[Silpelit7]

Spoiler for crazy theory:

Is it possible that Ovan is someone who placed the original The World and was close to the events of the original games? Everything seems to revolve around Haseo (who we already know is a character in the G.U. games), Ovan (particularly his left arm which contains massive amounts of undecipherable data), with Shino caught in between.

My theory is as such: Ovan knew everything that would happen. He knew that Haseo would play an important role in the events to come. The whole "Twilight Brigade" thing was just a sham, I think, for Ovan to gather people together. Ovan's arm... could it be a fragment of the Key of the Twilight? And has he really been searching for a way to activate it? Anyway... I believe Ovan knew about Tri-Edge, and warned Shino about her eventual PKing. However, I think he had hoped to be freed from Naobi by then to help/manipulate Haseo further.

Shino bothers me more than anything... when she is with Haseo at the Cathedral and he discovers that her PC's clothing had changed color, she states that it "echoed her inner decisions" or something. She had already accepted her own demise. Later in the same scene she says something like, "I won't run away like Aura did." Huh? Why is Shino, a real person playing a game, comparing herself to Aura, who was the driving soul of The World V.1?

As she is PK'd (or data drained), rather than just dying, the data which composed her PC seems to be torn away bit by bit. Then there is a scene in the real world where we see the person behind Shino trying to wake up, hearing her cell phone ring (as Haseo's user calls her), then closing her eyes again. Comatose?

Maybe I'm trying to draw too many comparisions between the 1st and 2nd series of games here. But now I want to play Rebirth more than ever! If Ovan comes back in the last episodes of //roots, I think he and Haseo will quickly grow distant. Haseo may learn that Tri-Edge was the one who PKed Shino.... Poor Shino, I wonder what lies ahead for her?