Monday, our memory was of a masked ball. There was a girl at the ball, dressed in pink silk. She was yelling at someone-- "don't think you can just stand in the corner the whole time; you're dancing even if I have to drag you out there myself"-- and her voice was. . . familiar.

I believe it was the girl who screamed in our earlier memory. The one in which Tiger-san was stabbed.

[axilium]

... You actually did not mention a screaming girl before?

[doublecrows]

She seemed irrelevant at the time. But there was a scream, mingled with a dragon's roar, when Tiger-san was stabbed.

[axilium]

Oh. Pleasant.

[doublecrows]

. . . I suspect this girl may be Beauty.

[axilium]

Yeah, seems like it, unless they're introducing new pieces to this whole thing. Think she was talking to Beast?

[doublecrows]

Yes. I do. But as far as I can tell, none of our memories involved Beast yet.

[axilium]

[he hums.]

Have you tried writing to either of them?

[doublecrows]

[. . . . :T]

Varian-san suggested something similar. Why would I write to them?

[axilium]

Well, personally, I got desperate for info?

[doublecrows]

[what!!]

Did they respond?

[axilium]

Yup, to Beauty. Blotted out like the other letters from the dead, but based on what I could decipher... they mostly criticized my wooing attempts. Oh, and encouraged completing the objectives and working with you guys, the Historians. Nothing groundbreaking.

[doublecrows]

[oh my god]

Who are you even trying to woo?

[BELPH PLZ!1]

[but then he just looks awkward]

Where. . . did you send the letter?

[axilium]

I might've not treated the letter I wrote super seriously.

[ :) ]

Through the owlery.

[doublecrows]

[belph. . .]

The owlery. Of course.

[SHIFTS AWKWARDLY. . .]

I don't know how I feel about writing letters to those who are supposed to be dead.

[axilium]

[what...]

It's pretty weird. Though in Beauty and Beast's case—even though it turned out that the dead are in the same dimension—I guess I thought of it more as being trapped elsewhere, rather than dead.

[doublecrows]

As did I. The book didn't exactly clarify, but "being sent to the other side" doesn't at all evoke images of death.

[axilium]

Yeah. Apparently it's not a pleasant place, so there's that. Guess it reinforces the idea that completing the objectives will net us enough ink to revive them, if Beauty's gunning for that route.

[doublecrows]

Is that the theory?

[first he's heard of it]

I admittedly never asked the Crafters what would happen if enough ink was gathered. But they've always been vague, every time I've asked them about this game's ending.