[Game] Umineko - Spoilers, Theories, Interpretations [Archive] - Page 123

GoldenLand

2012-09-11, 02:41

7) Battler, evidence in EP4 I think (whenever they had the picnic) and EP7 shows that Battler had promised Shannon who obviously was a girl (as Battler has shown no inkling of liking the same sex) that he would ride a white horse and take her away from the island, Battler clearly had romantic feelings for her thus suggesting that Shannon is distinctively a girl.
4) Jessica & George, people keep calling Yasu gender confused but what about Jessica and George? They are certainly not gender-confused...and no clues have been presented which suggests that they are attracted to the same sex, so surely Jessica would have noticed Kanon is actually a girl or Shannon is actually a boy and either said something or stopped loving them...
5) Evidence has been given from what Battler has seen that Jessica does indeed love Kanon and George does indeed love Shannon (so it's not as if these pairings are actually fiction themselves either), so it is clear that J&G believe that Shannon and Kanon are 2 different people.

Battler thought that Shannon was a girl.

As for Jessica and George, they think that Kanon and Shannon are different people, of course. Jessica thinks that Kanon's a guy, and George thinks that Shannon's a girl. It's a mystery how nobody realised that the two people are one and the same in body, but that's the way it is.

You may as well be saying "why didn't George or Jessica [or Natsuhi, etc] realise that Shannon's boobs are fake?" But fact is that Ryukishi has confirmed that Shannon's boobs are fake.

Have you seen Ryukishi's interview with Keiya? This is the bit after where he talks about Shannon and her body problems and how she has a body that "cannot make love" and also has fake boobs.

K Then I think it is also a clue that nothing happened between them, while they were staying at the same place in Okinawa.

R It is a clue. To just blurt it out spontaneously was more than Shannon was ready for. "I will reveal it sometime". Because she was so scared of herself, she couldn’t confess. If it had been because of one action that George took, she wouldn’t have had any choice, that was the balance of passivity she upheld. While she did not hide it actively, she also wouldn’t talk about it openly. Because of that thinking, going on that trip to Okinawa was an experience to her like being a carp on a high slope, "He prepared separate rooms for us *twitch*?" *laugh*. That knightly George came all the way to Okinawa only to dare and prepare separate rooms? Shannon must have been like "What?!". But there are many scenes like that which show how Shannon left the decision to fate. For example at the first twilight in EP1, when George was told by Hideyoshi "You should not look at this corpse!". If he had gone in, not minding that there would be no face, he would have seen that there was no corpse. It would have meant the end of the incident. Or even if Battler had actually squeezed Shannon’s breasts, he might have noticed that they are fake. Shannon was in a state of mind that said "if it comes to light, let it".

But, you know, I think you're being unfair to Jessica and George by assuming that they would definitely stop loving Kanon and Shannon if they found out about gender issues. Ryukishi has also said that if Shannon had come out with the truth to George, she might have received an answer that would surprise her.

Your argument seems to boil down to

(a) that the games present Kanon and Shannon as two different people and that that means they have separate bodies.

I'd say: But those two characters are Yasu's creations, whom she wanted to write as individuals. They are precious, important "people" to her, whom she is very invested in. It doesn't mean that they don't both have the same body in the stories Yasu wrote. Of course she is writing them as separate people as much as she can.

(b) that Jessica, and George (and Battler) would not love someone who wasn't the opposite gender physically. They would be able to tell the difference. Therefore, because of these feelings those three have for Shannon and Kanon, those two must have separate bodies.

I'd say: nope, that doesn't follow. Also, remember, nobody has even realised that Shannon has fake boobs, let alone any other possible issues. If they were going to notice something, they would have noticed that! And for George, Ryukishi has strongly implied that if he'd found out about Shannon's body problems, he wouldn't have stopped loving her.

Umineko relies on coincidences. Ryukishi has made one of those be that the Shannon/Kanon body issue was not discovered in the gameboards.

(c)...that Episode 7 is all lies

I'd say: What? Proof is needed if you want to assert that. You should include reasons for why Ryukishi would write that whole episode as a big troll.

(d) that Shannon and Kanon not being the same person means that Rosa is the culprit? That you "know" she's the culprit but find it difficult to prove.

I'd say: No, that doesn't follow. Anyway, if you have come up with a theory for Rosa being the culprit, you should be willing to back it up with reasons. Will and Dlanor would be disappointed to hear you give up like this.

Kealym

2012-09-11, 02:41

Well, there just didn't seem to be any indication that she WAS in on it, outside of the line you posted (as far as I remember, anyway), which as you said could just as easily be taken as literally everybody on the island save Ghoda just lying to her about it, and we DO know they were lying about it.

Also, why expose their daughter to the potential legal consequences, or take on the risk of telling people unnecessarily? They didn't tell Ghoda (who's never met Kinzo at all, I think), and ... well, this is flimsy, but it just seems contrary to her characterization, as well. Jessica apparently didn't like being on the island at all, or being the heir to the family, so if she wouldn't really be concerned, why bother telling her?

Thunder Book

2012-09-11, 03:56

If Jessica actually noticed "Hey holy crap I haven't actually seen my Grandpa who's been living in the same house as me for the past two years, what the fuck is up with that?," she might eventually put two and two together and begin to distrust her parents. Or at least if I were Krauss or Natushi, that's why I'd consider telling her.

On a related note (And I can't really think of any evidence directly supporting this but I'll throw the idea out there anyways), is it possible Jessica DID figure this shit out on her own, and is blackmailing her parents in any of the Episodes?

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-11, 05:42

It was all Rosa - I know it there is no other way...but it is hard to pin her down as the culprit.

Wow there, slow down. You sound very confident in that, but no, there are plenty of other ways. Do you have anything to support it?

(This had better not be KnownNoMore's theory, just warning)

If Jessica actually noticed "Hey holy crap I haven't actually seen my Grandpa who's been living in the same house as me for the past two years, what the fuck is up with that?," she might eventually put two and two together and begin to distrust her parents. Or at least if I were Krauss or Natushi, that's why I'd consider telling her.

Well we aren't told that Jessica expected meeting with Kinzo regularly, and if she heard her parents say the same lame excuse that he's 'immersed in his research', she wouldn't doubt it unless there was some strong idication to make her think otherwise. Plus, I think she didn't really bother.

On a related note (And I can't really think of any evidence directly supporting this but I'll throw the idea out there anyways), is it possible Jessica DID figure this shit out on her own, and is blackmailing her parents in any of the Episodes?

Boy, imagine what that would look like. "Mom, I wanna get a tattoo." "I foribd it!" "Then I tell aunt Eva gramps is already dead."

Jan-Poo

2012-09-11, 07:33

*snip*

Look I think we more or less clarified our positions, even if we still don't agree on some points, what matters is that at least there shouldn't be anymore misunderstanding. In the end the problem can be reduced mostly on semantic and technicisms.

Theme of miracles. Don't equivocate. We totally can argue probabilities of Ryukishi's intent in his writing and even produce evidence for or against it.

I was under the impression that we were making a discussion on realistic probabilities. If we include the narrative factor then certain arguments do not work against me either, like the unlikeliness of a stranger adopting Battler.

Sayo didn't have a bird-watching friend she named a as number-punned reference to Tomitake... who turned out to actually be Tomitake.

I'm not sure I understood it right, are you talking about Battler? This argument would only make sense for those who actually believe he is Battler.
But I don't really see the relevance. Ryuukishi decided to call her Ikuko precisely because she is both Battler's new companion, and the author of the new forgeries in my opinion.

But does this mean you take the position that Yasu, just based on what we know of her, is not more likely to adopt and hide a random amnesiac than the average person? Becaaaaaause... I find that idea preposterous.

I have explained it before. It doesn't matter how unlikely it is for such a person to exist, as long as the probability for that person to exist isn't zero, that specific person will have a 100% probability of adopting Battler.

Refer to the example of the 10000 stranger cards I've explained before.

In addition, there's the "supposed to be dead" thing to take in account.
Example: Imagine that a specific crime is reported, the investigator analyzing the modus operandi concludes that there are only two criminals who are likely enough to have committed that specific crime in that specific way. Now let's say that the investigator deduces that this is more like "Criminal A" and only relevatively compatible with "Criminal B". However Criminal A has been reported to be dead. What's more probable? That Criminal A isn't actually dead, or that the less compatible (but not entirely incompatible) Criminal B is the culprit?

Renall

2012-09-11, 08:19

On a related note (And I can't really think of any evidence directly supporting this but I'll throw the idea out there anyways), is it possible Jessica DID figure this shit out on her own, and is blackmailing her parents in any of the Episodes?
It's funny, because this would be a perfect motive for Jessica as a culprit if the story gave us any reason whatsoever to think she was even remotely involved in anything. It basically doesn't, of course, but it's interesting.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-11, 08:31

It's funny, because this would be a perfect motive for Jessica as a culprit if the story gave us any reason whatsoever to think she was even remotely involved in anything. It basically doesn't, of course, but it's interesting.

But why would she involve everyone else, when they're clearly the intended victims of Krauss' and Natsuhi's scam?

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-11, 09:30

Well, I understand that what Thunder Book probably meant wasn't a Jessica Culprit Theory but a way to get Jessica involved in the events that happen on the island, but just for teh heck of it...

What if Jessica's tongue slips in front of the relatives (we know she's not that cunning, so she might screw up without even noticing, provided she knew such a secret.. One of them (let's say Eva because she's the most fitting for the part) pressures her a LOT, almost tortures her until she confesses. Also, we know that Jessica talks trash about her parents but loves them and always defends them. We've also got the whole 'next head' thing pressuring her. So, all those things considered, Jessica attacks and kills Eva.

But as for why she would kill the rest of them... yeah, never mind.

Kealym

2012-09-11, 10:23

I rather like it.
Jessica has shown twice that she's prepared to stand toe to toe with Eva in an argument, and though they're usually pretty innocent of anything, I wouldn't have minded if the kids were a little more involved with family affairs than they are.

honestly, though, if Jessica figured it out (and that's a pretty fair possibility), I mostly imagine her ... weakly asking her parents about it in a roundabout way (Is... is Grandfather really alright, shut up in there all the time..?), and more or less convincing herself to believe the lie they'd almost certainly tell.
But no yeah, somebody go write this blackmailer-Jessica forgery, right away please. :heh:

kefir645

2012-09-11, 11:52

The whole fake breast thing is either trolling on author's part or Ryukishi genuinely believes his readers to be retarded. I just can't take Shkanontrice theory seriously after that remark anymore.

RandomAvatarFan

2012-09-11, 12:14

Jesica was involved in the Kinzo cover up. She even says in EP1 that "Oh yeah, I can hardly believe he only has three months left." Or something to that affect.

And for someone with the kinds of issues and problems as Yasu has, why is it far-fetch'd to believe that her bras were stuffed?

AuraTwilight

2012-09-11, 13:10

Jesica was involved in the Kinzo cover up. She even says in EP1 that "Oh yeah, I can hardly believe he only has three months left." Or something to that affect.

Or it's a plot hole caused by Ryukishi's rewrite.

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-11, 13:16

The whole fake breast thing is either trolling on author's part or Ryukishi genuinely believes his readers to be retarded. I just can't take Shkanontrice theory seriously after that remark anymore.

Okay, why?

Or it's a plot hole caused by Ryukishi's rewrite.

Based on the information suggesting Jessica was involved in the Kinzo scham (meaning absolute zero), I'd say it's the latter.

battle22

2012-09-11, 13:20

The whole fake breast thing is either trolling on author's part or Ryukishi genuinely believes his readers to be retarded. I just can't take Shkanontrice theory seriously after that remark anymore.
Shannon devoloped a complex Because of her flat chest, What's wrong with that? And we know how Yasu thought she was a failiure and could not love, Because of the body damage,.Atleast she didn't want others to view herself like that ,She wanted to be a 'human' with her own interpretaion of things

AuraTwilight

2012-09-11, 14:09

I just want to point out that it's kind of hilarious how Shannon's jiggle physics in the anime is a legitimate, narrative-wrecking plot hole.

GabrieliosP

2012-09-11, 14:33

2) It's highly implied in each episode that the First Twilight is faked. It's entirely possible, nay, likely, that Yasu is buying off all the adults for a Murder Mystery Game for the kids.

"The beggining and the end overlap!"

I think in this case, "sneaked out after everyone went out and hid in the chapel" fits better.

Renall

2012-09-11, 15:43

I now want to see a forgery where Erika discovers a loose pad and determines that the culprit can be identified by finding the woman to whom this bra stuffing applies, demanding the use of Detective Authority to grope every female in the cast. Battler of course is a willing assistant in this matter:

"It's settled. We shall inspect every female present on this island. Naturally, I shall be excluded from this rule," Erika proclaimed with a brisk, businesslike tone.

Battler grinned. "Wait, wait, who says you should be excluded from consideration? Aren't you one of the females present on this island?" With a flourish, he added: "Isn't it possible that you could be the owner of the evidentiary pad?"

"What? That... um... th-that's clearly not possible!" Erika stammered, glaring at Battler. His gaze seemed all the more lecherous with each passing moment.

"Can you prove that, though? If we test every individual but you, isn't it possible there could be no match, or a false positive? If you're excluded, it throws the entire investigation into question!"

Erika grimaced. "I have no idea what you are rambling about, Ushiromiya Battler, but I insist-"

"State it in red! 'I am to be excluded from consideration as the owner of this pad because everyone knows that I'm flat as a board!'"

"..."

Battler tapped his foot. "Well?"

"...I am to be excluded from consideration as the owner of this pad because everyone knows that I am flat as a board. Satisfied?" Erika's face was flush with humiliation.

"How could I be?" Battler bemoaned with feigned disappointment.

GoldenLand

2012-09-11, 19:58

^ Such a scene would represent real detective skills being used! That really ought to go into a forgery.

The whole fake breast thing is either trolling on author's part or Ryukishi genuinely believes his readers to be retarded. I just can't take Shkanontrice theory seriously after that remark anymore.

Personally, I find the thing he said about rain and the culprit not getting wet in it to be much more absurd than the boob thing. It's reasonable that somebody who doesn't have boobs and wants them would go in for stuffing, it's just odd that nobody noticed it. Like Shannon's schoolmates, if they ever had to change clothes in the same room. Or Jessica, who can't have ever gone swimming with Shannon, or tickled her, etc. And the stuffing can't ever fall out. ("Sh, Shannon! You really need a new bra! Things are starting to go south!...Uh, wait, it's not possible for that to happen so fast, right?")

Keiya: Because carrying those corpses is a painfully heavy task, I quickly dropped it. Carrying 6 corpses through a storm is impossible, right?!

Ryukishi: It’s difficult, yes. If we are talking about the storm, if there is one thing that does not fit into a mystery in Umineko and can clearly be identified as fantasy, there is one kernel part, there is not even a thought spent on getting wet in the rain. It is one part that I cut right out of that world.

...

If you do something in the storm and return afterwards, you will be pretty much drenched, in case of a woman your makeup might be smeared, or there might be wet spots left in the room, there should be plenty of things. But throughout all the story there is never an explicit mention of something being "wet", which is slightly fantastic isn’t it?!

...

Because Umineko adopts the world view of a logic puzzle more than that of a orthodox mystery puzzle, rain only becomes a topic once it is important, so it’s safe as long as it doesn’t come up. That’s because in the world of logic puzzles it’s okay to omit those parts that you don’t need as a hint.

But, that's just the world that Ryukishi is playing in...:heh: He hasn't been playing fair right from the start. He's a dirty cheat. But he does get to make the rules, and he did say the game wasn't fair.

I just want to point out that it's kind of hilarious how Shannon's jiggle physics in the anime is a legitimate, narrative-wrecking plot hole.

I think she has jiggling problems in the Ougon games, too...

Joeyscraggy

2012-09-11, 21:17

I think she has jiggling problems in the Ougon games, too...

That was even more ridiculous as every character uses fixed images for their special declarations, and she's the only one with an animation. Guess where does she gets animated.

Actually, what if she didn't do it on Prime? Or what if she told Jessica she stuffs her bra? I don't think someone (much less Jessica) can figure she's (possibly) a boy just by knowing that, after all stuffing a bra is somewhat common, and won't spoil her little secret, if she has one

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-11, 22:13

After reading al this I knew it: so that's why Battler has that gropping move! It really is a killer weapon in Umineko o.o!
Maybe that molestation move was put in there for that reason XD

erneiz_hyde

2012-09-11, 22:23

It has been said for a while that Umineko would've been solved in ep.1 if Battler actually groped Shannon's breasts, so yeah...:heh:

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-12, 04:28

I don't see how finding out about her fake tits would solve anything.... Nobody (Battler-George or Jessica, Maria not even mentioned) would be nosy enough to ask, perhaps they'd embarrassedly let the subject slip. But maybe a Yasu that is convinced on letting herself to Fate would confess everything if that was found out.

As for Ougon, the jiggling is no problem at all if you take into account that her damn skirt flips so much all the time, anyone could find out her gender whether they like it or not.

AuraTwilight

2012-09-12, 05:06

Unless Yasu really does have mutilated junk.

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-12, 05:10

Yep, I know. I was just making a point that anime will be anime. I'm sure they didn't even think the jiggling might be a plot hole in the first place.

(Or maybe they did, but as long as they get to put *bounce* *bounce*, who the hell cares???)

Wanderer

2012-09-12, 06:01

Ougon doesn't count. It's all meta/fantasy, so Shannon can be a real woman there.

GuestSpeaker

2012-09-12, 06:06

Ok, so sad thought. At current publishing rate, and assuming they do the whole thing, Yen press won't be done producing Umineko in English until 2016.

Also, as to those theories about why Battler sucked at mysteries when he is meant to have read so many, I wonder if he always would have. I mean, Gameboard Battler might have (after all, who compares real life murders to books) but Ryu said he was surprised no-one called him on using old tricks. It is possible after Ep 2 if the fanbase had performed as requested and actually read old mystery novels, Battler would have started actually trying reasonable solutions to tricks.

battle22

2012-09-12, 06:55

Ok, so sad thought. At current publishing rate, and assuming they do the whole thing, Yen press won't be done producing Umineko in English until 2016.
I know right. :(. I hope it sells well so that they can speed it up a little. I am gonna buy all the volumes, Btw I think it will be faster than higu no ? or is it the same amount of waiting?

Thunder Book

2012-09-12, 08:57

GoldenLand

2012-09-12, 09:23

I know, right. It really makes you wonder how the series would have gone had Land been published.

On a different note, about Land, I wonder if it would be fun if someone tried writing a forgery based upon ideas of how that story might have gone? (I'm not suggesting that I do so myself right now; I'm already busy with another forgery.)

Let's see, we know there would have been a "Virgilius" who would have played more of an Erika role. But I forget what else Ryukishi gave away about it. It would be fun to try to plot out how Land might have progressed, filling in the gaps. After all, Beatrice did claim that it was her greatest work! It would have to be suitably epic. And it should differ from the way the way the rest of the series progressed, at least in some ways, since Ryukishi made serious revisions at that time.

Drifloon

2012-09-12, 09:29

Wasn't Land going to be a thing where pretty much everyone but Battler was an accomplice? Sounded sort of like EP4 in that respect.

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-12, 09:58

Wasn't Land going to be a thing where pretty much everyone but Battler was an accomplice? Sounded sort of like EP4 in that respect.

From what we see in Hane, Battler is definitely a culprit/accomplice in Land.

And also, wow, GoldenLand, this is an awesome idea, it would make a kickass Forgery. I'd really wish to try something like that if my schedule wasn't so messed up.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-12, 10:09

It actually would be cool try and figure Land. Lemme see what I can remember on the fly (Sing and try to remember~)

'Our Confessions' I think, was a written scketch of the gameboard in Land, right? From there, we can think that some of the clues presented in the EPs that replaced Land (3-4 and some loose hint in 5-6? I can't remember...) were going to be in the META layer. There wouldn't be that huge-ass hint about ignoring the unreliable narration (that TV thinghy that Virgilia said) And of course, Beato wasn't going to be as forgiving as she was in her previous/next gameboards so there had to be some strong reasoning made by Battler.

Last I can think is that Virgilius was going to be an ass. Not just any ass, more like intelectual-rapist-ass. So a masculine Erika? For some reason I got nauseas...

Hum. If really Battler made some plausible theorizing in Land, but was reduced to small bombs to make a suitable detective for the lest trying gameboards that replaced Beato's Master Piece, that thing was the basis for Ryuu to say that 'Battler liked to read mistery novels' revelation, that seems so out of the blue in the published eps. So Smart!Battler (and by proxy badassGM!Battler/GoldenSorcerer!Battler) became so weird because we didn't see him in action how it was supposed to be...

And if piece Battler was an accomplice as Cap Bluebeard suggests, Black Battler in Hane also wouldn't have poofed into existence so randomly XD

Thunder Book

2012-09-12, 10:28

erneiz_hyde

2012-09-12, 10:34

Last I can think is that Virgilius was going to be an ass. Not just any ass, more like intelectual-rapist-ass. So a masculine Erika? For some reason I got nauseas...

Excuse me, I'm not sure, I might have amnesia or something since it's been a long time. Are you talking about Ronove or someone else?

Thunder Book

2012-09-12, 10:37

Land was supposed to have a character similar to Virgilia originally, but would have been male. And had a personality similar to Erika's.

I guess it was to match Virgil (Virgilius) from The Divine Comedy a little more closely to Battler's Dante.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-12, 10:37

Would we not get the Knox Rules in a Post-Land Chiru?

If Battler really had been a huge mystery fan from the beginning, it seems like they might only come up in passing conversation (Kind of like they already did in...Episode 2, I think), and not major plot points like in End.

Hm... maybe we would. Knox was to be used against Game Master Battler, and it would help a lot to solve Land. I think that having Knox to help the reader is actually more plausible after an insanely difficult gameboard like Land, and suitable for the answer arcs, than having knox after some bizarre but not so brainmelting gameboards.

So the original idea was like this: Battler as the detective and Battler as the Game Master was a pair of concepts to give us readers the view of both sides of the gameboard. So Question Arcs we are seeing from the POV of the detective trying to discover the truth, and in Answer arcs we are seeing from the POV of the witch trying to hide the truth. It'd help nicely to keep that idea of Beatrice's Game being eternal and almost unsolvable. And, because Umineko is S with it's readers, no matter what side you played you were going to get some good bosses to fight (Beatrice for anti-mistery and Virgilius for Anti-fantasy at the begining; BATTLER for A-M and Knox for A-F in chiru, with its variations.)

EDIT: erneiz, two posts before I put mine XD I'm slow writting... It's like Thunder book said, Virgilius was going to be some ruthless male detective solving the ruthless game of the witch. Or something like that.

GabrieliosP

2012-09-12, 10:40

Ryu said in an interview that Virgilia was originally supposed to be a character named Virgilus (yeah, male) that was supposed to have Erika's personality. But he changed it to Virgilia when he gave up on Land and wrote Banquet.

EDIT: Argh, spined. Damn that slow net today.

erneiz_hyde

2012-09-12, 10:54

lol at the consecutive ninja-posts there :heh:

Thanks, I never knew that. Even after all these years I like how I can still learn something new from this thread! :D

GoldenLand

2012-09-12, 10:59

Let's see, I think the following are the most useful bits of information from the relevant interviews.

R: Actually, the difficulty level in EP3 has been set much lower than originally planned. The original plan was to use "Land of the Golden Witch" as the subtitle and create a super hard game. Readers have already gone through EP1 and EP2, so I wanted to increase the difficulty level. But as everyone now knows, the difficulty level in EP3 "Banquet of the Golden Witch" only goes as far as being on "equal level". It's already much easier than EP2's "highest level". I wanted to see how much of the story the readers have grasped. Although there were many readers like Keiya-san who came up with answers for EP2 on their own, I believed many people will find the EP3 prototype too difficult to understand. Therefore, we've greatly lowered the difficulty level, and then added many sub-characters into the game to accommodate the readers. It's common practice in the gaming world to lower the difficulty level for the sequel if the players found the first game too hard.

That's why some of the content originally planned for the answer arc is now included in the revised version of EP3. Schrodinger's Cat is one of them. Initially we were planning on having the readers figure out on their own that in Rokkenjima, as-yet-confirmed things exist simultaneously (mystery and fantasy). But we thought it would be too difficult to fathom out, so we gave it away early. We ended up having to scrap "Land of the Golden Witch" altogether.

R Because of that situation I cancelled the production of what was planned to be EP3, Land of the Golden Witch. Right after we released EP I thought "So, after the proper greeting by the witch, let’s create a real evil, orthodox mystery incident." but because so many people abandoned reasoning all together I hurriedly changed the whole script. Because it felt necessary to give the player a character who would lecture him about how to think, Vargilia was born. There were plans for a character similar to Vargilia to appear in the story before, but it was to be a more agressive character who later became the basis for Erika.

K At that time there were already plans for something like Erika?

R It was a character who would argue with the main characters about reasoning, and become an antagonist, approaching everything from a different point than Battler. It was actually planned to introduce that character at the stage of EP3. At that time it was a man called Vergilius.

K The name is taken from the character Vergilius in Dante’s Divina Commedia, right?!

R That is correct. But because a lecture like this became severely necessary, I changed the character Vergilius into the woman Vargilia. And because he changed into Vargilia, the connection to Kumasawa was created. At that point I stopped thinking about the character Vergilius at all, but now when I think about it, with a little struggling, you could call him the male version of Erika. Though a little bit more impertinent in her knowledge.

K At the time of EP2, Battler had a pretty hard time reasoning himself. If Vergilius had appeared then, the plot would have become an even fiercer battle?

R It became a fierce battle either way, didn’t it? In my head EP1 was supposed to be nothing more than an opening, during which you get to remember the structure of the characters and the mansion. EP2 was to be the beginning of the fight. And EP3 was to mark the beginning of the truly orthodox incidents. I really thought about putting many difficult riddles into Umineko from start to finish, but… I don’t think I would be able to make you enjoy Land, now that all of you have learned about the truth. If the answer is already out, it’s laughable to try and hide it with difficult riddles. At best it would be funny. Maybe you’d think "Hey, that makes up for some of it". Well that might happen, but almost all of the tricks planned for Land have been divided up and mixed into what became EP4~6. I really hear you asking for a release of Land, but I’m afraid I’m just not able to do that anymore.

...But I still think it would be fun! Would be good to have a forgery. A tough, orthodox mystery. (Okay, it's obvious that any fan of the series would be able to guess some of it, but still...)

'Our Confessions' I think, was a written scketch of the gameboard in Land, right? From there, we can think that some of the clues presented in the EPs that replaced Land (3-4 and some loose hint in 5-6? I can't remember...) were going to be in the META layer. There wouldn't be that huge-ass hint about ignoring the unreliable narration (that TV thinghy that Virgilia said) And of course, Beato wasn't going to be as forgiving as she was in her previous/next gameboards so there had to be some strong reasoning made by Battler.

Was Our Confession really meant to be a sketch of Land? That's the first I've heard of that. On the other hand, all I've seen of it is the summary by LyricalAura.

Renall

2012-09-12, 11:03

As far as I know, no; it's an outline of a discarded gameboard, but that doesn't mean it's Land. We don't know how Land was supposed to play out, just that it was very difficult and had a particular character in it.

We also know the "tricks" of 4-6 were mixed up and put into those episodes, so one presumes there might have been something akin to the Logic Error in it, something about proving Kinzo's death, and perhaps a post-murders Battler discovery session akin to the Tea Party of Alliance.

Thunder Book

2012-09-12, 11:03

Wait, so:

Right after we released EP I thought "So, after the proper greeting by the witch, let’s create a real evil, orthodox mystery incident." but because so many people abandoned reasoning all together I hurriedly changed the whole script.

Land already exists in some form?

PUBLISH IT FOR US NERDS RYUKISHI! :(

GabrieliosP

2012-09-12, 11:06

He also said in another interview that he has no plans to publish Land.

Thunder Book

2012-09-12, 11:09

He also said in another interview that he has no plans to publish Land.

Fuck that shit, he should publish it anyways. Even just as a mini booklet would be great.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-12, 11:12

I really would like to nerd over Land. And I'd like to see Virgilius! There's a sad lack of handsome male cast in seacats LOL. (Maybe VIrgilius is no bishonen, but I like to dream) Okay, so that's a foolish excuse for wanting Land even if Umineko is already over, but there's more: If they had to spread Land in EP 3-6, it HAD to be some sumarized game about everything. And there's nothing I'd like more than a summary of Umineko, seeing how I can0t remember everything of those HOURS I spent reading the main games...

So ninja posting everywhere. Everyone is online right now? Is like 10 persons posting at the same time! Madness, I say!

GabrieliosP

2012-09-12, 11:17

Actually, he did show Virgilius concept art. It's just Virgilia with short hair. It's on the Umineko wiki, just lemme try to find it...

EDIT: Found it. It's here (http://umineko.wikia.com/wiki/Virgilia#Gallery).

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-12, 11:38

Oh. Oh. He looks... well, maybe with a little help... Looks like a snobish boy with a terrble haircut *cries in a corner*
M-Maybe if I look at him from other perspective, imagining in the PS3/anime version... hum... yeah.
George got bishounenfied as well (and lost some pounds).
Or the design could grow on me like PC Beato's.
Is it just me or he looks a little more like Rosa than Virgilia?
Hum... yeah.
Thanks for the link :)

AuraTwilight

2012-09-12, 15:00

Wow so Virgilius is basically Cornelia.

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-12, 15:03

He looks more like a Cornove.

P.S: It's a shame Land wasn't released, I'd love to get my hands on it, but then that way, we wouldn't get Erika....

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-12, 15:09

Cornove? LOLWUT!
Well, I can't say that Erika's lost would sadden me... not that much.

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-12, 15:11

How dare you! Can you imagine living in a world without Erika?????
(Okay, I know she's annoying as hell, but that's just one more thing to be loved XD)

Jan-Poo

2012-09-12, 18:32

I wouldn't say she's a character to love, but she's certainly a pretty interesting character.

Wait, so:

Land already exists in some form?

PUBLISH IT FOR US NERDS RYUKISHI! :(

Maybe the script was just inside his mind, or maybe he just wrote a storyline.

Renall

2012-09-12, 20:16

I think if he had a more complete script he'd be slightly more specific about what's in it or post an excerpt or something.

Joeyscraggy

2012-09-12, 21:12

AuraTwilight

2012-09-12, 21:45

The shorter one IS Yasu, most likely.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-12, 21:59

She had breasts... then again, is the manga... but she had breasts... so it was a she after all...
wait, what the hell am I writting? I sound like some sicko, looking at that. Then again, her breasts are plot points...
no, really, this is not a h forum...
But she was so little---

AuraTwilight

2012-09-12, 22:18

Uh...where are you seeing breasts? She's flat as a board.

You also need to keep in mind that in that scene, Yasu is nine years old, legally six.

tempteste

2012-09-12, 23:28

The person who posted it said that Yasu has no appearance and the the story goes from her eyes like in the novel. However we can't be sure without the full chapter.

AuraTwilight

2012-09-13, 00:03

Well then the manga is already in error, since Yasu's supposed to be the only maid with a notable size difference.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-13, 00:19

Well then the manga is already in error, since Yasu's supposed to be the only maid with a notable size difference.

Really? I don't remember that...
The only thing that I remember is that she's the only one to be that young.

Kealym

2012-09-13, 01:46

Hm, reading these things about Land ... well, I mean, the murders in EP2 weren't difficult at all, the logic on most of them was somewhat apparent (depending on who you were willing to name a culprit). It's just all incomprehensible because there's no real, discernible motive besides that one piddly line in Banquet, so I wonder how THAT was going to be offered in Land.

It also irks me to realize that Virgilia was only even conceived of as of EP3, so it's entirely possible Kumasawa was gonna be as important as ... like, Hideyoshi, in the original grand scheme of things. I AM kinda glad we got Erika instead, though ... she's one of the best characters in the series, IMO. I mean, damn, what was Virgilus gonna ... BE in the fantasy/META narrative, I wonder? A demon? A witch? The Con Chair of some of those Witch Hunter cons, that Ange particularly disliked>:heh:

Thunder Book

2012-09-13, 01:51

Virgilius would have been Ghoda obv. You see, Ghoda is actually a super genius but has to spend so much time cooking he can't ever just sit down and solve the Rokkenjimma murders. Had he been not cooking on October 4th he would have caught the culprit before anything even happened.

Ghoda would also have had a character arc dealing with the duality of being a Magical Chef versus being an Ace Detective. But alas, he gave into his culinary desires and the Ushiromiya family all suffered for it.

battle22

2012-09-13, 02:03

I'm glad we have Erika too, I love her XDDD

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-13, 05:34

Hey, a new EP7 manga chapter preview was released, and they already started with Clair's story. As far as i can see, there's no sign of Yasu showing, but there are 2 new maids, one of them has a body type that could match with Yasu's age, but still we don't know...
Here's the pic: http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ma8tq1HEk31qicpp7o5_1280.jpg
Do you think Yasu will be shown?

I don't think that's Yasu. She looks nothing like an 'underdeveloped nine-year old', (read six year old look-alike). I don't really think they're going to show her at all.

By the way, wouldn't that be really troublesome if a Chiru Anime was ever made?

I wouldn't say she's a character to love, but she's certainly a pretty interesting character.

Interesting characters are the only characters to be loved.

Maybe the script was just inside his mind, or maybe he just wrote a storyline.

I think it was the first one. We know he took the results of his readers in mind when making a new episode, so while he might have had some ideas for it his readers just wouldn't follow. He's said in Answer to the Golden Witch that the entire 'cat box' and 'braun tube' example was meant to be a really core hint that would be revealed in the end, but since nobody would pieck up on that, we got Virgilia.

I mean, damn, what was Virgilus gonna ... BE in the fantasy/META narrative, I wonder? A demon? A witch? The Con Chair of some of those Witch Hunter cons, that Ange particularly disliked>:heh:

Hmm... I don't think he could be a witch hinter, Ange's future wasn't even introduced until the end of that arc (well, we might have got that earlier in Land, who knows...) and I also think Eva surviving was also conceived after the turn of events in Banquet, though that's just an impression.

Probably he could be like... Bern's piece? Since the basis for his character became Erika, it wouldn't be that impossible.

Ghoda would also have had a character arc dealing with the duality of being a Magical Chef versus being an Ace Detective. But alas, he gave into his culinary desires and the Ushiromiya family all suffered for it.

My witch's golden dreamer is a magical Gohda-chef
"I CAN NEVER LOSE IN THE KITCHEN!!!!"

Oh Gohda, your talent all went to waste....

I'm glad we have Erika too, I love her XDDD

Umineko without Erika just wouldn't be the same Umineko.

Not saying I wouldn't be curious to read that Umineko, I'm just saying.... Erika rules.

jjblue1

2012-09-13, 08:23

Wanderer

2012-09-13, 09:13

So, I'm casually translating Our Confessions. I'm slow, and I'm not sure how accurate I am, but it's good practice. What I'm doing is not a summary-translation like LyricalAura, but a detailed one.

I'll release my work in chunks. If anyone good at Japanese has any corrections,　ぜひ、知らせてください。

Also, 3 disclaimers:

1) I'm doing this at my leisure, so there are no guarantees whatsoever that I will continue.
2) My source for this seems to have things in a somewhat different order than LyricalAura's. Or something.
3) What I'm releasing today is nothing terribly informative. It's most just Ryuukishi being metaphorical about what Our Confessions is...

我らの告白
Our Confessions
「お嬢様。ドラノールさまがお越しになりました。」
"Milady, lady Dlanor has arrived."
「これはこれは！たかだか、筋書きの確認をするだけのために異端審問官の、それも主席がお越しになるとは！大法院はよほどの暇か、人余りと見える。」
"Oh what is this! The inquisition has come just to check the outline, and what's more it's the head inquisitor! The Great Court seems to have a lot of free time, or a surplus of manpower."
「……私が立会いを命じられる程に、あなたのゲームが複雑難解かつ見事なものでアル、とお思いいただきたいものデス。」
"......By my preciding witness, I expect your game will be unfathomly difficult and SPLENDID."
「世辞はいらぬ、座るが良い。ロノウェ、主席殿に甘い紅茶とクッキーの用意を。」
"No need to flatter; have a seat. Ronove, prepare some tasty tea and cookies for the head inquisitor."
「畏まりました。」
"Yes, milady."
「結構デス。それより、さっそく拝見させていただきたいデス。……あなたが紡ぐ、新しきゲームの筋書きヲ。」
"No, that's ALRIGHT. More importantly, I would like to see it right AWAY."
「良かろうとも。大筋は出来ている。物語としての修飾はまだまだ途中だがな。」
"Very well. The outline is complete. But I'm still in the middle of decorating it as a story."
ベアトは卓上の原稿の山を掻き分け、その中から一束を掴み出す。
Beato pushed her way through a pile of manuscripts on top of her desk and pulled out a single bundle.
それこそが、新しきゲームの物語の、原稿。
It was the manuscript for the new game.
何度も書き直され、様々な注釈の資料や付箋を貼りつけられたそれには、受け取る前からある種の貫録が漂っている。
Revised countless times with various notes and tabs attached, it eminated a kind of dignified presense.
ドラノールは一礼してから、それを受け取った。
Dlanor gave a bow, and accepted it.
そして、ロノウェが配膳する紅茶の湯気の中で、その表紙を捲る。
Then amidst the tea vapors as Ronove set the table, she turned over the front cover.
「今回のゲームには何という名ヲ？」
"What is the name of the game this TIME?"
「まだない。妾はいつも、物語を完全に書き終えて最後に名を考えるのでな。」
"There isn't one yet. I always wait until I have completely finished writing the story before thinking of a name."
「了解デス。……それでは早速、拝読させていただきマス。
役得、と言いたいところですが、見事に整えられた物語となってからの初読となれないことが残念デス。」
"UNDERSTOOD. ......Then with no delay, I shall begin the READING.
Although if I may say, it is disappointing that my first reading will be before it has become a beatifully arranged STORY."
「くっくくくく。それがデバッカーの気の毒なところよ。」
"Kukkukukuku. That is the biggest disappointment of all!"
「…………今回も、実に複雑奇怪な事件のようデス。……これが物語に昇格されたらどのようなものになるのか、……本当に楽しみデス。」
"............It seems that this time, too, it will be a truly complex and mysterious INCIDENT. ......I am really looking foreword to seeing just how this will be elevated to 'story' STATUS."
「世辞は良い。さっさとページを捲れ。妾はまるで、原稿を持ち込み編集者を前にした新米漫画家のような気持であるぞ。」
"No need to flatter. Hurry and turn the page. I feel as if I am the newbie mangaka putting my manuscript in front of the editor."

ベアトが悪戯っぽく笑うと、ドラノールも同じ笑みで返す。
Beato made a rougish smile, and Dlanor returned the same expression.
ドラノールが手にするのは、……言うなれば書きかけの原稿。
Dlanor had in her hands, ......the so-called "unfinished manuscript".
いや、原稿に至る途中のプロットが入り混じる、未完成のもの。
No, on it's way to becoming a manuscript, it had a plot in the middle of it's construction mixed in- it was truly an unformed thing.
ベアトの好む言い方で例えるなら、……それはまるで、冷やす前のアイスクリームの素。
If we were to use Beato's style of speech, ......it's just as if it was the milky form of ice cream before it was frozen.
いや、まだ元としてさえ完成していないだろう。
No, it's probably even less complete than that.
ボールの中に卵黄と牛乳、生クリームなどが投じられてはいるが、まだ混ぜてる真っ最中という状態。
It's still egg yolk, milk, and raw cream cast into a bowl and at the height of its mixing stage.
「……まさに、物語の卵デス。これをあなたは、時間をかけてじっくりと温め、孵化させるのデス。」
"......It really is just like the egg of a TALE. You carefully put time into keeping it warm and cause it to HATCH."
「出来ることなら、そなたには見事なアイスクリームとして完成してから、賞味させたかったのであるがな。」
"If I could, I would love to show it to you as magnificent ice cream, since I wanted to allow you to fully appreciate it."
「もちろん、それが最高デス。……しかし、これはこれで乙なものとも思っていマス。」
"Of course, that would be IDEAL. ......However, I think this makes for the next best THING."

なぜなら、今の状態は未完成であっても、……そのレシピが晒されている状態。
Because, even if it's in an incomplete state now, the recipe is still exposed.
完成した後には決して見ることの出来ない、貴重なその裏側を見ることが出来るのだ。
We can see the precious other side of it; the side we could never see from a completed story.
これを見ることが出来るのは。
Those able to see this are...
物語を執筆する魔女本人と、……その魔女が認めたほんのわずかの立会人だけ。
Only the witch who wrote the tale herself, and... the very few observers she allows.
これはそんな、未完成のアイスクリームとなる前。
This is the unfinished, before it becomes ice cream...
どろどろでカオスなスープの状態の未完成原稿。
manuscript, in a muddy chaos soup state.
物語としての起承転結は存在せず、それどころか読み物としてさえ完成していない。
In fact, it's missing the narrative development characteristic of a story; it's not even complete as any kind of reading material.

しかしそれでも。
However, even so,
無限の魔女、ベアトリーチェが、習性、誰にも明かすことのなかった、秘密のレシピが記されている。
The Infinite Witch Beatrice's secret recipe, yet discerned by no one, is recorded upon it.
料理人にとって、レシピと厨房は聖域。
To a chef, her recipes and her kitchen are sacred ground.
それを冒そうとすることは、最大の冒涜。
To desecrate that is the greatest sacrilege.
しかし、美味に感嘆したる者ならば、誰もが求めて止まない禁断の蜜でもある……。
However, for those who admire delicacies, it is also the forbidden honey that no one can resist.
ここで、ベアトの好む例えではなく、……フェザリーヌの好みそうな例えに言い換えよう。
This is not an example of one of Beato's interests, ... but we could instead say it's an example of one of Featherine's.

これより先に記されたるは、猫の、内臓。
From here on, what is recorded is... the cat's... guts.
これより先のページを捲るということは、猫の腹を割きて殺すということ。
From here on, turning the pages means splitting the cat's stomach open and killing it.
猫は愛でて、殺して、二度楽しめる。
To love the cat, then kill it and enjoy it again.
それはベルンカステルの言葉だが、元はフェザリーヌが口にしたものだ。
Those were Bernkastel's words, but they were originally uttered by Featherine.

だから汝に問おう。
So I inquire of thee.
汝は、猫を殺すか、否か。
Doth thou kill the cat? Or not?
老境のフェザリーヌは、幾千の物語の腹を割いて殺したことを後悔した。
The ancient Featherine has regretted splitting the stomachs of and killing thousands of tales.
そして、知ることと知らぬことは不可逆的な関係にあり、知らぬことを処女性に例えて讃えさえした。
And, in the relationship of irreversability between knowing and not knowing, she even likened not knowing to that of noble virginity.

だから改めて汝に問おう。
Thus, I must at least inquire of thee.
汝は、猫を殺すか、否か。
Doth thou kill the cat? Or not?
これより先は、猫の腸の中……。
Beyond lies... the inside of the cat's stomach.

The next section is "Accomplices". It's where, in LyricalAura's summary, Natsuhi and Krauss are recruited.

Renall

2012-09-13, 09:14

It also irks me to realize that Virgilia was only even conceived of as of EP3, so it's entirely possible Kumasawa was gonna be as important as ... like, Hideyoshi, in the original grand scheme of things.
Well... she basically still was, in the end. Sort of the textbook definition of a dropped thread there. Virgilia remained important, but Kumasawa was never really developed past the reveal in Banquet.

Also, I must be the only person who doesn't particularly care for Erika.
By the way, wouldn't that be really troublesome if a Chiru Anime was ever made?
Only troublesome because Deen can't be trusted to do it properly. A first-person through-the-eyes segment is entirely possible to do in animation, it would just require competence and budget and Deen seems to have had neither.

You would, however, have to give Yasu a voice... though you could handwave it as Claire narrating and then not clearly state that the two have the same voice necessarily.

But perhaps the manga just doesn't give a damn about obscuring her appearance, or perhaps Ryukishi is cool with it. I doubt he'd allow the depiction of the character unless it was acceptable to him that they do so. I honestly don't think it really matters that much. If nothing else, it could've just been laziness since we know he pretty much phoned in the art in Requiem and Twilight outside of Young Ange. He might've been fine with depicting Yasu and just got lazy.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-13, 11:40

I mean, damn, what was Virgilus gonna ... BE in the fantasy/META narrative, I wonder? A demon? A witch?

If the sketches on that wikia are reliable, Virgilius was supposed to have a one-winged eagle symbol just like Virgilia.

In other words in some way or another he should've been one of Beatrice's servants, but he might've been supposed to be introduced as an antagonist just like Virgilia.

However in future episodes he couldn't have taken Erika's role, as he'd certainly become one of Battler's pawn, like Gaap and Ronove.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-13, 12:56

Uh...where are you seeing breasts? She's flat as a board.

You also need to keep in mind that in that scene, Yasu is nine years old, legally six.
She's not boy-flat. She's girl-formed flat. And she doesn't seem that much shorter than the other maids, even if she's supposed to have nine.
Now I will recall that mini-maid everytime I talk about Yasu, even if all here know that there's an error.

Not necessarily. As the story is told from Yasu's point of view, for all we know she could represent herself as with even more breasts than Beatrice and it would still be 'acceptable' (even if undoubtely it would be a lie).

What's interesting if that one is Yasu the representation given paints her as... let's say someone similar to a Beato with short hair, instead than to someone closer in look to Shannon.

Though I guess it makes sense as we're supposed to guess she and Shannon are the same person... and Beato is, in a fashion Yasu's childish personality.

And I think the breasts effect is more due to the dress than an effective presence of breasts (after all Yasu is supposed to be pretty young, unless that scene is already in a future in which she was working for the Ushiromiya by some years...)

There's a point.
It's really painfully obvious that Yasu is Shannon in the VN, but the Manga has it's own way to do things.
I say because she's not really shorter compared to the busty and maybe 17-- years old maids at her side...

jjblue1

2012-09-13, 17:24

She's not boy-flat. She's girl-formed flat. And she doesn't seem that much shorter than the other maids, even if she's supposed to have nine.
Now I will recall that mini-maid everytime I talk about Yasu, even if all here know that there's an error.

I'm not really sure of her height in that pic due to the perspective. If you look at her shoulders they seem a lot lower than the ones of the maid next to her but it can be due to the perspective so it can be tricky to judge her height. It doesn't help she seems to be next to the tallest maid.

There's a point.
It's really painfully obvious that Yasu is Shannon in the VN, but the Manga has it's own way to do things.
I say because she's not really shorter compared to the busty and maybe 17-- years old maids at her side...

I admit I'm rather impatient to see it myself as that pic left me a little confuse. The maids at the time were supposed to be Belphegor, Leviathan, Lucifer and Satan (plus Yasu/Shannon). However, while the black haired maid can be Lucifer and the 2 maids next to her can be Leviathan and Satan the other maid doesn't really look like Belphegor... she's more like a very femminine and tall Lion so maybe the manga have more maids than the VN...

Still, I'm curious to see how they'll handle EP 7 and if it'll reveal something more than the VN did.

So, I'm casually translating Our Confessions. I'm slow, and I'm not sure how accurate I am, but it's good practice. What I'm doing is not a summary-translation like LyricalAura, but a detailed one.

I'll release my work in chunks. If anyone good at Japanese has any corrections,　ぜひ、知らせてください。

Also, 3 disclaimers:

1) I'm doing this at my leisure, so there are no guarantees whatsoever that I will continue.
2) My source for this seems to have things in a somewhat different order than LyricalAura's. Or something.
3) What I'm releasing today is nothing terribly informative. It's most just Ryuukishi being metaphorical about what Our Confessions is...

我らの告白
Our Confessions
「お嬢様。ドラノールさまがお越しになりました。」
"Milady, lady Dlanor has arrived."
「これはこれは！たかだか、筋書きの確認をするだけのために異端審問官の、それも主席がお越しになるとは！大法院はよほどの暇か、人余りと見える。」
"Oh what is this! The inquisition has come just to check the outline, and what's more it's the head inquisitor! The Great Court seems to have a lot of free time, or a surplus of manpower."
「……私が立会いを命じられる程に、あなたのゲームが複雑難解かつ見事なものでアル、とお思いいただきたいものデス。」
"......By my preciding witness, I expect your game will be unfathomly difficult and SPLENDID."
「世辞はいらぬ、座るが良い。ロノウェ、主席殿に甘い紅茶とクッキーの用意を。」
"No need to flatter; have a seat. Ronove, prepare some tasty tea and cookies for the head inquisitor."
「畏まりました。」
"Yes, milady."
「結構デス。それより、さっそく拝見させていただきたいデス。……あなたが紡ぐ、新しきゲームの筋書きヲ。」
"No, that's ALRIGHT. More importantly, I would like to see it right AWAY."
「良かろうとも。大筋は出来ている。物語としての修飾はまだまだ途中だがな。」
"Very well. The outline is complete. But I'm still in the middle of decorating it as a story."
ベアトは卓上の原稿の山を掻き分け、その中から一束を掴み出す。
Beato pushed her way through a pile of manuscripts on top of her desk and pulled out a single bundle.
それこそが、新しきゲームの物語の、原稿。
It was the manuscript for the new game.
何度も書き直され、様々な注釈の資料や付箋を貼りつけられたそれには、受け取る前からある種の貫録が漂っている。
Revised countless times with various notes and tabs attached, it eminated a kind of dignified presense.
ドラノールは一礼してから、それを受け取った。
Dlanor gave a bow, and accepted it.
そして、ロノウェが配膳する紅茶の湯気の中で、その表紙を捲る。
Then amidst the tea vapors as Ronove set the table, she turned over the front cover.
「今回のゲームには何という名ヲ？」
"What is the name of the game this TIME?"
「まだない。妾はいつも、物語を完全に書き終えて最後に名を考えるのでな。」
"There isn't one yet. I always wait until I have completely finished writing the story before thinking of a name."
「了解デス。……それでは早速、拝読させていただきマス。
役得、と言いたいところですが、見事に整えられた物語となってからの初読となれないことが残念デス。」
"UNDERSTOOD. ......Then with no delay, I shall begin the READING.
Although if I may say, it is disappointing that my first reading will be before it has become a beatifully arranged STORY."
「くっくくくく。それがデバッカーの気の毒なところよ。」
"Kukkukukuku. That is the biggest disappointment of all!"
「…………今回も、実に複雑奇怪な事件のようデス。……これが物語に昇格されたらどのようなものになるのか、……本当に楽しみデス。」
"............It seems that this time, too, it will be a truly complex and mysterious INCIDENT. ......I am really looking foreword to seeing just how this will be elevated to 'story' STATUS."
「世辞は良い。さっさとページを捲れ。妾はまるで、原稿を持ち込み編集者を前にした新米漫画家のような気持であるぞ。」
"No need to flatter. Hurry and turn the page. I feel as if I am the newbie mangaka putting my manuscript in front of the editor."

ベアトが悪戯っぽく笑うと、ドラノールも同じ笑みで返す。
Beato made a rougish smile, and Dlanor returned the same expression.
ドラノールが手にするのは、……言うなれば書きかけの原稿。
Dlanor had in her hands, ......the so-called "unfinished manuscript".
いや、原稿に至る途中のプロットが入り混じる、未完成のもの。
No, on it's way to becoming a manuscript, it had a plot in the middle of it's construction mixed in- it was truly an unformed thing.
ベアトの好む言い方で例えるなら、……それはまるで、冷やす前のアイスクリームの素。
If we were to use Beato's style of speech, ......it's just as if it was the milky form of ice cream before it was frozen.
いや、まだ元としてさえ完成していないだろう。
No, it's probably even less complete than that.
ボールの中に卵黄と牛乳、生クリームなどが投じられてはいるが、まだ混ぜてる真っ最中という状態。
It's still egg yolk, milk, and raw cream cast into a bowl and at the height of its mixing stage.
「……まさに、物語の卵デス。これをあなたは、時間をかけてじっくりと温め、孵化させるのデス。」
"......It really is just like the egg of a TALE. You carefully put time into keeping it warm and cause it to HATCH."
「出来ることなら、そなたには見事なアイスクリームとして完成してから、賞味させたかったのであるがな。」
"If I could, I would love to show it to you as magnificent ice cream, since I wanted to allow you to fully appreciate it."
「もちろん、それが最高デス。……しかし、これはこれで乙なものとも思っていマス。」
"Of course, that would be IDEAL. ......However, I think this makes for the next best THING."

なぜなら、今の状態は未完成であっても、……そのレシピが晒されている状態。
Because, even if it's in an incomplete state now, the recipe is still exposed.
完成した後には決して見ることの出来ない、貴重なその裏側を見ることが出来るのだ。
We can see the precious other side of it; the side we could never see from a completed story.
これを見ることが出来るのは。
Those able to see this are...
物語を執筆する魔女本人と、……その魔女が認めたほんのわずかの立会人だけ。
Only the witch who wrote the tale herself, and... the very few observers she allows.
これはそんな、未完成のアイスクリームとなる前。
This is the unfinished, before it becomes ice cream...
どろどろでカオスなスープの状態の未完成原稿。
manuscript, in a muddy chaos soup state.
物語としての起承転結は存在せず、それどころか読み物としてさえ完成していない。
In fact, it's missing the narrative development characteristic of a story; it's not even complete as any kind of reading material.

しかしそれでも。
However, even so,
無限の魔女、ベアトリーチェが、習性、誰にも明かすことのなかった、秘密のレシピが記されている。
The Infinite Witch Beatrice's secret recipe, yet discerned by no one, is recorded upon it.
料理人にとって、レシピと厨房は聖域。
To a chef, her recipes and her kitchen are sacred ground.
それを冒そうとすることは、最大の冒涜。
To desecrate that is the greatest sacrilege.
しかし、美味に感嘆したる者ならば、誰もが求めて止まない禁断の蜜でもある……。
However, for those who admire delicacies, it is also the forbidden honey that no one can resist.
ここで、ベアトの好む例えではなく、……フェザリーヌの好みそうな例えに言い換えよう。
This is not an example of one of Beato's interests, ... but we could instead say it's an example of one of Featherine's.

これより先に記されたるは、猫の、内臓。
From here on, what is recorded is... the cat's... guts.
これより先のページを捲るということは、猫の腹を割きて殺すということ。
From here on, turning the pages means splitting the cat's stomach open and killing it.
猫は愛でて、殺して、二度楽しめる。
To love the cat, then kill it and enjoy it again.
それはベルンカステルの言葉だが、元はフェザリーヌが口にしたものだ。
Those were Bernkastel's words, but they were originally uttered by Featherine.

だから汝に問おう。
So I inquire of thee.
汝は、猫を殺すか、否か。
Doth thou kill the cat? Or not?
老境のフェザリーヌは、幾千の物語の腹を割いて殺したことを後悔した。
The ancient Featherine has regretted splitting the stomachs of and killing thousands of tales.
そして、知ることと知らぬことは不可逆的な関係にあり、知らぬことを処女性に例えて讃えさえした。
And, in the relationship of irreversability between knowing and not knowing, she even likened not knowing to that of noble virginity.

だから改めて汝に問おう。
Thus, I must at least inquire of thee.
汝は、猫を殺すか、否か。
Doth thou kill the cat? Or not?
これより先は、猫の腸の中……。
Beyond lies... the inside of the cat's stomach.

The next section is "Accomplices". It's where, in LyricalAura's summary, Natsuhi and Krauss are recruited.

Thank you so much for your awesome work!

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-14, 06:31

You would, however, have to give Yasu a voice... though you could handwave it as Claire narrating and then not clearly state that the two have the same voice necessarily.

They could give her like.... a unisex voice, like they did with Lion. And Yasu's a child, so it's not that easy to tell her gender by her voice alone.

(okay, 'tell her gender' has to be one of the most ridiculous sentences in the world)

I honestly don't think it really matters that much. If nothing else, it could've just been laziness since we know he pretty much phoned in the art in Requiem and Twilight outside of Young Ange. He might've been fine with depicting Yasu and just got lazy.

I really wonder about that. He does cut corners whenever he has the chance to, but I want to think that if he really had no problems depicting Yasu, he'd have the common sense to draw her, which would have been much easier and actually needed for something in comparison to Claire's sprite.

So, I'm casually translating Our Confessions. I'm slow, and I'm not sure how accurate I am, but it's good practice. What I'm doing is not a summary-translation like LyricalAura, but a detailed one.

I'll release my work in chunks. If anyone good at Japanese has any corrections,　ぜひ、知らせてください。

Also, 3 disclaimers:

1) I'm doing this at my leisure, so there are no guarantees whatsoever that I will continue.
2) My source for this seems to have things in a somewhat different order than LyricalAura's. Or something.
3) What I'm releasing today is nothing terribly informative. It's most just Ryuukishi being metaphorical about what Our Confessions is...

我らの告白
Our Confessions
「お嬢様。ドラノールさまがお越しになりました。」
"Milady, lady Dlanor has arrived."
「これはこれは！たかだか、筋書きの確認をするだけのために異端審問官の、それも主席がお越しになるとは！大法院はよほどの暇か、人余りと見える。」
"Oh what is this! The inquisition has come just to check the outline, and what's more it's the head inquisitor! The Great Court seems to have a lot of free time, or a surplus of manpower."
「……私が立会いを命じられる程に、あなたのゲームが複雑難解かつ見事なものでアル、とお思いいただきたいものデス。」
"......By my preciding witness, I expect your game will be unfathomly difficult and SPLENDID."
「世辞はいらぬ、座るが良い。ロノウェ、主席殿に甘い紅茶とクッキーの用意を。」
"No need to flatter; have a seat. Ronove, prepare some tasty tea and cookies for the head inquisitor."
「畏まりました。」
"Yes, milady."
「結構デス。それより、さっそく拝見させていただきたいデス。……あなたが紡ぐ、新しきゲームの筋書きヲ。」
"No, that's ALRIGHT. More importantly, I would like to see it right AWAY."
「良かろうとも。大筋は出来ている。物語としての修飾はまだまだ途中だがな。」
"Very well. The outline is complete. But I'm still in the middle of decorating it as a story."
ベアトは卓上の原稿の山を掻き分け、その中から一束を掴み出す。
Beato pushed her way through a pile of manuscripts on top of her desk and pulled out a single bundle.
それこそが、新しきゲームの物語の、原稿。
It was the manuscript for the new game.
何度も書き直され、様々な注釈の資料や付箋を貼りつけられたそれには、受け取る前からある種の貫録が漂っている。
Revised countless times with various notes and tabs attached, it eminated a kind of dignified presense.
ドラノールは一礼してから、それを受け取った。
Dlanor gave a bow, and accepted it.
そして、ロノウェが配膳する紅茶の湯気の中で、その表紙を捲る。
Then amidst the tea vapors as Ronove set the table, she turned over the front cover.
「今回のゲームには何という名ヲ？」
"What is the name of the game this TIME?"
「まだない。妾はいつも、物語を完全に書き終えて最後に名を考えるのでな。」
"There isn't one yet. I always wait until I have completely finished writing the story before thinking of a name."
「了解デス。……それでは早速、拝読させていただきマス。
役得、と言いたいところですが、見事に整えられた物語となってからの初読となれないことが残念デス。」
"UNDERSTOOD. ......Then with no delay, I shall begin the READING.
Although if I may say, it is disappointing that my first reading will be before it has become a beatifully arranged STORY."
「くっくくくく。それがデバッカーの気の毒なところよ。」
"Kukkukukuku. That is the biggest disappointment of all!"
「…………今回も、実に複雑奇怪な事件のようデス。……これが物語に昇格されたらどのようなものになるのか、……本当に楽しみデス。」
"............It seems that this time, too, it will be a truly complex and mysterious INCIDENT. ......I am really looking foreword to seeing just how this will be elevated to 'story' STATUS."
「世辞は良い。さっさとページを捲れ。妾はまるで、原稿を持ち込み編集者を前にした新米漫画家のような気持であるぞ。」
"No need to flatter. Hurry and turn the page. I feel as if I am the newbie mangaka putting my manuscript in front of the editor."

ベアトが悪戯っぽく笑うと、ドラノールも同じ笑みで返す。
Beato made a rougish smile, and Dlanor returned the same expression.
ドラノールが手にするのは、……言うなれば書きかけの原稿。
Dlanor had in her hands, ......the so-called "unfinished manuscript".
いや、原稿に至る途中のプロットが入り混じる、未完成のもの。
No, on it's way to becoming a manuscript, it had a plot in the middle of it's construction mixed in- it was truly an unformed thing.
ベアトの好む言い方で例えるなら、……それはまるで、冷やす前のアイスクリームの素。
If we were to use Beato's style of speech, ......it's just as if it was the milky form of ice cream before it was frozen.
いや、まだ元としてさえ完成していないだろう。
No, it's probably even less complete than that.
ボールの中に卵黄と牛乳、生クリームなどが投じられてはいるが、まだ混ぜてる真っ最中という状態。
It's still egg yolk, milk, and raw cream cast into a bowl and at the height of its mixing stage.
「……まさに、物語の卵デス。これをあなたは、時間をかけてじっくりと温め、孵化させるのデス。」
"......It really is just like the egg of a TALE. You carefully put time into keeping it warm and cause it to HATCH."
「出来ることなら、そなたには見事なアイスクリームとして完成してから、賞味させたかったのであるがな。」
"If I could, I would love to show it to you as magnificent ice cream, since I wanted to allow you to fully appreciate it."
「もちろん、それが最高デス。……しかし、これはこれで乙なものとも思っていマス。」
"Of course, that would be IDEAL. ......However, I think this makes for the next best THING."

なぜなら、今の状態は未完成であっても、……そのレシピが晒されている状態。
Because, even if it's in an incomplete state now, the recipe is still exposed.
完成した後には決して見ることの出来ない、貴重なその裏側を見ることが出来るのだ。
We can see the precious other side of it; the side we could never see from a completed story.
これを見ることが出来るのは。
Those able to see this are...
物語を執筆する魔女本人と、……その魔女が認めたほんのわずかの立会人だけ。
Only the witch who wrote the tale herself, and... the very few observers she allows.
これはそんな、未完成のアイスクリームとなる前。
This is the unfinished, before it becomes ice cream...
どろどろでカオスなスープの状態の未完成原稿。
manuscript, in a muddy chaos soup state.
物語としての起承転結は存在せず、それどころか読み物としてさえ完成していない。
In fact, it's missing the narrative development characteristic of a story; it's not even complete as any kind of reading material.

しかしそれでも。
However, even so,
無限の魔女、ベアトリーチェが、習性、誰にも明かすことのなかった、秘密のレシピが記されている。
The Infinite Witch Beatrice's secret recipe, yet discerned by no one, is recorded upon it.
料理人にとって、レシピと厨房は聖域。
To a chef, her recipes and her kitchen are sacred ground.
それを冒そうとすることは、最大の冒涜。
To desecrate that is the greatest sacrilege.
しかし、美味に感嘆したる者ならば、誰もが求めて止まない禁断の蜜でもある……。
However, for those who admire delicacies, it is also the forbidden honey that no one can resist.
ここで、ベアトの好む例えではなく、……フェザリーヌの好みそうな例えに言い換えよう。
This is not an example of one of Beato's interests, ... but we could instead say it's an example of one of Featherine's.

これより先に記されたるは、猫の、内臓。
From here on, what is recorded is... the cat's... guts.
これより先のページを捲るということは、猫の腹を割きて殺すということ。
From here on, turning the pages means splitting the cat's stomach open and killing it.
猫は愛でて、殺して、二度楽しめる。
To love the cat, then kill it and enjoy it again.
それはベルンカステルの言葉だが、元はフェザリーヌが口にしたものだ。
Those were Bernkastel's words, but they were originally uttered by Featherine.

だから汝に問おう。
So I inquire of thee.
汝は、猫を殺すか、否か。
Doth thou kill the cat? Or not?
老境のフェザリーヌは、幾千の物語の腹を割いて殺したことを後悔した。
The ancient Featherine has regretted splitting the stomachs of and killing thousands of tales.
そして、知ることと知らぬことは不可逆的な関係にあり、知らぬことを処女性に例えて讃えさえした。
And, in the relationship of irreversability between knowing and not knowing, she even likened not knowing to that of noble virginity.

だから改めて汝に問おう。
Thus, I must at least inquire of thee.
汝は、猫を殺すか、否か。
Doth thou kill the cat? Or not?
これより先は、猫の腸の中……。
Beyond lies... the inside of the cat's stomach.

The next section is "Accomplices". It's where, in LyricalAura's summary, Natsuhi and Krauss are recruited.

Thank you very much for your work. Finally, my prayers are being answered!

Wanderer

2012-09-14, 10:06

Here's the accomplices scene. It was longer than I expected. I'll be busy for the next few days, so the next part, assuming it happens, won't be for a little while.

■協力者
Accomplices
今回の協力者は、蔵臼と夏妃にしよう。
This time, let's make Krauss and Natsuhi into accomplices.
だが、夏妃はプライドが高く、たとえ莫大なカネをちらつかせても、恐ろしい事件の片棒を容易に担ぐとは思い難い。
But... Natsuhi has a lot of pride, so even if I flashed an enormous sum of money in front of her, it's hard to imagine that she'd easily be partner to a dreadful incident.
となれば、すでに逃げ場がなく、選択の余地がない状況に追い込むしかない。
With regards to that problem, I'll have to to corner her so she has no place to run and no margin for options.
台風後、密かに蔵臼と夏妃を地下貴賓室に案内し、爆弾の仕掛けを明かして脅迫する。
After the typhoon starts, I'll secretly guide Krauss and Natsuhi to the underground VIP room, reveal the bomb trigger, and threaten them.
断れば全員死亡。協力すれば、碑文の犠牲者以外は生還できる。
If they refuse, everyone dies. If they cooperate, those not sacrificed to the epitaph can come back alive.
すでに島外との連絡手段は切断済み。蔵臼たちに断る術はない。
All means to connect the island to the outside have already been completely cut off. They have no way to resist.

１０月４日。夕方過ぎ。
October 4. Past dusk.
雨はますます大粒に、そして風も強くなってくる。
The rain and wind are getting stronger.
台風はもう、本格的に島を包みつつある。
The typhoon is already enveloping the island in earnest.

「……こ、……これは一体……。」
"...Wh... What on Earth is this...?"
夏妃は、ぽっかりと開いた闇へと続く秘密の地下階段を前に、立ち尽くした。
Natsuhi stood frozen in front of the wide-open entrance to the secret underground staircase and the darkness beyond.
「怯えることはない。進むが良い。」
"There is nothing to be afraid of. We should advance."
ベアトは悠然と微笑む。
Says Beato with a composed smile.
「……これが、……お、親父殿の秘密の通路、……というわけなのかね……。」
"...This is... fa... father's secret passageway... isn't it?"
蔵臼は子供の頃から、この島には金蔵しか知らない、秘密の通路や部屋があると信じてきた。
Ever since his childhood, Krauss believed in the existence of a secret passage and secret room that only Kinzo knew about.
ではあっても、こうして目前にぽっかりと開かれると、臆さずにはいられない。
But even so, when it's brazenly right before his eyes like this, he can't enter without hesitation.

「まさか、蔵臼まで暗闇を怯えるのではあるまいな…？
それとも、こうして礼拝堂の裏で、風雨に身を晒し続けることを選ぶというのか。」
"Krauss, you aren't afraid of the dark, are you...?
Or is it that you'd prefer to expose your body to the wind and rain here behind the chapel...?"
「………この先に、何があるというのかね。」
"...Up ahead... what could be awaiting us?"
「その目で確かめるが良い。……薄々は想像がついているくせに。くっくっくっく……。」
"You should see it with your own eyes... But you're already imagining it, aren't you? Kukkukkukkuku..."
「あなた、やめましょう。きっとこれは何かの罠です……。」
"Dear, please stop. This is definitely some kind of trap..."
「……私も出来ることならば、こんな薄気味悪い階段を下りたくなどない。……しかしどうやら、私たちには選択の余地はなさそうだよ……。」
"...I wouldn't go down these forboding stairs either, if I could. ...But it seems we have no other choice."

ベアトはにやりと笑いながら、その手に持つ、ソードオフライフルをくるくると弄ぶ。
While grinning broadly, Beato playfully spun the sawed-off rifle held in her hand.
……確かに、蔵臼たちはその銃に脅されて、ここまで連れてこられた。
...Indeed, Krauss and Natsuhi had been threatened with that gun and forced here.
礼拝堂に連れ出された時、てっきりひと気のないところで殺すつもりかと思っていた。
They had thought for certain that when they were forced here, it was to kill them in a place where no one would notice.
しかし、この秘密の地下階段を見せられた今となっては、自分たちを殺すつもりはないかもしれないとも思い始めている。
However, now that they've been shown this secret staircase, they were beginning to think that maybe she wasn't planning to kill them.
この秘密の地下階段の存在を知ることが、ベアトが魔女である所以なのだ。
That she knows this secret underground staircase is the cause of Beatrice being a witch.
それをわざわざ見せた以上、殺す以外の目的があると考えて、恐らく間違いない。
And she went out of her way to show it, so she probably has some other motive than to kill them; nay, she must.
蔵臼はごくりと唾を飲み込んでから、ゆっくりと地下階段を下り始める。
Krauss gulped deeply, and they began to slowly decend the underground stairs.

その夫の後を夏妃も追う。
Natsuhi follws behind her husband.
ベアトはにやりと笑って、悠然とその後に続くのだった……。
And Beato, grinning confidently, followed after them...

地下貴賓室に積まれた莫大な黄金。
The enormous pile of gold in the underground VIP room...
もちろん蔵臼たちの心を大きく揺さぶるが、それだけでは恐ろしい事件の片棒など担がない。
Of course it makes Krauss's and Natsuhi's hearts jump, but just that wouldn't make them accomplices to some kind of dreadful incident.
爆弾の仕掛けを説明することになる。
And so, the bomb trigger is explained.
幸いにも、蔵臼は金蔵の狂気についてよく理解している。
Fortunately, Krauss has appreciation for Kinzo's madness.
島を丸ごと吹き飛ばすような仕掛けを戯れに設けていたとしても、笑い捨てることが出来ない。
Even the embellishment that Kinzo amused himself with the trigger that would blow up the whole island... wasn't something that could just be laughed off.
ここで、ベアトが爆弾の取り扱いを理解している事、そして、その威力について、彼らに理解させなくてはならない。
Understanding Beatrice's threat with the bomb, and the authority that comes with it, was something that they must be made to appreciate.

（……中略……）
...Omission...I have no idea what would be "omitted" here, since there's not really any question how the "before" the omission gets to the "after" it. In any case there's quite a few of these "omissions" in the later sections of Our Confessions. 「……君はこれから何かの条件と引き換えに、私たちに何かを強いるつもりだろう。
…それがどのようなものか、私には皆目検討もつかないが、可能な限り、交渉に応じるつもりだ。」
"...Now you're going to strongarm us into an exchange for something.
...I can't even imagine what that something is, but as long as it's possible, negotiations are open."
「ほう。意外にも理解が早くて助かるぞ。」
"Hoh. Your surprisingly quick uptake saves me some trouble."
「恐らくそれは断り難いものだろう。何しろ、今の私たちは島丸ごとを、君に人質に取られてるも同然なのだからね。」
"Likely it's something we can't refuse. After all, right now you can take everyone on the island hostage."

「その通りだ。爆発から逃れる方法は二つしかない。一つは、妾しか知らない方法によって、時限装置を解除すること。
もう一つは、この格子の向こうの地下通路より島の反対側へ行き、爆発を逃れることのみだ。
……見ての通り、この格子の施錠も我が手中にある。いずれの方法で生き残るにせよ、妾を拒むことなど出来んのだ。」
"Exactly. There are only two ways to escape from the explosion. One is a way to abort the timer that only I know of. The other is to go down the underground passage beyond this grating to the other side of the island to flee the explosion.
As you can see, this grating's lock is under my control. You cannot refuse me given either intended method of survival."

「わかっているとも。私たちも自分の命は惜しい。
……しかし同時に、君も私たちに何らかの協力を得なければならないらしい。
時限爆弾と黄金という、最高の切り札を２枚も持つ君が、私たちに首を縦に振らさなければならない都合があるらしい。」
"We get it. We value our lives.
...But at the same time, it seems you require some kind of cooperation from us. You're carrying the two incredible trump cards of the time bomb and the gold, so it seems to be your good fortune that we must merely nod our heads."
「ふふふふ、くっくっくっく…！良いとも、蔵臼よ。そなたが望むのならそうしようではないか。
……これは脅迫ではない。取引だ。妾はそなたたちの協力を得たい。」
"Fufufufu, Kukkukkukku...! Wonderful, Krauss. If that's they way you wish it, let's do it that way.
...This isn't a threat. It's a trade. I wish for your cooperation."

「先に見返りを聞こうではないかね。」
"Let's hear what we get out of it."
「この黄金の山の全てと、家族の命を保証しよう。ただし、それ以外の一切は諦めてもらうがな。」
"Let's make it this entire mountain of gold, and the guarentee of your family's life. However, you'll have to give up on everything else."
「……それ以外の一切、という意味を、もう少し詳しくうかがいたいね。」
"...May I ask for a little more detail on what you mean by 'everything else'?"
「そのままの意味だ。何しろ、この島の全ては吹き飛ぶのだからな…！！」
"It means exactly that. Since this entire island is going to blow up...!!"

蔵臼も夏妃も、とんでもない話に仰天する。
Krauss and Natsuhi both were shocked at such an outrageous proposition.
しばらくは冷静を失うだろうが、いずれにせよ、断る余地のない話。
For a time they lost their composure, but even still it was an offer that couldn't be refused.
夏妃をなだめ、蔵臼は再び冷静を取り戻す……。
Krauss calmed Natsuhi and regained his cool...
蔵臼は、島が吹き飛ぶなら、黄金を運び出す時間がないと言い返す。
He retorted that if the island were to blow up, there wouldn't be enough time to carry out the gold.

ベアトは銀行の地下金庫のカードを差し出す。
Beato held out the card to an underground safe at a bank.
それはベアトがこれまでに換金してきたもの。
This was what Beato had turned into cash so far.
銀行本店の地下金庫には、アタッシュケースに詰めた現金１０億円が眠っている。
In an underground vault beneath the bank's head office slept 1 billion yen stuffed in an attache case.
そのカードを差し出すことで、蔵臼に１０億円を保障する。
By holding out that card, she guaraunteed Krauss 1 billion yen.
その金庫に、本当に１０億円があるか、蔵臼には信じがたい。
But Krauss found it hard to believe that there really was 1 billion yen in that safe.

しかし、カネでは家族の命は買えない。
But, money can't buy the lives of his family.

再び、夏妃と論争を繰り広げた後、がっくりと憔悴。
Once again, after disputing with Natsuhi, he was dispirited and worn.
蔵臼は自分の家族と絶対の安全と引き換えに、渋々と協力を申し出る。
In exchange for his family's absolute safety, Krause reluctantly offered up his cooperation.

もちろん、打算もある。
Of course, there was self-interest too.
島が吹き飛ぶのは事故として扱われるだろう。
The island being blown away would probably be treated as an accident.
それによって、親族たちがいなくなれば、自分への追及も全てうやむやに出来る。
And along with that, without any relatives the investigation directed at him would become unresolvable.
金蔵の死も当然、うやむやに出来、自分たちが抱えているトラブルのほぼ全ては、なかったことに出来るのだ。
Of course this includes Kinzo's death, too; nearly all the troubles they bear would be gone.

仮に金庫に１０億円がなかったとしても、金蔵にかけられた生命保険には莫大な金額が掛けられている。
And even supposing there isn't 1 billion yen in the safe, there's a lot of money on Kinzo's life insurance plan.

……夏妃は渋っているが、……蔵臼にとって、これは悪い話ではないのだ。
...Natsuhi was hesitant ...but to Krauss, it wasn't a bad deal.

そういう後ろめたい部分を隠し、蔵臼は、他に朱志香を守る方法はないと諭す。
Hiding the guilty part of his conscience, Krauss argued that there was no other way to protect Jessica.

「……それで、私たちに何をしろと言うのですか。」
"...So, what will you have us do?"
「協力すると言ったが、……おかしな犯罪の片棒は担げんよ。」
"We said we'd cooperate but... We won't partner with you for some weird crime."
蔵臼たちは疲れ切った様子でそう言った。
Krauss and Natsuhi said, completely drained.
「妾は、とある人物を持て成す為に、ある芝居を上演したい。」
"I have want to put on a performance to welcome a certain person."

「……ある芝居……？」
"...A performance...?"
「そやつと妾は推理小説を嗜み、互いに議論を交わした仲よ。故に、その６年ぶりの帰りを祝って、極上のミステリーで歓迎してやりたいのだ。」
"That guy and I have a taste for mystery novels; it's a relationship of exchanging contesting ideas. Therefore, to commemorate his return after 6 years, I wish to welcome him with a first-rate mystery."

ベアトはこの台風で閉ざされた島で、何らかの狂言をしたいらしい。
It would seem that, on this island shut off by a typhoon, Beato wants to put on some kind of kyougen* play.
その辻褄合わせとして、彼女の用意したシナリオに従うのが役目と言う。
Their role is to obey the scenario she prepared, so that the story will stay consistent.Kyougen are a certain kind of Japanese Noh play. They are the let-loose version of Noh and are usually light-hearted, silly, and often bizzaire... I would say they have a kind of... "untamed" feeling to themつまり、彼女の芝居の登場人物になれということだ……。
In other words, to become characters in her play...
シナリオに従い、行動し、喋るだけ。
To act and speak only in accordance with her scenario.
それ以上のことは強要しないようだった。
There apparently was nothing more required of them than that.

ただし、それ以外のことは禁止。
Except, all other things are forbidden.
彼女の物語を邪魔するようなことがあった場合は、蔵臼一家の無事を保障しない。
In the event that her story is interferred with, the safety of Krauss's family is not guaranteed.
大爆発から逃れるには、屋敷の敷地から遠く離れるしかない。
The only way to escape the giant explosion is to get far away from the mansion grounds.
その唯一の方法は、地下貴賓室からの地下道で島の反対側に逃れることのみ。
The only way to do that is to escape to the opposite side of the island by the tunnel out from the underground VIP room.
そして、その地下道は鉄格子で封鎖され、施錠されている。
And, that underground tunnel is blocked by a locked metal grate.
その鍵を持つのは、ベアトのみ。
Only Beato holds a key.
ベアトはその鍵を、全てが終わった後、蔵臼に渡すと約束する。
And Beato promises that after everything is over, she will hand that key over to Krauss.
何から何までが胡散臭く、物騒な話……。
The whole story is dangerous and shady all over...

……いや、ひょっとすると、これすらも狂言の一部なのかもしれない。
...No, perhaps this is a nesesary aspect for a kyougen play.
彼女は、黄金の全てを譲る代わりに、最期の芝居、あるいは余興に力を貸して欲しいと言っているだけなのだ。
She, in exchange for all the gold, is saying she wants help just for one last play, or perhaps side show.
彼女が肖像画の魔女のドレスを着て酔狂に笑うのもまた、……碑文の謎を解いた者にのみ許される愉悦なのかもしれない。
The dress of the witch in the portrait that she wears, and her whimsical smiling... are perhaps joys only permitted to those who solved the mystery of the epitaph.
蔵臼は重ねて家族の無事を保証させ、それが破られた時には一切の協力をしないと強く迫る。
Krauss continued to press for his family's safety, that when that promise is broken all cooperation ceases.
それに対しベアトもまた。
And to that Beato once again...
自分の与えたシナリオ通りに動かなければ、誰一人生かしては帰さないと、狂気の笑いと共に睨みつけるのだった……。
...would scowl with a crazy laugh, that if they don't follow the scenario provided not a single persone will survive.

以上をもって、蔵臼夫婦の共犯化完了。
And with that, Krauss and Natsuhi have been made complacent.
使用人全員と南條もすでに共犯化済み。
The cooperation of all the servants and of Nanjo has already been arranged.
ゲーム盤の準備はこれにて完了。
The preparations for the game board are now complete.

Of course the interesting switching between 1st person author Beatrice, and 3rd person Piece Beatrice.

Couldn't be more obvious about the whole shabang being for Battler... and about the mystery novel connection. Not that they were in doubt before...

One still wonders why Krauss would be so ready to believe that there were those explosives. "I wouldn't put it past Kinzo" doesn't mean the same thing as "Oh Kinzo definitely did that". I'd say no matter how crazy Kinzo was it would be 50/50 at best.

Dammit, Krauss, you're too willing to let Maria and Gohda get killed. You didn't even think of them.

Can't people walk to the Kuwadorian on their own? Why is the tunnel the only way?

All this time I never realized that the underground tunnel was directly connected to the VIP room. Is that grate the same one as mentioned in Alliance?

Personally, if threatened like this, I would consider trying to find a chance to capture and torture the bitch for the bomb switch, or at least the grate key.

Renall

2012-09-14, 10:36

Random forgery concept: Beatrice tries to make Rudolf and Kyrie accomplices, Kyrie takes Beatrice hostage and starts trying to get at Genji, assuming that he knows enough about the plan to strike a deal with them to give the necessary info to disarm the explosives and give them the gold in exchange for Beatrice's life and silence about what she's revealed to them. Refuse to comply and the other servants start dying, and if necessary, maybe some relatives. It'd all get pinned on Beatrice anyway as the chief conspirator, right?

Would sort of make a better Rudolf/Kyrie Culprit scenario than "lol let's just shoot errybody Rudy" "k."

Drifloon

2012-09-14, 11:02

Can't people walk to the Kuwadorian on their own? Why is the tunnel the only way?

Kuwadorian is really well hidden and difficult to find, isn't it? I mean, all this time people have suspected its existence and nobody was ever able to get there. (Except Rosa by some incredible fluke.)

But this translation is certainly enlightening...LyricalAura's summary was ambiguous about whether Krauss and Natsuhi actually believed that anyone was being murdered, but this makes it clear that they know. I'm not really sure how I feel about that, assuming that it applies to the game-specific accomplices in the actual episodes...Personally, towards the beginning of each episode at least, I've always had the impression that the accomplices don't think that anything bad is actually happening to the others. I mean, if Eva and Hideyoshi in EP1 knew that everyone but their family was going to be blown up, then what would be the point in them using the receipt to try and get Natsuhi to reveal Kinzo's death? She's going to explode anyway, unless she's an accomplice too. But if that's the case, Natsuhi should start to suspect something once Eva and Hideyoshi, who are also accomplices, get killed...eh, I don't even know any more.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-14, 11:42

Kuwadorian is really well hidden and difficult to find, isn't it? I mean, all this time people have suspected its existence and nobody was ever able to get there. (Except Rosa by some incredible fluke.)

It never made sense for the Kuwadorian to be that well hidden. There's a port not far from it and it should be visible to the naked eye. Also the Kuwadorian should be visible from above since it is implied there's a garden aroud it. On top of that there's a huge fence surrounding it, which means one is bound to bump on it even if he doesn't go directly to the Mansion.

In the end a middle schooler managed to go to and return from Kuwadorian without even caring where she was going, and all of that in less than a single day. After all it's just a 2km wide island, it's really not much. The only problem is the forest that would make travel quite difficult, but apparently it isn't that difficult if a middle schooler managed it.
Anyway if I were to be told such a story I'd rather think it shouldn't be that hard to reach Kuwadorian rather than believing that Rosa was granted a miracle.
In other words I'd take my chances with the forest before becoming the accomplice of a mass murder and putting the life of my family and mine in the hands of a sociopath who's likely to not keep her promise.

At any rate torturing Beatrice seems to be most logical step, I'd try that first and then the forest if that plan failed.

As a side note the accomplices compliance isn't the only hard to believe factor in this story.

The island being blown away would probably be treated as an accident.

I don't mean to say that it's impossible that an explosion can happen accidentally, but since when an explosion is assumed to be accidental?
The only thing that is true is that the lack of proofs would make prosecution impossible (albeit the police would most likely try to extort a confession). But just because it can't be determined who is the criminal or if there was a criminal to begin with, you don't assume it was an accident.

theacefrehley

2012-09-14, 11:49

There is no 'ommission' in the original
The person who transcribed probably removed some chunks of text before uploading
I have the book and there is no ommissions

LyricalAura

2012-09-14, 12:17

jjblue1

2012-09-14, 12:25

Here's the accomplices scene. It was longer than I expected. I'll be busy for the next few days, so the next part, assuming it happens, won't be for a little while.

I love you for the hard work you're making! Thank you so much!

Of course the interesting switching between 1st person author Beatrice, and 3rd person Piece Beatrice.

Couldn't be more obvious about the whole shabang being for Battler... and about the mystery novel connection. Not that they were in doubt before...

One still wonders why Krauss would be so ready to believe that there were those explosives. "I wouldn't put it past Kinzo" doesn't mean the same thing as "Oh Kinzo definitely did that". I'd say no matter how crazy Kinzo was it would be 50/50 at best.

Dammit, Krauss, you're too willing to let Maria and Gohda get killed. You didn't even think of them.

Can't people walk to the Kuwadorian on their own? Why is the tunnel the only way?

All this time I never realized that the underground tunnel was directly connected to the VIP room. Is that grate the same one as mentioned in Alliance?

Personally, if threatened like this, I would consider trying to find a chance to capture and torture the bitch for the bomb switch, or at least the grate key.

Yes, undoubtely they're represented as too prone to get along with the witch and this make them look pretty cold and uncaring (and again they apparently misteriously don't realize she's Shannon... I'll say 'poor girl, no one remembers her face' if it wasn't for the fact).
I mean, she might end up killing Krauss' siblings and their cousins... and would you really trust someone who's just saying you she has no qualms to murder everyone and isn't really handing you a way out as of now but might do it in the future?

What if this person changes her mind?

The general impression is they're using Beato's threat to justify themselves into letting the others being killed...

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-14, 12:50

It never made sense for the Kuwadorian to be that well hidden. There's a port not far from it and it should be visible to the naked eye. Also the Kuwadorian should be visible from above since it is implied there's a garden aroud it. On top of that there's a huge fence surrounding it, which means one is bound to bump on it even if he doesn't go directly to the Mansion.

In the end a middle schooler managed to go to and return from Kuwadorian without even caring where she was going, and all of that in less than a single day. After all it's just a 2km wide island, it's really not much. The only problem is the forest that would make travel quite difficult, but apparently it isn't that difficult if a middle schooler managed it.
Anyway if I were to be told such a story I'd rather think it shouldn't be that hard to reach Kuwadorian rather than believing that Rosa was granted a miracle.
In other words I'd take my chances with the forest before becoming the accomplice of a mass murder and putting the life of my family and mine in the hands of a sociopath who's likely to not keep her promise.

At any rate torturing Beatrice seems to be most logical step, I'd try that first and then the forest if that plan failed.

As a side note the accomplices compliance isn't the only hard to believe factor in this story.

Yeah, that Kuwadorian was so well hidden never made too much sense for me. Krauss for example could've found kuwadorian going around the island searching for the gold all those years if Rosa found it in a rebellious day...
I always asumed that Kuwadorian wasn't found for the same reason the siblings were reluctant to go to the chapel: Kinzo's authority.
For ex., they didn't make open moves to prove that Kinzo was dead because of that. Eva, the most temperamental and firm in her idea that Kinzo was dead could easly and skillfully walk around Natsuhi and enter the study (she has physical power, if everything failed she could shove aside Natsuhi) instead of using that trick with the recipe, but her fear to Kinzo's fury held her back. She could just look at the door with frustation and leave.
So they didn't went near the chapel nor the forest because they still acknowledged Kinzo's authority. All that 'wouldn't put it past grandfather' bussiness is a result of that.
So actually Rosa finding Kuwadorian wasn't some miracle, it was because she overcame her fear to Kinzo in her state of despair (for whatever teenage problem she had, I don't remember) and broke the taboo of going to the forests. It's actually because she was the youngest and the more likely to break the old rules that she was the one to find Beatrice II.
Eva and Krauss were far too scarred by Kinzo to dissobey him, and Rudolf always looked to me like the guy who'd just pass on those problems.

About reversing the tables on Beato and accomplices: Beatrice has a gun, but Krauss has mad boxing skills and enough hot blood to use them if a situation like that arose, so is possible for him to disarm her... but not to point the barrel her way. He'd try to reach a gentleman's deal XD I shudder if she tried to sway Eva with those tactics... and let's not talk about yakuza princess Kyrie.
There was a point about Yasu having a weak body, so is not too farfetched that someone overpowered her and, depending on the sibling in case, blew her head and went with the original plan. So actually Yasu imagining that pointing a gun to the fierce sons or daughters of Kinzo was going to get those results (absolute obedience of an accomplice) was too naive. Maybe that's what ignited the clusterfuck in RokkenPrime? Yasu was dreaming gameboards too hard to realize exactly who she was fucking around with and things went downside... sounds more plausible that the siblings devotedly going along with her just because she had a gun or the promise of some bomb that could be avoided if all ran to the forest with all their might still they reached the other shore (even if they didn't find kuwadorian, they could go to somwhere as far of the main house as Kuwadorian).

Renall

2012-09-14, 13:09

I mean, she might end up killing Krauss' siblings and their cousins... and would you really trust someone who's just saying you she has no qualms to murder everyone and isn't really handing you a way out as of now but might do it in the future?

What if this person changes her mind?

The general impression is they're using Beato's threat to justify themselves into letting the others being killed...
There's no reason to trust Beatrice, ever. The only reason anyone goes along with it in the stories is because the author wants them to. The rationale provided is basically as flimsy as possible without being nonexistent.

Either that or Ryukishi really believes that people would be okay with the murder of their friends and family for a sufficiently large sum of money promised by a person who cannot be trusted in any way.
Yeah, that Kuwadorian was so well hidden never made too much sense for me. Krauss for example could've found kuwadorian going around the island searching for the gold all those years if Rosa found it in a rebellious day...
Worse, he claims in Legend or somewhere that he's had the island surveyed. Not only would this assure that the surveying crew found the place, airplanes existed in 1986 and the surveyors would almost certainly have used one. There's nothing anywhere in Banquet which suggests it can't be seen from the air, and the large fence would also stick out like a sore thumb.

Basically there's no way Krauss couldn't know. And if Rosa can get there and back, it's possible on foot.

That discounts for a moment the point that one could just go in that general direction even not knowing if one is going to reach Kuwadorian. If you know there's explosives, you know she can't move them, and if you just run off into the woods you might get lost but you could probably walk to safety (somewhere outside the blast radius) faster than she could stop you.

The entire plan revolves around the accomplices behaving according to the plan when they're not being monitored by Beatrice directly. All they have to do is lie until Beatrice is out of sight, and just grab everybody and book it for the forest.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-14, 13:48

About discovering Kuwadorian, It could be that Eva used her money and influence to shush that. To avoid all those curious and WH traveling ilegally to the island and discovering what they shouldn't. Yes, the gold was blown up but 10 t of heavy metal would scatter, not dissapear. That could account also for the insane profit she made after Rokkenjima's incident, and be a reason for eva to shut completely the island from foreigners claiming that is just void and half blown and there's nothing interesting anymore.
Even if the police investigated, they couldn't take heavy machines to search for the gold, but some stranger particularly obsessed with a mountain of gold could do it. Or, since it was illegal gold to begin with, the authorities could take it as property of Japan.

But about the serial killing, if Our Confessions is a general sketch to create the gameboards, Yasu's plans were naive and that's why everything went boom on her face... hum... probably

Jan-Poo

2012-09-14, 13:48

About reversing the tables on Beato and accomplices: Beatrice has a gun, but Krauss has mad boxing skills and enough hot blood to use them if a situation like that arose, so is possible for him to disarm her... but not to point the barrel her way.

I'm not sure if Krauss actually had that mad boxing skills, that's probably an embellishment.
But the point is that he didn't need to confront an armed Beatrice at all. Because beatrice's plan involves herself to play as her normal self in front of Battler, there were like a shitton of chances for any accomplice to ovewpower her without any risk involved throughout the many episodes.

Basically there's no way Krauss couldn't know. And if Rosa can get there and back, it's possible on foot.

I see only a plausible explanations to that. Genji could have bribed whatever squad Krauss decided to hire. This isn't completely impossible since we know Genji bribed and threatened a lot of people in the past (Kawabata, the family of the dead maid and so on).

That still isn't a perfect plan because any member of the squad could have said "screw it I'm a professional, I'll do my job" to Genji and spill the beans to Krauss. But it isn't entirely impossible that they'd choose the money instead.

The idea that they didn't find a thing, however, is absolutely implausible.

About discovering Kuwadorian, It could be that Eva used her money and influence to shush that. To avoid all those curious and WH traveling ilegally to the island and discovering what they shouldn't. Yes, the gold was blown up but 10 t of heavy metal would scatter, not dissapear. That could account also for the insane profit she made after Rokkenjima's incident, and be a reason for eva to shut completely the island from foreigners claiming that is jus void and half blown and there's nothing interesting anymore.
Even if the police investigated, they couldn't take heavy machines to search for the gold, but some stranger particularly obsessed with a mountain of gold could do it.

That didn't happen. The existence of Kuwadorian became known to everyone in the world after the "accident".

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-14, 13:55

That didn't happen. The existence of Kuwadorian became known to everyone in the world after the "accident".

Didn't know that... Were was it said?

Anyway, the family not knowing about it before the explosion could be Genji's meddling, Kinzo's meddling (before his death) the reluctance of the siblings to go around the island to forbiden places by their father or a weird combination of both.

GabrieliosP

2012-09-14, 14:22

Ange (not ANGE) mentioned that Eva's cover story was that she was 'in the hidden mansion Kuwadorian', so yeah, in post-Prime everyone knows about it.

Renall

2012-09-14, 14:26

That still isn't a perfect plan because any member of the squad could have said "screw it I'm a professional, I'll do my job" to Genji and spill the beans to Krauss. But it isn't entirely impossible that they'd choose the money instead.

The idea that they didn't find a thing, however, is absolutely implausible.
It seems like after the incident they'd probably have divulged that. So if Krauss did have a survey done, the results of that survey should be public knowledge (or at least known to the police).

If the survey doesn't show Kuwadorian, somebody at that company is in serious trouble, because there's no explanation for missing it.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-14, 14:28

Didn't know that... Were was it said?

Kuwadorian is mentioned multiple times from the 1998 perspective in EP4

First Okonogi states that Eva was found inside Kuwadorian by the rescue squad.
Then Ootsuki when he talks about the many books of occultism that Eva sold, explains that they were all retrieved from Kuwadorian.

From EP8 then Yukari already knows about Kuwadorian, even if she shouldn't have talked to Kawabata in that world.

"......Eva oba-san avoided the explosion accident by escaping to Kuwadorian. ......How did you escape the accident, onii-cha......nii-san?"

It seems like after the incident they'd probably have divulged that. So if Krauss did have a survey done, the results of that survey should be public knowledge (or at least known to the police).

If the survey doesn't show Kuwadorian, somebody at that company is in serious trouble, because there's no explanation for missing it.

I don't think there's any official record of whatever they have found on that island or even that such request was made. Krauss himself probably pressed for it to be kept under wraps.
But let's even suppose (I don't know how) the police came to know that Krauss requested for the island to be explored by them. Who could prove that they didn't honestly tell him everything? Who could prove that they didn't erase any documents about that because Krauss explicitly asked them to do so? Is there any law that forbids that?
All that is required is the contract that proves that they provided the service and that he paid for that.

GabrieliosP

2012-09-14, 14:30

"Sorry, but we... uh... researched the island by foot! You can't prove we didn't! Devil's Proof! Yeah!"

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Drifloon

2012-09-14, 14:56

It seems like after the incident they'd probably have divulged that.

Well, it doesn't really matter whether they divulged it AFTER the incident. Eva had already told everyone about Kuwadorian by then anyway.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-14, 15:14

Renall

2012-09-14, 16:01

Well, it doesn't really matter whether they divulged it AFTER the incident. Eva had already told everyone about Kuwadorian by then anyway.
The point is if they were paid to lie to Krauss, their documentation would show they hadn't found Kuwadorian. Which is a big fat lie and the day after the incident everyone would know it was impossible to have missed the place.

So they'd provably have committed some kind of fraud, and might have arguably been party to the deaths themselves if they knew about a safe location and didn't divulge it to the guy who owned the island.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-14, 16:16

The point is if they were paid to lie to Krauss, their documentation would show they hadn't found Kuwadorian. Which is a big fat lie and the day after the incident everyone would know it was impossible to have missed the place.

So they'd provably have committed some kind of fraud, and might have arguably been party to the deaths themselves if they knew about a safe location and didn't divulge it to the guy who owned the island.

Krauss is always the victim of fraud, that fool. So it actually wouldn't be strange that he was being robbed, and the search team was expanding the search all they could in order to squeeze more money.

Or maybe they tried to say it to them, but Genji/Kinzo used their magic to make them forget. Nanjo lost his memory of Beatrice Cas. for one bar of gold, after all... And Kinzo didn't really care for the money so he was all from investing his money to block his stupid son that took him for senile. I mean, you'd have to be really crazy to not notice Krauss digging holes in the island and sending search parties for you most cared secret and treasure.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-14, 16:37

Yeah. Still, I wonder if Eva didn't try coming back for the gold. Then I realized that it being illegal would make recover it a real pain in the ass. So maybe in the next no Naku Koro Ni the protagonist will find the gold like that scandal of spanish pirate treasure that was found not long time ago.
Would be pretty stupid, but I like it anyway :D

If we are to believe EP7 tea party to a certain extent, then the gold is more or less where the bomb is, in other words it would be "lost" in the explosion.

I remember an old discussion with Oliver where he stated that in such an explosion the gold would most likely vaporize into a billion of little fragments.
Still, gold cannot simply vanish, there should be ten tons worth of gold in a huge radius all around the explosion, including the sea floor.

It'd probably be a hassle to recover it all but I think the gain would offset the expenses in the long run.

Even so there was no mention whatsoever of the gold being retrieved or about gold fragments being found.

jjblue1

2012-09-14, 19:13

Yes, the gold was blown up but 10 t of heavy metal would scatter, not dissapear.

I think that if the gold is as close to the explosive as it seems, the explosion could melt it... and make crumble on it all that was above it (the room of the gold seems to be under the ground) so to recover it... you should probably open a mine.

But about the serial killing, if Our Confessions is a general sketch to create the gameboards, Yasu's plans were naive and that's why everything went boom on her face... hum... probably

It's way too naive. Yasu would have better chances at cooperation if she were to suggest them to play an halloween game to please Maria than with trying to bribe people in that way.

There's no reason to trust Beatrice, ever. The only reason anyone goes along with it in the stories is because the author wants them to. The rationale provided is basically as flimsy as possible without being nonexistent.

Definitely the whole blackmail thing is poorly done.

There's plenty of people that go along when blackmailed in the world, but the setting presented is terribly unconvincing.
The Ushiromiya aren't being blackmailed by a criminal gang that's keeping a gun pointed against Jessica's head in some secret hideout while observing every single move they do.

Hell, the blackmailing looks almost like a magic scene in it's implausibility.

A Shannon with a gun in a Beatrice dress doesn't look as an adversary you can't overcome and all they do to avoid the explosive is escape. That's true they might lose the money but they have no proof Shannon really converted the gold in cash.
Actually it's not so easy to do it since among the siblings the only one who could do it was Krauss.

Worse, he claims in Legend or somewhere that he's had the island surveyed. Not only would this assure that the surveying crew found the place, airplanes existed in 1986 and the surveyors would almost certainly have used one. There's nothing anywhere in Banquet which suggests it can't be seen from the air, and the large fence would also stick out like a sore thumb.

Basically there's no way Krauss couldn't know. And if Rosa can get there and back, it's possible on foot.

That discounts for a moment the point that one could just go in that general direction even not knowing if one is going to reach Kuwadorian. If you know there's explosives, you know she can't move them, and if you just run off into the woods you might get lost but you could probably walk to safety (somewhere outside the blast radius) faster than she could stop you.

The entire plan revolves around the accomplices behaving according to the plan when they're not being monitored by Beatrice directly. All they have to do is lie until Beatrice is out of sight, and just grab everybody and book it for the forest.

Exactly. Their obedience to her orders seems to imply they wanted Beato to kill the others.

About reversing the tables on Beato and accomplices: Beatrice has a gun, but Krauss has mad boxing skills and enough hot blood to use them if a situation like that arose, so is possible for him to disarm her... but not to point the barrel her way. He'd try to reach a gentleman's deal XD I shudder if she tried to sway Eva with those tactics... and let's not talk about yakuza princess Kyrie.
There was a point about Yasu having a weak body, so is not too farfetched that someone overpowered her and, depending on the sibling in case, blew her head and went with the original plan. So actually Yasu imagining that pointing a gun to the fierce sons or daughters of Kinzo was going to get those results (absolute obedience of an accomplice) was too naive. Maybe that's what ignited the clusterfuck in RokkenPrime? Yasu was dreaming gameboards too hard to realize exactly who she was fucking around with and things went downside... sounds more plausible that the siblings devotedly going along with her just because she had a gun or the promise of some bomb that could be avoided if all ran to the forest with all their might still they reached the other shore (even if they didn't find kuwadorian, they could go to somwhere as far of the main house as Kuwadorian).

That's another of the reasons for which I prefer to think that in Prime Yasu didn't try anything as such. It can work in a (poorly written) fanfic but in the real world, unless people are too dumb, too coward or like the idea of Beato murdering someone, no one would play along. At least not if things went as presented.

I'm not sure if Krauss actually had that mad boxing skills, that's probably an embellishment.
But the point is that he didn't need to confront an armed Beatrice at all. Because beatrice's plan involves herself to play as her normal self in front of Battler, there were like a shitton of chances for any accomplice to ovewpower her without any risk involved throughout the many episodes.

Well, it's probably an embellishment but he likely had some boxing skills. And anyway he's a man and stronger than Yasu. He can overpower her even without mad boxing skills.

Wanderer

2012-09-14, 19:32

I restored the originally bolded parts of the text; if you go back it should be a bit easier to read now.

----------------------

About escape into the forest. It is in a typhoon in the dark, which is quite a different situation than when young Rosa went there, so there is that to consider. But even still, it's weird that the idea never even came up (well, I suppose it may have been part of that "omitted" section). The phrase "no options" came up more than once.

----------------------

About Krauss's survey and the Kuwadorian. What reasons do we have to think Krauss didn't learn about it?

There is no 'ommission' in the original
The person who transcribed probably removed some chunks of text before uploading
I have the book and there is no ommissions

Indeed. Upon investigation that seems to be the case.

The part omitted was about convincing Krauss and Natsuhi of the existence of the bomb. It seems to have mostly covered the shrine's destruction as a test of the explosives, and Genji corroborating the whole story in general.

And the other source I have seems to be missing (at least) one page related to this, too, so I'm stuck on this part.

Rudolf and Kyrie hold Beatrice hostage in a sealed room. Relatives start dying outside anyway.

Oh hoh hoh! Now that sounds like a true Umineko forgery!

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-14, 19:41

About escape into the forest. It is in a typhoon in the dark, which is quite a different situation than when young Rosa went there, so there is that to consider. But even still, it's weird that the idea never even came up (well, I suppose it may have been part of that "omitted" section). The phrase "no options" came up more than once.

I prefer running in the forest in the middle of a typhon to sit down and wait to being blown away by a giant bomb (Only an infant would believe a mad mass murderer that will off 16+ people that they'll forgive him). But maybe Natsuhi 'refused to believe in such nonsense about grandfather putting explosives under his beloved family', so I don't know what they could be possibly thinking to follow that charade...

Someone said something about not finding the gold. It's actually weird, that they found Maria's jaw but not a single piece of gold. I don't have the slightest, so what happens when gold is exploded? Does it melt, fragment or what? It doesn't evaporate, that's really ridiculous, but...
Now that I think about it, it was foolish of me even thinking about Eva going after the gold. it would be pretty sick. something like 'Search for gold in here! and if you find a piece of my husband or son let me know, k?'

GabrieliosP

2012-09-14, 19:59

Considering the force of an explosion powerful enough to erase a chunk of an island... and also the fact that the gold is pretty close to the explosives... I'd say at least part of it melted and then became a giant blob of gold, under another ton of debris, that is.

But it was underground, and the location of the gold room was a secret, so the police probably only investigated the known buildings (the mansion, the chapel, the guesthouse and Kuwadorian).

Jan-Poo

2012-09-14, 20:12

Someone said something about not finding the gold. It's actually weird, that they found Maria's jaw but not a single piece of gold.

We don't know if they didn't find any gold, it's just that there's absolutely no mention of that.

Anyway according to EP4 Eva had a lot of financial problems soon after the accident, and that means that the bank chip with 1 billion yen is most probably a big fat lie.

That however doesn't tell us much about the existence of the gold itself because it's simply possible that she couldn't retrieve it or sell.

GabrieliosP

2012-09-14, 20:20

Yeah, but we know for sure that Yasu really sent money to people like Chiyo's son. The 1 billion yen card might be true.

Think about it: your husband's financial situation was bad, and the accident attracted a lot of attention from the media. Would you use the card right away when it would raise suspicion and make the gossip and conspiration theories worse?

RandomAvatarFan

2012-09-14, 22:16

Well, I don't know, but could it have been possible that some assets may have been frozen for a while during the investigation? Until they were certain that Eva had the rights to it or something like that? But I like Grabrielios' explanation too...

Jan-Poo

2012-09-14, 23:50

According to what is said in EP4 the gossip and conspirations didn't really start until the second message in the bottle was found, several years later.
So the only reason for Eva to keep a low profile would be to prevent the police from inquiring.

Still that money was completely irretraceable, I'd think someone like Eva who showed to be a real shark in the finance world would find a way to use that money without drawing direct suspicions on herself.
She wouldn't really be the first magnate who inexplicably got a huge amount of money "out of nowhere" anyway.

Kealym

2012-09-15, 02:28

They could give her like.... a unisex voice, like they did with Lion.
...there was NOTHING unisex about PS3-Lion. :heh:

Here's the accomplices scene. It was longer than I expected. I'll be busy for the next few days, so the next part, assuming it happens, won't be for a little while.
Like everyone else, thank you so much for your willingness to do this for everyone! Your efforts are greatly appreciated. Also, it was mentioned that you could take the tunnels from the VIP room several times (and Genji mentioned a far simpler entrance than the Chapel contraption when he hands over the keys to Yasu in EP7), but I don't think a locked grate was ever mentioned beforehand.

But just because it can't be determined who is the criminal or if there was a criminal to begin with, you don't assume it was an accident.
Yeah, Eva being in the Kuwadorian alone is already suspicious. Kratsuhi and Jessica being in the Kuwadorian alone would require QUITE the story to not arouse suspicion.

Rudolf and Kyrie hold Beatrice hostage in a sealed room. Relatives start dying outside anyway.
Ha, that sounds AMAZING, would read.

The general impression is they're using Beato's threat to justify themselves into letting the others being killed...
It is somewhat strange.
"Well okay, but we WILL NOT be party to some strange incident."
"No problem them. I just want you to play a part is an elaborate murder mystery scenario as I off your siblings one by one."
"Well I guess there isn't anything too strange about that."

If the survey doesn't show Kuwadorian, somebody at that company is in serious trouble, because there's no explanation for missing it.
Isn't it more likely that Krauss just lied about having the island surveyed because Eva is a git who needs some "shaddup already", sometimes..?

She wouldn't really be the first magnate who inexplicably got a huge amount of money "out of nowhere" anyway.
If we're going to draw that parallel ... now I'm just imagining people making conspiracy theories about how Kinzo MUST have somehow causes the 1923 Kanto Earthquake, for that sweet, sweet Headship.

I also mention that in this scenario, come on, they HAVE to know it's Shannon pointing a gun at them, wearing some obscene ballgown. What I'm REALLY interested in is this whole "Kanon" thing, from their perspective.:uhoh:

battle22

2012-09-15, 02:37

...there was NOTHING unisex about PS3-Lion.
I think the voice for her was perfect, It could belong to both male and female, As for her sprite, Even when I read the original , I thought Lion was female, Until Will said which gender she was, then went wtf lol, Loved that feeling of shock

Jan-Poo

2012-09-15, 06:59

Ha, that sounds AMAZING, would read.

It's final destination all over again, if they somehow escape their fate they NEED to die in some other way. Berkanstel then will reveal that of all the possible versions of Rokkenjima in existence everyone dies even when there's no Yasu, even where there's no explosion and even when there's no family meeting!

Then John Titor from steins;gate will pop up from her time machine and she will explain that it's all because of the attractor field.

jjblue1

2012-09-15, 07:31

Yeah, Eva being in the Kuwadorian alone is already suspicious. Kratsuhi and Jessica being in the Kuwadorian alone would require QUITE the story to not arouse suspicion.

Actually it would make more sense for Krauss and Co to be there than for Eva.
He lives on the island so he might know about Kuwadorian and could have said he went there to... hum... prepare an halloween party and the siblings were supposed to join him when KABOOM.

Or that he and his family were supposed to take some stuffs from the place and carry them back.

But actually even Eva might have made up a story that would have made it look all right for her to be there. What about 'before the storm I went out for a walk, got lost and ended here just when the storm was starting. Since it was safe I wanted to wait for the rain to stop before going back and I even used the telephone line to warn the others I was safe. No idea what happened to them, I just hear a KABOOM and then...'

The really weird thing isn't that she's in Kuwadorian, it's that she offers no explanation about how or why she got there.

It is somewhat strange.
"Well okay, but we WILL NOT be party to some strange incident."
"No problem them. I just want you to play a part is an elaborate murder mystery scenario as I off your siblings one by one."
"Well I guess there isn't anything too strange about that."

Exactly. It's just plainly weird, the sort of thing that seems forced by the author and doesn't feel natural at all.

I also mention that in this scenario, come on, they HAVE to know it's Shannon pointing a gun at them, wearing some obscene ballgown. What I'm REALLY interested in is this whole "Kanon" thing, from their perspective.:uhoh:

Well, in the VN wherever they see Beato they don't seem to recognize her for Shannon (see Ep 2 with Kyrie & Rosa and EP 7 teaparty) but this might be excused with either the scene being a lie or missing something.

What's odd is how no one seems to notice that Shannon and Kanon have the same face despite not being related. I mean... in Our confession Krauss and Natsuhi's attention might have been more focused on the gun than on Beato's face (people at whom was pointed a gun sometimes say they're unable to recognize/describe who did this because 'too focused on the gun') but what's their excuse for not noticing Shannon and Kanon's resemblance?

They aren't so cold they don't look at the servants in the faces, and the matter becomes even more serious when you think at Battler, George and Jessica (or Erika, unless she was really that sure that servants couldn't be the culprits she never spared them a second glance)

Wanderer

2012-09-15, 08:07

It is somewhat strange.
"Well okay, but we WILL NOT be party to some strange incident."
"No problem them. I just want you to play a part is an elaborate murder mystery scenario as I off your siblings one by one."
"Well I guess there isn't anything too strange about that."

I think they just don't want to get their hands dirty.

Renall

2012-09-15, 14:01

Someone said something about not finding the gold. It's actually weird, that they found Maria's jaw but not a single piece of gold. I don't have the slightest, so what happens when gold is exploded? Does it melt, fragment or what? It doesn't evaporate, that's really ridiculous, but...
Now that I think about it, it was foolish of me even thinking about Eva going after the gold. it would be pretty sick. something like 'Search for gold in here! and if you find a piece of my husband or son let me know, k?'
Maybe the gold doesn't exist?

The only confirmation of it we ever get is within a bunch of stories. At best, we know Kinzo had something he used to convince people he might have had a bunch of gold, and somebody had access to a bunch of money in 1986. Neither of those things proves the existence of the gold.

If the gold did exist, you'd think unscrupulous salvagers would be crawling over the island crater and trawling the surrounding ocean trying to find even a trace of it. Gold does not naturally occur in high quantities on volcanic islands. It's alluvial and normally would be nearer to a river or something than the ocean. If you found gold dust in the sea or washed up on the freaking shore (because yes, this would happen), you could be reasonably confident that the gold had to have been real as there is little other explanation as to why you'd find any quantity of gold in Izu.

Basically, if the gold existed, unless it was literally fused into a single lump by the blast there would be traces of it everywhere. And it would be pretty much impossible to conceal even with a police cover-up. Gold dust would probably be washing ashore at Nijima. You can't explain that away with weather balloons and swamp gas.

Drifloon

2012-09-15, 14:25

It's weird because EP3's ???? repeatedly implies that Eva has the gold, somehow. Which contradicts everything else in the series, so it's probably best ignored, but it's still weird.

All of the Ushiromiya family's massive fortune had come into the possession of Ushiromiya Eva. ...It was said that this fortune also included the 10 tons of hidden gold that Ushiromiya Kinzo was rumored to have hidden.

Now, I will give to you the cursed mass of gold and the inheritance of the Ushiromiya head, ......as well as, ............the name of the Golden Witch, Beatrice.

I won't tell yoooooouu, aaahhhyahhyahhyahhyah!! I'll leave behind the cursed gold!

Kealym

2012-09-15, 15:24

I think the voice for her was perfect, It could belong to both male and female, As for her sprite, Even when I read the original , I thought Lion was female, Until Will said which gender she was, then went wtf lol, Loved that feeling of shock
Heh, a matter of opinion. I couldn't figure Lion out based on either the portrait, OR his original sprite ... I personally think the PS3 version makes it far too femenine looking/sounding, but, eh.

Though to be fair, I also thought Kanon was a girl pretty much until he died in Episode 4 of the anime, and he has the only "androgynous" sounding voice, to me. I don't think I'd believe Lion's voice as a boy, and Zepar's voice sounds too ... exaggerated? Though they're all voiced by women, so, /shrug

It's final destination all over again, if they somehow escape their fate they NEED to die in some other way. Berkanstel then will reveal that of all the possible versions of Rokkenjima in existence everyone dies even when there's no Yasu, even where there's no explosion and even when there's no family meeting!
I would just, I would read this SO HARD. That reminds me, I gotta get back to the other piece youw ere writing with Erika investigating that school murder...

The really weird thing isn't that she's in Kuwadorian, it's that she offers no explanation about how or why she got there.
...
They aren't so cold they don't look at the servants in the faces, and the matter becomes even more serious when you think at Battler, George and Jessica (or Erika, unless she was really that sure that servants couldn't be the culprits she never spared them a second glance
On the first part, you're right, Eva's complete silence is confusing. Also that we're never told anything about the state she was found in. You'd think Ange would track down one of the first officers to arrive before she goes talking to conspiracy theorists off the internet.

On the other part, well, in EP2 Kyrie and Rosa were probably both asked to just lie. The only time it becomes a REAL problem is EP4, where at best we get "well it was dark and raining and she was high up."
I think they just don't want to get their hands dirty.
Hm, that would explain it. According to what we've just read, Krauss used "we have to think of Jessica" to make himself feel not-awful about complying, but you still think we'd get some passing notion of "Even Godha? Even MARIA..?", since the epitaph only describes 11 or 13 deaths.
It's weird because EP3's ???? repeatedly implies that Eva has the gold, somehow. Which contradicts everything else in the series, so it's probably best ignored, but it's still weird.
Hm, she's either speaking metaphorically about it, or maybe referring to her current mass of gold (her actual assets as of 1998).
Or, why not, the gold mountain still exists at the Kuwadorian. Eva bribed every single person, EVERY SINGLE PERSON who might expose it's existence with a gold ingot to themselves. Those things permeated the Tokyo underground for the next 10 years before all being properly traded off, and Ange never heard of them because she's a good girl who doesn't hang out in bad places. By the time of of EP8's ???, Ikuko's probably tracking them down for shiggles. Will demand her funeral to involve locking the entire mountain of them, and Eva's unlocked diary, into her own crypt with the words "Ahaha.wav" etched into the stone above. Tohya takes a moment to reevaluate his choices in romantic partners.

battle22

2012-09-15, 16:13

Though to be fair, I also thought Kanon was a girl pretty much until he died in Episode 4 of the anime, and he has the only "androgynous" sounding voice, to me. I don't think I'd believe Lion's voice as a boy, and Zepar's voice sounds too ... exaggerated? Though they're all voiced by women, so, /shrug
Hah, Same here I thought Kanon was a girl when I first watched anime, I even thought 'Heh What a cool girl' and then I facepalmed myself :D :D :D

jjblue1

2012-09-15, 16:28

It's weird because EP3's ???? repeatedly implies that Eva has the gold, somehow. Which contradicts everything else in the series, so it's probably best ignored, but it's still weird.

I think it's more likely Eva got Kinzo's money and called it Kinzo's gold. Also she might have inherited the bank accound and got an extra share from that one.

It's also possible though that Eva just made money through her business and people thought she instead finally decided to use Kinzo's inheritance. In the beginning if I'm not wrong Eva's finances were so bad she went so far as selling Kinzo's library to get some money...
Eva simply never corrected their belief her money came from the gold and not from her hard work.

On the first part, you're right, Eva's complete silence is confusing. Also that we're never told anything about the state she was found in. You'd think Ange would track down one of the first officers to arrive before she goes talking to conspiracy theorists off the internet.

Yes, it's interesting how Ange never went to the police to have a report on what had happened. It's as if she completely forgot they investigated and might have discovered things they didn't reveal to the newspapers.

She's all for the 'let's hear the complete unprofessional guys' opinions and forget about the guys who first hand investigated the facts and the island with the proper means.'
It's an incongruence.

On the other part, well, in EP2 Kyrie and Rosa were probably both asked to just lie. The only time it becomes a REAL problem is EP4, where at best we get "well it was dark and raining and she was high up."

Yes, it's possible they were told to lie but this would make both Kyrie and Rosa accomplice and prove right from the beginning Beato wasn't going to keep the promise of sparing them since Kyrie is offed at the first twilight in EP 2.

Hm, that would explain it. According to what we've just read, Krauss used "we have to think of Jessica" to make himself feel not-awful about complying, but you still think we'd get some passing notion of "Even Godha? Even MARIA..?", since the epitaph only describes 11 or 13 deaths.

Well, undoubtely they're portrayed with pretty low morals.

Myname

2012-09-16, 03:10

So what does Yasu "look" like?

Beato
Shannon
Lion
Claire

AuraTwilight

2012-09-16, 03:20

None of them.

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-16, 04:21

So what does Yasu "look" like?

Beato
Shannon
Lion
Claire

All the afforementioned are embelishments. Yasu has a particular dislike for her own body and appearance, so all of her personnas are 'prettied' up.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-16, 08:16

You'd expect Yasu to look a lot like Kinzo seeing as how they share 75% of their genes. The funny thing is that Battler is a Kinzo lookalike. BattlerxYasu is one hell of a narcissistic couple.

AuraTwilight

2012-09-16, 14:28

Someone make a photoshop of the Goldsmith face on a meido sprite with the caption "I cannot be loved!"

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-16, 15:18

If she looked like Kinzo, now I well fcking know why she refused to see her own ugly body and created embelishments everywere. Now I can't stop thinking about an old man with hairy legs and balding head inside a maid outfit.
Ugh.
Yeah, YasuxBattler is a very narcissistic pairing. And not very convincing to boot. I'm just getting over all the incest in Umineko, so Yasu/ANYUshiromiya still makes me sick. Even more because the relationships are reaaally weird, even for the immune to incest vibes.

Will/Claire. Yeah, that will be mi OTP. At least they're not related. Or Will/Lion, if she is actually a she. Ougon Musou introduced me to the world of crack pairing, and even Will/Bern doesn't sound that bad. Or Ronove/Virgilia. Hell, even Ronove/Battler. And there's a lot of yuri, too, between non-blood-related individuals

DaBackpack

2012-09-16, 15:54

In response to Patchwork Chimera, I think everything makes more sense if Yasu/Lion is a boy.

Random question: I know this is in there somewhere, but does Yasu ever find out that he/she is Kinzo's child? IIRC, he/she finds out about the baby being thrown off the cliff, but I don't remember if Kinzo tells him/her more than that.

In EP7 Meta Kinzo goes on about "ohhh I want to tell Beatrice the truuuuth" so I'm led to believe that he doesn't in fact tell Yasu everything.

jjblue1

2012-09-16, 16:28

Will/Claire. Yeah, that will be mi OTP. At least they're not related. Or Will/Lion, if she is actually a she. Ougon Musou introduced me to the world of crack pairing, and even Will/Bern doesn't sound that bad. Or Ronove/Virgilia. Hell, even Ronove/Battler. And there's a lot of yuri, too, between non-blood-related individuals

LOL, I always wondered if it could be that Will was Battler/Toya alterego, sort of a Toya self insertion in the story.
It's made more interesting by the fact that in a sidestory it was said something along the line about how it's unlikely the two of them could show up in the same story and that the pairing Lion/Will would be an alternate version of the Beato/Battler pairing.

Though everything is up to speculation. In Ougon it's implied Will is a detective Shannon created in a story she told to Ange.

I'm not really bothered by the incest, especially in Umineko as Yasu and the cousins had no idea they were related when they fell in love and had things gone differently they would have never found out.

Kinzo/Beato 2 however is a completely different matter as, not only he knew she was his daughter but apparently she wasn't even that willing and surely the environment in which he kept her doesn't make the situation any better.

Random question: I know this is in there somewhere, but does Yasu ever find out that he/she is Kinzo's child? IIRC, he/she finds out about the baby being thrown off the cliff, but I don't remember if Kinzo tells him/her more than that.

In EP7 Meta Kinzo goes on about "ohhh I want to tell Beatrice the truuuuth" so I'm led to believe that he doesn't in fact tell Yasu everything.

Well in Ep 7 it's implied she's told it as well as the fact she fell off the cliff. If Ep 5 is to take into consideration she also knew/believed it was due to Natsuhi she fell off of it.

Renall

2012-09-16, 16:33

If she looked like Kinzo, now I well fcking know why she refused to see her own ugly body and created embelishments everywere. Now I can't stop thinking about an old man with hairy legs and balding head inside a maid outfit.
Ugh.
Kinzo was handsome in his youth, which is why Battler (who is regarded as handsome) is sometimes stated to look a lot like him. So it wouldn't be that bad when you're only 19.
Random question: I know this is in there somewhere, but does Yasu ever find out that he/she is Kinzo's child? IIRC, he/she finds out about the baby being thrown off the cliff, but I don't remember if Kinzo tells him/her more than that.

In EP7 Meta Kinzo goes on about "ohhh I want to tell Beatrice the truuuuth" so I'm led to believe that he doesn't in fact tell Yasu everything.
We don't know if there was a baby and we don't know if Yasu was the baby. What he/she is told is irrelevant, the only people who would know have motive to lie (Genji) or be mistaken (Kinzo) or are just plain nuts (Natsuhi, who might be having words put in her mouth anyway).

However, I do think Yasu believes this is who he/she is. And that's the only thing that really matters in this respect because the goal is to inform and explain Yasu's actions, not ask whether he/she really was Kinzo's incestuous rapebaby.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-16, 17:07

I was mostly kidding about Yasu and her issue, but she had to be at least pretty regardless of her opinion. I mean, everybody wants her... and if Battler, who strikes me as the type who flirts with pretty girls, made that embarrasing pony promise to her, and then George tried to get her, and then Jessica tried to get her too... well.
On the other hand it could be the maid outfit. A lot of people loves meidos.
I was skipping trough the early games. I don't remember exactly where, but there's a discussion that made me lol, where Jessica is talking about Sayo being her best friend in the guesthouse and George goes very defensive on her. George is all like 'Hey, everything's allright and we're gonna marry' with his weird glasses, and Jessica is 'You don't have to rub it in my face, you know?'. Shannon is just there being unconfortable.
And apparently George had heard before about those two frienship (cue shiny glasses of doom and 'inmediate' response about going to marry soon).
If one uses Shkanon in that scene, it gets really funny XD

Jan-Poo

2012-09-16, 18:28

and if Battler, who strikes me as the type who flirts with pretty girls, made that embarrasing pony promise to her

But Battler wants girls with big boobs.
You can only imagine what Yasu thought when Battler told her how his ideal woman should look like.

I bet she started using pads even as Shannon because of that.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-16, 18:57

I meant little battler. He was probably still in the age of 'girls are yucky' and it takes some kind of girl to make a 10 year old start bragging and going shakespeare on them. Or that's what I think. I have a hard time imagining little battler talking about big boobs.
On the other hand, he was always a pervert...

GabrieliosP

2012-09-16, 19:04

12 years old. That's the age where puberty starts kicking in and it makes sense for Battler to start showing off to Yasu.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-16, 19:42

Ah, of course, sorry. Made a mistake in there. Well, starts making sense. But still is too early. no? A twelve year old saying something about how big his girlfriend's boobs have to be.
Or maybe it's allright since he's an Ushiromiya. Pervertedness is hereditary... except for Krauss, but he's an idiot XD

GabrieliosP

2012-09-16, 19:49

There was a boy my class when I was around that age... let's just say everyone's parents didn't want their childs to be friends with him. All he talked about was girls and sex.

So yeah, it's not impossible for 12-year old Battler to be like that.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-16, 19:58

W-Woh. Battler being compared a lot to kinzo takes a whole new meaning! And him not being as flashy... my god, cannot unsee...
Anyway, I recently read some traslation to B. Battler's lines in OMK (You posted about it right?) and the part about -letting your body get cold because I can't love- or -Now your body is MINE- really were freaky.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-16, 20:05

From the scene of EP7 it is shown that Yasu formed her new image of Beatrice based on what Battler told her about his ideal girlfriend.

So that logically should have happened in 1980.

GoldenLand

2012-09-17, 00:33

Someone make a photoshop of the Goldsmith face on a meido sprite with the caption "I cannot be loved!"

http://i.imgur.com/pf4Tw.png

AuraTwilight

2012-09-17, 04:21

GoldenLand, I love you. I owe you one Wish that is within my power to grant ye.

Wanderer

2012-09-17, 08:04

Next installment. It's a big one. It's hard to tell since I'm cross-referencing a couple incomplete sources for this, but I'm probably more than halfway done.

The text relies a lot on cues in the characters' speech patterns that can't be translated in order to convey who is speaking, so sometimes I will have a character's name in parentheses following a line when context isn't enough.

And finally, the story begins.

"In any case, nothing happens if dad doesn't come down." (Rudolf)
"You've got that right. We didn't come to speak to our brother. We came to speak to father." (Eva)
"..........."

Krauss quietly bore all the harsh words of the siblngs.
He couldn't do anything extraneous.

...He must behave in accordance with the scenario provided to him by the witch.
...In the scenario, he was to wait until 24:00.
Which... was soon to be.
Then, they heard the chime of the banquet hall's grandfather clock.
It's 24:00.
It's time for that witch's scenario... to take motion.

'At 24:00, there will be a knock on the door of the dining hall.'

Knock-knock.

The door was knocked.
"...Who is it?" (Krauss)
He meant to say it nonchalantly, but it came out slightly nervous.
"...Forgive the intrusion. It's Genji."
He is also a person following Beatrice's scenario.
"Oh, Genji-san. ...What is it at such an hour?" (Eva)
"This is perfect. I'm kinda thirsty. Should we take a little break for now and have some tea?" (Hideyoshi)

Genji, after signalling to Krauss with a look, deeply lowered his head to everyone and made the announcement.

"...Ladies and gentlemen, the head summons you to his study."

Everyone stirred at those words.
Eva doubted even the existence of Kinzo... but that very person was summoning everyone to his study.

"...Wh ...What could this mean...?"
"I... I dunno. ...I've never been able to understood dad's whims." (Krauss)
All is going according to scenario.
...Everyone is commanded to the study.
And then in front of the study he and Natsuhi specifically will be told to wait......

"Please wait. ...The master and milady are to wait here."
In front of the study... Genji made the pronouncement.
Natsuhi says nothing, silently casting her eyes at the floor.
Seeing this, Eva smiles triumphantly.

"Ohhh, what could this be? What on earth could he want to say to us first, without the two of you?"
"No idea... I never know what dad is thinking." (Krauss)
"Master, it is Genji. I have brought all your relatives."

Genji says this through the door after knocking.

A farce. Beyond that door lies only a deserted room that has lost its master.

"Ladies and gentlemen. ...it is the study of the glorious Ushiromiya family head, Kinzo-sama. I implore you not to make any careless mistakes."
"...Genji-san. Dad's in a good mood... right?" (not sure if Rudolf or Krauss)
"Indeed. The master is in a very good mood."
Both Eva and Rosa were visibly relieved.

...But Krauss and Natsuhi knew.
The master Genji spoke of... was a new master. It was that witch.
Right now, awaiting them inside the study... was the Golden Witch, Beatrice.

The island, the mansion he lived in... was, at some point unbeknownst, granted to the witch of the portrait as its new master.
This mansion Krauss had come to believe was his home... had quickly became a very different place for him.

With Genji leading, Eva and the other relatives were... swallowed up by the pungantly poison-scented study.
Slowly the door closed... and with the heavy sound of the autolock, their existance disappeared.

"..............."
"...Does this mean... our job is over?" (Natsuhi)
"......Well, at least for tonight..." (Krauss)
"That woman is ominous. ...She gives me the terrible feeling that she's capable of destroying herself and everyone else if we're careless in dealing with her."
"...Yeah, me too. That's why I think we should do exactly what she says. I think... if we didn't just nod our heads to her she would have killed us on the spot."
"...All the servants are already that woman's henchmen, too."
"Well, no one wants to die. ...Also, they may have the same reward promised to them. ...She's got 20 billion in gold, after all."

Suddenly hearing unexpected footsteps, Krauss and Natsuhi went quiet.
They looked and saw Kumasawa coming up the stairs.
Kumasawa was also one of the witch's henchmen.
They can't afford to lower their guard, but still they did view her as someone they could better relate to than Genji.

"...Well done. Master's and milady's parts are complete for tonight."
"......What is the witch saying to them...?" (Krauss)
"Who knows... I don't know how Beatrice-sama thinks."
"I see. Both the witch and father truly resemble each other in their whimsicalness." (Krauss)
"What... should we do now?" (Natsuhi)

"...Tonight you shall return to your rooms and rest. ...Starting tomorrow you are to follow tomorrow's scenario..."
"Kumasawa-san. Have you... also been bought out by that witch?" (Krauss)
".........I also value my life, so..."
"Is there really a bomb triggered to explode...?" (Krauss)
"...It's probably true ...since the local shrine has really been blown up with explosives."

"................."
"Kumasawa, have you heard what will happen next...?" (Natsuhi)
"......All I've heard is that it's a big show meant to surprise a certain person. ...Please let me off at that. ...I've also been threatened with my life if I say anything unnecesarry......"
When Kumasawa meekly said this, she lowered her head very deeply.

The buyouts from the giant pile of gold and the threat from the bomb.
They really have... no way to resist.
Is this all just a giant farce? ...Or is it the opening to some ghastly celebration of the of the golden witch's resurrection?

Despite the ominous feeling they got from the thunder outside, Krauss and Natsuhi could only head to their respective rooms.

But, in their bedrooms were the new scenarios, already delivered.
By reading them they knew... tonight's farce will continue...

----------

The 5 invited into the study; Eva, Hideyoshi, Rudolf, Kyrie, and Rosa; stood firmly at attention like children called to ceremony.

"...Master, I have brought 5 members of the family."
"Good. Thank you, Genji."
Everyone was surprised at hearing a female voice.
A flash of lightning illuminated a woman's figure for an instant, which... was the very figure of the person whose portrait hung in the reception hall.
"Ladies and gentlemen. You are visiting the glorious Ushiromiya family head, Beatrice-sama."
So overwelmed by the sight of the witch, they forgot to even close their gaping mouths.

Eva was the first to come to her senses.

"......Wh......what kind of joke is this? Genji-san, what's the meaning of this?!"
"H...hey I'm impressed... she really looks just like the witch of the portrait...... is that dress a custom order...?" (Hideyoshi)
"Quiet, please. You are in the presense of the master. Please refrain from such murmuring."
Being scolded to earnestly by Genji returned everyone to confusion.

No, that's not right.
It was because the more familar family head had causually appeared from the darkness.
"The day that I return everything to my beloved witch has finally come.
Tonight, I have turned over the ring and all the assets of the Ushiromiya family to her."
Kinzo made the announcement in boistrously high spirits.

Of course, Kinzo never really appeared.
To those who already know that Kinzo has left this world, this illusion is nothing more than a farce.
Because illusions are... an embleshiment of the result's cause.
They are merely a creative production behind known results.
The results are... that five people die in the study.
And along with their miserable final moments comes its own new production.

"Alright! So, there is a reason behind you all being gathered here tonight! Might there be someone who can figure it out? Kukkukku, you won't if I just ask you out of the blue like that... so I'll give you a hint: There's significance behind Krauss and Natsuhi not being called in. Oh, and don't count Genji, since he still has his uses."

Suddenly declaring this, Beato had a mischievous smile creep upon her face.
Of course there really was no way for any of them to answer such a question.
Even Kinzo tilted his head.
"...Beatrice. To have prepared a question that even I do not know the answer, is truly something astounding. Why? Why is it that you do not have Krauss and Natsuhi here to celebrate your resurrection?"
"You haven't realize it, Kinzo? ... kukkukukukuku. I'll give another hint: It's something that was signalled by the grandfather clock in the entrance hall, just a little while ago.

Getting more and more confused, the relatives muttered amongst themselves.
They really had no idea what was happening.
"Hmpf! To think Kinzo wouldn't realize either! I am disappointed, humans...! Fine, I shall tell you the answer. Let's see... how shall I do it this time?... The Seven Sisters lack manners... the Siesta Sister corp is too much the old stand by... Gaap might be good... but actually... I think it's about time to call in a new guest!"

Which new demon shall I call?
Opening her grimoire she picks randomly from the 72 noble demons.
...mm, causually flipping through the pages...
the number that appears is 64.
Who was number 64 again?

Rank number 64. Flauros.
Flauros. ...Yes, it has a nice ring to it. Let's go with this one.
Alright, what kind of character design shall we do...
Gapp and Ronove and everyone have an adult-like design, so this time I'd like try the opposite with a more child-like design.
A killer with childlike innocence... or something...
Maybe it could be expressed through character design. Let's look up more about Flauros.
Flauros. Flau-chan. Yes, I like the sound of it.
...What? Has the appearance of a Leopard?
...Has the appearance of a man when taking human form?... Whaaat? A maaaaaan? A cute girl would be so much better.
Ammended. Let's make her a cute girl with matching animal ears.
Sakutarou had cute ears... something like his...
Let's do a sketch.

ScribbleScribbleScribble......http://images.wikia.com/umineko/images/0/04/Flauros.jpg

...Omission...
(I have no source for this part. Maybe it's a good excuse to actually buy the book)

"Flauros. It has been a while. ...For you to acknowledge my summons, it means that you are not bound by contract to anyone.
I am pleased. I welcome you as my ally."
"Rank number 64 of the 72 Noble Demons, Flauros the Blazing, is here!" (Flauros)

To human eyes, she probably looked like a girl still in middle school.
However, she's one of the 72 Great Noble Demons, Flauros.
With her terrible power she lays waste to her summoner's enemies. Her specialty is burning them to ash. Truly a demon among demons.

"It was just some random summons but, it seems I got someone interesting. To imagine that my summoner was the great Lady Beatrice!
Even though I'm here for business, it looks to be fun!"
"Indeed. Once you were contracted to an enemy witch of mine... Your partner was quite a hassle."
"Well, had no choice 'cause it was my job. So, what's the new gig?"
"I command you to cooperate in my ceremony. The clock has already marked it's beginning! I command you to kill 6 people as sacrifices for the first twilight!!"
"Kill six? Got it! Can I kill the 6 of 'em conveniently lined up right here?"

"......fu ...fuhhahahahhahhahhahha! So that's what it is! Ah, so I'm also one of the unlucky ones...! Hahahahahahahahahahaha!!"
Kinzo finally understood the reason for which everyone was gathered in his study.
In Beato's mind, the sacrifices of the first twilight had already been decided.

"...Fa...Father... What... is the meaning of this...?"
Eva timidly asked.
But Kinzo just continued his mad laughter.
"You're a bunch of unlucky guys! Sooooo, who shall I eat first!?"

Flauros's two hands stretched to the floor.
Her appearance was now not so much that of a human's, but of a ferocious leopard's.

"Don't hate me. You guys didn't do anything wrong. If you're going to hate someone, hate that guy who trashed his promise for 6 long years."

They all starred befuddled.
Beato bent down into the sofa's shadow.
And when she stood up again, she was holding in each of her two hands one from Kinzo's collection of sawed-off rifles.
The relatives could only imagine the sight of her wearing a dress and holding antique guns... to be that of a proper lady holding something like a folding fan.

Well, at least they couldn't imagine lead actually gushing from those muzzles.

First, in Ushiromiya Kinzo's study shoot Eva, Hideyoshi, Rudolf, Kyrie, and Rosa dead.
The door to Kinzo's study is thick, so the sounds of the guns won't be heard easily.
Krauss and Natsuhi will already have been guided far enough away from the study by Kumasawa and won't hear the guns firing.
The tools necesary for dealing with the corpses will already have been brought to the study.

Flauros changes into the form of a giant leopard, and starts by swallowing Kinzo in one gulp.
Swallowing him whole serves as an expanation for Kinzo not to leave a corpse.
It might be good to leave something like some of cut-off scrap of Kinzo's rope behind in the room. (I dunno what this "rope" is about)
Shocked by this, the relatives try to escape the room, but they can't because it's been magically sealed.

...Omission...
(I have no source for this part. Maybe it's a good excuse to actually buy the book)

To abide by the above scenario, the bodies are distorted.
So that bullet holes are not discovered, whole chunks of their bodies are destroyed.
Flauros tears into their stomachs, pulls out the entrails and bites them off.
This is also carefully reproduced.

...Omission...
(I have no source for this part. Maybe it's a good excuse to actually buy the book)

Flauros's four legs return to the floor and she moans happily with a stretch, her entire body quivering in delight.
Her body slowly glowing red, she burns brightly.
"I am rank 64 of of the 72 Noble Demons, Flauros the Blazing!! I eat it all, burn it all, smash it all!! Maaan, I can't wait until it's my turn again!!"
Her bright red light turns to white, and suddenly causes a giant explosion.
The room splinters, and everything turns white with smoke and dust from the blast.
The inside of the study was swallowed up by a torrent of blistering rain...
Flaurous's explosion broke a gaping hole in the wall of the study.

"My my, you didn't need to be so flashy. I wasn't planning to something like that, since the idea was that it's supposed to be a closed room murder. That kind of unfettered destruction of the wall is intolerable."
"Nyahhihihihi! I did somethin' bad! I love destroyin' about as much as I love killin'! And I love incineratin' most of all!!"
As she yells Flauros returns to leopord form and, leaving behind flaming footprints, jumps out into the storm-filled sky.
From the giant hole in the wall she lands in the middle courtyard, kicking the walls and prancing about until she disappears into the jet black sky.
It seems she just can't help herself after being separated from the physical world for so long.

"I see. She's the kind that never bores. Kukkukkukku. But still, this is awful."
The giant gaping hole, the wreckage and dust, and the storm blowing in all made the study quite a wreck.
And of course... the sacrifices with their inards cruely strewn about.
"Well, sometimes a bold first twilight like this has its own charm. Kukkukuku, hahahahahahahahahahaha...!!"

Then, Krauss and Natsuhi are be brought to the scene and made full witness to everything.
So... it would probably be good to get them a bit dusted up.
Something like having them do one roll on the floor of the trashed up study should do the trick.
So after the murder of the first 6, Beato sneers "aren't you lucky?" at Krauss and Natsuhi who, since the seal has expired, manage flee out the door... or something.

After that, Krauss and Natsuhi rush to call the police, but for some reason the call can't get through.
The general outline is that they, in a panic, take the servants and rush to the guesthouse.
But both Kanon and Shannon can't go together, so this part will have to be done carefully.
A simple story would be... Natsuhi and Shannon go on ahead to the guesthouse while Krauss and Kanon went to get guns for self-defense but are a bit late coming back.
Shannon enters the servants room with the terrified Kumasawa, slips out through the window, and meets up with Krauss.

Then for a while everyone holes up in the guesthouse.
The children of the killed parents will probably want to see the crime scene, or start planning revenge, or find some other reason to leave the guesthouse.
If they're really persistant, they can go to the study.
Once again it will be auto-locked, but it's not a problem since Genji has a key.
When they see such a bizairre crime scene with a large hole in the wall, they will certainly accept that it couldn't possibly have been done by humans.

It would also be interesting if there were a magic circle at the crime scene that wasn't there before.
The magic circle could have been prepared several days earlier.
All that's needed is for Krauss and Natsuhi to give false testimony that it wasn't there before.

And to make it even more inexplicable, Krauss or Natsuhi will carry an envelope that makes a proclaimation about the crime... and it will be 'discovered' in a closed room situation.

This is just an example but, something like having a room that was just confirmed locked with nothing unusual, but then when it's reentered there'll suddenly be a creepy letter there.
It will be impossible to explain it by methods other than magic without doubting Krauss and Natsuhi.
The first argument in the upper world can be held here.
Without doubting Krauss and Natsuhi there is absolutely no way to see through it.

Probably 'they' won't be able to think of anything outside of something having to do with the lock, or some kind of location-based trick based off a gap in or around the door or window.
But if this is a closed room in the true meaning, there isn't some mysterious culprit hiding somewhere.
If I note all these things in red, they'll just give up.
They can only destroy 'false closed rooms'.
So, if this room really is a closed room, they'll go as far as 'it's magnificent' and stop thinking.

Genji seems to be quite a robot, in on everything and happy to help with the dirty work... for no discernible reason.

We have an explanation for why so many corpses are mutilated; it's not really to gross people out as it's to distract from the mundane way in which people were actually killed.

Very explicit... and expected explanation for the letters.

Krauss and Natsuhi seem to be in a very similar situation to Rosa in Turn.

Wonder why Yasu used explosives in Kinzo's room.

Also, interesting that the meta world is described from a meta-meta perspective.

Drifloon

2012-09-17, 10:23

That's all pretty interesting. I still don't think that the mutilated corpses are really necessary, though...Everyone in EP3 was killed in pretty mundane ways, but I don't think it was any less effective in conveying the Illusion of the Witch. Heck, it might even have been better to go for a more subtle approach. Yasu really isn't a very refined witch, is she? Pukukuku.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-17, 11:25

At any rate the first twilight of EP2 cannot be simply explained by the necessity of hiding wounds. Beatrice has just been purposely creative. Naturally they were all dead already so it's not like she hurt them or anything, but certainly she didn't really have any respect for the dead.

The sentence that I found most relevant is this:

"Don't hate me. You guys didn't do anything wrong. If you're gonna hate, hate that guy who trashed his promise for 6 long years."

This seems to confirm what I was arguing some time ago regarding the fact that whatever wrong they might have done to Yasu, that didn't count as a factor in being chosen as victims.

It really seems that Yasu doesn't really care about them, anyone would be fine, she just needs corpses.

However the fact that she claims through Flauros that Battler is to be hated seems to contradict the claim that she didn't perform the serial murder as a form of vengeance.
Because... let's be serious... nobody had any reason to hate Battler except herself. If she thinks that what Battler has done was reason enough to hate him, it's because she hated him.
Maybe the part of her that still loved him didn't allow her to realize or admit her own hate. But frankly hating someone that you once loved is pretty common.

When you consider the apparent fact that she resented Battler for what he's done 6 years before, it's really hard to accept that what she has done had absolutely nothing to do with vengeance, expecially because it doesn't really make sense elseway.
What exactly was she trying to achieve by massacring Battler's family in those horrible ways? If it was just to make him understand her feelings and making him remembering his sin, there were plenty of other less cruel and drastic options.

Maybe vengeance wasn't her primary purpose, but hell, let's be honest here, she wanted Battler to suffer.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-17, 11:45

I find really curious how, if this is the general way the murders were done, in-game people tends to be sympathetic towards Yasu. Maybe in Prime it didn't happen that way. Maybe she went back, decided not to kill anyone or something like that. Still, holly shit. This are her toughts and desires, Ladies & Gents.

But then, even Our Confessions is full of fantasy scenes, just in a different perspective called OOC.

If we try to link it to the perception of every META that played the gameboard that went all 'find the heart~, don't exclusively blame Beato~', this scenarios have so many wrongs in them.

So what, OurConf. is a work witout love? In other words a B. Battler scenario? Ryuukishi tends to go to the extremes so often is funny: or you see the culprit as a tragic hero who breaks under the world's unfairness, or the culprit is a psycothic bastard that gets the giggles dismembering pepole.

Still, this pretty much writes down the general theories that go around the net to explain the gameboards (and the most easy to reach): namely, that Yasu with the help of the servants reunited all the siblings to announce herself as the Head and then went beast on them, dishonored their bodies and worked in the pretty first twilight that tends to be so shocking. That the accomplices were the ones leaving letters when nobody was looking and that Yasu had more ways to kill them that the winchesters.

I wonder what went wrong in Rokken Prime... the first twilight seems so full of posibilities to fail, least some of them are faking it.

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-17, 11:56

This seems to confirm what I was arguing some time ago regarding the fact that whatever wrong they might have done to Yasu, that didn't count as a factor in being chosen as victims.

I think that's a given from the start. A serial murderer can't have a grudge against every single one of their victims individually.

What exactly was she trying to achieve by massacring Battler's family in those horrible ways? If it was just to make him understand her feelings and making him remembering his sin, there were plenty of other less cruel and drastic options.

Well, she'd go nuts over the corpses for the purposes of the game perhaps(?).... after all, it's a black magic ceremony.

Maybe vengeance wasn't her primary purpose, but hell, let's be honest here, she wanted Battler to suffer.

"Boyfriend forgot his pony.... Let's massacre all his family in the most gruesome way imaginable!"

(Think I read that in some meme or something... It really fits here, right?)

Drifloon

2012-09-17, 13:30

Well, I think that the "If you're gonna hate, hate the guy who trashed his promise" line is more saying that the victims shouldn't blame Beatrice for their deaths, but Battler for forcing her to do it.

...Sure, that is a screwed up way of thinking, but it really isn't anything new. Clair said in EP7 that she always found it disagreeable that Battler wouldn't realise that the crime was his fault. It seriously seems like she thinks that she isn't to blame at all, and that she had literally no choice after what Battler did to her. That's actually the vibe I get throughout a lot of EP7.

Also, does anyone find it odd how the fantasy scene is so self-contradictory here? I mean, you'd think that Flauros would say to blame Kinzo for starting the ceremony, since that is what the fantasy version of the story is supposed to be. And also, how Flauros mentions Krauss and Natsuhi being absent, but then they're retconned into being present?

AuraTwilight

2012-09-17, 14:48

I don't think Yasu is really resenting Battler here so much as shifting blame from herself. Something she's done her whole life regarding absolutely everything.

That being said I still refuse to believe she did it.

UsagiTenpura

2012-09-17, 16:51

Thought of something, which I haven't seen explored personally.
Kinzo challenged everyone with the epitaph riddle because he learned he was about to die.
Looking for an alternative to genital problems concerning Yasu's complex, couldn't it be that?
Yasu learned she was about to die, making her feel like she was not allowed to love (as she would never grow up to fulfill it).
Her actions related to the epitaph might parallel Kinzo's as well. Whoever solved the epitaph = Beatrice (to Kinzo).
Is Yasu seeking a "Battler" or something in the same process? Is it somehow possible what Yasu is looking for is redemption before her death?

Arc 6 even has Battler seemingly fulfilling every wish of Beatrice (meta people) yet she still dies. Rest in peace? Could that be her goal?

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-17, 17:01

That's... actually not that bad. If the wounds left in her body by being trown from a cliff were internal and her organs were failing, not only her uterus, she'd die before she could properly begin her life as a wife or boyfriend or whatever. Then all her despair and devil-may-care atitude might be less weird: it's not extrange that people with a death sentence by illness does crazy things. Actually equal or more crazy than blowing up an island.
It's sounds good and despairing enough...

On a side note: I realized that Battler had resolved the part about following the sweetfish river and searching for a place with certain kanji in it's name in EP1. The cousins even sugested looking a map. Yes, they were using Odawara and not the right 'river' (choosing the right thing is hard for those who don't know about taiwan). Cool thing is that Battler alone came with the steps to apply to the real thing in little time lazyng in the beach, and all the other cousins had to think together to reach it.
C'mon, Battler. You are always at least mildly competent in gameboard, but in Meta you're a small bomb failure. Tsk, tsk.

Wanderer

2012-09-17, 17:57

The sentence that I found most relevant is this:

Actually, at first I thought it was Flauros speaking, but looking at it again I'm not really sure whose line it is between Flauros and Beatrice. It bridges the two different versions of the scene (magical, mundane) and makes sense in the context of both. It's probably meant to segue the two perspectives together. Anyway, the original line is:

「悪く思うな。そなたらに罪はない。恨むなら、６年もの長きにわたり、約束を反故にしたあの男を恨むのだな。」

Flauros likes to add だぜぃっ to the end of her sentences, so it's actually probably more like Beatrice.

Anyway, I edited it to make the speech patterns a bit more neutral.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-17, 21:16

Ah well I was assuming it was still Beatrice talking through Flauros anyway, but reading that sentence in Japanese I think it's almost certainly Beatrice directly. That "sonatara" isn't something that anyone else would say.

Renall

2012-09-18, 09:45

I find really curious how, if this is the general way the murders were done, in-game people tends to be sympathetic towards Yasu. Maybe in Prime it didn't happen that way. Maybe she went back, decided not to kill anyone or something like that. Still, holly shit. This are her toughts and desires, Ladies & Gents.

But then, even Our Confessions is full of fantasy scenes, just in a different perspective called OOC.
The impression I've gotten from Chiru and OC is not a positive one of the person behind Beatrice. Someone who demands everyone understand her heart but has no empathy for others. Someone who thinks she's suffering but ignores the suffering of others (the lack of Genji characterization could well be because Yasu never once cared why Genji would want to help her, despite him doing a lot for her according to Requiem). Someone who sees other people as so greedy they'd agree to the murder of their families and friends but unable to see the irony in how selfish her own desires are. Someone willing to dishonor the memory of the dead while hiding her own involvement and existence.

And, quite possibly, someone so self-absorbed as to hurt other people and then daydream that those people would forgive her for her self-desribed "noble" motivations. That's awfully twisted.

Yet I don't get the sense that's how I'm supposed to view the character.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-18, 12:07

The impression I've gotten from Chiru and OC is not a positive one of the person behind Beatrice. Someone who demands everyone understand her heart but has no empathy for others. Someone who thinks she's suffering but ignores the suffering of others (the lack of Genji characterization could well be because Yasu never once cared why Genji would want to help her, despite him doing a lot for her according to Requiem). Someone who sees other people as so greedy they'd agree to the murder of their families and friends but unable to see the irony in how selfish her own desires are. Someone willing to dishonor the memory of the dead while hiding her own involvement and existence.

And, quite possibly, someone so self-absorbed as to hurt other people and then daydream that those people would forgive her for her self-desribed "noble" motivations. That's awfully twisted.

Yet I don't get the sense that's how I'm supposed to view the character.

You know who is the villain i liked more in R07 works? Shion. But not because what she did or undid, nor because her personality or past or reasons. It was because, even if Meakashi was written from her POV, it's always reported in a 'believe what you want' way. I remember the post-script part where Ryuukishi listed some reasons why that girl was almost unforgivable, and questioned the reader that felt simpathy towards her. 'She's murdered and tortured little girls and don't you forget that.'

He explained clearly her reasons to going apeshit insane, and even after all of that, he didn't try to convince the reader to forgive her. A 'pityfull character' was all he was aiming for.

So Yasu is full of self-pity. She has her reasons, begining with her upbringing and the impact knowing she was a princess all along made in her. I can just think what a person would feel if she was treated like a lowly useless servant and then finds she's supposed to be the beloved and most important candidate to head in the family -at least, accoding to Kinzo-.

Actually Lion might be how Yasu dreamed she would be if Natsuhi didn't fuck her life. A perfect person, beloved by everyone and with a confident air, and of course Kinzo would make her the legitimate heir. A succesfull person in every ambit that caused envy in everyone else (but that'd be allright, because she was so loved even a little jealousy towards her would be downplayed in favor of adore her personality).

Then Yasu has to wake up. She's no Lion, she's no heir and even if she was she'd explode with the island. Why? Because that 'perfect heir' Yasu dreamed was limited to Rokkenjima's catbox. So, in order to follow the rules of every fantasy that could walk in earth, it had to be closed in the catbox. Bernkastel took that fact and shoved it in her mouth. Lion was no real.

I got off track... what bothers me most about Yasu is that, different of Shion, nobody calls on her for her egoistical way of seeing things. Nobody. Not herself (Shion explicitly said she was being selfish, at least at the begining when she wasn't insane) not even the higher beings. All are like 'understand her!' 'Not her fault!'.

Suddenly Berkastel insistence in break utterly and completely Beatrice mades a lot more sense. She KNOWS what an endless torture is, she knows how disgusting is self-pity and how meaningless is for a murderer to try and justify killing others friends and family because she had an horrible past (Talking about Takano, of course). Bernkastel fixing Takano's past might be a way of saying "There, not bad memories. Let's see what happens with my life if you stop crying about the unfairness of your life." And, after seeing the beautifull not-pain filled world it was, of course Bern was going to get a pet peeve when seeing self-centered idiots like Takano... or Beatrice. Like "I didn't do anything to you. And I spent a hundred years of repetitive torture for because YOU lived twenty bad yeaaaaars???!!!"

Then there goes Battler, in the same position as her. She got the itch to make something about it. And then Battler started acting like "Nothing wrong, she's forgiven". So Bern of course was angry and more than a little resentfull towards that guy. The last chapters in chiru, especially Twilight, might be about Bern refusing to acknowledge that bastards like Beatrice can be forgiven just like that. She's beaten and the message that Ushiromiya Battler deliver with that huge ass golden truth is 'People has different ways of thinking, for me, letting things go and forgiving someone you find unforgivable is possible'.

My personal answer to that is "Living without hate, or finding your death without hate about something you can't do anything to fix is cool. That doesn't make Beatrice's selfishness less disgusting, nor makes her suddenly someone who I'd forgive and embelish to a tragic heroine, sorry."

I got more love for Bern suddenly...

battle22

2012-09-18, 12:27

bastards like Beatrice can be forgiven just like that
...What makes you think Yasu was the culprit? As Aura suggested she might be covering for somebody else, You guys don't pity Yasu?, She was born from Incest, She had her body damaged to the point where she could not tell her freakin' Gender , How horrible is this? I admit that nothing can justify murder , but Yasu might not actually be the culprit and I would also never dare to call him/her Bastard. Mostly on Gameboards , first twilights are faked and then are lead into real crimes, Meaning it didn't went as Yasu wanted, I am sure she would never kill someone and I am sure she did no such thing in Rokkenjima Prime. Sorry if I came off as offensive , I didn't want to sound like that

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-18, 12:42

about Bern refusing to acknowledge that bastards like Beatrice can be forgiven just like that
I qoute my post

That's what was happening for Bern to be such an anti-beatrice witch. I agree with her to a certain extent. If you find the one who's torturing you, you don't suddenly make it easy on her. So maybe Prime-Yasu didn't kill anyone. But she was what started everything. And for Bernkastel, who saw how was a world without the woman who started everything (her friends happy, her family complete), begining a massacre indirectly is worse than realizing a massacre, because her dearest friends realized massacres, and all the fault was on Miyo, the one who started that mess.

Maybe Beatrice is different and RokkenPrime Yasu is a sweetie who didn't kill a fly. But the endless witch (the one she's treating in the Meta level - Bern's level of existence) acts like another Takano, gloating about being an all powerfull being, torturing a guy 'forever' because she had it rough... the paralell is merciless (made worse by the fact that Beatrice knows that Battler is suffering and reveling in that -Takano at least had no idea that Rika was trapped in an endless bad end) and that's why Bern's so invested in defeating 'Takano-Beato' by any means.

She's all the Rika that couldn't defeat 'real Takano'. So of course is personal.

That's talking about the meta level. What tragedy happened in real world or the gameboards is not of Bern's concern, she's focused in her own layer and the story that is unfolding there.

Is a little twisted, but Bern is pointed to be twisted.

My problem with Beatrice is that okay, she can be pitied or forgiven. But no one calls on her for her own selfishness and EVERY character in Umineko forgive her and thinks of her as a martyr. Except Bern, and we see why. (Edit: And Bernkastel is treated as an horrible, terrrible villain. Okay, she is, but she's had it as rough as Beatrice... ha. No. She's had it worse)

You don't explode an island knowing what was happening and wait for everyone to pat you in the head because you had it rough. Especially not the guy you start torturing killing his family and that has no freakin idea what you're talking about.

musouka

2012-09-18, 12:44

Someone who demands everyone understand her heart but has no empathy for others.

Hoping for one person to understand her is quite different from demanding that everyone understands her. You seem to have mistaken her drive to commit suicide with her drive to be emotionally saved. Well, Battler criticized her for it too, so...

Someone who thinks she's suffering but ignores the suffering of others (the lack of Genji characterization could well be because Yasu never once cared why Genji would want to help her, despite him doing a lot for her according to Requiem).

Hahaha, sure! Yes, that dastardly Yasu, having ambivalent feelings about the man that made her put on the dress her mother died in, console the heart of the man that raped her mother, and then only told her these things after the fact. Yes, yes, poor, tragic Genji.

Someone who sees other people as so greedy they'd agree to the murder of their families and friends but unable to see the irony in how selfish her own desires are.

This completely ignores the fact that in the episodes actually penned by Yasu, Beatrice is a monstrous sadist and all our pity is with the family. This doesn't speak of someone unaware of their own selfishness. It's only after Touya takes over writing duty that Beatrice becomes a sympathetic, fully-fledged character.

And, quite possibly, someone so self-absorbed as to hurt other people and then daydream that those people would forgive her for her self-desribed "noble" motivations. That's awfully twisted.

When did she daydream about that, pray tell? Because Beatrice was always characterized as someone yearning for love, but believing she was fundamentally unlovable. In the end scroll in EP8, she even points out that she's irredeemable and doesn't deserve to live for her crimes.

Yet I don't get the sense that's how I'm supposed to view the character.

Well, like Shion, you're supposed to view her however you want. Ryukishi obviously pities her, again, like Shion, but that doesn't mean that you have to.

Renall

2012-09-18, 12:55

Hahaha, sure! Yes, that dastardly Yasu, having ambivalent feelings about the man that made her put on the dress her mother died in, console the heart of the man that raped her mother, and then only told her these things after the fact. Yes, yes, poor, tragic Genji.
Assuming any of that is true, or that any of that actually happened. And if we can supposedly understand a person's drive to commit murder, I'm sure we can totally understand Genji, right? Right? Oh wait, we can't if we don't know anything about him. We literally have no idea why he does anything, be it in stories or reality, other than a vague sense of "loyalty" to either Kinzo or Yasu.

So right, other than a highly metaphorical scene that stretches all bounds of plausibility and a lot of things he may have said that we have no context for, and disregarding all the things we know he confirmably would have to have done, he's quite an ass.

On the other hand, he's apparently characterized as pretty selfless, at least in the sense that he has no actual self. So that still makes him a better person than either of his masters. Possibly. Unless he's actually a huge dick inside.

You can't seriously expect to go anywhere with criticism of the behavior of a character who is left entirely unreadable. But I suppose that's to be expected.
...What makes you think Yasu was the culprit? As Aura suggested she might be covering for somebody else, You guys don't pity Yasu?, She was born from Incest, She had her body damaged to the point where she could not tell her freakin' Gender , How horrible is this? I admit that nothing can justify murder , but Yasu might not actually be the culprit and I would also never dare to call him/her Bastard. Mostly on Gameboards , first twilights are faked and then are lead into real crimes, Meaning it didn't went as Yasu wanted, I am sure she would never kill someone and I am sure she did no such thing in Rokkenjima Prime. Sorry if I came off as offensive , I didn't want to sound like that
No, I don't pity her. At all. She has a pretty nice life. There are a lot of people within the context of the story itself presented as living far worse lives than she has and finding hope and strength in them. People who do not pity themselves. People who are desperately searching for a solution.

Everything she considers so tragic and dangerous are fantasies of her own making inside her own head. The reality of her situation is that she is living a good life with decent people and has been treated incredibly well - even excessively favorably - by a number of people who owe her nothing.

And she is torn up over feelings of teenage angst which change nothing and are not the end of the world, and broiling in self-pity over things that might not have even ever actually happened to her, at least so far as she knows. And she's upset about not being able to see a person when no barriers whatsoever exist to her trying to do so if she wishes.

Plus, if she is a mass murderer... it's really only my belief that it's not in her nature to actually do something like that which prevents me from going deeper into that. But she's just kind of an annoying person as-is. Throw that in the mix and she becomes outright despicable.

So, I pity Maria. I don't pity Yasu. The world hands Yasu everything and she doesn't want it because of a passing fancy. The world craps in Maria's face on a daily basis and she copes with it. Why should I consider the two equivalent?

musouka

2012-09-18, 13:44

Assuming any of that is true, or that any of that actually happened.

Well, if that's the route you're going, how do we know that Genji isn't a robot? How do we know that there is even an island? How do we know up is up, down is down, and the sky is blue? How do you know that you even read Umineko no Naku Koro Ni?

We could do this all day.

No, I don't pity her. At all. She has a pretty nice life.

Yes, I, too, would be thrilled to know that my body is completely sexually dysfunctional and I'm 75% Kinzo, after having been working as a servant under the woman that tried to murder me. Man, that Yasu and her silly complaints!

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-18, 14:20

That's what was happening for Bern to be such an anti-beatrice witch. I agree with her to a certain extent. If you find the one who's torturing you, you don't suddenly make it easy on her. So maybe Prime-Yasu didn't kill anyone. But she was what started everything. And for Bernkastel, who saw how was a world without the woman who started everything (her friends happy, her family complete), begining a massacre indirectly is worse than realizing a massacre, because her dearest friends realized massacres, and all the fault was on Miyo, the one who started that mess

Okay, that characterization is a lot more twisted than anything that is ever said about Yasu. I know Bernkastel is meant to be twisted, but the way you put it, how exactly is she in the right here? Even if Yasu actually is a twisted, horrible, despicable, damned, satan's best pal, how the hell does that make Bern right here?

My problem with Beatrice is that okay, she can be pitied or forgiven. But no one calls on her for her own selfishness and EVERY character in Umineko forgive her and thinks of her as a martyr.

Um... EP3?

Except Bern, and we see why. (Edit: And Bernkastel is treated as an horrible, terrrible villain. Okay, she is, but she's had it as rough as Beatrice... ha. No. She's had it worse)

You don't explode an island knowing what was happening and wait for everyone to pat you in the head because you had it rough. Especially not the guy you start torturing killing his family and that has no freakin idea what you're talking about.

And I'll say again that this is a whole lot more twisted. You know, when a person forgives the ones who crucified them and even spends their last breath pleading for them to be forgiven, it somehow belittles that noble action to say 'nope, those guys are unforgivable, you shouldn't forgive them so easily' (I'm really not trying to get religion dragged into this, just making an example, I'm an atheist).

To say that Bern is right for wanting to crush Beatrice because she cannot forgive her for something she did to OTHER people, just because she had something similar happen to her, and therefore cannot excuse Beatrice for not getting called on it is... at least irrational. Ask the people who get their asses blown, Battler forgave Beatrice, so Bern should just stay in Higurashi and dress up as a slutty cat or something.

I'm not trying to argue about Yasu being a tragic heroine instead of a murderer, I'm just pointing out that forgiveness isn't something to be taken so lightly. The way you put it, Bern is just a spoiled bitch (I know she is, but she's totally not right for it).

On the other hand, he's apparently characterized as pretty selfless, at least in the sense that he has no actual self. So that still makes him a better person than either of his masters. Possibly. Unless he's actually a huge dick inside.

Well he kinda just looked the other way when his boss f***ed the shit out of his own daughter who was kinda kept as his own sex-dressup-prisoner.... so....

No, but seriously, I think he's one of the most poorly written characters in Umineko. Taking into account the way Umineko approaches the core of its characters, Genji could have been a masterpiece. Maybe my favorite character of all times. He could.

(But then again he doesn't have the hips for a cute mini-skirt, so I don't think Ryukishi07 agrees with me on this one.....)

There are a lot of people within the context of the story itself presented as living far worse lives than she has and finding hope and strength in them. People who do not pity themselves. People who are desperately searching for a solution.

But arguing 'why didn't they commit murder' isn't really a valid point (not saying you're doing that). It's obviously Yasu's fault for not being like them.

So, I pity Maria. I don't pity Yasu. The world hands Yasu everything and she doesn't want it because of a passing fancy. The world craps in Maria's face on a daily basis and she copes with it. Why should I consider the two equivalent?

I think Yasu is far more pitiable than Maria just for that reason. Maria can cope, she can even turn the shit life throws to her face into gold, and she should be proud of that. Yasu, the complete opposite who has no such ability is the pitiful one.

battle22

2012-09-18, 14:31

I think Yasu is far more pitiable than Maria just for that reason. Maria can cope, she can even turn the shit life throws to her face into gold, and she should be proud of that. Yasu, the complete opposite who has no such ability is the pitiful one.

Wasn't it Yasu Who thought Maria how to handle that kind of situations? EP7 Maria and Beatos meeting, One of the most sweetest scenes in Umineko.

Renall

2012-09-18, 14:36

Yes, I, too, would be thrilled to know that my body is completely sexually dysfunctional and I'm 75% Kinzo, after having been working as a servant under the woman that tried to murder me. Man, that Yasu and her silly complaints!
Except that's not something she knows is true. It's something she thinks is true, and which has never had any bearing on her life before. If she never heard about any of it, her life would be no different than it is. And the way it is is pretty good.

Literally, it matters only because she believes it. Even if every word of it were true, it doesn't matter, because her reaction would be the same if it were all false. She cannot prove she is the baby. She cannot prove there was a baby. She doesn't remember it. The trauma is not her own. She has no reason whatsoever to suffer some complete breakdown over this. It is entirely her fault how she chooses to react (or overreact) to unverifiable information. She's given a choice and I wouldn't begrudge her believing it and being emotionally harmed by it. But what she seems to do, or at least is alleged to have done, is the core of the problem. No one but her bears responsibility for that, and to latch on to something you merely believe is true as impetus for (possibly) the deaths of over a dozen people is disgusting.

It's ridiculous. She's being a transcendent drama queen about what amounts to a story, a story she cannot even confirm. And then, if we go by the fantasy scenario, she gets an apology and a bazillion dollars. And is nevertheless motivated by something apparently completely unrelated to that anyway.

Her characterization is an unbelievable mess that paints a picture of an overly-credulous, selfish person willing to fly off the handle about everything that is good for fanciful stories of horrible things that might have once been. But then acts like she's sensitive and pitiful. She has no idea how good she has it, how much worse others have it, and how hard they try to cope regardless.

The argument "well she's not that strong" would seem to fly in the face of her conviction to commit mass murder (and her apparent ability to create coping mechanisms as portrayed in Requiem). Of course, if she didn't do that, then the characterization claim is valid... but in that case she's innocent, and her supposed motive can't even be read that way because it's unrelated to why people actually died, and we're right back where we started.

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-18, 14:37

Wasn't it Yasu Who thought Maria how to handle that kind of situations? EP7 Maria and Beatos meeting, One of the most sweetest scenes in Umineko.

That's exactly what I'm pointing at. Even though Yasu teaches Maria to pick up only happy fragments, she herself does the opposite. That's why she's pitiful.

jjblue1

2012-09-18, 14:45

I think that Higurashi did a way better job in dealing with Shion than Umineko did with Yasu.
Shion's reasons are clearly presented as well as her youth, her true identity, her attempts to stop herself, her blaming herself, what she tried to do, what she suffered emotionally and physically (nail ripping is a form of torture), her fears and what made her snap.

While what she does is clearly wrong you can understand why she did it and get the uncomfortable feeling of 'but if I had been in her place would I have been able to do the right thing or would I have gone paranoic as well and gone on a murdering rampage?'

Yasu... is someone we've to figure out.
However the problem is that generally people doesn't think themselves capable of doing such things. They would need a strong motivation to doubt themselves. The idea of placing yourself in the shoes of a serial murderer when you're a normal person is already something hard to do.
In order to think you might lose it and do something that horrible you need a strong setting. When you hear: 'hey, it's because her childhood crush, who didn't exactly knew if she returned his feelings, after losing his mother and leaving his family forgot about her and, when he came back and saw she had another boyfriend and was happy with him didn't really try to win her over again or thought he'd wronged her' we're prone to say 'uhm, what? if any girl who'd been dumped had to kill so many people Earth population would be reduced to 0... if we include in the dumping part the childhood crush humanity would have disappeared by the Earth long ago'.

Now, Yasu might have better motivations than Battler to do all that. She has the potential to have them. However:
a) Yasu never aknowledge them as her own reasons to act (unless she's lying to herself)
b) Some of them are impossible to guess, at least in the first 4 episodes
c) Some of them are so little developed it's impossible to deem them enough to justify murder
d) Yasu excuses herself a lot placing the blame on the person who's less culpable among the ones that were mean to him (you can blame Natsuhi for the fall, Kumasawa, Nanjo and Genji for ripping her from her family, even Eva for looking down at her likely planning to make her life hard should she try to marry George or Rosa for beating her friend, Maria or Gohda for taking advantage of her but Battler? He didn't mean to hurt her and if he didn't keep his 'promise' and ended up forgetting it, it's because he had a serious reason. Also she had made no real promise to leave with him in return but just... to think at it. If she were to decide she wanted to stay should have Battler killed her?)
e) Yasu could escape from many things that made her life unpleasant
f) Yasu could have tried to contact Battler
g) Yasu has around people who loves her, like George and Jessica, with whom she's not being honest, and people who apparently cared for her like Genji, Kumasawa and Nanjo. Even if you want to blame Kumasawa and Genji for what they did, they did it in hope to help her, at least that's how it's presented. If they actually did it for their own interest... well, that's up for you to speculate, it's not proved nor clearly hinted so it feels forced.

All in all Yasu has the full potential to be a pitiful culprit but... she's poorly handed so it's rather hard to place yourself in her shoes and justify her.

It doesn't help that as Lion she depicts herself as a perfect yet bossy heir who doesn't really care much for her family's feelings (when Jessica asked Lion not to candidate Lion does anyway even knowing this would place Jessica in an uncomfortable position, when Bern said that her family might not like the fact Lion is the heir Lion said something along the line of 'too bad, that's how it was decided' not 'my family loves me and would never think so' or 'I would make up for it somehow'... and he never considered Krauss' feelings over not having the headship passed to him. Nor Lion even figured out Kinzo's feelings).

In short, it's hard to feel pity for Yasu.

...What makes you think Yasu was the culprit? As Aura suggested she might be covering for somebody else, You guys don't pity Yasu?, She was born from Incest, She had her body damaged to the point where she could not tell her freakin' Gender , How horrible is this? I admit that nothing can justify murder , but Yasu might not actually be the culprit and I would also never dare to call him/her Bastard. Mostly on Gameboards , first twilights are faked and then are lead into real crimes, Meaning it didn't went as Yasu wanted, I am sure she would never kill someone and I am sure she did no such thing in Rokkenjima Prime. Sorry if I came off as offensive , I didn't want to sound like that

I think the Yasu we're talking about is the gameboard Yasu not Prime Yasu over which we know very little.

Also Yasu's problems aren't presented in a way that makes excusable her crimes not even by her and anyway she's taking it out on the wrong people.

Actually often the first twilight isn't entirely faked, just the part in which Yasu is supposed to be dead. In Ep 1 apart from yasu the others were dead, same for Ep 3. In our confession the first twilight is genuine and they all were dead. It's just Ep 5 who have all the victims fake their deaths to die later.

I doubt though Yasu's covering for someone else with the tales.
First it was due to the tales what had been labelled as an incident became even more suspicious.
Second the tales either were impossible to solve or didn't point at her as culprit as Ange never worries about them pointing at the maid. As they're public knowledge one would think people had tackled them, Tohya included, yet either he too didn't solve them or his tales also weren't solvable or he didn't make Yasu as the culprit.
Third, the official explanation given for Yasu writing the tales is that she wanted someone to understand her, not to cover for someone else. If you were to understand her through the tales and she's innocent the tales would reveal someone else is the culprit or, at best, wouldn't explain nothing about who's the culprit.

Mind you, I also dodn't think Yasu is the real culprit in Prime, though I don't know if that happened because:
a) she never planned it
b) she planned it but had second thoughts and gave up on her plan/something happened and someone else took away from her the role of culprit

There's too little to judge PrimeYasu but there's plenty to judge PieceYasu and, while PieceYasu might have lot of excuses for what she did, in the end they failed to present her as so pitiful we can say 'well, what she did was wrong but at the moment she couldn't do any better/she didn't know better/she wasn't in her right mind to do better'.

All I can say is that while Yasu had the potential to be pitied and sympathized the story didn't really work hard in that direction.
Even the revelation that she had her body mutilated is a random sentence at the end of Ep 7 which didn't really did her justice.
The coworkers are mean with her? That's bad but she also get special privileges and they have to take the blame for Yasu's mistakes (it's explained in the beginning that there's a share responsibility rule) and they've no reason to feel the need to care for Yasu who actually doesn't look that much bothered by their behaviour as she has Shannon.

At least Maria is represented as suffering for the lack of attentions from her mother, Sakutarou being only a palliative and even Ange suffered due to her classmates' behaviour even when she had the 7 sisters.

It's possible, even likely, that Yasu suffered too though apparently she didn't have it as hard as Ange or Maria and she's never really showed suffering like them.

battle22

2012-09-18, 14:51

musouka

2012-09-18, 15:08

It's ridiculous. She's being a transcendent drama queen about what amounts to a story, a story she cannot even confirm. And then, if we go by the fantasy scenario, she gets an apology and a bazillion dollars. And is nevertheless motivated by something apparently completely unrelated to that anyway.

Why are you assuming that Yasu is unable to confirm what Genji tells her. You honestly think that if there is something seriously wrong with your body--like castration--it's "impossible" to verify? You have absolutely no proof that Genji wasn't able to substantiate his story, so judging Yasu on those grounds is pretty hilarious.

Who apologized to Yasu? Kinzo was crazy and was apologizing to Beatrice. Genji and Co seem to think the scene where Yasu is paraded up the stairs and forced to act the part of "Beatrice" as her coming into her "heritage", something to be lauded, not horrified over.

She has no idea how good she has it, how much worse others have it, and how hard they try to cope regardless.

I guess you missed all the scenes in EP7 where Yasu specifically points out that no one is to blame for her situation, even Battler. Her method of coping is actually trying to think about others and how she can't "blame" them for her own pain, until it finally gets to be too much for her and she snaps. Even if the people around her "love" Yasu. Even if all the pain they put her through is unthinking and accidental... That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt.

Renall

2012-09-18, 15:25

Why are you assuming that Yasu is unable to confirm what Genji tells her. You honestly think that if there is something seriously wrong with your body--like castration--it's "impossible" to verify? You have absolutely no proof that Genji wasn't able to substantiate his story, so judging Yasu on those grounds is pretty hilarious.
We didn't see it. Is it possible his claims are independently verifiable? Maybe. But the baby and its mother didn't even officially exist. Exactly how much confirmation is she going to get from non-biased sources?

You also don't actually know what, if anything, is wrong with Yasu. Because it was never said. Somebody proposed a workable alternative just within the last page or two, even. There could be nothing wrong physically. All we get is the mental reaction, and its specific cause is unclear. We have every rational reason to doubt it, if we are rational people.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-18, 15:28

Okay, that characterization is a lot more twisted than anything that is ever said about Yasu. I know Bernkastel is meant to be twisted, but the way you put it, how exactly is she in the right here? Even if Yasu actually is a twisted, horrible, despicable, damned, satan's best pal, how the hell does that make Bern right here?

Who's in the right? Don't tell me miss 'Bribing and trying to sway the siblings into going along with a murder game' is not fucked up. I say I agree with her in the 'pitying a person doesn't mean I can forgive them for mass murdering my precious family, friends', and more like that 'Yasu's portrayal is so flimsy that forgiving her is just a moronic thing to do for Battler'.

Um... EP3?

Wasn't that her furniture following her game of north wind and sun? Just look how everybody called her out, Virgilia, the one who helped her to cook the scheme, or Ronove, who's just one person and doesn't really care about the humans.

The one called out was EVA-Beatrice. Beato was just screwing with Battler, but because Battler went to depression she started to fall from her position. In EP4 Bernkastel had to make Ange a burger to make Battler firm enough to not forgive her! In other words, all those times he said in the past he 'was going to destroy her' were so meaningless he had to bathe in Ange's blood to keep figthing.

And I'll say again that this is a whole lot more twisted. You know, when a person forgives the ones who crucified them and even spends their last breath pleading for them to be forgiven, it somehow belittles that noble action to say 'nope, those guys are unforgivable, you shouldn't forgive them so easily' (I'm really not trying to get religion dragged into this, just making an example, I'm an atheist).

To say that Bern is right for wanting to crush Beatrice because she cannot forgive her for something she did to OTHER people, just because she had something similar happen to her, and therefore cannot excuse Beatrice for not getting called on it is... at least irrational. Ask the people who get their asses blown, Battler forgave Beatrice, so Bern should just stay in Higurashi and dress up as a slutty cat or something.

I'm not trying to argue about Yasu being a tragic heroine instead of a murderer, I'm just pointing out that forgiveness isn't something to be taken so lightly. The way you put it, Bern is just a spoiled bitch (I know she is, but she's totally not right for it).

Bern is not right. She's trying to get into a scenary that is very similar to what she went through in her days trapped in a loop. And she's trying to win.

And people who forgive those who crucified them are called saints. A normal human would break hard under torture. Yeah, all humans have the ability to become saints and forgive. But rarely they go with that path. Normally they search a lawyer and try to give the bastard a shot. Or at least a life sentence.

Forgiveness isn't something a being like Bernkastel is known for. Not after all the shit thrown in her way. She cannot forgive, she cannot look at tales that talk about forgiving when she didn't got closure nor happiness because the doings of a woman she barely knew. Like the mayorty of people cannot look at a tale about rape if they were raped without some strong reaction.
Hm... that's a little strong, but I believe a hundred and more years of repeatedly being murdered and watch your family get murdered goes into insane shit that can't be really compared to anything that happens in life.

I think Yasu is far more pitiable than Maria just for that reason. Maria can cope, she can even turn the shit life throws to her face into gold, and she should be proud of that. Yasu, the complete opposite who has no such ability is the pitiful one.

Yasu is making a storm about silly things. Maria was trying to go on with her life. Yasu had hope about someone else coming and solving her problems. Maria had hope about being strong and live her life happily, regardless of not being able to change her mother's violence.
A nine year old tried with all her might to live, and find love for her acknowledging herself if no one was going to love her.
A nineteen year old tried to find someone who would take her away and love her. She dreamed about being acknowledged... when people like George and Jessica acknowledged her already.

I can't help but respect and later feel pity about Maria's start in the black world of witches. I can't help but facepalm when talking about Yasu's overreactions.

musouka

2012-09-18, 15:40

We didn't see it. Is it possible his claims are independently verifiable? Maybe. But the baby and its mother didn't even officially exist. Exactly how much confirmation is she going to get from non-biased sources?

For all you know, Genji had a DNA test done. Unlikely? Perhaps. But you constantly reiterate that there's No. Possible. Way. that Yasu could have had reason to believe Genji's claims, and then use that as a strike against her as a character, when, in reality, you have no idea what Genji actually told her or showed her.

We do know is that Yasu took the news about her body seriously; whatever is wrong would be visible to someone who attempted to have sexual intercourse with her; and that Yasu has no breasts to speak of, to the point where if discovered it would have nipped her plans in the bud. If you want to play dumb and pretend that 2+2=6, then that's your prerogative.

Either way, blaming a young teenager for daring to trust what a (supposedly) trustworthy adult tells her is pretty messed up, especially when the issues she faced have driven grown men and women to suicide.

Renall

2012-09-18, 15:46

Most people aren't driven to take a dozen people or more with them.

Granted, I still don't believe she actually did it.

musouka

2012-09-18, 15:58

Most people aren't driven to take a dozen people or more with them.

Most severely depressed and mentally unstable people don't have the detonation switch to a bomb, or have been told that said bomb was the key to "miraculous" success in what you wanted to accomplish.

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-18, 16:05

Who's in the right? Don't tell me miss 'Bribing and trying to sway the siblings into going along with a murder game' is not fucked up. I say I agree with her in the 'pitying a person doesn't mean I can forgive them for mass murdering my precious family, friends', and more like that 'Yasu's portrayal is so flimsy that forgiving her is just a moronic thing to do for Battler'.

And allow me to say that calling 'Battler a moron for forgiving Yasu' is more fucked up than everything. I'm not trying to pass Yasu off as a saint, because I am perfectly aware of all the sins (I also don't think she really committed, but let's stick to PieceYasu for argument's sake) she committed.

Wasn't that her furniture following her game of north wind and sun? Just look how everybody called her out, Virgilia, the one who helped her to cook the scheme, or Ronove, who's just one person and doesn't really care about the humans.

You're not following what I mean by reffering to EP3. I was talking more about Battler slapping the shit out of Beatrice and doing exactly what you said 'call her on her selfishness'. Yeah, part of her strategy, but Battler calls her on it for real, and Beatrice is hurt by that for real.

And people who forgive those who crucified them are called saints. A normal human would break hard under torture. Yeah, all humans have the ability to become saints and forgive. But rarely they go with that path. Normally they search a lawyer and try to give the bastard a shot. Or at least a life sentence.

Battler doesn't have to be a saint to forgive Beatrice, and I see how reffering to religion as an example was a bad idea, I just thought this was the best and most moving act of forgiveness there was to reffer to. Battler isn't a saint, but he isn't a moron either. Would it make for a better story if Battler took Beatrice to the Eisnere Jungfraw lawyers and had them confiscate every penny she owns in compensation through legal means? I don't think it would.

And at any rate, I'm not sure if it is even possible to make excuses for Yasu's actions. While I do understand the motive that's used to back it up, understanding is totally different from forgiving or even justifying. However, just because there is no excuse, it doesn't mean Battler, the person who is the target of her revenge (and everyone else, taking how they act in EP8) shouldn't forgive her. How can you call them stupid for that?

Hm... that's a little strong, but I believe a hundred and more years of repeatedly being murdered and watch your family get murdered goes into insane shit that can't be really compared to anything that happens in life.

To that, I will agree. That is why I think Yasu's motive shouldn't be perceived along the lines of reality. Despite that, as far as Umineko's context is concerned, I find Yasu a very 'human' character.

Yasu is making a storm about silly things. Maria was trying to go on with her life. Yasu had hope about someone else coming and solving her problems. Maria had hope about being strong and live her life happily, regardless of not being able to change her mother's violence.

But Maria did change her mother's violence. She changed it whenever she blamed it on the bad witch, or whenever she excused her mother for neglecting her. Maria isn't really going on with her life. She 'tweaks' the sad reality into a happy one, which is kinda the opposite. Having said that, I still don't find her pitiful or stupid for that.

A nineteen year old tried to find someone who would take her away and love her. She dreamed about being acknowledged... when people like George and Jessica acknowledged her already.

Except what they acknowledge is nothing more than a facade Yasu puts up in order to hide her real self because she herself cannot find acceptance for it. Yasu isn't sure if they would do the same with her real self, and that's her real issue here. The fact that she is incapable of accepting herself is what renders her unable to be accepted by anyone else.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-18, 16:11

You honestly think that if there is something seriously wrong with your body--like castration--it's "impossible" to verify?

Castration? Is that the reason Yasu snapped according to you? She was unable to love Battler because she didn't have balls? Was she seriously thinking that?

Of course there's quite a possibility that it's actually so, but that's absolutely retarded. I can't really sympathize with someone that makes a tragedy out of something that is completely unrelated to her real plight.

If he's a male, as you suggest, her incident has absolutely nothing to do with her inability to give heirs to George or to love Battler. Even if she was perfectly normal it wouldn't have changed a damn thing.

...What makes you think Yasu was the culprit?

Apart the overwhelming evidence? The only way to claim that Yasu isn't the culprit is by drawing as a lie half of chiru, our confession and several parts of Ryuukishi's interviews. Sorry but I pass on that.

Naturally we're talking about the gameboards. Prime is another matter.
But really in my opinion Umineko wouldn't even make sense if Yasu wasn't the culprit of the games. The games in that case would be just pointless mysteries with absolutely no relation to what Umineko is actually about: Yasu's love and madness.
So let's even say that we are supposed to understand that the culprit is George or Rosa or Rudolf, but for what end? Who cares if Yasu wrote mysteries with random people as murders?

Regarding Shion, Ryuukishi certainly said that readers are free to sympathize or not with her, but frankly I think that was just because he didn't want to say that we are supposed to sympathize with a murderer. But as for himself I have little doubts that he sympathizes with her and that he wishes for people to do the same. The efforts he made in that direction are almost tangible.

musouka

2012-09-18, 16:15

Castration? Is that the reason Yasu snapped according to you? She was unable to love Battler because she didn't have balls? Was she seriously thinking that?

Of course there's quite a possibility that it's actually so, but that's absolutely retarded. I can't really sympathize with someone that makes a tragedy out of something that is completely unrelated to her plight.

If you can't understand why someone would be horrified and upset upon gaining proof that they have been raised a different gender from their birth, and what that would do to their romantic prospects--especially considering how men tend to react to trans* individuals--then I can only assume you live in a different world from the rest of us. Must be nice.

Of course, you're making the mistake everyone does, assuming that Yasu's goal RE: Battler was romantic in nature.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-18, 16:28

If you can't understand why someone would be horrified and upset upon gaining proof that they have been raised a different gender from their birth, and what that would do to their romantic prospects--especially considering how men tend to react to trans* individuals--then I can only assume you live in a different world from the rest of us. Must be nice.

Gaining proof? She must have realized that by himself at one point long time before 1986 unless he was completely retarded.

But that has absolutely nothing to do with her decision. People don't decide to kill an entire family because of that, and Yasu, as crazy as he was, didn't either.

You're point is moot anyway. I'm talking about overreactions here. Unless you can argue that it is understandable for a transexual to become a psycopath, Yasu is still a very unsympathetic person.

I know about three different cases of children that lost their penis and were raised as girls. Two of these cases adapted to their reassigned sex without problems, the remaining didn't and he had psychological problems throughout his life. In the end he killed himself, but he didn't drag anyone with himself.

But Yasu's cases is different from that one, because Yasu has clearly a female personality, meaning that he adapted. He doesn't have any excuse.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-18, 16:31

And allow me to say that calling 'Battler a moron for forgiving Yasu' is more fucked up than everything. I'm not trying to pass Yasu off as a saint, because I am perfectly aware of all the sins (I also don't think she really committed, but let's stick to PieceYasu for argument's sake) she committed.

Boyfriend forgot his promise to bring a white horse and take me away? -> Let's murder his family and make him watch.

Girl who I don't even remember murdered my family and made me watch? -> Let's marry her.

Conclusion1: Are you fucking kidding me, Ryuukishi?

Conclusion2: I don't even know who deserves more to be called a moron.

Sick things are sick. No matter what side you take, you're gonna be siding with some fucked up individual.

You're not following what I mean by reffering to EP3. I was talking more about Battler slapping the shit out of Beatrice and doing exactly what you said 'call her on her selfishness'. Yeah, part of her strategy, but Battler calls her on it for real, and Beatrice is hurt by that for real.

And she was so surprised and depressed by someone telling her off that she got into a freaking coma. Why? oh, why am I hated? In what did I got it wrong? O-Oooh. So killing his family wasn't a good thing to do. Who would've thought that?

My reaction: refer to conclusion 1.

Battler doesn't have to be a saint to forgive Beatrice, and I see how reffering to religion as an example was a bad idea, I just thought this was the best and most moving act of forgiveness there was to reffer to. Battler isn't a saint, but he isn't a moron either. Would it make for a better story if Battler took Beatrice to the Eisnere Jungfraw lawyers and had them confiscate every penny she owns in compensation through legal means? I don't think it would.

Some guy you don't know goes and blows you home with all your family and familiars inside. The incident causes you to lose it, amnesia, attacks, despair and ending in a wheelchair. Yoir little sister grows as damaged as they get and then returns to the gameboard. And then she's also killed.

You have to be Jesus, capitain. You have to be Jesus to forgive that. I can barely forgive the guy that ran over my aunt and made her almost lose her life because he was drunk. I'd go all Sasuke on the responsible's ass if something as strong as Rokkenjima's big bang happened. Then again, I don't consider myself the best human in the street.

And at any rate, I'm not sure if it is even possible to make excuses for Yasu's actions. While I do understand the motive that's used to back it up, understanding is totally different from forgiving or even justifying. However, just because there is no excuse, it doesn't mean Battler, the person who is the target of her revenge (and everyone else, taking how they act in EP8) shouldn't forgive her. How can you call them stupid for that?

She goes so sad she vaporizes into gold dust. I could FORGIVE her. I could nor MARRY HER!

To that, I will agree. That is why I think Yasu's motive shouldn't be perceived along the lines of reality. Despite that, as far as Umineko's context is concerned, I find Yasu a very 'human' character.

But Yasu's motive is talked about as the thing that started everything. Is the core of Umineko, the culprit of Ryuukishi hammering into my head 'search for the heart' so much I started to joke Eva-Beatrice was the first to find it in EP3.
I can be dissapointed by a lot of things and let them pass, but the motive of mass murder has to be a pretty damn good one.

But Maria did change her mother's violence. She changed it whenever she blamed it on the bad witch, or whenever she excused her mother for neglecting her. Maria isn't really going on with her life. She 'tweaks' the sad reality into a happy one, which is kinda the opposite. Having said that, I still don't find her pitiful or stupid for that.

No matter how she embelished the reality, she could not make Rosa stop. She would get hit, even if she justified. Maria is going on with her life tweaking the horrible parts. If she didn't do that, she'd get stuck like Ange. Ange was stuck in the past because she couldn't go on, she had to learn to let things go, and if things were so horrible, tweak them into something bereable like 'There were no murders. Onii-chan is going to return one day'.

Except what they acknowledge is nothing more than a facade Yasu puts up in order to hide her real self because she herself cannot find acceptance for it. Yasu isn't sure if they would do the same with her real self, and that's her real issue here. The fact that she is incapable of accepting herself is what renders her unable to be accepted by anyone else.

She is incapable of accepting herself. So she is accepted by George. She has his full devotion, and he's ready to hang himself for her if she asks him. Jessica is trying hard to understand her. She has an unbeliebable amount of acknowledging, much more than Maria, Rosa, Natsuhi or Eva.

musouka

2012-09-18, 16:35

Gaining proof? She must have realized that by himself at one point long time before 1986 unless he was completely retarded.

Yasu probably suspected there was something wrong with her body, but that's a far cry from "we castrated you and isolated you from living with your peers to hide it after you fell off a cliff because we were afraid your dad might rape you just like he raped your mom. BUT LOOK AT ALL THE SHINY GOLD YOU HAVE!"

You're point is moot anyway. I'm talking about overreactions here. Unless you can argue that it is understandable for a transexual to become a psycopath, Yasu is still a very unsympathetic person.

I think it's understandable for anyone to go crazy after being faced with that level of lying and manipulation from people she had previously trusted. But make no mistake, Yasu is screaming in agony over them allowing her to live when her body is "like this" in the red guts scene. That should probably be a pretty big hint as to how she felt about it.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-18, 16:44

Yasu probably suspected there was something wrong with her body, but that's a far cry from "we castrated you and isolated you from living with your peers to hide it after you fell off a cliff because we were afraid your dad might rape you just like he raped your mom. BUT LOOK AT ALL THE SHINY GOLD YOU HAVE!"

Nobody castrated Yasu, Nanjo saved that child's life. And Yasu blamed him for doing what his oath required him to do.

I think it's understandable for anyone to go crazy after being faced with that level of lying and manipulation from people she had previously trusted. But make no mistake, Yasu is screaming in agony over them allowing her to live when her body is "like this" in the red guts scene. That should probably be a pretty big hint as to how she felt about it.

My point is that she overreacted, not that she didn't feel bad.

And anyway this still has nothing to do with Yasu becoming a murderer.

musouka

2012-09-18, 17:04

Nobody castrated Yasu, Nanjo saved that child's life. And Yasu blamed him for doing what his oath required him to do.

Yes, such a pity the Hippocratic Oath requires medical practitioners to avoid telling a person the truth about their body and family situation for nearly two decades. Oh, wait...

My point is that she overreacted, not that she didn't feel bad.

How dare she make those people feel bad for lying to her for her entire life!

And anyway this still has nothing to do with Yasu becoming a murderer.

The reason for Yasu's mindset that allowed her to write elaborate murder mysteries and flip the trigger on a bomb that eventually blew up the island has nothing to do with her...motivation for writing elaborate murder mysteries and flipping the switch to the bomb that would eventually blow up the island? If you say so.

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-18, 17:08

Boyfriend forgot his promise to bring a white horse and take me away? -> Let's murder his family and make him watch.

Girl who I don't even remember murdered my family and made me watch? -> Let's marry her.

Anything would sound stupid if you summarized it in one sentence. Especially Umineko. 'Boyfriend forgot his pony' doesn't even start to explain Yasu's motive.

Some guy you don't know goes and blows you home with all your family and familiars inside. The incident causes you to lose it, amnesia, attacks, despair and ending in a wheelchair. Yoir little sister grows as damaged as they get and then returns to the gameboard. And then she's also killed.

You have to be Jesus, capitain. You have to be Jesus to forgive that. I can barely forgive the guy that ran over my aunt and made her almost lose her life because he was drunk. I'd go all Sasuke on the responsible's ass if something as strong as Rokkenjima's big bang happened. Then again, I don't consider myself the best human in the street.

I don't disagree with you, nor am I saying I would forgive any of it so easily. However, that is not a valid reason to argue against the fact that I would admire the shit out of the person who would do so instead of calling them stupid. Forgiving people who wronged you is stupid instead of noble? I thing that assesment is the most fucked up thing here.

But Yasu's motive is talked about as the thing that started everything. Is the core of Umineko, the culprit of Ryuukishi hammering into my head 'search for the heart' so much I started to joke Eva-Beatrice was the first to find it in EP3.
I can be dissapointed by a lot of things and let them pass, but the motive of mass murder has to be a pretty damn good one.

There really is no excuse for mass murder. None. Nothing justifies taking the life of another human being. I'm willing to be a bit more lenient since this is fiction we're talking about, meaning some of the things discussed in Umineko do not reflect real life.

The motive for mass-murder is not the excuse for mass-murder. Heck, Sweeney Todd is one of the saddest fictional-people, I say, serves those bastards right to be turned into pies, but I still think he saw what he had coming. The motive for a crime can let you have insight on where another human being went wrong. And I think no matter what the crime, everyone should have the right to be forgiven.

If you are not willing to accept the author's choice of motive here, that's your opinion, and clearly I can't disagree with you there, even if my opinion's the total opposite. Neither can I say anything to you when you think it can't 'justify' murder, because even I who does accept it find it stretched. However, disagreeing with it because it cannot 'excuse' murder is where I draw the line. Murder can be justified but not excused.

She is incapable of accepting herself. So she is accepted by George. She has his full devotion, and he's ready to hang himself for her if she asks him. Jessica is trying hard to understand her. She has an unbeliebable amount of acknowledging, much more than Maria, Rosa, Natsuhi or Eva.

You don't get what I'm saying. George and Jessica do accept her personas. Yasu doesn't let them know her real self because she's afraid they will not accept it. She hides behind the veil of her own facades. The fact that George accepts Shannon does not mean he will accept Yasuda. It is not hear real self that is being accepted here. Frankly, it's mostly her own fault (maybe we can also attribute some of it to the experiences that led her to think this way, but mostly, it's her own issue). However, in all fairness, she at least has a reason to feel insecure, because she cannot give George the future he dreams of.

Renall

2012-09-18, 17:23

I think it's understandable for anyone to go crazy after being faced with that level of lying and manipulation from people she had previously trusted.
"Murder a bunch of people who had nothing to do with it" crazy, though? I do not buy that for a second.

To believe a person irrational enough to kill themselves is one thing. To believe them both irrational and hopelessly callous to people who have never wronged them is another matter entirely and I sincerely believe that someone who is characterized the way she is characterized would stop herself from such madness, even if resolved to commit suicide.

Remember, even if we assume all the adults have somehow done her wrong, and all the servants, and Battler (which is stupid, but I'm accepting your premise on its face here), as far as I can tell Maria/Jessica/George never have. And probably Hideyoshi.

I can somewhat accept "these people have wronged me or wronged my family or lied to me, I don't care what happens to them." But there are people there she cares about and who have done their damndest not to hurt her, at least so far as we (and she) seem to know or care about. To cross the line further and say "I don't care what happens to them either" is the act not of a person in despair, but of an utter monster.

And she is not characterized as a monster, nor does anyone accept it when she portrays herself that way. Which leads me to believe that, when worse came to worse, I don't think she could bring herself to harm those people. Apparently, she couldn't bring herself to harm Battler... or else Battler just coincidentally happened to get away, but that doesn't seem like it'd be a satisfying resolution at all. Plus Eva. There shouldn't have been any survivors if her execution were as professional as Beatrice's.

I think she's just not capable of doing that outside of the stories. She has trouble doing it within them.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-18, 17:35

Anything would sound stupid if you summarized it in one sentence. Especially Umineko. 'Boyfriend forgot his pony' doesn't even start to explain Yasu's motive.

The specific reason the massacre was ignited was for Battler's return. What did the poor sod do to get what he got, again? Giving her a childish promise of being his boybriend six years ago, promise that everyone (the maids, Jessica) stated (indirectly) was stupid to believe.

The logical retribution, of course, was to blow everyone in his face...

I don't disagree with you, nor am I saying I would forgive any of it so easily. However, that is not a valid reason to argue against the fact that I would admire the shit out of the person who would do so instead of calling them stupid. Forgiving people who wronged you is stupid instead of noble? I thing that assesment is the most fucked up thing here.

I'm not saying he doesn't have guts and heart for doing such a thing. I'm saying that everyone forgives her and live happily ever after. Even Eva. Natsuhi. Krauss. Rudolf. Kyrie... c'mon. Nobody here a little resenful of being massacred? Hm... Eva is a bad person like me, and she has some beef against the maid anyway. You sure that poor woman whose life went to hell forgave Yasu? Apparently yes: in later episodes we see Eva perfecly allright asking forgiveness for being a bad PTSD, grieving aunt to Ange. Not even a 'You killed my family!'. What does Battler and Beatrice think the world is?!

There really is no excuse for mass murder. None. Nothing justifies taking the life of another human being. I'm willing to be a bit more lenient since this is fiction we're talking about, meaning some of the things discussed in Umineko do not reflect real life.

The motive for mass-murder is not the excuse for mass-murder. Heck, Sweeney Todd is one of the saddest fictional-people, I say, serves those bastards right to be turned into pies, but I still think he saw what he had coming. The motive for a crime can let you have insight on where another human being went wrong. And I think no matter what the crime, everyone should have the right to be forgiven.

If you are not willing to accept the author's choice of motive here, that's your opinion, and clearly I can't disagree with you there, even if my opinion's the total opposite. Neither can I say anything to you when you think it can't 'justify' murder, because even I who does accept it find it stretched. However, disagreeing with it because it cannot 'excuse' murder is where I draw the line. Murder can be justified but not excused.

I mean a motive that makes me at least feel like you felt with Sweeney. Or Shion. She ended as a spot in the paviment. I didn't even think it was unfair after everything she did. But I could understand where she was coming from, and her motive for going mass murderer was covered for every aspect so throughly I believed it and felt a logic and convincing plot there.

Mass murder Is not excusable. But Yasu's motive is so weird and shady it's like she wanted to blow something and things went bad from there. So.. like an excuse. "Not my fault even if i say it was... forgive me for starting this madness?"

You don't get what I'm saying. George and Jessica do accept her personas. Yasu doesn't let them know her real self because she's afraid they will not accept it. She hides behind the veil of her own facades. The fact that George accepts Shannon does not mean he will accept Yasuda. It is not hear real self that is being accepted here. Frankly, it's mostly her own fault (maybe we can also attribute some of it to the experiences that led her to think this way, but mostly, it's her own issue). However, in all fairness, she at least has a reason to feel insecure, because she cannot give George the future he dreams of.

"If Yasu showed George the truth, she would be surprised at his response" thats word of god. But she didn't. Instead of taking the options she had (confess, retire, convince, take a leap of faith or stay with Jessica as she anyway wanted) she took... mass murder.

I've felt insecure, I'm sure you too, and all the others in this discussion. For the ones who have already *ahem* went at it with their lovers: Oi! You there felt insecure when showing yourself for the first time to that special person? Did you had second thoughts? Maybe... don't know... like your only option was to blow away an island with 16 guys in it yourself included?
I say nay...

But going serious: you don't think about killing a lot of people because you are afraid your boyfriend is not going to like your body. And if you do, go to the nearest mental hospital and do us a favor locking yourself up before something happens.

jjblue1

2012-09-18, 19:04

But Gameboard Yasu does not exist, We have no idea what she thinks ,what she wants . We only get glimpse of her thoughts in Ep7 and the last two years were skiped Because Will or Clair, I dont remember which said it that the last two years are not needed...So I understand you guys and I agree that we don't know anything about her.

Actually the one about which we don't know things is PrimeYasu. The best we know about PrimeYasu is that she might have been the author of Ep 1 & 2, of which we aren't sure as we've no proofs Ep 2 is the second tale in the bottle nor we know if the two tales were told faithfully as they could be read in the messages or were embellished.

The one we 'deal with' is PieceYasu who commits the murders on the gameboard and whose story is told in Ep 7. PrimeYasu's real story might have had some common elements but we really don't know if it's the same. PieceYasu surely decided to commit murders and then kill herself and destroy the island. Can we say the same for PrimeYasu? We don't know. She might have, she might have not.

We don't even know if PrimeYasu was really Kanon & Shannon or the idea to represent herself as two servants was merely metaphorical, we don't know if PrimeYasu played Kanon's role at Jessica's school with Jessica knowing it was Yasu/Shannon in truth, we don't know if George really planned to ask Shannon to marry him or it was just an one sided thing from Yasu/Shannon, just to name a couple of things that are rather important for Yasu.

Note also that PieceShannon and PieceKanon are strongly in love with George and Jessica and willing to off each other to fulfil their wish. Can the same be said for their Prime versions or they're just a metaphor of a wish of being a certain type of person?

If we assume that PrimeYasu never meant to kill anyone, her intention contrasting sharply with PieceYasu who meant to make a mass murder we've to assume what we learnt on the gameboard about PieceYasu didn't necessary apply to PrimeYasu. Otherwise, if they're the same, they shared the same murdering intention.

Why are you assuming that Yasu is unable to confirm what Genji tells her. You honestly think that if there is something seriously wrong with your body--like castration--it's "impossible" to verify? You have absolutely no proof that Genji wasn't able to substantiate his story, so judging Yasu on those grounds is pretty hilarious.

Well, Umineko is pretty vague in how and when Yasu learnt about her body mutilation.

If in all those years didn't realize it either she's very ignorant on anatomy or it's something that can't be seen first glance (if she had a uterus and it was removed/damaged, well at best you'll notice a scar that you won't necessarily connect to a missing/damaged uterus).

If she could already realize herself what had happened to her, Genji told her nothing new... but somehow Umineko seems to imply she discovered it only right then and not before as apparently it's in that moment she start to consider herself as furniture.

Anyway, Genji apparently told her something she hadn't realized herself. So to confirm it either she can start studying anatomy or needs to go to a doctor to check.

Now, apparently her problem is a delicate issue so she might not be so willing to go have it checked by a doctor especially since likely she was told there was no way to fix it.

Genji making up such a story for some unknown reason seems hard to picture so really, the only reason I can see for Yasu to check Genji's words is because she's either lacking faith in him or she's delusional. In either way it requires a certain amount of guts to face her problems which I can't see Yasu having.

So I don't think it's likely Yasu would check Genji's story about her injury.
What Genji might have lied about though, willing or by mistake, is about Natsuhi causing her to fall from a cliff. Yasu evidently found out and believed Natsuhi did it on purpose. Genji wasn't there to check if Natsuhi did it on purpose and not even Natsuhi is that reliable as she was in a peculiar state of mind.

This is something Yasu can't know for sure as well as she can't know for sure she's really Kinzo's daughter without a DNA test.

Genji might have told her that story just because he wanted to make Kinzo happy before he were to die.

Through all this is apparently unimportant as, according to Yasu, that's not why she's doing things. So either she's lying or her injury, her fall and her birth aren't as important as Battler breaking is promise is.

I like to think they are but that's not what Beatrice insist is her motive. Her motive is Battler forgetting his promise... though if Battler had remembered it she wouldn't have turned into Lion. She would have still been an incest baby, tossed off a cliff by Natsuhi and mutilated.

But hey, at 13 she would have been living on her own in a big city, working and studying and maybe seeing Battler at school and when she was off duty and maybe Battler might have decided to date her... or he might have dumped her as his promised required only to go get Yasu, not to devote his life to her. But hey, the fact he would have kept it would have really changed things for Yasu.
Now, instead than 10 tons of gold and a bomb to blast everyone she should have used something else to off 18 people once she were to realize her life wasn't a bowl of cherries.

I'm being sarcastic so it sounds mean but really, Yasu's motive should have been explained better otherwise what's said isn't enough to justify her actions.

Who apologized to Yasu? Kinzo was crazy and was apologizing to Beatrice. Genji and Co seem to think the scene where Yasu is paraded up the stairs and forced to act the part of "Beatrice" as her coming into her "heritage", something to be lauded, not horrified over.

Let's recap everything. Genji though Yasu was unsafe at the Ushiromiya house so he hid her in an orphanage. Doing so he realized he took from her her family and thought this wasn't good too.

He seems to believe that the parade fixed everything as it gave back to Yasu her birthrights and her family. Even if Kinzo apologized to Beato he implied now he knew the difference between Beato and Yasu so the dressing up (which might also be merely an embellishment so we don't really know if it happened) might have been merely to underline the resemblance between Beato and Yasu.

In Japanese stories where a kid goes lost and then it's found she's often dressed like the mother (or has to do something the mother did) so that she can be compared to her and recognized.

I guess you missed all the scenes in EP7 where Yasu specifically points out that no one is to blame for her situation, even Battler. Her method of coping is actually trying to think about others and how she can't "blame" them for her own pain, until it finally gets to be too much for her and she snaps. Even if the people around her "love" Yasu. Even if all the pain they put her through is unthinking and accidental... That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt.

I think it's more correct to say that a side of Yasu knew it wasn't Battler's fault while another found more easier to blame him.
We've too many bits in which it's said it's all Battler's fault to think Yasu completely forgave him.
Blaming Battler is also a convenient copying mechanism.
Thinking that if Battler had done something different her life could have been better gives her hope somewhere a better universe exist for her.

Bern 'set her straight' though telling her that in all the universes in which she was Yasu tragedy strike and the same would happen even in the universes in which she was Lion and she wasn't burdened by Battler's promise.

To be honest I think Bern sort of cheated as she basically implied that, in order to end up in the cat box, all the other universes had to end into tragedy so there's no way for a happy ending but, at the same time she did something interesting. She asked Lion to think at how the others were feelings.

She does all of it in a rather cruel way yet she forces Lion to face something Lion refused to look at.

Yasu is making a storm about silly things. Maria was trying to go on with her life. Yasu had hope about someone else coming and solving her problems. Maria had hope about being strong and live her life happily, regardless of not being able to change her mother's violence.
A nine year old tried with all her might to live, and find love for her acknowledging herself if no one was going to love her.
A nineteen year old tried to find someone who would take her away and love her. She dreamed about being acknowledged... when people like George and Jessica acknowledged her already.

I can't help but respect and later feel pity about Maria's start in the black world of witches. I can't help but facepalm when talking about Yasu's overreactions.

I agree. In Tsubasa there's a really interesting part in which Maria decides she'll try to make breakfast for her mother so that the day will start well and their relation will grow stronger. In short she takes an active stance instead than just waiting for Rosa to magically understand it.

Even when she 'uses magic' Maria tries to do it in a way that is active. She thinks that sound she makes should make things better between her and her mother because once it worked. Probably she kept trying to make it because Rosa gives mixed responses (when Rosa feels guilty because she had just hit Maria she doesn't complain anymore if she does it and gets nicer with Maria) so Maria might even think that the times Rosa complain is because she's not saying it properly.

Still, she's doing more than just waiting.

And allow me to say that calling 'Battler a moron for forgiving Yasu' is more fucked up than everything. I'm not trying to pass Yasu off as a saint, because I am perfectly aware of all the sins (I also don't think she really committed, but let's stick to PieceYasu for argument's sake) she committed.

Well, more than Battler being a moron for forgiving her is: all of sudden the game present Yasu/Beato as someone who's not at fault for what she did. Actually it's Battler who caused all of this so he's the one to blame and that has to apologize.

Of course the game might have been trying to draw a line between PieceBeato and MetaBeato.
After all it's MetaBattler who forgives MetaBeato. MetaBeato isn't killing real people as the pieces aren't real in her world so effectively it can be the only thing she's doing wrong is not explaining this clearly to Battler who seems to think each time a piece die it's a person that's killed.

However the whole message is so blurry that this interpretation isn't immediate or the only one possible.

But Maria did change her mother's violence. She changed it whenever she blamed it on the bad witch, or whenever she excused her mother for neglecting her. Maria isn't really going on with her life. She 'tweaks' the sad reality into a happy one, which is kinda the opposite. Having said that, I still don't find her pitiful or stupid for that.

Undoubtely there are things that Maria is doing wrong. It's also clearly implied Maria is a girl with issues that's living a situation of abuse and neglectment that's bigger than her. her copying mechanisms aren't really perfect but I like to think that more than tweaking reality she's trying to have an optimist or Pollyanna-like approach to life most of the time.
Mama got angry and said mean things? Surely she didn't meant that it was just stress. And it can be it was just stress.
Rosa was a bad mother but this didn't necessary mean she hated Maria, just that she failed at being a mother because she chosed using a behaviour that had been used by her relatives on her.

In many cases the truth is in between. Rosa is stressed and exhasperated and doing the wrong thing. It doesn't mean there's no love at all, just that there isn't enough to help Rosa doing the right one all the time.
Rosa is, after all, weak and unstable.
Maria couldn't understand all that, she could only see that some days her mom would love her deraly and some others... she wouldn't and would try to interpret this 2 contrasting truths her own way.

Yet she always try to get along. And I think that's worth something.[/quote]

Except what they acknowledge is nothing more than a facade Yasu puts up in order to hide her real self because she herself cannot find acceptance for it. Yasu isn't sure if they would do the same with her real self, and that's her real issue here. The fact that she is incapable of accepting herself is what renders her unable to be accepted by anyone else.

Rather true but again the blame switch on Yasu here. She dreams of being aknowledged for herself but hides herself so that the ones who'd like to get close to her... well, can't. Figuring out her true nature also means to understand she's lying and lacking in trust toward her.
In the end George is very open to her confessing her his worst sides but she can't find herself willing to do the same.
Jessica and Battler too always seem to be rather straightforward and honest and Battler seems to have quite a bunch of troubles in doubting others. So in a fashion Yasu has around himself people who're willing to trust her but whom she's unable to trust in.

Yes, she has issues so it's understable she has troubles but the point is she's the one trapping herself in this vicious circle.

tempteste

2012-09-18, 19:26

(if she had a uterus and it was removed/damaged, well at best you'll notice a scar that you won't necessarily connect to a missing/damaged uterus)

Can I ask how exactly she could damage uterus? Because I don't really get it...

jjblue1

2012-09-18, 20:13

Can I ask how exactly she could damage uterus? Because I don't really get it...

She was a baby who fell from a cliff. Part of her body could have been crushed or either even stabbed by something sharp over which it fell damaging her internal organs.
In a list of traumas you can have due to incident are included the crushing of a uteus which will also cause internal bloodloss of the organ so it's possible that was the damage Yasu received.

Genji said he didn't think she would survive when he rushed her to Nanjo so I think whatever she suffered was serious and Yasu was very lucky to survive to it.

Anyway Ryukishi believed it shouldn't have been possible to determinate which sex Yasu was just by reading what happened to him/her so it has to be possible for Yasu to be hurt in a way that would make his/her body unable to be loved regardless from his/her gender.

If this wasn't true, just by knowing Yasu was hurt in such way we would know which gender Yasu is/was and this would destroy the catbox about Yasu's sex.

As Ryukishi wanted to preserve the catbox just saying Yasu received an injury that turned his/her body unable to be loved shouldn't help us to guess which sex Yasu is.

GoldenLand

2012-09-19, 01:22

Some guy you don't know goes and blows you home with all your family and familiars inside. The incident causes you to lose it, amnesia, attacks, despair and ending in a wheelchair. Yoir little sister grows as damaged as they get and then returns to the gameboard. And then she's also killed.

You have to be Jesus, capitain. You have to be Jesus to forgive that.

...

She goes so sad she vaporizes into gold dust. I could FORGIVE her. I could nor MARRY HER!

I have the feeling you're confusing the meta-layer/Rokkenjima Prime with the gameboards here. It looks as if you're talking partially about Tohya. If meta-Battler in the games is representing the part of Tohya that's Battler, then to him, if he realises that Beatrice is the culprit on the gameboard but might not be the culprit in Rokkenjima Prime, then maybe he has reason to forgive her. If Beatrice is painting herself as the culprit in the stories to cover for someone, then he could feel bad about thinking it was her. (Particularly if Battler is the real culprit or an accomplice! :p)

The impression I got isn't that Battler forgave Beatrice, but that he realised that she wasn't to blame in the first place and that he even wanted her forgiveness. Now, if what he realised was "If only I hadn't forgotten my promise, Beatrice wouldn't have killed my family! It's all my fault!" then OK, things are messed up there. But it doesn't make sense for him to think that, in my opinion. Jesus or not, it isn't a logical train of thought for him to follow. Meta-Battler didn't get presented as a person who would simply forgive mass murder in real life. But he did grow into someone who wasn't always horrified by "fictional" murder on the gameboards - like in the love duel, where he was hardly yelling at Jessica/George/Shannon/Kanon/Beatrice for the murders they committed during that.

LyricalAura

2012-09-19, 02:16

. But he did grow into someone who wasn't always horrified by "fictional" murder on the gameboards - like in the love duel, where he was hardly yelling at Jessica/George/Shannon/Kanon/Beatrice for the murders they committed during that.

I found that sequence really interesting because even Jessica and George ended up approaching it as fiction. It's the first time that the story openly raises the idea of taking mundane conflicts and highlighting them on a gameboard by amplifying them to the level of "motives for murder".

We don't point at those scenes and claim that Meta or Piece Jessica is a horrible, irredeemable monster because she'd boil Kyrie in lava for the sake of her crush in that situation. It's understood that the "motive" was a caricature for the reader's benefit and that we shouldn't approach Piece Jessica as having the same level of realism as a real-world murderer. Although the murder in question took place in a fantasy scene, Battler went to the trouble of putting that element in a game about Beatrice's origins, and even included a fantasy-meta level to talk about it in, so I think it would do a lot of good to consider why he did that.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-19, 02:48

Yes, such a pity the Hippocratic Oath requires medical practitioners to avoid telling a person the truth about their body and family situation for nearly two decades. Oh, wait...

How dare she make those people feel bad for lying to her for her entire life!

Wow! She really is in a position to blame others for lying! Like she never tricked anyone in her whole life! Right, she was the image of honesty really.

At least Nanjo and Genji had good reasons. Maybe they were misguided, but they didn't do that just to have fun.
You might as well blame adoptive parents for not telling their children the truth right away.

And anyway is that what Yasu's drama is about? She's been "lied" to?

The reason for Yasu's mindset that allowed her to write elaborate murder mysteries and flip the trigger on a bomb that eventually blew up the island has nothing to do with her...motivation for writing elaborate murder mysteries and flipping the switch to the bomb that would eventually blow up the island? If you say so.

Except I didn't say so.
If anything of what you mentioned was the cause for Yasu to blow up the island, she would have done it whether Battler returned or not, simply for the fact that George asked Shannon to marry him.

But the truth is that if Yasu had born female and never suffered any injuries, nothing would have changed at all. Battler would have still forgot about his promise, George would have still proposed to Shannon, and Yasu would have still snapped when Battler decided to come back 6 years later.

tempteste

2012-09-19, 07:14

But the truth is that if Yasu had born female and never suffered any injuries, nothing would have changed at all. Battler would have still forgot about his promise, George would have still proposed to Shannon, and Yasu would have still snapped when Battler decided to come back 6 years later.
If it would be this way in last two years Yasu wouldn't have felt like an inhuman garbage who deserves no future, whose only way to be free of such body is to die, which wouldn't led her to depression and constant fights within herself, joining the ones she already had, completing a list of her conflicting desires, which are one of the main reasons why the truth of umineko is left without confirmation. The catbox itself may have been her true intention as it fulfills all of her wishes that are impossible in the real world.
The ShKanon/furniture complex is a part of what Yasu wanted Battler to understand through her game. And it meant a lot to her.
Her hopeless and desperate mental condition + Battler brings us what we have. Erasing one of them will change the story.

Wanderer

2012-09-19, 08:50

Maybe Beatrice is different and RokkenPrime Yasu is a sweetie who didn't kill a fly. But the endless witch (the one she's treating in the Meta level - Bern's level of existence) acts like another Takano, gloating about being an all powerfull being, torturing a guy 'forever' because she had it rough...

Which makes Bern the biggest hypocrite in the world for the way she treats Ange and Erika. Meanwhile Beatrice's "torture" was just a front all along, anyway.

I guess you missed all the scenes in EP7 where Yasu specifically points out that no one is to blame for her situation, even Battler. Her method of coping is actually trying to think about others and how she can't "blame" them for her own pain, until it finally gets to be too much for her and she snaps. Even if the people around her "love" Yasu. Even if all the pain they put her through is unthinking and accidental... That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt.

It just doesn't matter how much pain she's in, it doesn't make sense to randomly kill everyone.

In the first place, it was not the revelation of Yasu's sexual problems, or the revelation that her most trusted guardians were lying to her her whole life or anything like that that actually triggered any actual intent to murder. The trigger was Battler's return.

So how could news of Battler's return cause Yasu to plan and carry out a mass murder?

In other words, it's not a matter of her "snapping" from pain. In fact, it's more like she "snapped" from hope. So what we have is a situation where Yasu's motive for killing over a dozen people is not vengeance, nor desire for destruction caused by a sense of powerlessness, nor some other motive that places intrinsic meaning in the act of taking the lives of the victims. No, the motive is to create a chance of Battler remembering her. In other words, these murders are no more than a means to an end. The victims are less than human. They're consumable tools. They're pieces.

This is not a satisfying motive for murder. It's a fantasy motive.

Yasu simply has no "mystery" motive. That's why I think Yasu is innocent in Prime.

Rather true but again the blame switch on Yasu here. She dreams of being aknowledged for herself but hides herself so that the ones who'd like to get close to her... well, can't. Figuring out her true nature also means to understand she's lying and lacking in trust toward her.
In the end George is very open to her confessing her his worst sides but she can't find herself willing to do the same.
Jessica and Battler too always seem to be rather straightforward and honest and Battler seems to have quite a bunch of troubles in doubting others. So in a fashion Yasu has around himself people who're willing to trust her but whom she's unable to trust in.

Yes, she has issues so it's understable she has troubles but the point is she's the one trapping herself in this vicious circle.

From Dlanor's Forward in Our Confessions (previously translated by LyricalTwilight):

Without love, it can't be seen.

They are her words.
But I shall repeat them.

Love exists in everyone's hearts.

Her true tragedy was that she couldn't see it.

Renall

2012-09-19, 09:08

We don't point at those scenes and claim that Meta or Piece Jessica is a horrible, irredeemable monster because she'd boil Kyrie in lava for the sake of her crush in that situation. It's understood that the "motive" was a caricature for the reader's benefit and that we shouldn't approach Piece Jessica as having the same level of realism as a real-world murderer. Although the murder in question took place in a fantasy scene, Battler went to the trouble of putting that element in a game about Beatrice's origins, and even included a fantasy-meta level to talk about it in, so I think it would do a lot of good to consider why he did that.
Jessica also expressed heavy reservations about ever doing such a thing multiple times in Dawn, and had to basically become possessed to even do it. That confuses the matter somewhat because Jessica and George sort of had different attitudes toward it. Although I doubt anyone really thought by that point that Jessica's character was one which would give her a motive of that sort, so I think most people agreed with your perception of why that scene was the way it was.

Although really that whole scene mostly just existed so Kyrie could plot dump.
If it would be this way in last two years Yasu wouldn't have felt like an inhuman garbage who deserves no future, whose only way to be free of such body is to die, which wouldn't led her to depression and constant fights within herself, joining the ones she already had, completing a list of her conflicting desires, which are one of the main reasons why the truth of umineko is left without confirmation. The catbox itself may have been her true intention as it fulfills all of her wishes that are impossible in the real world.
The ShKanon/furniture complex is a part of what Yasu wanted Battler to understand through her game. And it meant a lot to her.
Her hopeless and desperate mental condition + Battler brings us what we have. Erasing one of them will change the story.
You're missing his point. Her body image could just as easily be a mistake on her own part, based on misunderstandings or assumptions from things she has heard about. It's a bit like the whole "did Natsuhi do it on purpose or not?" question with respect to the baby story; even Natsuhi herself isn't totally sure, and she alternates between firm denial she did anything and guilt-riddled assumption that she must have. Natsuhi is the only person who could know, and she acted as if she wasn't really sure; consequently, whether you choose to believe she's right or wrong, you must make an assumption that you can't confirm.

The same is true for anything Yasu hears from Genji and Nanjo or from Kinzo or from anybody really. She doesn't know there was a baby. She doesn't know she was that baby. She doesn't know the baby was injured in some way and that her body image is the result of an actual injury. Feeling abnormal or uncomfortable with one's own body is not that uncommon in perfectly healthy people. Yasu had these feelings and made assumptions based on information.

The point is, she chose to believe this was true and behaved accordingly. Jan-Poo's point (I think) is that it doesn't make any difference whether she's right or wrong about it.

For example, let's say the baby really did exist, really did suffer a fall and an injury, really was operated on by Nanjo, and really was placed in the orphanage by Genji. And at some point Genji accidentally made a mistake and lost track of the baby, thinking entirely by error that some other baby was the one. That baby came to be raised as Yasu-Alternate, let's say, on the mistaken assumption it was Kinzo's secret child.

Yasu-Alternate grows up in the same situations and perhaps has the same feelings. Yasu-Alternate is also uncomfortable with him/herself for reasons he/she isn't sure of. Yasu-Alternate also has a relationship with Battler which is interrupted by Battler's departure. And Yasu-Alternate eventually finds out from Genji/Nanjo what happened to the baby. He/she believes them, because they're telling the truth about the incident, but all three just happen to be mistaken and think Yasu-Alternate was that baby.

Would Yasu-Alternate behave the same way as Yasu? I don't see why not. He/she believes the circumstances to be as presented, even though everyone involved in the situation is mistaken. By the same token, Yasu can't know she's the secret baby or that there even was a secret baby. She has to trust Genji, and apparently she is inclined to do so. In doing so, she believes it and acts as if it is true.

Because she acts as if it is true, it doesn't matter if it is or isn't actually true, because Yasu has no apparent way of knowing other than the ways she's got in front of her. So whether the situation is Baby Exists -> Yasu is Baby -> Body Image Caused by Injury or Baby Doesn't Exist -> Yasu isn't Baby -> Body Image Caused by Something Else, Yasu will behave identically by drawing a conclusion that fits the information she has.

Thus in Jan-Poo's theoretical account of a perfectly normal female Yasu who just mistakenly believes she's a mutilated male, silly as such a thing might obviously sound, her reaction ought to be no different. In other words, unless the scenario changes so drastically as to be entirely unrecognizable, the events of 1986 would play out basically the same whether or not the stories were true.
No, the motive is to create a chance of Battler remembering her. In other words, these murders are no more than a means to an end. The victims are less than human. They're consumable tools. They're pieces.

This is not a satisfying motive for murder. It's a fantasy motive.

Yasu simply has no "mystery" motive. That's why I think Yasu is innocent in Prime.
However, this motive makes perfect sense in the case of, say, a murder mystery game. Battler would probably realize at some point that the motive makes no sense and, from that, hopefully guess that nobody is really dead. Because there's no motive to actually harm them.

Still a potentially dickish thing to do to Battler, but at least it would be done with the willing participation of everyone for an essentially innocent purpose. That would be a sufficient "mystery" motive, although obviously it would also assert her innocence.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-19, 10:24

@Renall

My point is close to what you're saying, but more or less you nailed the fact that "being a mutilated male" has so little to do with a real problem for herself that even if she was a normal female she would have still come up with some kind of drama to feel pitiful about.

Now if she was a mutilated male that never felt like a woman, that wanted to be male and that suffered form his forced feminization then hell yeah, I would understand and recognize her tragic situation.

But as much as we have doubts about Yasu's sex there isn't really any about her gender identity. Yasu doesn't suffer from being a woman at all, if anything her ideal selfs are always female.

The point is that people like her usually end up deciding to remove their testicles by their own decision, and often they hate the fact that they have a penis.

In the end the real problem with Yasu (assuming she was a mutilated man) is not that she doesn't have a penis, but the fact that she wasn't born a woman.
Her idea that "it's all because of that incident if I'm not fit to love" only shows how much she subconsciously needs to play the part of the tragic heroine at all costs.

If she still had a penis, she'd still have a problem romancing George and Battler, and she probably would still dramatize over the fact that she doesn't have a vagina. Which at least it's something that I would understand, at least there would be a sequitur.
But there's still the fact that the whole idea that she isn't fit to be loved is something that she decided by herself. Nobody told her that, of course the chance that she would be refused was high, but she didn't even try. She didn't even left the involved persons to decide whether they still wanted to love her or not.
And that's why she's a drama queen. You can understand that a person is one, when they decide their tragedies are unsolvable before even trying. Which is basically what she did with the whole Battler situation.

BTW. There is no evidence that Yasu is actually a biological male. For all that we know she could as well be female. In that case she would be simply a woman unable to reproduce. In this case at least there would be a real connection with her incident, because supposedly that would be precisely the reason that made her unable to bear children.
However that would still be an overreaction. The world is plenty of women in the same condition. It's sad, but it's not such a tragedy. And that's certainly not a reason to think you can't possibly be loved.

However, this motive makes perfect sense in the case of, say, a murder mystery game. Battler would probably realize at some point that the motive makes no sense and, from that, hopefully guess that nobody is really dead. Because there's no motive to actually harm them.

Still a potentially dickish thing to do to Battler, but at least it would be done with the willing participation of everyone for an essentially innocent purpose. That would be a sufficient "mystery" motive, although obviously it would also assert her innocence.

Well there is a chance that in Prime that's exactly what Yasu wanted to do, and that the stories she wrote were just possible fictional plots she had in mind. In that case Yasu in Prime wouldn't be guilty of anything major.

But the character in her stories would still be a psychopath.

UsagiTenpura

2012-09-19, 10:37

Well I did suggest a drastically different interpretation of Yasu's body that cannot be loved.
She has lethal health problems that are going to kill her soon anyway. Basically she's in the same situation as Kinzo.

No need for gender confusion or being unable to reproduce.

I'm sure some would say that she can still be loved even if dying and all of that, but that's a bit too idealistic. Not going to bother debating that much if anyone disagrees. I'm only going to say, go look at a retirement house and witness how much love these people are receiving.

As for what problems she has I'm not certain but it looks like it's heart related problems. Teen with heart problems aren't going to live very long. Especially if they had surgeries already (I know there's exceptions and that nowaday medecine is getting much better but in 1970-80 an heart surgery wasn't something you'd easily recover from).

Jan-Poo

2012-09-19, 10:41

Well that certainly would be a lot more tragic, but...

K: At first I was thinking that it was maybe a terrible wound that chained Yasu to the bed. But that does not seem to be the case at all.

R: It is a pretty adult topic, so I had to obscure it’s depiction.

Considering this I think the genital mutilation is a lot more probable.

BTW:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APgcSNVITTI
Someone should do an Umineko hell about this.
Nobody's PAAFEKTO!

Captain Bluebeard

2012-09-19, 10:53

The specific reason the massacre was ignited was for Battler's return. What did the poor sod do to get what he got, again? Giving her a childish promise of being his boybriend six years ago, promise that everyone (the maids, Jessica) stated (indirectly) was stupid to believe.
The logical retribution, of course, was to blow everyone in his face...

Do you even understand what Yasu's motive was? Because you're basically reffering to the many-many-many-many bits forming it, seeming to be actually missing the essence. At least, revenge for forgetting to bring her a pony is not it.

I'm not saying he doesn't have guts and heart for doing such a thing. I'm saying that everyone forgives her and live happily ever after. Even Eva. Natsuhi. Krauss. Rudolf. Kyrie... c'mon. Nobody here a little resenful of being massacred?

We've been assuming that Prime-Yasu is the culprit just for argument's sake, but I actually don't really believe that. In EP5, Battler reaches a truth. A truth that not only makes him forgive Beato, it even makes him willing to apologize to her. That's a good enough reason to believe that PrimeYasu isn't the culprit, and does not deserve being despised.

Hm... Eva is a bad person like me, and she has some beef against the maid anyway. You sure that poor woman whose life went to hell forgave Yasu? Apparently yes: in later episodes we see Eva perfecly allright asking forgiveness for being a bad PTSD, grieving aunt to Ange. Not even a 'You killed my family!'. What does Battler and Beatrice think the world is?!

Like Yasu, Eva wasn't a saint either. She did fuck Ange's life up, it's twisted to blame her for feeling remorseful about that fact.

And after all, what if Yasu didn't really kill her family? Yasu, the author of the forgeries isn't PieceBeatrice but MetaBeatrice. PieceBeatrice is the role she assigns to herself. However, in actuality, she is Meta-Beatrice, the one who spins the tales, killing and reviving everyone endlessly.

I mean a motive that makes me at least feel like you felt with Sweeney. Or Shion. She ended as a spot in the paviment. I didn't even think it was unfair after everything she did. But I could understand where she was coming from, and her motive for going mass murderer was covered for every aspect so throughly I believed it and felt a logic and convincing plot there.

That's a bit controversial in this case. Because Yasu's motive would be perfectly understandable to a person who actually believes in magic. I don't think such people exist (or at least the're very scarce?), but I am willing to accept it in the context of Umineko.

And actually, I do sympathize with (Piece)Yasu. I'm not saying I agree with killing everyone, I'm just saying I can see how she has been hurt, regardless of disagreeing with her actions.

Mass murder Is not excusable. But Yasu's motive is so weird and shady it's like she wanted to blow something and things went bad from there. So.. like an excuse. "Not my fault even if i say it was... forgive me for starting this madness?"

Are you sure we're on the same page about Yasu's motive?

"If Yasu showed George the truth, she would be surprised at his response" thats word of god. But she didn't. Instead of taking the options she had (confess, retire, convince, take a leap of faith or stay with Jessica as she anyway wanted) she took... mass murder.

Yean, but you know what? IF! She had no way to know how George might react. And Yasu is always depicted as a really insecure person (considering her body and how she's been brought up, it's natural).

I've felt insecure, I'm sure you too, and all the others in this discussion. For the ones who have already *ahem* went at it with their lovers: Oi! You there felt insecure when showing yourself for the first time to that special person? Did you had second thoughts? Maybe... don't know... like your only option was to blow away an island with 16 guys in it yourself included?
I say nay...

Yasu's case isn't the same as that. Plus, she's sort of in the middle of a huge mess she herself has been creating for six years.

But going serious: you don't think about killing a lot of people because you are afraid your boyfriend is not going to like your body. And if you do, go to the nearest mental hospital and do us a favor locking yourself up before something happens.

I seriously believe (and forgive me if my assumptions are rushed) that either you don't get the situation or you're just trying to be sarcastic. But you know, Yasu isn't afraid that George might not like her body. She's scared because it practically ruins his dreams for their relationship's future. Plus, her confession isn't an easy one to make.

Needless to say, I disagree with her choice of not coming clean with George, but it's not like it's hard to guess where it came from.

We don't even know if PrimeYasu was really Kanon & Shannon or the idea to represent herself as two servants was merely metaphorical, we don't know if PrimeYasu played Kanon's role at Jessica's school with Jessica knowing it was Yasu/Shannon in truth, we don't know if George really planned to ask Shannon to marry him or it was just an one sided thing from Yasu/Shannon, just to name a couple of things that are rather important for Yasu.

Although I will agree with most things in this post, this is where I draw the line. It's true that we know almost nothing for certain, but we can be at least 99% sure that Yasu had some reason for writing those stories with herself as the culrpit and hoped to give someone a message through those. So I think it's unlikely she would make them vastly different from the actual events. Prime's events should at least reflect some of the game boards' circumstances.

Note also that PieceShannon and PieceKanon are strongly in love with George and Jessica and willing to off each other to fulfil their wish. Can the same be said for their Prime versions or they're just a metaphor of a wish of being a certain type of person?

Okay, having said all that I said above, this theory really doesn't seem unrealistic at all. Not sure if I can accept it completely, but at least I'm sure that the game boards are meant to be a huge metaphor about Prime.

If in all those years didn't realize it either she's very ignorant on anatomy or it's something that can't be seen first glance (if she had a uterus and it was removed/damaged, well at best you'll notice a scar that you won't necessarily connect to a missing/damaged uterus).

She does have such scars. There are vague implies that she shows it to Genji and the others in EP2 (Zombie Kanon scene). And I think it's also implied in other places, but I don't really remember any specific example.

If she could already realize herself what had happened to her, Genji told her nothing new... but somehow Umineko seems to imply she discovered it only right then and not before as apparently it's in that moment she start to consider herself as furniture.

The red scene doesn't necessarily imply that she just learnt at that very moment. Most probably, she takes out her frustration on Genji and Nanjo when they confess to her how she actually got it that wound

I like to think they are but that's not what Beatrice insist is her motive. Her motive is Battler forgetting his promise...

No it isn't. It's just one of the key factors that make up her psychosynthesis. It's frankly hasty to call that the motive itself.

though if Battler had remembered it she wouldn't have turned into Lion. She would have still been an incest baby, tossed off a cliff by Natsuhi and mutilated.

But at least she wouldn't have snapped and got herself into the ShkanontriceXGeosicattler dilemma in the first place.

I'm being sarcastic so it sounds mean but really, Yasu's motive should have been explained better otherwise what's said isn't enough to justify her actions.

I also agree that Yasu's motive was drawn poorly and wasn't given nearly as much as focus as it was required in order for the reader's to understand it perfectly. This was intentional because Ryukishi (who seems very attached to it by the way) didn't want readers who didn't solve it understand a fuck about it.

But at least he should let those who did understand it 100% without whacking their brains.

I think it's more correct to say that a side of Yasu knew it wasn't Battler's fault while another found more easier to blame him.

Yasu says she doesn't have the right to blame Battler, which can be more frustrating than actually hating him. After all, she admits it was all in her head.

Battler sin isn't breaking the promise, it's not even remembering about it.

Well, more than Battler being a moron for forgiving her is: all of sudden the game present Yasu/Beato as someone who's not at fault for what she did. Actually it's Battler who caused all of this so he's the one to blame and that has to apologize.

Nope, this isn't Battler's fault. He may have 'caused' this unintenionally, but this only means he spinned some gears without even realizing. I think his change of heart towards Beato has more to do with Rokenjima Prime.

Rosa was a bad mother but this didn't necessary mean she hated Maria, just that she failed at being a mother because she chosed using a behaviour that had been used by her relatives on her.

Rosa does love Maria. She's just terrible, terrible, terrible at controling her emotions and keeping her cool, which makes her an awful parent. Love isn't all it takes in order to raise a child properly.

Yes, she has issues so it's understable she has troubles but the point is she's the one trapping herself in this vicious circle.

Yes, that's pretty much what I was saying.

UsagiTenpura

2012-09-19, 11:07

Bah damn you Ryuukishi, why do I bother to try to turn your story into a good one?

On another level, in Yasu's world (the Ushiromiya family) there isn't really any example of a successful love story. The author at least seems to genuinely wants us to care about the various members of the family's love problems. The compassion and empathy of the author and the culprit doesn't seem to match at all. Is the former depicting the later in a completely "black" way on purpose?

Do you even understand what Yasu's motive was? Because you're basically reffering to the many-many-many-many bits forming it, seeming to be actually missing the essence. At least, revenge for forgetting to bring her a pony is not it.

That is oddly reminding me of Ryoga from Ranma whom at first the later thought he wanted revenge for a matter of sandwiches at school.
Indeed it feels as if there is something missing.

An idea that I had is that Yasu might not be the mastermind. The game has been compared to chess very often and I'm thinking in that light that Beatrice is like the queen and already long dead. The pawn of Yasu is the one who successfully reached the other side and became the new black queen but she's still not the black king.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-19, 11:33

Do you even understand what Yasu's motive was? Because you're basically reffering to the many-many-many-many bits forming it, seeming to be actually missing the essence. At least, revenge for forgetting to bring her a pony is not it.

Yasu's hope to be loved, her despair and her confusion come as facepalmin worth... she's had the good things since the begining. She's loved, she's going to marry, she's rich, she doesn't have to deal with kinzo and she could stop all the bad things that happen in her work if she just said 'heir of kinzo here, I'll take enough to live a life and leave the rest of the money to you'. All the siblings would call her the witch Beatrice or even Kinzo if she said so.

We've been assuming that Prime-Yasu is the culprit just for argument's sake, but I actually don't really believe that. In EP5, Battler reaches a truth. A truth that not only makes him forgive Beato, it even makes him willing to apologize to her. That's a good enough reason to believe that PrimeYasu isn't the culprit, and does not deserve being despised.

Yeah, I don't think she killed them all alone. But she had accomplices and was trying at least to recreate a murder game. So nobody died. She still wanted Battler to see the 'corpses' of his family while he kept enough calm to resolve the whydunit of someone who he barely remembers. So Prime Yasu, at least, was an ass.

Like Yasu, Eva wasn't a saint either. She did fuck Ange's life up, it's twisted to blame her for feeling remorseful about that fact.

And after all, what if Yasu didn't really kill her family? Yasu, the author of the forgeries isn't PieceBeatrice but MetaBeatrice. PieceBeatrice is the role she assigns to herself. However, in actuality, she is Meta-Beatrice, the one who spins the tales, killing and reviving everyone endlessly.

Eva is apologizing for being a bad Aunt over and over in twilight. Beatrice is eating some snacks and floating around her husband.

Besides, Eva is not the type to forgive some stranger's mistakes if they led to her losing something. She's kind of an ass, too. Someone had to start the circus, and that someone was Yasu even if she didn't kill anyone.

That's a bit controversial in this case. Because Yasu's motive would be perfectly understandable to a person who actually believes in magic. I don't think such people exist (or at least the're very scarce?), but I am willing to accept it in the context of Umineko.

And actually, I do sympathize with (Piece)Yasu. I'm not saying I agree with killing everyone, I'm just saying I can see how she has been hurt, regardless of disagreeing with her actions.

Are you sure we're on the same page about Yasu's motive?

Yes, I know her motive. What I was saying is that it sound really weird and non-convincing to me. The 'wanted to blow up something' was just to show how much sense her starting point made to me.

Yean, but you know what? IF! She had no way to know how George might react. And Yasu is always depicted as a really insecure person (considering her body and how she's been brought up, it's natural).

Yasu's case isn't the same as that. Plus, she's sort of in the middle of a huge mess she herself has been creating for six years.

I seriously believe (and forgive me if my assumptions are rushed) that either you don't get the situation or you're just trying to be sarcastic. But you know, Yasu isn't afraid that George might not like her body. She's scared because it practically ruins his dreams for their relationship's future. Plus, her confession isn't an easy one to make.

Needless to say, I disagree with her choice of not coming clean with George, but it's not like it's hard to guess where it came from.

One of the triggers to make her so inclined to murder was this. She was so worried about George's reaction. Why didn't she use that 'bet magic' in betting on something else than trying to ruin the day of a guy she didn't even knew? She could've made a bet like 'I come clean. Red, George likes me and we go. Black, George doesn't like me and I stay with milady. Special slot (0): Battler remembers me.' She went and involucred bribes, gold, murder misteries and explosions.

I have the feeling you're confusing the meta-layer/Rokkenjima Prime with the gameboards here. It looks as if you're talking partially about Tohya. If meta-Battler in the games is representing the part of Tohya that's Battler, then to him, if he realises that Beatrice is the culprit on the gameboard but might not be the culprit in Rokkenjima Prime, then maybe he has reason to forgive her. If Beatrice is painting herself as the culprit in the stories to cover for someone, then he could feel bad about thinking it was her. (Particularly if Battler is the real culprit or an accomplice! :p)

The impression I got isn't that Battler forgave Beatrice, but that he realised that she wasn't to blame in the first place and that he even wanted her forgiveness. Now, if what he realised was "If only I hadn't forgotten my promise, Beatrice wouldn't have killed my family! It's all my fault!" then OK, things are messed up there. But it doesn't make sense for him to think that, in my opinion. Jesus or not, it isn't a logical train of thought for him to follow. Meta-Battler didn't get presented as a person who would simply forgive mass murder in real life. But he did grow into someone who wasn't always horrified by "fictional" murder on the gameboards - like in the love duel, where he was hardly yelling at Jessica/George/Shannon/Kanon/Beatrice for the murders they committed during that.

Put in purple were wyou wrote the point I was trying to make. Cuz I like purple, no particular reason. Battler can forgive judas for all I care, but his reasons and reactions are so messed up is not funny. That's what I was trying to say. Where did that line of thought engendrated, Battler?

Which makes Bern the biggest hypocrite in the world for the way she treats Ange and Erika. Meanwhile Beatrice's "torture" was just a front all along, anyway.

Bern has her standards. So she was a bitch, I never said she wasn't. But remember, Erika is a piece created from herself. Is like if Yasu started treating bad Shannon or Beatrice: she's just bitching at something that in the general POV is herself.

At the end, Ange got her anwers and everything else, and Erika became a detective/witch. Earn your happy ending, and all that.

It just doesn't matter how much pain she's in, it doesn't make sense to randomly kill everyone.

In the first place, it was not the revelation of Yasu's sexual problems, or the revelation that her most trusted guardians were lying to her her whole life or anything like that that actually triggered any actual intent to murder. The trigger was Battler's return.

So how could news of Battler's return cause Yasu to plan and carry out a mass murder?

In other words, it's not a matter of her "snapping" from pain. In fact, it's more like she "snapped" from hope. So what we have is a situation where Yasu's motive for killing over a dozen people is not vengeance, nor desire for destruction caused by a sense of powerlessness, nor some other motive that places intrinsic meaning in the act of taking the lives of the victims. No, the motive is to create a chance of Battler remembering her. In other words, these murders are no more than a means to an end. The victims are less than human. They're consumable tools. They're pieces.

This is not a satisfying motive for murder. It's a fantasy motive.

Yasu simply has no "mystery" motive. That's why I think Yasu is innocent in Prime.

From Dlanor's Forward in Our Confessions (previously translated by LyricalTwilight):

Without love, it can't be seen.

They are her words.
But I shall repeat them.

Love exists in everyone's hearts.

Her true tragedy was that she couldn't see it.

So Yasu's motive was fantasy. In real world she doesn't have any.

Wait, what?

tempteste

2012-09-19, 14:06

In the end the real problem with Yasu (assuming she was a mutilated man) is not that she doesn't have a penis, but the fact that she wasn't born a woman.

I don't think that's the case. Yasu had no problem with being male or female. It was more like she had a problem with being incomplete woman and incomplete man.

AuraTwilight

2012-09-19, 15:20

On another level, in Yasu's world (the Ushiromiya family) there isn't really any example of a successful love story.

Uh...what about Eva/Hideoyshi?

So Yasu's motive was fantasy. In real world she doesn't have any.

Wait, what?

It means she's probably not the actual murderer and is claiming credit for a tremendous crime she didn't do.

Renall

2012-09-19, 15:47

Or there wasn't a crime, and it got to look that way due to the stories.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-19, 16:06

Uh...what about Eva/Hideoyshi?
I find ironic that the only succesfull love story is about an arranged marriage XD

It means she's probably not the actual murderer and is claiming credit for a tremendous crime she didn't do.

That's widely accepted. But then makes all EP7 and part of EP6 lose 70% of their plot as a pile of dirty, foul misleading and lies.

Or there wasn't a crime, and it got to look that way due to the stories.

I thought that too, but then I decided to follow Van Dine's 'Has to be a crime' in my headcanon (even if it doesn't apply to all the game) and think that there was one for the sake of all the hours I spent theorizing. I mean, 'there was no crime' is such a let down for someone who spent all those hours sitting through Red vs Blue battles...

AuraTwilight

2012-09-19, 17:32

I find ironic that the only succesfull love story is about an arranged marriage XD

Errr....isn't Krauss and Natsuhi the arranged marriage? I'm pretty sure Eva chose Hideyoshi.

That's widely accepted. But then makes all EP7 and part of EP6 lose 70% of their plot as a pile of dirty, foul misleading and lies.

Quite the opposite; it infact makes them more meaningful.

Wanderer

2012-09-19, 17:32

I find ironic that the only succesfull love story is about an arranged marriage XD

I don't think Eva/Hideyoshi was arranged. The arranged marriage was Krauss/Natsuhi, which, incidentally, was also a successful love story.

That's widely accepted. But then makes all EP7 and part of EP6 lose 70% of their plot as a pile of dirty, foul misleading and lies.

How so?

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-19, 17:58

Errr....isn't Krauss and Natsuhi the arranged marriage? I'm pretty sure Eva chose Hideyoshi.

Eva said something about 'First you marry with the most convenient man, and after the ceremony you try to build love. It worked for me!' Maybe it was a marriage meeting, but I'm pretty sure she married with a profitable guy and then searched that silly thing called love. So maybe it wasn't a arranged marriage but a 'business convenience marriage', sorry.

(Wanderer) I don't think Eva/Hideyoshi was arranged. The arranged marriage was Krauss/Natsuhi, which, incidentally, was also a successful love story.

Krauss and Natsuhi's marriage is not a healthy one. Too much miscomunication (I'm pretty sure I wrote that word wrong, but I'm too lazy to search google for the correct spelling) and belittling and Krauss being a complete moron while Natsuhi is standing in the line of insanity... um... was your comment sarcasm?

How so?

About EP7. We find a complete redaction about Yasu's life (since the how her grandparents met still how she came to be), motive, views on the world and aspirations. Then we talk about her borderline MPD, painfilled days, and etc. We learn more about her than from everyone in the series except maybe Ange. Before that EP6 had an overly long almost-but-not-quite-out-of-the-blue duel Kanon vs Shannon vs Beatrice.

It's all about Yasu. The last games are all about whydunnit. So, to remark the gargantuan importance of whydunnit in a novel that's all about the heart, obviously you'd have to write everything about the culprit's thoughts and feelings to drive home the importance of why. You know, justify a little the neverending made-me-want-to-tear-my-hair repetitions of "Without love, you cannot see it(it being the motive)"

Then you say 'The crime wasn't her fault/she didn't do it'. I got confused there. So EP7 was just the maid's sob story, and the real culprit is still in the shadows or lost in between lines about conspiracies and grudges? Were's the heart? Oi, really. Or I'm slow or something fishy happened there.

If he just wanted to develop characters, he could've focused a little bit more on Genji and Kumasawa. You know, they are legendary for not being really known or deeply talked about. They're less developed than Shanon's bust. Less than Kinzo and his DESIRE. More than Hideyoshi, but not for much.

I really liked Ep7. It was soothing, creepy and entertaining. I don't want to lower the merit of one of my favorites by believing that Yasu is completely innocent and it was all a misunderstanding.

On another topic, I finally got Hane -not the transcripts in the web, but the real tips cd-. Black Battler looked like he was crossing his eyes, so I couldn't stop my giggles. The killer electric fan was made better by Battler and Jessica's crying faces everytime they got into an horrible stage.
Shanon and Battler waking up in a bed, hugging each other. Way to tease, Ryu. Way to tease.

Cao Ni Ma

2012-09-19, 19:13

It's all about Yasu. The last games are all about whydunnit. So, to remark the gargantuan importance of whydunnit in a novel that's all about the heart, obviously you'd have to write everything about the culprit's thoughts and feelings to drive home the importance of why. You know, justify a little the neverending made-me-want-to-tear-my-hair repetitions of "Without love, you cannot see it(it being the motive)"

Then you say 'The crime wasn't her fault/she didn't do it'. I got confused there. So EP7 was just the maid's sob story, and the real culprit is still in the shadows or lost in between lines about conspiracies and grudges? Were's the heart? Oi, really. Or I'm slow or something fishy happened there.
.

The only "crimes" we actually know she did was to write 3 stories. Beatrice's and Battlers characterization wouldn't make sense if she actually had committed the crimes. Unless of course both of them are insane.

e- The whole issue that Beatrice doesn't have an actual motive in Our Confessions, she's working entirely on a meta level. Its like an author killing off his characters. She/he has absolutely no need to do it, but he has to so that the story can progress in the matter the he/she has planned.

jjblue1

2012-09-19, 20:09

I think the general idea about Yasu and her past is that her past doesn't serve as a motive but to get us to understand her mindsetting so that we are supposed to understand why she decided to kill (or to write stories in which she killed) for a certain motive.

It's sort of saying that without knowing Rosa and Maria's relation, how Rosa deals with her, how important is Sakutarou and which are Maria's beliefs we wouldn't understand why Maria would dream to become a witch and murder her mother in the most gruesome ways, merely because Rosa broke one of her toys in punishment.

However with Yasu things become more troublesome as while MetaMaria's actions are dismissed as an 'innocent' fantasy of PieceMaria it's not so easy to apply the same reasoning to Yasu even when we assume that PrimeYasu is innocent and PieceYasu is only a fantasy.

That is because no one is actively trying to judge MetaMaria's for killing her mother repetitely and anyway Maria's situation is depicted so well that even if her actions are wrong you can understand how she could snap.

PieceYasu is however being judged and, through her, indirectly we're judging PrimeYasu and Ryukishi himself.

PieceYasu isn't a random fantasy disconnected by the context, it's part of a carefully studied story that is supposed to be realistic so we expect her motive to be realistic or at least deemed realistic by who wrote her.
In short it's like her author is telling us that 'people can kill for this reason' but the reason in itself is simply too weak. Now we can try to insert it in the setting because we can say that even if Maria killed Rosa due to Sakutarous' death, that's not the only reason.
Umineko doesn't help us. Yasu, differently from Maria who blamed Rosa for other things as well, insists she's doing it due to Battler only (Don't hate me. You guys didn't do anything wrong. If you're gonna hate, hate that guy who trashed his promise for 6 long years.). We can either say that Yasu is in denial or that the experiences she lived unconsciously twisted her so much that she could really kill for such reasons.

Her experiences still aren't depicted with the same amount of drama Maria's have.

Her life doesn't seem so desperate so her clinging to the promise Battler made doesn't seem to equate with how Maria clung to Sakutarou.

It's possible Ryukishi intended them to be one and the same or that for Yasu that promise was even more important that what Sakutarou was for Maria but that's not the feeling his work transmit.

If I've to compare Yasu with Maria or even Ange, Yasu doesn't come out as the one with the worst life when instead it's completely possible she was the one with the worst life.
It's just I get way more realistic moments of happiness for Yasu than for Maria and since Yasu hides behind the Shannon facade it's hard to assume she might not really be as happy as she might seems.

From Dlanor's Forward in Our Confessions (previously translated by LyricalTwilight):

Without love, it can't be seen.

They are her words.
But I shall repeat them.

Love exists in everyone's hearts.

Her true tragedy was that she couldn't see it.

Interesting! I've forgotten that part but now I see how it's very fitting!

Well I did suggest a drastically different interpretation of Yasu's body that cannot be loved.
She has lethal health problems that are going to kill her soon anyway. Basically she's in the same situation as Kinzo.

It would have been an interesting idea (and it would tie Umineko more closely with '10 little indians') but I don't think it's the intended solution... though I personally favour it.

Although I will agree with most things in this post, this is where I draw the line. It's true that we know almost nothing for certain, but we can be at least 99% sure that Yasu had some reason for writing those stories with herself as the culrpit and hoped to give someone a message through those. So I think it's unlikely she would make them vastly different from the actual events. Prime's events should at least reflect some of the game boards' circumstances.

There are things though that I think she couldn't give away or that could be her delusions. While the fact that Kanon was seen at Jessica's school is proof of Kanon's existence, if Jessica had merely asked her to dress up as a boy and the stories were to tell this to us ShKanon would be revealed in Ep 2.

George might have had feelings for her but it's also possible Yasu is assuming he would go to lenghts that real George isn't ready to go yet. After all she always assume in her stories that everyone would have not much problems in being her accomplices but we can't be sure that's true.

If you assume that in Prime there was never a Kanon to begin with it, it becomes much easier to accept that Yasu could play two roles without troubles and without anyone recognizing her as she did it only in a story and not in the 'real world'.

She does have such scars. There are vague implies that she shows it to Genji and the others in EP2 (Zombie Kanon scene). And I think it's also implied in other places, but I don't really remember any specific example.

I'll need to reread Ep 2 because i don't remember this then.

The red scene doesn't necessarily imply that she just learnt at that very moment. Most probably, she takes out her frustration on Genji and Nanjo when they confess to her how she actually got it that wound

I considered this but in this case hope should have died in Yasu long ago. It's the difference of the drama between who's blind by... well nearly his birth and who becomes blind. It's always horrible to be blind but for the second there's also the trauma while for the other blindness was there right from the beginning.
It's still horrible but in a different way... though people can react differently to things so maybe this point is mooth and Rykishi can chose to have Yasu act as he prefers.

No it isn't. It's just one of the key factors that make up her psychosynthesis. It's frankly hasty to call that the motive itself.

She's the one insisting that's her motive. You can say she's lying or that she's in denial but her words are what we're given.

"Don't hate me. You guys didn't do anything wrong. If you're gonna hate, hate that guy who trashed his promise for 6 long years."

But at least she wouldn't have snapped and got herself into the ShkanontriceXGeosicattler dilemma in the first place.

We can't really know if she wouldn't have snapped. Surely her life would have been different but she could have snapped anyway. Or not. It's all in a catbox.

But at least he should let those who did understand it 100% without whacking their brains.

Exactly. Since he talked about how the motive was important he should have explained it better.

Yasu says she doesn't have the right to blame Battler, which can be more frustrating than actually hating him. After all, she admits it was all in her head.

Battler sin isn't breaking the promise, it's not even remembering about it.

I don't really like to talk about it being a 'sin'. There's too much involved to make Battler really guilty.

Nope, this isn't Battler's fault. He may have 'caused' this unintenionally, but this only means he spinned some gears without even realizing. I think his change of heart towards Beato has more to do with Rokenjima Prime.

I'm not saying it is, it's just how the game seems to present things at first glance. Battler is sinful for forgetting the promise and this push Beato to do something horrible but this didn't set them square as Battler apologizes to her.

Yes, probably in truth the apology is also tied to the fact MetaBeato didn't really kill people, though making him believe she did so was pretty cruel.

AuraTwilight

2012-09-19, 20:19

Krauss and Natsuhi's marriage is not a healthy one. Too much miscomunication (I'm pretty sure I wrote that word wrong, but I'm too lazy to search google for the correct spelling) and belittling and Krauss being a complete moron while Natsuhi is standing in the line of insanity... um... was your comment sarcasm?

Have you ever met a married couple who's been together for more than ten years?

They're pretty much all like that to some degree. A bunch of external real-world problems fucking with your life and stressing you guys out doesn't mean your love is a failure.

GoldenLand

2012-09-19, 21:01

Put in purple were wyou wrote the point I was trying to make. Cuz I like purple, no particular reason. Battler can forgive judas for all I care, but his reasons and reactions are so messed up is not funny. That's what I was trying to say. Where did that line of thought engendrated, Battler?

Yeah, I knew what your point was. What I was saying is that that interpretation of Battler doesn't make any sense and is contrary to his characterisation, and that thus, it probably isn't what actually happened. Battler's reaction pretty much only makes any sense if Beatrice/Yasu is not the culprit in Rokkenjima Prime.

I'll need to reread Ep 2 because i don't remember this then.

Maybe it's this bit?

It was Kanon.

......His breath was feeble, ......and the puddles of mud he left quickly became drenched bright-red.
When Nanjo held him and turned him face up, there was a deep, gruesome scar right in the center of his chest, as though a spear or something had been stuck there.

Even now, deep-red blood poured out from there...!

I'm not sure. It does mention a scar, though.

It's all about Yasu. The last games are all about whydunnit. So, to remark the gargantuan importance of whydunnit in a novel that's all about the heart, obviously you'd have to write everything about the culprit's thoughts and feelings to drive home the importance of why. You know, justify a little the neverending made-me-want-to-tear-my-hair repetitions of "Without love, you cannot see it(it being the motive)"

Then you say 'The crime wasn't her fault/she didn't do it'. I got confused there. So EP7 was just the maid's sob story, and the real culprit is still in the shadows or lost in between lines about conspiracies and grudges? Were's the heart? Oi, really. Or I'm slow or something fishy happened there.

...

I really liked Ep7. It was soothing, creepy and entertaining. I don't want to lower the merit of one of my favorites by believing that Yasu is completely innocent and it was all a misunderstanding.

The strange thing about Ep7 is that although it went into depth about Yasu, what it never did was give her a decent motive for killing everyone. During the time we focused on her past, she definitely didn't seem like someone who could commit a murder. And then, we simply aren't shown what happened to her later on, during the time when she would have had to be planning to kill everyone. Supposedly, she was driven to it by various things that happened to her, but we never saw the most critical time period.

So...why, in a game which is all about Yasu, aren't we shown her motive for killing everyone? It looks as if you're satisfied with ep 7 as motivation for a culprit Yasu. But I'm really not satisfied with it at all. It's as if the "whydunnit" was deliberately omitted. Yasu is someone who can't manage to make a phone call to Battler, who doesn't want revenge and only blames herself (going by all the reds about Beatrice and what Beatrice says in ep 8, etcetera - although it's arguable she secretly wants some revenge against Battler), and yet...who is willing to murder everyone? Even if saying that actually she did want revenge against Battler, she didn't seem like a person who would kill all of his family - also her family - in order to do so.

The only Yasu culprit theory I can see support for is the one where she chooses to lock Rokkenjima up in a cat box for all of time so that all of her loves can be realised. But problem is, I don't think she's capable of murder, and even if she was, that motive would boil down to "Yasu did it because she's insane". Which is an unsatisfying motive for a culprit.

All this does lend itself to questioning whether she ever really developed a motive to kill. Ryukishi may have left out showing her deciding to do the murders because that never happened. It's still rather unsatisfying; I really want to know what happened during that time, whether she's a murderess or not.

...Agh. I wanted to write more about the "heart" of the story, but I've got to go now. Anyway, what if the "without love it can't be seen" thing was not talking about Yasu's motive to kill, but instead partially referring to her not being the culprit? Or even to there being no actual culprit for Rokkenjima Prime?

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-19, 21:30

Yeah, I knew what your point was. What I was saying is that that interpretation of Battler doesn't make any sense and is contrary to his characterisation, and that thus, it probably isn't what actually happened. Battler's reaction pretty much only makes any sense if Beatrice/Yasu is not the culprit in Rokkenjima Prime.

Or if Beatrice/Yasu is deluding herself with thinking how he'd forgive her if he knew. But you have a stronger theory there, so it's not so probable.

The strange thing about Ep7 is that although it went into depth about Yasu, what it never did was give her a decent motive for killing everyone. During the time we focused on her past, she definitely didn't seem like someone who could commit a murder. And then, we simply aren't shown what happened to her later on, during the time when she would have had to be planning to kill everyone. Supposedly, she was driven to it by various things that happened to her, but we never saw the most critical time period.

So...why, in a game which is all about Yasu, aren't we shown her motive for killing everyone? It looks as if you're satisfied with ep 7 as motivation for a culprit Yasu. But I'm really not satisfied with it at all. It's as if the "whydunnit" was deliberately omitted. Yasu is someone who can't manage to make a phone call to Battler, who doesn't want revenge and only blames herself (going by all the reds about Beatrice and what Beatrice says in ep 8, etcetera - although it's arguable she secretly wants some revenge against Battler), and yet...who is willing to murder everyone? Even if saying that actually she did want revenge against Battler, she didn't seem like a person who would kill all of his family - also her family - in order to do so.

The only Yasu culprit theory I can see support for is the one where she chooses to lock Rokkenjima up in a cat box for all of time so that all of her loves can be realised. But problem is, I don't think she's capable of murder, and even if she was, that motive would boil down to "Yasu did it because she's insane". Which is an unsatisfying motive for a culprit.

All this does lend itself to questioning whether she ever really developed a motive to kill. Ryukishi may have left out showing her deciding to do the murders because that never happened. It's still rather unsatisfying; I really want to know what happened during that time, whether she's a murderess or not.

...Agh. I wanted to write more about the "heart" of the story, but I've got to go now. Anyway, what if the "without love it can't be seen" thing was not talking about Yasu's motive to kill, but instead partially referring to her not being the culprit? Or even to there being no actual culprit for Rokkenjima Prime?

I'm not satisfied with how Yasu's motives where put. But let's say, there's an episode about Kyrie, just as exhaustive with all her backstory and everything else as 7 was with Yasu's. And she's refered as 'culprit'. One. Entire. Episode.

All that development, 'confesion', gathering of stories and testimonies...Then it's like 'alright, that's her. But she's not the culprit, you know?'. What the hell was I doing there, then?!

EP7 was basically a huge mine of answers and posibilities, and the last half was all Yasuyasuyasuyasu...Beatrice. And she didn't do it. So the real core of Umineko, the whydunnit, is never adressed? I don't want to see EP7 as a huge troll. So I have to think at least that, even if Yasu didn't kill anyone directly, she was responsible for starting the massacre. Or just forgot to switch off the bomb and had weird fantasies of murdering in cold blood 16 people.

As I said long ago, there's a tonshit of 'could or couldn't have happened' in Umineko, but there's some things that are necesary to at least pretend to acknowledge to follow the discussion, namely:

There was some kind of murder -if we don't think anything happened in that island, there's no point in trying to solve nothing about Umineko. All is fantasy.
--Alternatively, there was a misunderstanding/accidental murder that triggered the bomb. It's not like Maria was just playing with a clock and all went bang.

If a murder (fake, real, accidental or whatever) was commited, someone has to be the culprit. It didn't happen for the whims of magic, like Beatrice is so insistent we believe. Be indirectly, reluctantly or oportunistically someone made a huge mess before the island went boom. If that didn't happen, discussing about Umineko has no point. It's just an accidental explosion that erased half an island.

Even if those two points to begin with are highly controversial, it's necesary to at least pretend to believe them in order to make some type of reasoning in here. Otherwise the answer to all the game is "Accident/didn't happened/all was a dream" That'd be lame in so many levels I'd better uninstall Umineko and go at it with Higurashi again...

Have you ever met a married couple who's been together for more than ten years?

They're pretty much all like that to some degree. A bunch of external real-world problems fucking with your life and stressing you guys out doesn't mean your love is a failure.

So the man treats her wife like some doll, doesn't let her talk, doesn't defend her when his sister basically calls her a slut and doesn't acknowledge her efforts to be recognized as a good wife. If Natsuhi believed her position as wife was so strong and acknowledged by her husband, she'd not have delusions about Kinzo coming back to life praising her. She'd not cry alone in the hallways because his husband, again, dismissed her. The more I can see in that relationship is a guy forced to marry a woman and sort of getting used to her, and a woman so despaired for him to treat her as a wife and to belong to the family that she'd go into psycotic bursts when something else was piled to dismiss her as just a borrowed uterus that has no consequence in the family.

LyricalAura

2012-09-19, 21:43

The way I see it is that on the surface, without looking at motivations, every single piece of evidence circumstantially points at Yasu as the sole murderer. Even if the identity of the real killer is lost in the cat box, isn't there some value in digging to the very root of the disaster and proving her innocent?

Also, @PatchworkChimera: I am not AuraTwilight.

GoldenLand

2012-09-20, 01:23

I'm not satisfied with how Yasu's motives where put. But let's say, there's an episode about Kyrie, just as exhaustive with all her backstory and everything else as 7 was with Yasu's. And she's refered as 'culprit'. One. Entire. Episode.

All that development, 'confesion', gathering of stories and testimonies...Then it's like 'alright, that's her. But she's not the culprit, you know?'. What the hell was I doing there, then?!

EP7 was basically a huge mine of answers and posibilities, and the last half was all Yasuyasuyasuyasu...Beatrice. And she didn't do it. So the real core of Umineko, the whydunnit, is never adressed? I don't want to see EP7 as a huge troll. So I have to think at least that, even if Yasu didn't kill anyone directly, she was responsible for starting the massacre. Or just forgot to switch off the bomb and had weird fantasies of murdering in cold blood 16 people.

That really is the problem with Umineko, from the point of view of seeking the culprit. Yasu gets loads of attention, but her motive is weak and doesn't fit with the themes of the story and Battler's reactions. However, if it's not her and there is a sole culprit, that culprit has not had the right attention to them paid by the story. (In fact, many of the characters have hardly been paid any attention at all...like Hideyoshi, Genji, Gohda, etc.) We don't know who they are. And they don't have a satisfying motive either. I think there's some consensus that based on what we know, none of the characters has a good motive to kill everyone on the island. They might have the motivation to kill some, but not all.

It's possible that from Ryukishi's point of view, the "whodunnit" is just the "whodunnit" of the gameboards, and that the "whydunnit" for the gameboards is just that Shkanon were the puppets of meta-Beato as she wrote her stories. As in, Shkanon had no real motive other than a meta-motive.

So...maybe in the end, Ryukishi didn't even mean to tell us the culprit, and the mystery was the mystery of "who is Beatrice", which episode 7 and the rest of the series did tell us. The mystery of the culprit of the gameboards and the mystery of Beatrice's heart and Yasu. It could even be what LyricalAura suggested, and that proving the innocence of Yasu is the true mystery to solve even if we'll never know the real culprit.

Yes, it's weak from the traditional mystery perspective. I wanted to know the culprit and why they did it...but it seems that's not the story Ryukishi wanted to tell. I think the only way that the story Ryukishi wrote could have told us the "real" culprit is if the theory of there being no deliberate mass murdering culprit but a tragedy of misunderstandings is correct. He's shown us that the Ushiromiyas are flawed people who could potentially shoot someone if the circumstances were right. Something like the ep 7 tea party only without an "I'm randomly and stupidly evil" motive from Rudolf and Kyrie could work.

Actually, with the fake murder game thing, as has been mentioned by others before, if that game was what happened, I'd feel rather uncomfortably as if Battler is the best choice of culprit; after all, he's the one the game would be aimed at. Nearly everyone else could potentially have been an accomplice to Beato, but not him, the target. The person in the best (...worst..) position to freak out with paranoia and start shooting people once he thought a mass murder was occurring.

Although...were the characters really as bad as the stories say? Ep 8 had everyone being fluffy and nice. Ange had to question what the truth was, and that was either a forgery (maybe Tohya's) or something in Ange's imagination. The thing about the games is that they were written by Beatrice, and as has been mentioned up the page, although Beatrice went on about love existing in everyone's hearts, "Her true tragedy was that she couldn't see it". Yet at the same time it seems she's making herself the scapegoat for the very sake of those people. So many contradictions!

Even assuming Yasu didn't kill directly, there are certainly ways like the ones you mentioned where she could have had a hand in it. Those can even work if she has no intention whatsoever of killing anybody. With fake murder game theory + accidental murders theory, she provided a stage where things could go wrong. But that one doesn't automatically make her a culprit, just a cause.

AuraTwilight

2012-09-20, 01:51

So the man treats her wife like some doll, doesn't let her talk, doesn't defend her when his sister basically calls her a slut and doesn't acknowledge her efforts to be recognized as a good wife.

Arguing with Eva isn't productive, and Natsuhi isn't able to keep her cool in tense situations.

You're going to have to point out where he doesn't acknowledge her or treats her like a doll. That's never stated and you're probably impressing your own values as fact. The heart of the matter is that the two of them hold a strict adherence to the traditional Japanese ideal of a marriage, but their life difficulties make things tumultuous.

If Natsuhi believed her position as wife was so strong and acknowledged by her husband, she'd not have delusions about Kinzo coming back to life praising her.

Natsuhi is severely mentally ill and thinks she murdered a baby. Her mental illness is not Krauss' or her fault.

She'd not cry alone in the hallways because his husband, again, dismissed her. The more I can see in that relationship is a guy forced to marry a woman and sort of getting used to her, and a woman so despaired for him to treat her as a wife and to belong to the family that she'd go into psycotic bursts when something else was piled to dismiss her as just a borrowed uterus that has no consequence in the family.

You're judging their entire relationship by THE MOST DIFFICULT WEEKEND OF EITHER OF THEIR LIVES.

Why aren't you bringing up how they acted when they were still dating? When they couldn't conceive a baby? When Kinzo recently passed away and they both contributed equally to finding the situation and appreciated each other?

Instead, you're focusing on the moment where all of Krauss's siblings were trying to incriminate Krauss and bankrupt him and Natsuhi lost her cool in an argument with Eva that had them both being disruptive and loud.

Kealym

2012-09-20, 02:11

So the man treats her wife like some doll, doesn't let her talk, doesn't defend her when his sister basically calls her a slut and doesn't acknowledge her efforts to be recognized as a good wife. If Natsuhi believed her position as wife was so strong and acknowledged by her husband, she'd not have delusions about Kinzo coming back to life praising her. She'd not cry alone in the hallways because his husband, again, dismissed her. The more I can see in that relationship is a guy forced to marry a woman and sort of getting used to her, and a woman so despaired for him to treat her as a wife and to belong to the family that she'd go into psycotic bursts when something else was piled to dismiss her as just a borrowed uterus that has no consequence in the family.
Okay, on this specific point, I disagree. If we take EP5 into account (and I don't see why we shouldnt), even though they were arranged, Krauss was very sensitive to this fact, and did his best to treat her with affection. And eventually, they built a genuine, pleasant relationship out of it. While Krauss does seem to be somewhat of a chauvinist, I'm pretty sure he DOES care a lot about his wife.

And to be as fair as possible, they're under A LOT of stress in 1986, but, y'know ... at least they're hiding the corpse together. Y'know, as a team and stuff. And they both lose their shit when they think the other is in danger. Aaaaaaand with all due respect to Natsuhi's determination, she is both very emotional, and not too clever. In a tense discussion with his siblings, it was probably for his best to ask Natsuhi to leave. She kept having outbursts that were rather childish for a 50 year old woman.

Though I agree, Eva deserved a serious bitch-slap or SOMETHING when she said those things. I particularly enjoy the anime version of the scene, which shows Kyrie and Rosa sipping their tea CALMLY AS FUCK during the entire exchange. At least Rudolf looked like he felt bad.:heh:

edit : Oh, I was ninja'd by AuraTwilight
But no seriously go watch that scene in the anime as Kyrosa gives no shits at all, it's almost beautiful. As if to say "Man she pulls this shit every year when we come here, EVERY YEAR MAN."

Wanderer

2012-09-20, 03:46

I'm not satisfied with how Yasu's motives where put. But let's say, there's an episode about Kyrie, just as exhaustive with all her backstory and everything else as 7 was with Yasu's. And she's refered as 'culprit'. One. Entire. Episode.

The mystery Will was solving in EP7 was not "Who caused the Rokkenjima incident?" It was "Who killed Beatrice?" As in, the character Beatrice.

You can read the EP7 chapter "Here's the Culprit" if you want to better understand where I'm coming from.

There was some kind of murder -if we don't think anything happened in that island, there's no point in trying to solve nothing about Umineko. All is fantasy.
--Alternatively, there was a misunderstanding/accidental murder that triggered the bomb. It's not like Maria was just playing with a clock and all went bang.

If a murder (fake, real, accidental or whatever) was commited, someone has to be the culprit. It didn't happen for the whims of magic, like Beatrice is so insistent we believe. Be indirectly, reluctantly or oportunistically someone made a huge mess before the island went boom. If that didn't happen, discussing about Umineko has no point. It's just an accidental explosion that erased half an island.

Well, I do believe there was some kind of incident. And not just out of a desire for an interesting narrative. After all, Eva had the head's ring and was in the Kuwadorian when the explosion happened. That doesn't just happen.

All I've said, or at least meant to say, is that Yasu has no narratively acceptable motive for murder. She certainly could be, and probably is, in some other way responsible for the tragedy.

Renall

2012-09-20, 09:05

I'm not sure I'd refer to the gameboard character as "Piece-Yasu." In my mind, "Yasu" is an identity which can solely by applied to the author, who was apparently a real person in Rokkenjima-Prime. I do not believe the characters she wrote into the story were meant to be her. Notably, Our Confession suggests the primary agent is Beatrice and Shannon and Kanon are affected roles for Beatrice. I think it more productive (although also largely no different) to call the piece character "Beatrice."

I think this is important because the distinction between the person Yasu-as-author actually is and Beatrice-as-culprit is portrayed to be are far too divergent to merely represent "myself, but written into a story." As opposed to, say, her portrayal of Maria, which appears to have been more or less accurate to reality.

I consider this a significant factor in whether I believe in her guilt in Prime, and honestly it would not be indicative of guilt because she basically has to change her entire disposition and attitude in order to act as Beatrice. Beatrice may be able to do that, but her creator isn't (and can never wholly be) Beatrice. If Beatrice is "what I would need to become in order to be the culprit," then there's just no way I could buy Yasu as a culprit, because I don't believe she could bring herself to do that.

Did something happen? Probably. Did she maybe have a reason to feel responsible for it happening? Most likely. But it almost certainly wasn't intentional and it seems more probable that somebody was taking advantage of (or misunderstanding) her attempts to make the best of a volatile situation.

The story indirectly suggests several such instances. Murder Game gone wrong is touched on in End and Dawn. Chaos breaking out over the revelation of the gold (which I think she could easily have tried to do in order to save everyone from their financial woes) is shown in Requiem and Twilight. These are both plausible, although the way they are portrayed is highly exaggerated within the context of the stories themselves.

All it really would've taken on her part is a miscalculation about how things would have played out, or a misjudgment of somebody's nature. We might never know for sure, because her judgments end up parroted by Tohya and so we're just sort of left to view the characters the way those two authors view them.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-20, 11:31

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-20, 11:54

Okay, on this specific point, I disagree. If we take EP5 into account (and I don't see why we shouldnt), even though they were arranged, Krauss was very sensitive to this fact, and did his best to treat her with affection. And eventually, they built a genuine, pleasant relationship out of it. While Krauss does seem to be somewhat of a chauvinist, I'm pretty sure he DOES care a lot about his wife.

And to be as fair as possible, they're under A LOT of stress in 1986, but, y'know ... at least they're hiding the corpse together. Y'know, as a team and stuff. And they both lose their shit when they think the other is in danger. Aaaaaaand with all due respect to Natsuhi's determination, she is both very emotional, and not too clever. In a tense discussion with his siblings, it was probably for his best to ask Natsuhi to leave. She kept having outbursts that were rather childish for a 50 year old woman.

Though I agree, Eva deserved a serious bitch-slap or SOMETHING when she said those things. I particularly enjoy the anime version of the scene, which shows Kyrie and Rosa sipping their tea CALMLY AS FUCK during the entire exchange. At least Rudolf looked like he felt bad.:heh:

edit : Oh, I was ninja'd by AuraTwilight
But no seriously go watch that scene in the anime as Kyrosa gives no shits at all, it's almost beautiful. As if to say "Man she pulls this shit every year when we come here, EVERY YEAR MAN."

The problem with EP5 and later ones is that they are portrayed through some really unreliable author -amnesiac Tohya or Ikuko, don't remember wich-. What happens behind scenes is, at best, speculation. I'm not saying they don't care for each other or they don't love each other, but they seem highly disfunctional for me.

Tension and a bad week can be other possibilities, if in the first games (written by Yasu, a maid that was in the island for more time, and that if she could get ANYONE right would be the people she lives with.) they don't seem so functional before or during the game. But if you want to see that scene with love, I can't dissagree with you for the catbox and premise of Umineko.

That really is the problem with Umineko, from the point of view of seeking the culprit. Yasu gets loads of attention, but her motive is weak and doesn't fit with the themes of the story and Battler's reactions. However, if it's not her and there is a sole culprit, that culprit has not had the right attention to them paid by the story. (In fact, many of the characters have hardly been paid any attention at all...like Hideyoshi, Genji, Gohda, etc.) We don't know who they are. And they don't have a satisfying motive either. I think there's some consensus that based on what we know, none of the characters has a good motive to kill everyone on the island. They might have the motivation to kill some, but not all.

It's possible that from Ryukishi's point of view, the "whodunnit" is just the "whodunnit" of the gameboards, and that the "whydunnit" for the gameboards is just that Shkanon were the puppets of meta-Beato as she wrote her stories. As in, Shkanon had no real motive other than a meta-motive.

So...maybe in the end, Ryukishi didn't even mean to tell us the culprit, and the mystery was the mystery of "who is Beatrice", which episode 7 and the rest of the series did tell us. The mystery of the culprit of the gameboards and the mystery of Beatrice's heart and Yasu. It could even be what LyricalAura suggested, and that proving the innocence of Yasu is the true mystery to solve even if we'll never know the real culprit.

Yes, it's weak from the traditional mystery perspective. I wanted to know the culprit and why they did it...but it seems that's not the story Ryukishi wanted to tell. I think the only way that the story Ryukishi wrote could have told us the "real" culprit is if the theory of there being no deliberate mass murdering culprit but a tragedy of misunderstandings is correct. He's shown us that the Ushiromiyas are flawed people who could potentially shoot someone if the circumstances were right. Something like the ep 7 tea party only without an "I'm randomly and stupidly evil" motive from Rudolf and Kyrie could work.

Actually, with the fake murder game thing, as has been mentioned by others before, if that game was what happened, I'd feel rather uncomfortably as if Battler is the best choice of culprit; after all, he's the one the game would be aimed at. Nearly everyone else could potentially have been an accomplice to Beato, but not him, the target. The person in the best (...worst..) position to freak out with paranoia and start shooting people once he thought a mass murder was occurring.

Although...were the characters really as bad as the stories say? Ep 8 had everyone being fluffy and nice. Ange had to question what the truth was, and that was either a forgery (maybe Tohya's) or something in Ange's imagination. The thing about the games is that they were written by Beatrice, and as has been mentioned up the page, although Beatrice went on about love existing in everyone's hearts, "Her true tragedy was that she couldn't see it". Yet at the same time it seems she's making herself the scapegoat for the very sake of those people. So many contradictions!

Even assuming Yasu didn't kill directly, there are certainly ways like the ones you mentioned where she could have had a hand in it. Those can even work if she has no intention whatsoever of killing anybody. With fake murder game theory + accidental murders theory, she provided a stage where things could go wrong. But that one doesn't automatically make her a culprit, just a cause.

Just being a cause is fine. Because there's even the extreme theory floating that she didn't do anything. That I cannot believe.

I agree with the things about characters. The problem is the excesive 'could or couldn't have happened' in all the story. There's basically nothing solid or that can't be argued. If, for example, Ryuukishi put real personalities in the characters (and then put them in the gameboard) guaranteed at least to the readers, we could make theories basing in whydunnit. That even would be benefitial for his posture of thinking in the character's feelings/reasons.

It's hard to "keep in mind the heart" if we can't even determine the basic aspects of some of the characters personalities because 'they could be embelished'.

But maybe proving that Beatrice didn't off them all and danced on their corpses is the objective of Umineko. So not a 'find the culprit' but a 'find the inocence'. So we are like freaking lawyers. I better go play phoenix wright, might get some hint of how to approach Umineko XD

I'm not sure I'd refer to the gameboard character as "Piece-Yasu." In my mind, "Yasu" is an identity which can solely by applied to the author, who was apparently a real person in Rokkenjima-Prime. I do not believe the characters she wrote into the story were meant to be her. Notably, Our Confession suggests the primary agent is Beatrice and Shannon and Kanon are affected roles for Beatrice. I think it more productive (although also largely no different) to call the piece character "Beatrice."

I think this is important because the distinction between the person Yasu-as-author actually is and Beatrice-as-culprit is portrayed to be are far too divergent to merely represent "myself, but written into a story." As opposed to, say, her portrayal of Maria, which appears to have been more or less accurate to reality.

I consider this a significant factor in whether I believe in her guilt in Prime, and honestly it would not be indicative of guilt because she basically has to change her entire disposition and attitude in order to act as Beatrice. Beatrice may be able to do that, but her creator isn't (and can never wholly be) Beatrice. If Beatrice is "what I would need to become in order to be the culprit," then there's just no way I could buy Yasu as a culprit, because I don't believe she could bring herself to do that.

Did something happen? Probably. Did she maybe have a reason to feel responsible for it happening? Most likely. But it almost certainly wasn't intentional and it seems more probable that somebody was taking advantage of (or misunderstanding) her attempts to make the best of a volatile situation.

The story indirectly suggests several such instances. Murder Game gone wrong is touched on in End and Dawn. Chaos breaking out over the revelation of the gold (which I think she could easily have tried to do in order to save everyone from their financial woes) is shown in Requiem and Twilight. These are both plausible, although the way they are portrayed is highly exaggerated within the context of the stories themselves.

All it really would've taken on her part is a miscalculation about how things would have played out, or a misjudgment of somebody's nature. We might never know for sure, because her judgments end up parroted by Tohya and so we're just sort of left to view the characters the way those two authors view them.

Yasu, if I remember correctly, wasn't the type to murder everyone. But let's remember that annoying analogy about chick beatrice: all those '1000' years of pain (why am I thinking about a vicious kancho? :/ ) made an innocent starry eyed girl into the crazy badass witch that paraded around kicking Battler in the crotch. I find that laughable, but is the best explanation given in the games.

Kealym

2012-09-20, 12:34

Well, I feel a bit like a parrot to say it again, but I still see no reason to object to Ryukishi generally portrayed the humans in a way accurate to their reality, and the various elements of their backgrounds can be trusted.

It's not so much me viewing the scene with love, but finding no push to doubt it. And that isn't even a Chiru-specific problem. There are elements that wouldn't be in the expected knowledge pool of ANY possible author littered all over the place, right from EP1 ("dohoho Battler, Kyrie let's have ... A FAMILY TALK." /thunderwave/), but Ryukishi wanted us to know about them, so, hey.

I myself would say There are very few things that are impossible for a truly intrepid author to learn, if they were willing to research it. The baby switch, the construction of the chapel, Eva's preferred countries to vacation to, George's habits at school, Kratsuhi's feelings about their marriage, these are all among things that could be reasonably verified with research and interviews. The fact that Ryu never suggested that such research was done is just his fault as an author, being the same man, of course, who disregards culprits getting wet in the rain and wraps up plot threads with amnesia.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-20, 13:01

EP8 decided that nobody knew how the characters were in reality with that scene about Kinzo and the happy family scene. So 'different personalities IRL' is not totally unheard of in Umineko.

Kealym

2012-09-20, 13:19

Renall

2012-09-20, 13:28

I don't quite agree with that Renall, Beatrice and Yasu are basically the same entity. It is wrong to say that Yasu was a personality in its own because she (or her) never liked that name, and therefore would have never created a personality specific for that.

Yasu simply became Beatrice, at that point there was no Yasu, only Beatrice and Shannon, in that person mind. If you want to keep calling her Yasu, that's okay, but you must be aware that is just the name for Beatrice, or Shannon if you think that's more like the true self (albeit I disagree on that).

In short, there is absolutely no Yasu personality. Yasu is just a name.

Also Beatrice is not "what I would need to become in order to be the culprit". She became Beatrice a long time before she even thought about that. And even when she underwent the second change, that was still before she planned the murders.
Beatrice is a creation. There's plenty of evidence behind that. Her titular nature, the description of her purpose for creation and repurposing later, her behavior behind the scenes in Our Confession and arguably even in Turn and Alliance when she physically appears before people, all of that suggests an independent entity to some extent from the author and a distinction being drawn.

Yasu has a personality. A poor self-opinion, strong imagination, and a desire to retreat into fantasies doesn't prevent that. There is a person there, a person who wants to reach out to someone she knew years before.

Unless you're going to suggest that Yasu wasn't Yasu when she first met Battler, at a time when Beatrice essentially didn't exist, Shannon was somewhat different, and Kanon hadn't even been thought up. Who was the person Battler knew, then? Clearly, it was the personality of Yasu-as-author.

Did she change in six years? Of course. Even if none of the stuff from Requiem is true, she'd still by necessity change over that length of time. She'd be something of a different person, but I don't think she'd be essentially a completely distinct and unrecognizable entity.

I mean look at it this way: Yes, the forgeries are stories. But at the same time, the portrayal of Beatrice to Battler in Alliance or the portrayals of Shannon and Kanon elsewhere do not make Battler remember. If Battler can't remember Yasu based on the behavior of her created characters, then either: He is impossibly dense;
Each of the characters used in the story are significantly distinct from the person he remembers; or
Yasu doesn't even exist in the stories, meaning none of her characters can be her.Now granted, it could just be that he's stupid. But he seemed to have an essential and unique relationship with another person and he should have been able to recognize that.

I find it almost impossible to believe Battler wouldn't have remembered in Prime. Whether he thought it was important is another thing, but I don't think Yasu could've fooled him. Beatrice does, and I think it's because Beatrice just isn't the same person. Beatrice has traits and convictions that Yasu lacks, but is capable of imagining having.

I wouldn't think of them as the same individual at all. The portrayal of human beings is one thing, but Beatrice/Kanon/Shannon are fictional characters. Witches and furniture. Yasu-as-author is under no obligation to portray herself accurately when the entire premise is that she's replaced herself with these characters to play out a particular fantasy. I don't think she could've gotten away with it in the real world in the same manner Beatrice does in the stories. She might have done something similar (such as a game), but I don't think she's a 1:1 correspondence with Beatrice no matter how much she wants to push that notion.

Particularly since the meta-narrative pushes the equal importance of Shannon and Kanon, not to Beatrice, but to something of a higher order than Beatrice. And of those three, Shannon and Kanon have a particularly difficult time in the meta-narrative with harming the family and each other. It's clear there are attachments the author has that her created culprit does not. I can't imagine it would be so easy to abandon those. But I don't think it was ever her intention to actually do so, as she takes too many steps designed to be nice to people and care for people than to believe she's the sort of person who could just callously orphan Ange to satisfy herself.

Put both of these conceptions of the author next to each other and the one who is innocent is deeper and more human in realization than the guilty one, who comes across as a whiny self-centered hypocrite. It also explains more things... except what actually happened. But it's not like eliminating guilty-Yasu eliminates all possible explanations. Just the one most heavily pushed, yet also the one hardest to believe.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-20, 13:29

EP8 did not decide "nobody knew how the characters were in reality" ... even the characters themselves ARGUE "You can just ask X! They'll tell you how I was..!"

You're right, EP8 did decide to disregard reality to do whatever it wanted, though. But it's so obviously weird compared to the rest of the series, I AM pushed to doubt it (Really? Nobody is the least bit resentful that they got exploded in the face..?). The only person who gets a kinda sorta pass is Kinzo, who, being dead, crazy, and prone to wild mood swings, is treated more like a phantom than a human, anyway.
You can ask a lot of people about a lot of things, but generally when you ask "Do you think X is capable of murder?" or other personal questions, you ask close people. Who, cassualy, exploded with X in the island.

I don't know why, but your comment about Kinzo made me laugh so hard I spilt my coffe. My boss is not amused...

Edit: Renall ninja'd me.

Renall

2012-09-20, 13:46

EP8 did not decide "nobody knew how the characters were in reality" ... even the characters themselves ARGUE "You can just ask X! They'll tell you how I was..!"
Who really knows you? I know a lot of people who would describe me in particular terms that do not in any way reflect who I really am, at least to myself. Even my parents, in my estimation, get me all wrong.

For example, Krauss could say "Soandso from Whatsit Co. knew me quite well, he could tell you all about me." And he could, probably. To the extent he knows Krauss, in the context he knows Krauss. Which is probably business.

What does Soandso from Whatsit Co. know about Krauss's investment troubles? His family problems and relationship with his wife? His father's health and death and a possible coverup?

What people believe is in your nature may be all that is necessary. For example, Ange apparently had to contend with some speculation about her parents, even though in her mind and her memory the idea that they could have harmed anyone seemed ridiculous. It would seem enough people considered that possibility plausible elsewhere in society that the matter didn't simply die out!

Personally, I prefer to imagine that characters cannot act outside their nature as the author/Game Master believes their nature to be. There's no way that Yasu or Tohya or any forgery writer or anybody really could get the whole picture of a person, even someone they knew intimately. I mean look at the Battler/Ange relationship in Twilight; there are aspects of Battler that Ange doesn't understand and isn't comfortable with, and vice-versa (although in the opposite case, it's probably because it's been at least 12 years and she's changed quite a lot by sheer time passage). You can never know somebody completely, so how far you're willing to believe that doubt can be pressed should inform just how much you would allow a piece to do.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-20, 14:26

Unless you're going to suggest that Yasu wasn't Yasu when she first met Battler, at a time when Beatrice essentially didn't exist, Shannon was somewhat different, and Kanon hadn't even been thought up. Who was the person Battler knew, then? Clearly, it was the personality of Yasu-as-author.

Suggesting? It was outright stated that Battler never met Beatrice before 1986.

The person Battler met was Shannon, the one who fell in love with Battler was Shannon. The promise of returning on a white horse was made to Shannon.
This is what the story says. If you disagree, then you are disagreeing with the story.

Absolutely nothing suggests that Battler ever met "Yasu" or that he even ever heard that name.

The only other personality that we can assume Battler "met" is Beatrice. This happens clearly in the metaworld, but it might be as well a metaphorical representation of something that actually happened.

If that happened in prime, then it is most certain that she revealed herself as "Beatrice", the heir of Kinzo and the original Beatrice, the new head of the family, not Yasu or Sayo Yasuda which is a fake identity that she was given by Genji.

It should have been made clear in EP8 that Beatrice is how Battler sees her, beyond the obvious lies about her background.
For example in EP8 Battler says that Beatrice is the granddaughter of the woman that gave Kinzo the gold. This isn't another personality with another background, it is still Beatrice revealed for who she actually is. and this is the background of a real person.

If Beatrice was a fictional creation as you think she is, then she couldn't possibly be separated by the fictional story of magic she was originally shown with. But that's not the case. Conversely Shannon and Kanon, those are clearly fakes, in that they are attached to a specific fictional background that is never "dispelled", because dispelling that would mean dispel their very beings.

Kealym

2012-09-20, 14:26

You can ask a lot of people about a lot of things, but generally when you ask "Do you think X is capable of murder?" or other personal questions, you ask close people. Who, cassualy, exploded with X in the island.
Of course, I'm referring to people who are still alive. Besides, the Ushiromiya's aren't even that close to one another. At this point in their lives, they see each other just a few times a year, if that. The kids get along great but never see each other, and the adults, despite some lingering squabbles, have mostly shifted into adulthood pretty amicably. To be clear, I'm saying that Rudolf / Hideyoshi, or Natsuhi / Rosa seem to have entirely friendly relations.

I don't know why, but your comment about Kinzo made me laugh so hard I spilt my coffe. My boss is not amused...

I'm ... very sorry?:heh:

I mean look at it this way: Yes, the forgeries are stories. But at the same time, the portrayal of Beatrice to Battler in Alliance or the portrayals of Shannon and Kanon elsewhere do not make Battler remember. If Battler can't remember Yasu based on the behavior of her created characters, then either: He is impossibly dense;
Each of the characters used in the story are significantly distinct from the person he remembers; or
Yasu doesn't even exist in the stories, meaning none of her characters can be her.
Not quite ... based on what we're told on the Gameboards, Battler DOES remember her. He remembers that they played together, that he had a crush on her, and had a knack for cheesy Engrish. When he meets Shannon, it's a reunion where he commends her on having grown such fine breasts, not a first meeting.

A "Ohhhh, it's Shannon-chan! Um ... sorry, the horse wouldn't fit on the boat, see..?" when she first comes to grab the kids for dinner would've prevented everything.

Who really knows you? I know a lot of people who would describe me in particular terms that do not in any way reflect who I really am, at least to myself. Even my parents, in my estimation, get me all wrong.

For example, Krauss could say "Soandso from Whatsit Co. knew me quite well, he could tell you all about me." And he could, probably. To the extent he knows Krauss, in the context he knows Krauss. Which is probably business.

What does Soandso from Whatsit Co. know about Krauss's investment troubles? His family problems and relationship with his wife? His father's health and death and a possible coverup?

What people believe is in your nature may be all that is necessary. For example, Ange apparently had to contend with some speculation about her parents, even though in her mind and her memory the idea that they could have harmed anyone seemed ridiculous. It would seem enough people considered that possibility plausible elsewhere in society that the matter didn't simply die out!

Personally, I prefer to imagine that characters cannot act outside their nature as the author/Game Master believes their nature to be. There's no way that Yasu or Tohya or any forgery writer or anybody really could get the whole picture of a person, even someone they knew intimately. I mean look at the Battler/Ange relationship in Twilight; there are aspects of Battler that Ange doesn't understand and isn't comfortable with, and vice-versa (although in the opposite case, it's probably because it's been at least 12 years and she's changed quite a lot by sheer time passage). You can never know somebody completely, so how far you're willing to believe that doubt can be pressed should inform just how much you would allow a piece to do.
Heh, I'm pretty certain if I get too deep into a philosophical discussion I'll certainly lose my arguing point.

But of course, one admits that there's always a difference between your perception of yourself (which also has room for inaccuracy), and how others percieve you, and that the context of any given relationship gives form to how you view that person ... In a pretty extreme case, I could say I don't know my brother very well at all, despite me watching him closely and interacting with him frequently for his entire life so far, because who knows whats going on inside that head of his.

But really, the idea that you can build a reasonable expectation of a person's self and behavior is a pretty easy one to accept. Maybe Soandso at Whatsit.co was pretty friendly with Krauss, they played golf together, they've known each other casually since college. Krauss unloaded all the time about his hysterical, arranged wife, and "he used to complain about Kinzo-san all the time, but one day in 1984 he just didn't wanna talk about it any more. I didn't press further." I mean, if 1000 people tell you "Man, Krauss was cheap", then hey ... maybe he was cheap. If one person then tells you "Well actually, he made sure his wedding was quite opulent", then fine, Krauss was cheap ... but wanted a really opulent wedding.

...might just be rambling at this point. What I'm saying is that you can get a real view of a person that way, sort of like ... the way a Monet painting records what a certain place looks like. Does that make sense..? Also, I'm fairly sure Ryukishi has a very whole idea of what these people are like.

jjblue1

2012-09-20, 14:45

Maybe it's this bit?

Well, it mentions a scar but that scar is supposed to be due to the wound one of the 7 sisters gave him. If Yasu's problem was a gruesome scar right in the center of his chest it's unlikely that wound damaged her reproductive organs. It's just a pretty horrible scar to look at but in this case her problem would be a problem of look with nothing to do about her sexuality.

It's all about Yasu. The last games are all about whydunnit. So, to remark the gargantuan importance of whydunnit in a novel that's all about the heart, obviously you'd have to write everything about the culprit's thoughts and feelings to drive home the importance of why. You know, justify a little the neverending made-me-want-to-tear-my-hair repetitions of "Without love, you cannot see it(it being the motive)"

Then you say 'The crime wasn't her fault/she didn't do it'. I got confused there. So EP7 was just the maid's sob story, and the real culprit is still in the shadows or lost in between lines about conspiracies and grudges? Were's the heart? Oi, really. Or I'm slow or something fishy happened there.

I think Umineko is a layered story. What we're supposed to figure out is:

- Yasu wrote some mystery tales placed on Rokkenjima with the Ushiromiya as main characters that she wanted to show to Battler (by re-acting them or reading them, I don't care do your pick) so that she would re-ignite their old bond and drive home a message (she was madly hurt by the fact he didn't keep his promise).

- On Rokkenjima however something tragic, that might be related to Yasu's tales but can also be unrelated to it, happens from which only few survive (Eva, Battler and maybe Yasu herself?)

- A couple of Yasu's tales is found and people begin to wonder if they can be a retelling of what happened, beginning to judge what was regarded as an incident as a murder case. The legend of Beato is born and people start writing their own versions of what had happened as well.

- An amnesiac Battler also start writing his own version of what happened in co-work with Ikuko (who might be or not Yasu)

- Now WE are presented with what I think is likely to be a retelling of the two tales that Yasu wrote and were found and the one Battler/Tohya wrote in form of gameboard. The tales are solvable but not necessarily depict what had happened on Prime, though they're likely containing setting and facts that might have happened on Prime.

- The meta level represent the reasoning over those tales and the reaching of the truth inside it, that in the tales the culprit is Yasu but that the tales doesn't represent the truth of Prime ergo in Prime Yasu didn't murder people.

- The motive is 'the motive for writing the tales in a way that depict Yasu as culprit'. In this sense she didn't wrote them for Battler to get revenge on him but to drive a message home. Said message likely contained a slightly scolding note so it came out harsh, though if the Rokkenjima incident hadn't happened and he hadn't believed the tales were a desecration of his family/the real thing, it's unlikely Battler would have take it that drammatically.

- As the tales contain certain truths they contain hints to figure out certain things about Prime. I'm not sure if they can go as far as to tell us who was the real culprit in the real world.

- Umineko's target is never Prime. Umineko is 'a tale into a tale'. We're supposed to focus on Yasu's tales, not on Prime. Ep 7 likely tells us why Yasu/MetaBeatrice murdered all the pieces in her tales and it's a motive that work really well and it's well detailed for 'writing a murder story'. The downside of it is it's not a satisfing motive for the murders that were surely committed by PieceYasu.

As a result of all this:
Yasu isn't Prime's culprit but she's the culprit in the gameboards/tales.
The motive presented in Ep 7 is surely for Yasu to write the stories.
If the motive presented in Ep 7 is also for PieceYasu to murder either it's unsatisfing or Yasu wasn't developed in a convincing manner.
Otherwise Piece Yasu's motive is either different or more elaborate than just 'Battler didn't keep his promise' and her caracterization was... let's say sugar coated? Didn't depict her like a potential murderer in a manner that was convincing enough?

So the man treats her wife like some doll, doesn't let her talk, doesn't defend her when his sister basically calls her a slut and doesn't acknowledge her efforts to be recognized as a good wife. If Natsuhi believed her position as wife was so strong and acknowledged by her husband, she'd not have delusions about Kinzo coming back to life praising her. She'd not cry alone in the hallways because his husband, again, dismissed her. The more I can see in that relationship is a guy forced to marry a woman and sort of getting used to her, and a woman so despaired for him to treat her as a wife and to belong to the family that she'd go into psycotic bursts when something else was piled to dismiss her as just a borrowed uterus that has no consequence in the family.

I think Krauss isn't the best of the husbands but this doesn't mean he's the worst. Jessica complains her parents aren't a happy couple like George's but she also says she has 0 respect for them and wants to leave Rokkenjima and therefore them and yet it's clear she loves them dearly.

I think the general idea isn't that there's no love between Krauss and Natsuhi but that they just aren't that armoniously paired up as Eva and Hideyoshi can be.
They're both too clumsy, prideful and yet shy in expressing their feelings. Krauss, chasing away Natsuhi, might have meant to keep her away from Eva's remarks in a moment in which he wasn't in the best position to defend her as he had to keep hidden the fact Kinzo was dead. However more than feeling protected/spared from dealing with an unpleasant situation, she felt rejected and looked down. Talk about driving the wrong message with possibly the best intentions.

That really is the problem with Umineko, from the point of view of seeking the culprit. Yasu gets loads of attention, but her motive is weak and doesn't fit with the themes of the story and Battler's reactions. However, if it's not her and there is a sole culprit, that culprit has not had the right attention to them paid by the story.

The problem with Umineko is that it doesn't pay real attention to the real crime. We're told little to nothing about what had happened on Prime and using the gameboards to speculate might not help. For example in the gameboards Kinzo is conveniently dead. They're stories so there's no problem about conserving his corpse without nobody finding it.

In real life when Kinzo was introduced to Yasu he might have had an ictus or a heart attack or something that didn't kill him but reduced him to an almost vegetal state. His personality is dead but his body is not.

Likely it would still be a problem for Krauss as Kinzo would surely be declared unable to handle business and, even if the ineritance wouldn't have to be split, the siblings can insist on Krauss not being the sole caretaker of their father's money, while Kinzo's name wouldn't work anymore as 'insurance' for Krauss' business.

It would make sense he would hid Kinzo's state, though it'll be a lot less serious and dangerous than hiding his death. At the same time it can also be viewed as a pity act not showing Kinzo while reduced in this pityful state.

Switching 'vegetal Kinzo' with 'dead Kinzo' in the tales isn't really that far from reality, it's simply more practical and, anyway, after the Rokkenjima tragedy, it would be impossible to prove if Kinzo was dead by two years or in a vegetative state by 2 years and died only due to the incident.

In a fashion it would also fit with Kinzo being alive in Ep 7&8. It would be just a 'different interpretation of Kinzo's status' in a situation in which Kinzo's status can be viewed both as dead and alive.

It's possible that from Ryukishi's point of view, the "whodunnit" is just the "whodunnit" of the gameboards, and that the "whydunnit" for the gameboards is just that Shkanon were the puppets of meta-Beato as she wrote her stories. As in, Shkanon had no real motive other than a meta-motive.

If I'm not wrong in OC's summary it was said that Shannon acted the way she did in the game because she would do everything for her lady Beatrice, which sort of doesn't match with Shannon's characterization as she usually fight Beato... so I'm rather anxiously waiting/hoping for Wanderer to translate that part...

It could even be what LyricalAura suggested, and that proving the innocence of Yasu is the true mystery to solve even if we'll never know the real culprit.

Personally I like this theory!

Actually, with the fake murder game thing, as has been mentioned by others before, if that game was what happened, I'd feel rather uncomfortably as if Battler is the best choice of culprit; after all, he's the one the game would be aimed at. Nearly everyone else could potentially have been an accomplice to Beato, but not him, the target. The person in the best (...worst..) position to freak out with paranoia and start shooting people once he thought a mass murder was occurring.

Well, we don't know if the game was setted to be realistic or it was said right from the beginning that the victims would fake being dead and people started freaking out only when one of them was found dead for real (maybe for an incident during the game as Tohya's tales implied a bullet might have been shot by mistake).

Just being a cause is fine. Because there's even the extreme theory floating that she didn't do anything. That I cannot believe.

I agree with the things about characters. The problem is the excesive 'could or couldn't have happened' in all the story. There's basically nothing solid or that can't be argued. If, for example, Ryuukishi put real personalities in the characters (and then put them in the gameboard) guaranteed at least to the readers, we could make theories basing in whydunnit. That even would be benefitial for his posture of thinking in the character's feelings/reasons.

It's hard to "keep in mind the heart" if we can't even determine the basic aspects of some of the characters personalities because 'they could be embelished'.

But maybe proving that Beatrice didn't off them all and danced on their corpses is the objective of Umineko. So not a 'find the culprit' but a 'find the inocence'. So we are like freaking lawyers. I better go play phoenix wright, might get some hint of how to approach Umineko XD

Yes, the problem with Umineko is that Ryukishi seems to think we can solve it like some sort of equation but didn't realize he put in it too many variants.

One matter is saying 4-X=2 and another is saying X-Y=2 that in Umineko's case is more like X-Y+A/B*C=2.

A person get lost in figuring all the variants and can end up picking up the wrong values because they simply can produce the same result.

EP8 did not decide "nobody knew how the characters were in reality" ... even the characters themselves ARGUE "You can just ask X! They'll tell you how I was..!"

You're right, EP8 did decide to disregard reality to do whatever it wanted, though. But it's so obviously weird compared to the rest of the series, I AM pushed to doubt it (Really? Nobody is the least bit resentful that they got exploded in the face..?). The only person who gets a kinda sorta pass is Kinzo, who, being dead, crazy, and prone to wild mood swings, is treated more like a phantom than a human, anyway.

I think Ep 8 didn't disregard reality but merely offered another interpretation for it.

Ange said Kinzo was a mean, scary grandpa but in Ep 8 Battler says that Kinzo didn't mean to be a scary grandpa but a joking grandpa only his idea of fun ended up scarying his young grandchildren.

Same result (Ange got scared), different interpretation (Kinzo being mean vs Kinzo failing at jokes).

The same can be applied to... well nearly everything in Umineko only we're often presented with the same interpretation for a certain event. Ep 1 explains the not Ushiromiya had a certain position at the table because deemed inferior, Ep 8 says that it was because it was easier for everyone to have a conversation if they were placed in that way.

Same result, different interpretation.

Renall

2012-09-20, 15:04

Suggesting? It was outright stated that Battler never met Beatrice before 1986.

The person Battler met was Shannon, the one who fell in love with Battler was Shannon. The promise of returning on a white horse was made to Shannon.
This is what the story says. If you disagree, then you are disagreeing with the story.

Absolutely nothing suggests that Battler ever met "Yasu" or that he even ever heard that name.

The Shannon he knew is essentially her, yes. The "Shannon" of the stories is not the same person. It's not that hard to understand. Shannon's apparent mutual interests never come up once and Battler never seems to make any such connection in-story. It doesn't even seem particularly in-character for her. There's also the differences in behavior and the differences in ideals and goals. Of course they mirror reality; that doesn't mean "Battler met the Shannon of the stories" is a true statement and it doesn't mean "Yasu and Beatrice are the same" is true. Because it isn't. Because it can't be.

You're quibbling rather uselessly over minor details that in no way change the point that the author of the stories is in no way wholly one of those characters, and thus none of those characters can be said to truly be her. If that's so, then one must assume all of them are there in bits and pieces, which is exactly my point. And in aggregate, I cannot believe this person could be a culprit. You can only get there by ignoring Shannon and Kanon, something you clearly don't believe we should do.

Also, it's worth noting that the meeting between the characters of Piece-Battler and Piece-Shannon never actually happened. The people who met were Battler-Prime and Yasu/Shannon-Prime. They talk about meeting, which would have happened in the context of history, but Shannon is not the only character operating in her creator's story, and cannot be a 1:1 representation. It just isn't possible.

AuraTwilight

2012-09-20, 15:08

Suggesting? It was outright stated that Battler never met Beatrice before 1986.

The person Battler met was Shannon, the one who fell in love with Battler was Shannon. The promise of returning on a white horse was made to Shannon.
This is what the story says. If you disagree, then you are disagreeing with the story.

Absolutely nothing suggests that Battler ever met "Yasu" or that he even ever heard that name.

The only other personality that we can assume Battler "met" is Beatrice. This happens clearly in the metaworld, but it might be as well a metaphorical representation of something that actually happened.

If that happened in prime, then it is most certain that she revealed herself as "Beatrice", the heir of Kinzo and the original Beatrice, the new head of the family, not Yasu or Sayo Yasuda which is a fake identity that she was given by Genji.

It should have been made clear in EP8 that Beatrice is how Battler sees her, beyond the obvious lies about her background.
For example in EP8 Battler says that Beatrice is the granddaughter of the woman that gave Kinzo the gold. This isn't another personality with another background, it is still Beatrice revealed for who she actually is. and this is the background of a real person.

If Beatrice was a fictional creation as you think she is, then she couldn't possibly be separated by the fictional story of magic she was originally shown with. But that's not the case. Conversely Shannon and Kanon, those are clearly fakes, in that they are attached to a specific fictional background that is never "dispelled", because dispelling that would mean dispel their very beings.

Jan-Poo, do you realize the difference between "Yasu is a separate personality from Beatrice" and "Yasu is an author and Beatrice is a author avatar?"

Because your responses aren't really touching on Renall's points at all. You're talking right past him.

In any case, Yasu isn't a "separate personality" from Beatrice and Shannon in the way they are from each other. In the Prime sense, all three of them are Yasu since there's nothing under the masks but Yasu. But in the stories, there seems to be NO Yasu, and Renall is suggesting she deliberately writes out her existence to make her three identities separate, but fundamentally unreal beings.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-20, 15:47

Of course, I'm referring to people who are still alive. Besides, the Ushiromiya's aren't even that close to one another. At this point in their lives, they see each other just a few times a year, if that. The kids get along great but never see each other, and the adults, despite some lingering squabbles, have mostly shifted into adulthood pretty amicably. To be clear, I'm saying that Rudolf / Hideyoshi, or Natsuhi / Rosa seem to have entirely friendly relations.

My point was that the people still alive are not as close to the possible culprit as the dead are. Not all, of course. But for example: you'd ask Eva and Hideyoshi about George, and George about his parents. You'd ask Kyrie about Rudolf. Natsuhi about Krauss and Jessica. Battler is possible to research trough his classmates, but his only close family for six years (and the ones more likely to know him well) were his -dead- grandparents. It makes a linked circle of 'who knows who'. The most trusted people of the possible murderer are dead along them.

I'm ... very sorry?:heh:

I got scolded, but that was so my fault. You should be discreet when procrastinating at work and all that jazz.

I think Umineko is a layered story. What we're supposed to figure out is:

- Yasu wrote some mystery tales placed on Rokkenjima with the Ushiromiya as main characters that she wanted to show to Battler (by re-acting them or reading them, I don't care do your pick) so that she would re-ignite their old bond and drive home a message (she was madly hurt by the fact he didn't keep his promise).

- On Rokkenjima however something tragic, that might be related to Yasu's tales but can also be unrelated to it, happens from which only few survive (Eva, Battler and maybe Yasu herself?)

- A couple of Yasu's tales is found and people begin to wonder if they can be a retelling of what happened, beginning to judge what was regarded as an incident as a murder case. The legend of Beato is born and people start writing their own versions of what had happened as well.

- An amnesiac Battler also start writing his own version of what happened in co-work with Ikuko (who might be or not Yasu)

- Now WE are presented with what I think is likely to be a retelling of the two tales that Yasu wrote and were found and the one Battler/Tohya wrote in form of gameboard. The tales are solvable but not necessarily depict what had happened on Prime, though they're likely containing setting and facts that might have happened on Prime.

- The meta level represent the reasoning over those tales and the reaching of the truth inside it, that in the tales the culprit is Yasu but that the tales doesn't represent the truth of Prime ergo in Prime Yasu didn't murder people.

- The motive is 'the motive for writing the tales in a way that depict Yasu as culprit'. In this sense she didn't wrote them for Battler to get revenge on him but to drive a message home. Said message likely contained a slightly scolding note so it came out harsh, though if the Rokkenjima incident hadn't happened and he hadn't believed the tales were a desecration of his family/the real thing, it's unlikely Battler would have take it that drammatically.

- As the tales contain certain truths they contain hints to figure out certain things about Prime. I'm not sure if they can go as far as to tell us who was the real culprit in the real world.

- Umineko's target is never Prime. Umineko is 'a tale into a tale'. We're supposed to focus on Yasu's tales, not on Prime. Ep 7 likely tells us why Yasu/MetaBeatrice murdered all the pieces in her tales and it's a motive that work really well and it's well detailed for 'writing a murder story'. The downside of it is it's not a satisfing motive for the murders that were surely committed by PieceYasu.

As a result of all this:
Yasu isn't Prime's culprit but she's the culprit in the gameboards/tales.
The motive presented in Ep 7 is surely for Yasu to write the stories.
If the motive presented in Ep 7 is also for PieceYasu to murder either it's unsatisfing or Yasu wasn't developed in a convincing manner.
Otherwise Piece Yasu's motive is either different or more elaborate than just 'Battler didn't keep his promise' and her caracterization was... let's say sugar coated? Didn't depict her like a potential murderer in a manner that was convincing enough?

I haven't forgotten about the layered part of Umineko. I think is one of the brilliant things in there, even if it's confusing as hell.

The goals of the game were screwed up since the begining, because, even if Ryuukishi insisted our challenge was to deny beatrice we ended up in a twisted romance novel. More twisted than Durarara, and less entertaining hands down.

Seeing Beatrice as Inocent is all good and dandy (for some), but still lefts the culprit in the shadows. And the mistery crew scratched their heads, gave a half assed answer, got ruthelessly eaten by goats and went to hell. That sucks.

I think Krauss isn't the best of the husbands but this doesn't mean he's the worst. Jessica complains her parents aren't a happy couple like George's but she also says she has 0 respect for them and wants to leave Rokkenjima and therefore them and yet it's clear she loves them dearly.

I think the general idea isn't that there's no love between Krauss and Natsuhi but that they just aren't that armoniously paired up as Eva and Hideyoshi can be.
They're both too clumsy, prideful and yet shy in expressing their feelings. Krauss, chasing away Natsuhi, might have meant to keep her away from Eva's remarks in a moment in which he wasn't in the best position to defend her as he had to keep hidden the fact Kinzo was dead. However more than feeling protected/spared from dealing with an unpleasant situation, she felt rejected and looked down. Talk about driving the wrong message with possibly the best intentions.

My point is in them being dysfunctional as a pair, and you went in there too. I was talking about the irony of the only really harmonious couple being Eva/Hideyoshi, even if they were together for a business marriage.

jjblue1

2012-09-20, 19:13

Not quite ... based on what we're told on the Gameboards, Battler DOES remember her. He remembers that they played together, that he had a crush on her, and had a knack for cheesy Engrish. When he meets Shannon, it's a reunion where he commends her on having grown such fine breasts, not a first meeting.

A "Ohhhh, it's Shannon-chan! Um ... sorry, the horse wouldn't fit on the boat, see..?" when she first comes to grab the kids for dinner would've prevented everything.

I think it's a pity Umineko never presented Battler's version of how things went because there were some interesting things I noticed in the Battler/Shannon relation.
Yes, Battler remembered her, as soon as he heard her name:

"They're probably busy with cleaning or lunch arrangements. It's alright, we'll go and greet them properly afterwards. Shannon's reception will sure be better than Gohda's nosy one, right? Heehehe!"

"Shannon? ......Shannon. ......Aaaaaaaaahh... I remember, that girl! She's still a servant now? Such spirit!"

But my feeling is he remembers a different Shannon, not simply a Shannon that looked different...

"...Ah...! Jessica had me surprised, but, Shannon-chan! You too, you've gotten to be a completely beautiful woman, haven't you!"
"Y-...your words are too good for me, I'm flattered..."
"Bu~ut, food on this island must be reeeally nutritional, hmmmm? What are you eating, where are you training, to get boobs that big?~!! Let me feel them a bit and see whether yours or Jessica's are bigger, oka~ay?!"

but a Shannon that also acted differently.

Also there's this

"Yep. Those were the only times that Shannon-chan smiled like a girl her age."
"I might have......gotten a bit carried away. It's embarrassing..."
"Battler's insanely huge now, but back then, Shannon and I were both taller and stronger than him."

It might mean nothing but we know that Jessica and Battler were used to fight and Battler was used to lose as a kid. It's possible he was used to lose against Shannon as well, though maybe they didn't really fight but, for example, race.

All in all though the picture of Shannon that Battler seemed to remember is of a girl who, at least around the cousins, is more vivacious than the timid, shy, overly polite Shannon he met.

Also, since Battler admitted he liked Shannon back then it's possible that part of his 'ideal woman' description was supposed to match with the Shannon of back then or, at least, with how he saw Shannon back then.

Even if in Ep 3 he's... let's say slow in remembering his promise

"That's right, this is a memory I want to disappear, the bittersweet kind of thing that everyone does in adolescence as they transition to becoming adults... Aaaaarrggh..."
Anyways, it was just something I'd let slip out without thinking, so I hadn't remembered exactly what I had said.
But when those words were recited to me, it was all so embarrassing.

and after

Actually, six years ago, I remember taking notice of her just a little bit.

though he denied remembering or wanting to remember:

"I don't remember anything about what I said off the top of my head. Please, don't make me remembe-r."

and says he doesn't understand the point of having an 'only one'.

"......Six years ago... That's a long time. What did these six years mean to me? I've just gotten taller. It was just a waste of time, six years I spent obstinately fighting with my dad."
"What about you, Battler? Have you gotten a girlfrie-nd?"
"Hmm, I wonder. There's a lot of girls that I play with. But there is no 'only one'. ......I'm just like a kid. I think it's more fun to be noisy with a large group of people than being alone with one person."

and in Ep 7 he's even faster in remembering it and without Shannon prompting him

.........Shannon-chan.
Six years ago, you were part of our group, and we played together a lot, didn't we...
Back then, I think I might've......liked Shannon-chan.
That was the age when we were all overly self-conscious, in love with love.
Bittersweet memories of jokes involving melodramatic, flippant words.
"......That takes me back. I think I remember saying all kinds of stuff that I'd be way too embarrassed to say now. Gyaaah, just remembering it is making my face go red!"
"Hihihi. Shannon might be a scatterbrain, but her memory's incredible. Guess I'll just have to ask her all about your dark, embarrassing history."
"Qu, quit it. That was six years ago, so give me a break...!"
......I see. So, Shannon-chan is going out with George-aniki.
..................
What am I thinking? Could this be...jealousy?
I didn't really think about it until now, ...but that thing Shannon-chan and I had back then...that was probably my first love.
Well, it's not like I have any right to be jealous, after forgetting the whole thing until we met again.

So not only he hadn't totally forgotten but he had feelings for her that somehow survived even if he put them aside because Shannon and George are dating.

There are also some other interesting things Battler said:

"Even though you're the one who brought up this subject, why do you have to betray me like this? Women are creatures who always ask questions, and yet, they almost never answer them. What cruel creatures, seriously."

Though he said it in a joking manner if you turn it over Shannon actually never answered to his request to leave the island and move to his home. Sure, she was supposed to do it after one year but there's another thing interesting about the whole promise thing...

"If only I could leave this place, ......I'd be able to read so much more..."
"............"
"How long do you plan to be a servant, Shannon-chan?"
"......I don't know."
"If, someday, you decide to quit..."
"If I do......?"
"Come over to my place. And then, ......we won't need to worry about time running out anymore."
"......That's right. ......We could be together......as long as we wanted..."
"I know that day'll come someday."
"......You think it will...?"
"Yeah. I'm certain of it. When that day comes, ......I'll come for you, riding a white horse."
"......Wha......?"
"I, ...... I wonder... when that day will come..."
"Very soon, once you've made up your mind."
"Huh.........?"
"Any time's good for me. This is your life we're talking about, Shannon-chan. You should think about it carefully before you decide. .......And once you've made up your mind, I'll respect your decision, no matter when you make it."
"O, ......okay......"
"I'll keep on waiting until that day comes."
"Nn, ......ah......"
"I, ......I'm glad... ......Thank you......"
"Heheh......"
"......Thanks for giving me time."
"You have all the time in the world."
"No. ......I'd feel bad if I kept you waiting too long."
"Hahaha."
"So, I've prepared myself. ......No, I should say that I will prepare myself. ......I'm not going to quit my job right now. ......Yes, ...one year. ......I'll do it in one year. One year from now, right here, ......I'd like to make my decision."
"......A whole year, huh? That sounds good. Spring, summer, autumn, winter. ......That's a good amount of time to look deep into your heart."
"S, ......so...next year......"
"Yep. I'll be waiting for that day to come."
"Yes. ......I'll be waiting too...... ...Make sure......you come, okay...?"
"Yeah."
"......Don't forget. Come here next year, okay?"
"Yeah. I'll definitely come. I'll meet you here."

Maybe it's just the translation but actually Battler promised to come for her on a white horse when she would decide to quit being a servant and come over at his place. However he couldn't know Shannon had already decided to do so, in fact he gave her time in which she could decide for a yes or a no.
So for Shannon the white horse was tied to Battler's return while for Battler it was tied to Shannon's decision, whom he'll never know (and it probably didn't help Shannon looks already engaged with George when he finally comes back and that he promised to respect her decision).

Sure, he didn't come back but:

"That's right. We're already old enough. It's not like we couldn't meet each other when our parents aren't around. ...It might not be a bad idea to gather the cousins together and play every once in a while."

Sure, he's referring to the cousins but it might be a veiled reference to the fact that Shannon was old enough to come and search for him if she wanted to tell him her decision.

Which is sort of fun because Shannon will short later say:

"But I think that is very important. It's very hard for people to always be together, to always be friendly unless they desire it."

Which might be a veiled complain to how Battler never showed up but if you apply it in the reverse way, she also never tried contacting him which might be interpreted by Battler as she didn't desire to keep contact with him.

Oh and Battler said something rather wise and that applies well to Shannon/Yasu

"Well, who you love depends on the person. Isn't everything fine as long as it's someone who's fun to be with? Being with someone doesn't require any permission as long as the two people accept each other. If you worry about your parents or your family, then you lose. Don't forget that. You can't go out with someone with incomplete feelings."

It's also interesting that this is in Ep 3 which likely was written by Tohya/Battler.

Something else I found interesting is how in EP 6 (in which Tohya/Battler should have had his memory back/understood & remembered everything) Battler was cold toward ChickBeato because she wasn't the Beato he wanted to see so desperately and to whom he wanted to apologize. If you see it as a metaphor, the Shannon he found wasn't the Shannon he wanted to find (and possibly apologize for making her wait) so he kept her at distance acting in a way that... let's say wasn't the one Battler usually had around her (though in the games Battler doesn't seem cold with Shannon, quite the contrary, it's possible his behaviour wasn't exactly like that previously).

So I really wonder what would have happened if Shannon hadn't presented herself as dating George or has tried contacting Battler to tell him she wanted to leave.

The goals of the game were screwed up since the begining, because, even if Ryuukishi insisted our challenge was to deny beatrice we ended up in a twisted romance novel. More twisted than Durarara, and less entertaining hands down.

Seeing Beatrice as Inocent is all good and dandy (for some), but still lefts the culprit in the shadows. And the mistery crew scratched their heads, gave a half assed answer, got ruthelessly eaten by goats and went to hell. That sucks.

Yes, one of the downsides of Umineko is that the Prime culprit is left unknown. The mystery can't be solved and justice isn't/can't be done. Not a single character is presented that want true justice for Prime because even Ange searches for a truth that would please her, she's not really ready to accept a truth that won't be 'Eva is the culprit' regardless of what she says and, in the end, she'll reject whatever truth she learnt.

I guess Umineko wanted the 'real world' to reperesent the unfairiness of the real world where not always justice is done and people search the truth for noble ideals.

While I can apprecciate the attempt at realism, it's still annoying not to have a solution for the mystery. It looks like an unfinished story and, as far as I'm involved, that's displeasing.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-21, 11:16

Jan-Poo, do you realize the difference between "Yasu is a separate personality from Beatrice" and "Yasu is an author and Beatrice is a author avatar?"

Yes I do, you would know if you had read this:

Naturally if your point is that Yasu/Beatrice described herself somewhat different in her own story well that's just something that anyone can do. Even Battler could have done that. In that case you can say that Character-Battler is different from Author-Battler. But the distinction you made with Yasu and Beatrice isn't quite right.

To answer both you and Renall. If we strictly consider the stories and exclude prime then Yasu simply doesn't exist. The culprit is Beatrice, which of course doesn't mean that the culprit is a witch in a literal sense. that character makes her appearance in EP2 directly inside the gameboard albeit it was very much hinted to exist since EP1

Now if we consider prime alone, there are no more reasons to think that the author is Yasu rather than thinking it is Beatrice.
To reiterate what I said earlier Yasuda's identity is that of a random fukuin children, it is a fake name given to her by Genji, it doesn't reflect the truth of that person at all.
Beatrice however is the daughter of a woman that was also called Beatrice and Kinzo. She is the granddaughter of Beatrice castiglioni. She is in other words the chosen heir of Kinzo, the head of the Ushiromiya family.
This background is more true to the real person than that of Yasuda. And this is what the real person identifies with. Certainly not Yasuda, and even less with Yasu, which is a nickname and a role she always hated.

AuraTwilight

2012-09-21, 15:48

To answer both you and Renall. If we strictly consider the stories and exclude prime then Yasu simply doesn't exist. The culprit is Beatrice, which of course doesn't mean that the culprit is a witch in a literal sense. that character makes her appearance in EP2 directly inside the gameboard albeit it was very much hinted to exist since EP1

And no one contests that, but we're not excluding Prime in this discussion.

Jan-Poo is a jewel in the roughJan-Poo is a jewel in the roughJan-Poo is a jewel in the rough

Quote:
Originally Posted by AuraTwilight View Post
Jan-Poo, do you realize the difference between "Yasu is a separate personality from Beatrice" and "Yasu is an author and Beatrice is a author avatar?"
Yes I do, you would know if you had read this:

Quote:
Naturally if your point is that Yasu/Beatrice described herself somewhat different in her own story well that's just something that anyone can do. Even Battler could have done that. In that case you can say that Character-Battler is different from Author-Battler. But the distinction you made with Yasu and Beatrice isn't quite right.

To answer both you and Renall. If we strictly consider the stories and exclude prime then Yasu simply doesn't exist. The culprit is Beatrice, which of course doesn't mean that the culprit is a witch in a literal sense. that character makes her appearance in EP2 directly inside the gameboard albeit it was very much hinted to exist since EP1

[quote]Now if we consider prime alone, there are no more reasons to think that the author is Yasu rather than thinking it is Beatrice.
To reiterate what I said earlier Yasuda's identity is that of a random fukuin children, it is a fake name given to her by Genji, it doesn't reflect the truth of that person at all.

Well we can't call her Lion; we can't call her Shannon or Beatrice. As far as describing the part of her that is neither of those three, Yasu works. Don't tell me this is a semantics thing, because arguing with Renall and I because "Yasu isn't the truth of her name" is really dumb and completely irrelevant.

Beatrice however is the daughter of a woman that was also called Beatrice and Kinzo. She is the granddaughter of Beatrice castiglioni. She is in other words the chosen heir of Kinzo, the head of the Ushiromiya family.
This background is more true to the real person than that of Yasuda. And this is what the real person identifies with. Certainly not Yasuda, and even less with Yasu, which is a nickname and a role she always hated.

But she's not Beatrice. She may claim that identity, and she may fit into it well, but it's not who she is. It's just an elaborate delusion. And since she can't seem to possess the qualities of ruthlessness, malice, force of personality, and the other personality details assigned to her, then she's not really identifying with Beatrice; she just wants to be her.

Beatrice is not her true self. At best she's an otherkin persona, at worst she's totally flipped her balls. She no better matches it than Robbie Wheelings is Pardieu in Mazes and Monsters.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-21, 21:38

Well you are entitled to have your opinion and claim that Beatrice is a fake persona and Yasu is different, but that's not how I see it. While Shannon and Kanon are completely different, Yasu and Beatrice lie on the exact same continuum. They aren't different, their story and personality do not conflict with each others, it is just that Yasu at a certain point became Beatrice, but that is just an evolution a personal growth not the construction of a new personality.

The point remains that Beatrice still has all the memories of Yasu, which is something you cannot say about Shannon and Kanon. And in my opinion Yasu has always been as malicious as Beatrice is. After all if she pulled those pranks, you can't say "oh but it wasn't her, it was just her fake persona", balls, it was Yasu, and she totally enjoyed that.

Additionally, note that Yasu always saw Shannon as someone different from herself, even before Beatrice kicked in. But that never happened with Beatrice. Well... if you exclude Gaap. But the point is that once Clair-Beatrice was formed, unlike the other personalities there was a total identification. Yasu didn't create Beatrice, Yasu became Beatrice.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-21, 21:58

So basically, Yasu is a character X that we don't know anything about. She's the unknown basis for the other personalities. Then Beatrice in prime is Yasu taking the role of 'heir'. Shanon is Yasu taking the role of 'ideal maid'. Then Kanon is Shanon taking the role of a snarky aloof guy that she acts as when helping Jessica to fool her classmates (and the protective little brother Yasu talks to any other time).

Then, by expanding the fact that Yasu thinks that acting as someone makes a new person, Beatrice is furniture to be heir, Shanon furniture to be maid, and Kanon furniture to be a suportive/agressive guy.

That's what AuraTwilight says? I can't find a fault in that.

GuestSpeaker

2012-09-21, 22:46

EP8 decided that nobody knew how the characters were in reality

I always thought it depicted that since pieces can't do what their models couldn't, that these people were much more 3d than we gave them credit. Sure they could fight and be petty and kill in the right circumstances, but they could just as easily be nice and play games and have a good time.

I think Umineko is a layered story. What we're supposed to figure out is:

This summary sort of reflects how I feel, but also ties into something I've been noticing. The parallels between the who Yasu and Battler's promise and Ikuko and Battler's amnesia. Battler's sin was not reneging on his promise, but forgetting it. Here's a thought I've only half formed:

- Battler has amnesia, and forgets whatever new life he had begun with Yasu/Shannon (so maybe did come back for her or whatever)
- When being reminded of Battler, he goes into painful attacks of something
- He somehow seems ok with reading the forgery about the incident (prepared according to Beatrice "on a whim" (so maybe written beforehand or for some other reason))
- Meta-Beatrice is playing a game to get Battler to remember he made a promise, and for it she must constantly put him through the paces or seeing his family murdered in different ways (writing forgeries with him, enjoying the game but not realising until later that he actually feels real pain about it)

I am phrasing this badly, but basically, what if the white horse promise is just a representation of what Battler actually forgot, the fact they were going to start anew together. It is a little bit 'the vow' or whatever that movie is. Battler never sinned against Beatrice (Ikuko) but forget the relationship they had that began it all.

It makes Ikuko the culprit, because she is killing them over and over again just for her "ceremony". It doesn't go any way to explaining prime though (in which something clearly happened) and still has Yasu as a selfish enough person, but it fits with the story nicely.

As for what did happen on Prime, there was clearly an explosion incident, and Yasu probably had some part in it. But when you are playing with explosives, you don't need to actively kill every person individually, it just needs to happen.

I only really can't decide why Yasu wouldn't just be upfront about it, though Battler did ask that himself.

AuraTwilight

2012-09-22, 00:25

The point remains that Beatrice still has all the memories of Yasu, which is something you cannot say about Shannon and Kanon.

Yes, I can, considering that Piece-Shannon and Kanon seem to know everything Piece-Beatrice seems to by fantasy fiat.

And in my opinion Yasu has always been as malicious as Beatrice is.

Yea, when those other girls bullied Yasu she totally blew off half their faces with a shotgun and made a party spread in the church out of their entrails.

After all if she pulled those pranks, you can't say "oh but it wasn't her, it was just her fake persona", balls, it was Yasu, and she totally enjoyed that.

Just because she enjoyed it doesn't mean anything. She enjoys what Kanon and Shannon enjoy, too. There's either no dividing line between the four, or they are all distinct from each other. You can't have it both ways. Beatrice and Yasu have clear and demonstratable differences in characterization and personality. You can't even claim that Beatrice is more real than Shannon, since Beatrice's persona can be edited on the fly too.

"Beatrice you love Battler now instead of Shannon kthx."

Additionally, note that Yasu always saw Shannon as someone different from herself, even before Beatrice kicked in. But that never happened with Beatrice. Well... if you exclude Gaap.

Thanks for totally undermining your own point.

But the point is that once Clair-Beatrice was formed, unlike the other personalities there was a total identification. Yasu didn't create Beatrice, Yasu became Beatrice.

She also became Shannon, identifying equally as her in the day time.

Jan-Poo

2012-09-22, 01:05

Yes, I can, considering that Piece-Shannon and Kanon seem to know everything Piece-Beatrice seems to by fantasy fiat.

They cannot possibly consider Yasu's memories as their own, especially not Shannon. Shannon and Yasu existed at the same time, that would be quite a problem.

Yea, when those other girls bullied Yasu she totally blew off half their faces with a shotgun and made a party spread in the church out of their entrails.

Absolutely pointless.
We both agree that "this person" didn't kill anyone in prime.
By implying that Beatrice is the "psycho killer" mask of Yasu you are conveniently forgetting all those scenes where Beatrice is substantially presented as a good person.
In other words the "psycho killer" is as much a mask for Beatrice than it is for Yasu. It cannot be attributed to either's nature.

This is actually a good point. It is evident that Beatrice can wear masks, that she can pretend to be what she isn't, as she is clearly shown to be now a cruel monster and then a good person. If she was a mask herself she couldn't do that. She can wear masks because she is a real person.

Just because she enjoyed it doesn't mean anything. She enjoys what Kanon and Shannon enjoy, too.

Not the point. If she enjoys bad taste pranks then that means the person is malicious, not just the made up persona. Else she wouldn't do it. Your claim that Yasu isn't malicious doesn't work. She is. She feels everything that Beatrice feels.

There's either no dividing line between the four, or they are all distinct from each other. You can't have it both ways. Beatrice and Yasu have clear and demonstratable differences in characterization and personality. You can't even claim that Beatrice is more real than Shannon, since Beatrice's persona can be edited on the fly too.

The differences you see in Yasu and Beatrice are just the normal differences you can see between a person and his younger self. I am clearly different from how I was when I was a kid, but that doesn't mean I ever had two different personalities.

You want to convince me that Yasu and Beatrice are distinct? Then show me conclusive evidence that they existed at the same time.

Patchwork Chimera

2012-09-22, 01:44

Yea, when those other girls bullied Yasu she totally blew off half their faces with a shotgun and made a party spread in the church out of their entrails.

Naw, there was just a misterious accident in wich a maid broke something important and made her quit her job in fear. But that was the witch Beatrice, who felt insulted by that non-believer, right?

Just because she enjoyed it doesn't mean anything. She enjoys what Kanon and Shannon enjoy, too. There's either no dividing line between the four, or they are all distinct from each other. You can't have it both ways. Beatrice and Yasu have clear and demonstratable differences in characterization and personality. You can't even claim that Beatrice is more real than Shannon, since Beatrice's persona can be edited on the fly too.

"Beatrice you love Battler now instead of Shannon kthx."

I always tought about that this way: everything Yasu did was blamed on one of the personality-characters-MPDresults. Like, if she was feeling antsy or resenful towards someone, she was Kanon. If she felt serene and happy she was Shanon. If she felt angry or half murderous, she was Beatrice.

She linked the personalities to the actions she did. Like 'I pushed that maid downstairs. But that wasn't because I (as Shanon) didn't like her, it's cuz Beatrice totally possesed me.' or 'I stole the keys, but Gaap posessed me so it really wasn't me, it was Gaap.' She could condition herself to show certain emotions in the daily basis -"summoning furniture", like the "counting to ten and breathing steadly" done by normal people-, but when pushed she went sour or disrespectful and some of the furniture came to take the blame.

Basically, I can say that I have a furniture that's really troll and bitchy named Mera. So everytime I'm feeling bitchy it's because I'm being possesed--Mera came to play. When I'm calm you can call me Patchy, who is a cool big sister that does everything right (because she's always here when I'm calm and less prone to spill the tea on the lady's face).

So she decided that everytime she thought of Battler, it was because Beatrice was possesing her. Before, that heartache was all Shanon's, but then she blamed Beatrice's random apparitions for it.

Wanderer

2012-09-22, 05:25

This is actually a good point. It is evident that Beatrice can wear masks, that she can pretend to be what she isn't, as she is clearly shown to be now a cruel monster and then a good person. If she was a mask herself she couldn't do that. She can wear masks because she is a real person.

Does that make Virgilia a real person? Does it make Bern and Lambda real people? Erika? Lion? What about Kanon's repressed feelings towards Jessica?

What you are basically saying, I think, is that the only "true" mask of Yasu is Beatrice.

But then why should we give a shit how Shannon and Kanon feel? How are they even relevant to anything? Why does Kanon even exist at all?

AuraTwilight

2012-09-22, 17:36

They cannot possibly consider Yasu's memories as their own, especially not Shannon. Shannon and Yasu existed at the same time, that would be quite a problem.

...And? They're not separate minds, bro. Yasu is LARPing, and controls their every 'thought' and action. Meaning they possess Yasu's memories and simply have to ignore what isn't supposed to be 'theirs'.

...Which also goes for Beatrice, because she has to ignore certain memories of Yasu in order to be a thousand year witch. She also had to adopt some of Shannon's memories as her own due to taking her love for Battler, so she's not even a perfect 1:1 Yasu correlation.

Absolutely pointless.
We both agree that "this person" didn't kill anyone in prime.
By implying that Beatrice is the "psycho killer" mask of Yasu you are conveniently forgetting all those scenes where Beatrice is substantially presented as a good person.
In other words the "psycho killer" is as much a mask for Beatrice than it is for Yasu. It cannot be attributed to either's nature.

You're the one who claimed that Yasu and Beatrice were equally malicious and cruel. Beatrice enjoys mass murder. Beatrice, being a fictional being, performs fictional murders and derives fictional enjoyment from them. Stop flip-flopping on this issue as it's convenient for you.

This is actually a good point. It is evident that Beatrice can wear masks, that she can pretend to be what she isn't, as she is clearly shown to be now a cruel monster and then a good person. If she was a mask herself she couldn't do that. She can wear masks because she is a real person.

This is an unsupported assumption. Why can't maskception occur? :P

Shannon and Kanon also wear masks, by the way. So why are you insisting Beatrice is more real or a 1:1 correlation to Yasu when Shannon and Kanon share most of Beatrice's qualifications of being Yasu that you seem to be using?

Not the point. If she enjoys bad taste pranks then that means the person is malicious, not just the made up persona. Else she wouldn't do it. Your claim that Yasu isn't malicious doesn't work. She is. She feels everything that Beatrice feels.

She also feels everything Shannon and Kanon feels, which is why she had to shuffle around the emotions of her characters in the first place. If Shannon's love was inconvenient for her and she didn't feel Shannon's emotions, why didn't she just delete that shit? And why could she just accept an imaginary love at the drop of a hat.

The only answer is that Shannon's thoughts and emotions are just as real as Beatrice's, which you are insisting are just as real, infact synonymous with, Yasu's. You can't have it both ways. If Beatrice is Yasu instead of being a role she plays, they ALL are.

The differences you see in Yasu and Beatrice are just the normal differences you can see between a person and his younger self. I am clearly different from how I was when I was a kid, but that doesn't mean I ever had two different personalities.

Beatrice liked stealing people's brooms while Yasu didn't.

You want to convince me that Yasu and Beatrice are distinct? Then show me conclusive evidence that they existed at the same time.

I don't need to, it was a major scene in the novel. You can't just choose to ignore it just because it's inconvenient for you. Show me that Yasu's adopting of Beatrice's identity is substantially different from Beatrice adopting Shannon's love, because Beatrice identifies with it so absolutely and completely that you'd SWEAR that she personally experienced it....as Shannon!

I always tought about that this way: everything Yasu did was blamed on one of the personality-characters-MPDresults. Like, if she was feeling antsy or resenful towards someone, she was Kanon. If she felt serene and happy she was Shanon. If she felt angry or half murderous, she was Beatrice.

She linked the personalities to the actions she did. Like 'I pushed that maid downstairs. But that wasn't because I (as Shanon) didn't like her, it's cuz Beatrice totally possesed me.' or 'I stole the keys, but Gaap posessed me so it really wasn't me, it was Gaap.' She could condition herself to show certain emotions in the daily basis -"summoning furniture", like the "counting to ten and breathing steadly" done by normal people-, but when pushed she went sour or disrespectful and some of the furniture came to take the blame.

This is how I always felt about it. Yasu is basically a teenage Maria. ^_^

Wanderer

2012-09-23, 05:06

Next installment. This should be the second to last one. I'm getting close to the end.

Continuing from Beatrice's predictions on how 'they' (her audience) will approach the mystery of letters appearing in closed rooms.

Certainly, in Carr's closed room taxonomies...
there are listed many false closed rooms made to appear like true closed rooms. They provide enjoyment with tricks, and when thinking of how to entertain with mystery novels it's true that a tangibly identifiable "answer" which can be reasoned out is convenient. It's why we can say that there's no helping the vast majority of mysteries from overflowing with false closed rooms.
(But incidentally this also makes for a limit on the thinking involved in the majority of closed rooms. Don't misunderstand, I'm not criticizing false closed rooms. What I am criticizing is a section of narrow-minded humans who, because they only know false closed rooms, think it's the one and only kind of closed room mystery.)

However, we mustn't forget that in Carr's closed rooms taxonomies there are also descriptions of methods for murder in true closed rooms, too.

In fact, if guaranteed a perfect closed room in red, it becomes easy to reason based on Holmes closed room taxonomies.

According to Boucher, closed room murders can be explained with three categories.
To make these categorizations extremely clear, I've written them below.

Listed are: The crime was committed before the closed room was constructed, it was committed while the closed room was up, or it was committed after the closed room had been destroyed.
It's only these 3 categories.

If red truth says it's impossible to do it while the closed room was up, then it would be natural to think the crime was committed before the closed room's construction or after its destruction.

If we are to use an incident of the sudden appearance of a letter as an example, then the letter was placed before the closed room, or after the closed room; it's just these 2 categories.

With the former, you can doubt the person who confirmed it's absence when they locked the room.
With the latter, you can doubt the person who discovered the letter.
In other words, if you base your thinking by Boucher's closed room taxonomies, you can immediately suspect that someone in the Ushiromiya family is cooperating with the culprit.
And it should be clear as day who is more suspicious between the children from the guesthouse who confirmed the closed room, and the lone survivors of the previous tragedy, Krauss and Natsuhi, who claimed to "have been witness to a demon summoned by a witch killing their relatives".

For those who see this world as a mystery, they won't be caught by this kind of deception.
Because to declare "I saw a witch, I saw magic, I saw demons" in this world is the same as confessing to being bought out to play a part in the culprit's ruse.

What a simple and cheap mystery.
Probably, for those people who love to read the mystery novels that I have boundless respect for, they'll see right through it with a big laugh.
To witness demons, even with a brazen display of fantasy as "proof", is to mystery the height of satire; it will no doubt get laughs.

Or so I think.

About 1 in 1000 people might seriously believe that a witch summoned a demon.
Only for that rare person can fantasy be sufficient for my world.

---------------------------------

Excuse the digression.
So anyway, I will confuse the foregoing matter using the upper world, decorating it with the preface of an incomprehensible incident.

The target of the upcoming Second Twilight will be Shannon.
We'll have it so the women will go up to the guest house's second floor while Krauss and the male servants fortify the first floor.
And so, Shannon and George can be together.
George will probably attend to the frightened Shannon.
These two 'close' ones will be the target of the Second Twilight.
This time I will 'tear apart those who are close' with an abduction.

After going to the servants' room on the first floor, Shannon will head to the bathroom.
Naturally, George will come too.
But of course he can't go inside the girls' bathroom.
He'll wait at the entrance.
This is not a single person bathroom, but a bathroom made for use in the guesthouse, designed large enough to serve several people at once.
At this point Shannon will exit through the window in the back of the bathroom.
Then, Kumasawa will enter.
And she will lock the window Shannon escaped through.
Then she'll scream to announce some kind of incident.

-----------------------------------------

"Wh, what's wrong Kumasawa-san?! I'm going to open the door!!"
George opens the door to the girls' bathroom.
When he does, Kumasawa's face will be pale and she will be pointing to a stall, shaking.
"Hi-ii, h-iiiii...!!!"
"What happened...!!! Shannon! Shannon!!"
Shannon went into the girls' bathroom before Kumasawa.
Kumasawa's scream had conveyed only that something strange had happened to Shannon.
Fearing the worst, George peered into the stall that Kumasawa was pointing at.
There was... pasted thickly... in red...
a creepy magic circle drawn on the wall in blood-like paint...

"Wh, what is this...!? Shannon! Where's Shannon!?"
"I, I don't know...!"
"That's impossible!! Shannon went in right before you, so why isn't she here!? Shannon!? Shannon!?!?"

There were 3 stalls, but all of them were empty.
There was only one entrance.
And since George had been there the whole time, right now Shannon should be somewhere in the bathroom.

It's hard for George to imagine, but she could have left through the window in the back.
However, it's locked from the inside, and he can't understand why Shannon would need to crawl out a window in the first place.
It makes no sense. This couldn't happen.
Shannon suddenly disappeared and was exchanged for a creepy magic circle...!!
"Geo, George-sama... um... there's one of the head's envelopes..."
On the toilet in the stall with the magic circle... there was a mysterious envelope... just like the last tauntful envelope from the witch.

"It can't be... this is... this is...!!"
George picks up the envelope and violently tears it open.
Seeing only a single short sentence... as if assaulting by a wave of dizziness, George staggers into a wall, leaning on it.

'At the Second Twilight tear apart those who are close'

Since I'd like to make Flauros the one responsible, I want to leave some Flauros-style evidence.
Something like having the stall be hideously burned. Or having traces of an explosion from inside it.
Once again they'll find weird evidence that they'll think clearly could not be produced by human means.

Regarding this, it could all be prepared with leisure before the incident.
The only problem is the possibility that one of the female guests would come in to this bathroom beforehand.

For that, the day before the incident the bathroom on the first floor of the guesthouse could be 'out of order', so it would be necessary to instead use the bathrooms of the various bedrooms.
This itself can also be interesting as foreshadowing for the trick.

Or if the flashy decorations were something that couldn't be noticed from the outside, having the stall's door closed would be all that's needed to keep guests from seeing them.
Then later thinking back, they can realize that no one was supposed to be in stall during that time, and that door was closed.
...So then, who closed that door?
If they reason from "no one was supposed to be there", they should be able to figure out that the magic circle was prepared beforehand.
I hope to have a lot of fun debating the Second Twilight.

It shouldn't be hard to suspect Shannon and Kumasawa here.
We'll have a scenario where Natsuhi comes to this conclusion and accuses the servants.
This is a mystery novel gimmick.
I'll use the readers' expectations, that the reasoning coming from the other characters is usually wrong, against them.
By having Natsuhi say something is "right", it will cause them to think it must not be so; it's a confusion technique.

So after that, Natsuhi and Krauss will level suspicion at the servants.
Of course George and the others will object.
They will insist that the servants are victims caught up in the same situation as everyone else.
After the discourse between Krauss and the servants, the decision will be to hunker down in two separate groups: A relatives group and a servants group.

The relatives group will stay in the guesthouse and the servants group will go to the mansion.
In the middle of all this, George will probably insist on looking outside for Shannon.
He can look as much as he wants.
He'll probably be quickly chilled to the bone in the thunderstorm, give up, and return to the guesthouse.

Following that, all the servants will have a meeting together in the mansion.
They'll reaffirm what their next actions are.

The Forth~Eighth Twilights will be a closed room chain.
The feature of closed room chains is that the corpses will be found in a chosen order.
As long as the first closed room will be on the first floor and the others on the second floor or higher, or in places outside the mansion, I can control the flow of their investigation.

"Servants. Your turn has finally come."
Beatrice gathered all the servants to the mansion's banquet hall to make this pronouncement.
Genji's, Shannon's, and Kanon's expressions were calm, but Kumasawa's and Gohda's weren't.

"...Is it really going well? I'm worried..." (Kumasawa)
"Since I've never done something like this, I'm not sure whether I'm enjoying myself or I'm nervous... haha... haha..."
Gohda feigned laughter while trying to appear composed.
They don't know.
They don't even know that Eva and the others are really dead.

This is Beato's deception, made possible by her discovery of the gold.
They believe the five victims were also paid off, and that they're just playing dead.

Excluding exceptions like Genji, most bribees are easier to manage if they aren't informed that they're involved with murder.
It's case by case.

"Alright, now everyone move to your respective rooms. Playing dead can be surprisingly tiring, you know.
Lie in a position that won't wear you out. Kukkukku!"

Kanon in the guestroom.
Genji in on the 2nd floor, the VIP room.
Kumasawa on the 2nd floor, Natsuhi's bedroom.
Gohda on the 3rd floor, waiting room.
Shannon in the Chapel.
They all go to their respective murder scenes and do their make-up.
From the Forth Twilight on they are all 'gouge and kill'.
They are all to be gouged with some of the Seven Stakes of Purgatory.
Everybody attends to their separate tasks in their separate rooms.
Genji is composed. So are Shannon and Kanon. Gohda is nervous that his faking will be found out.
Kumasawa is over that, and is starting to look forward to putting on the show.

"Wohhohohoho... I've played a lot of pranks, but this is the biggest one I've ever done."
Kumasawa was chuckling in Natsuhi's room.

"Is everything ready, Kumasawa?"
"Oh, Beatrice-sama. As a servant it just doesn't feel right to lie on madam's bed"
"Lies. I know that while making it you've wanted to jump on it once or twice."
"Wohhohohohoho. That is what Beatrice would say."
"Okay, time to start the make-up. Lie down."
"Alright..."
Kumasawa takes off her shoes and starts to get on the bed.

"Hey, hey. Does a corpse go and take off her shoes? You should keep them on."
"To get on madam's bed while wearing shoes feels like something really I shouldn't do. Hohohoho."
Kumasawa climbs onto the bed with her shoes on.
Beato was opening up her make-up bag.

"Have you found a comfortable position? You'll get tired from holding the same pose for a long time even if you are laying down."
"Yes, I know. But this is for a hundred million yen. Wohhohohohoho."

Each of the servants is getting a hundred million yen.
...In fact, it's already been sent.
In a few days bank keycards should arrive at their homes.
They won't be able to receive them, but their bereaved families can.
It will be more than enough for their funeral costs......

"Something like this?"
Kumasawa had been stirring restlessly, but it seems she finally found a comfortable pose.
It really looked like she had been killed.
"Good. That looks right. You definitely have a knack for fooling people."
"Hohhohhohho. I couldn't possibly compare to Beatrice-sama and her grand show."

"I'm going to start the make-up. Hold still for a minute... no, actually you're already a corpse, so don't move for an even longer while."
"Once Doctor Nanjo visits I'll be able to rest, right?"
"Right. After Nanjo does his autopsy, the room will be sealed until the police arrive. When that happens, you'll be able to rest a bit.
But you'll still be a corpse. You can't make any loud noises."
"Yes, of course not... Sooo, I should hide this."

Kumasawa hides her half-read book and bag of smoked squid under the bedsheets.
"My, aren't you well prepared? Careful not to relax toooo much. Don't forget that if for some reason the show is a failure, there will be no reward."
"Of course. I'll be careful. Ohhohohohoho......"

During their light banter, Beatrice had pulled a stake from her tool bag.
Kumasawa is to be gouged and killed with this stake.

"......Fuumu... Sorry but could you go face-down? The face-up pose just isn't working."
"Face-down is it? I can do that but, I think it might be hard to breathe..."
"Face-up I somehow easily sense that you're just sleeping. Could you just test laying face-down out for a minute? Just a test."
"Is that so? Then I'll try it..."
"Will it be difficult to hold that pose for a long time?"
"For the time being I can manage somehow... Hohoho, I hope the autopsy comes soon."
"I see, I see. Stay like that for now. I'm going to adjust your clothes a bit. Without the clothes set up right there's no realism."

Beato takes a tool from her bag.
It's a twirled up, light extension cord.

"Sorry, I'm adjusting them now. Stay just like that."
"Yes, yes."

She coiled the extension cord around Kumasawa's neck, cross-lacing it from behind.
Once the leftover in each hand had gotten short, Beato flumped herself onto Kumasawa's back, straddling her.

Suddenly, Kumasawa's throat tightened.
And she could neither breathe nor scream.
That extension cord wrapped around her neck... was making a crackling sound... from strangling her.
Kumasawa looked like she was doing the flutter kick in the pool, her heavier kicks occasionally pounding the bed.
And straddling on top was Beato... in complete silence, as if she thought Kumasawa some kind of a bug or rodent, mercilessly wringing her neck.
...The scene looked just as if a giant golden spider had captured some pitiful prey and was injecting it's poison.
And along with that, the canopy bed must also appear to be made from this strange spider's silk.
This web would sometimes suddenly quiver... from Kumasawa's feeble resistance.

And finally, Beato slowly got off of Kumasawa's back.
Kumasawa didn't move a muscle...... she was dead.

"Sorry, Kumasawa. You're gouge is in the leg. To kill you by stabbing you there would be unnecessarily painful."
Done with her strangling tool, Beato next grabbed her nearby rifle.
And then aiming at Kumasawa's calf, she pulled the trigger.

The gunshot wasn't loud... it's not like the 'bang' sounds from TV or the movies.
At most, it was as loud as uncorking a champagne bottle.
But then a splot of blood flies, and there's blood oozing out of the discomforting hole as it's being fished into.
She's picking out the bullet shot into the calf.
Then she unceremoniously tosses it into a small vinyl bag she had in her larger tool bag.
Already stored in that vinyl bag were several stained bullets......

"The placing for the Forth and Fifth Twilights can be taken care of with just a gun, but it get's more troublesome as the Twilights go on.
Sooo... if the large Gohda isn't killed on the Forth or Fifth Twilight it will lead to problems."

Then, taking the stake... she puts the tip into the bloody, still-oozing hole in the calf.
Using her body weight, she carefully presses it deeper.
When she lets up, the stake is cleanly plunged into the calf. She was still a bit worried that it might fall out before it's discovered, but it should still be enough to sustain the idea of sacrifices being gouged with stakes.

---------------------------------

And now Kumasawa, Gohda, and Genji have been killed.
As for Kanon, who will be the first discovered, he can't die yet because he still has work to do.

He will take his time drawing magic circles on the doors of all the crime scenes.
The chapel is far from the mansion, so it won't be searched first.
There are 4 scenes to find in the mansion, but they'll have to break a window to get in since they're all locked.
Other than the guest room, all the locations are on the 2nd floor or higher, so it's nearly certain that the first scene they'll set foot in will be the guest room.

In the guest room Kanon will be dead, and in his pocket a master key.
And in the room will also be a letter from the witch that includes the key to the next room.
The survivors will end up finding the corpses in following with the dictated route.

Under the pretense of preserving the room to hand over to the police, the crime scenes will be insulated from possible investigation.
Natsuhi will restrain the children, and Doctor Nanjo and Krauss will be the only ones who go near the corpses.
Jessica might want to run up to Kanon's corpse, so she'll require special attention.

Next the survivors will find Kanon.

I'll post thoughts later.

Drifloon

2012-09-23, 06:21

I'll use the readers' expectations, that the reasoning coming from the other characters is usually wrong, against them.
By having Natsuhi say something is "right", it will cause them to think it must not be so; it's a confusion technique.

Hahaha, I think Ryukishi used this 'confusion technique' a LOT. And I think that it worked pretty well, actually. Most of EP2 wasn't even difficult if you suspect the servants, but people refused to do that and made it much harder than it needed to be.

They don't know.
They don't even know that Eva and the others are really dead.

This is Beato's deception, made possible by her discovery of the gold.
They believe the five victims were also paid off, and that they're just playing dead.

This is something that really annoys me in most of the episodes. The corpses are generally horribly mutilated during the first twilight. If you want people to believe that they are fake, why on earth would you do that? And why on earth would the accomplices be fooled by it?

Also, Kumasawa's death scene is...really, really horrible to read. It is pretty hard to sympathise with Piece-Yasu in cases like this...

Wanderer

2012-09-23, 07:40

This is something that really annoys me in most of the episodes. The corpses are generally horribly mutilated during the first twilight. If you want people to believe that they are fake, why on earth would you do that? And why on earth would the accomplices be fooled by it?

Genji seems to fully know what he's involved in, and so do Krauss and Natsuhi. Nanjo pretty much has to know too.

The only people who she seems to be referring to in this case are Gohda and Kumasawa, who probably never saw the corpses in Kinzo's room with their own eyes.

She does it "case by case". It's easier if they don't know there's actual murder, but that doesn't mean it's impossible if they do know...
...well personally I think it's too much to expect full, knowing cooperation in murder just by the bomb threat... especially from several different people. But, in this world written by Beatrice it seems to work every time just fine.

Also, Kumasawa's death scene is...really, really horrible to read. It is pretty hard to sympathise with Piece-Yasu in cases like this...

Agreed. Try to imagine translating it.

One thing I found really strange was Beatrice saying that Kumasawa's face-up pose was good, originally, and then asking her to go face-down later. It'd make more sense to me if she just said the face-up pose was no good the whole time, instead of appearing to randomly completely change her mind.

It almost feels like there are two different Piece-Beatrices, or like the part with her killing Kumasawa was added into the scene later. Could just be me not wanting to believe she really did it, though.

Kealym

2012-09-23, 11:14

Drifloon

2012-09-23, 11:38

Haha, it sure wouldn't be much of a closed room if there was a huge hole, would it?

jjblue1

2012-09-23, 14:34

Yes, remember that Kratsuhi was only threatened with the bomb because they were especially prideful. The implication was that the other adults would probably participate for just the money, if they were lead to believe the whole thing was fake, anyway.

Also, this bit :
What a simple and cheap mystery.
Probably, for those people who love to read the mystery novels that I have boundless respect for, they'll see right through it with a big laugh.
To witness demons, even with a brazen display of fantasy as "proof", is to mystery the height of satire; it will no doubt get laughs.

I dunno why, but it feels like my respect for the whole series just got a boost.

Anyway, what I find most interesting about the gameboard presented so far is
1. It only involves 10 people dying, since the 2nd Twilight is being interpreted differently
2. It's probably the most involvement Krauss has ever had
3. No seriously, did she say that there was going to be a giant exploded hole in Kinzo's study??

I'm a bit sorry I saw Higurashi before watching Umineko.
Due to Higurashi's paranoia syndrome connected to aliens through all the anime I was expecting Umineko's solution to be something weird as well and not mystery like as well.
LOL, I wasn't enoying it much though. If I've to be honest I began enjoying it only when a friend introduced me to the visual novel and told me that Umineko could be handled like a mystery.

This is something that really annoys me in most of the episodes. The corpses are generally horribly mutilated during the first twilight. If you want people to believe that they are fake, why on earth would you do that? And why on earth would the accomplices be fooled by it?

Well, of course there's denial.

Come on, Yasu's a kind girl that wouldn't be capable of gruesome murder and that is supposed to feel affection for those people and she just told you they're playing dead, it's just make up and hey, she's rich enough to pay the staff of a holliwood movie to come here and cover you in make up, why should you doubt her? Sure, that make up seems a bit too realistic and they're really cool at being perfectly still without even breathing but hey, they're gonna be paid, aren't they?

Personally I find easier for someone who believes it's all a game to play along that for someone who thinks it's a real murder and yet does nothing to stop it even if yes, the whole 'I didn't notice they were really dead' seems a bit forced and a trick that wouldn't work so well in real life with such murderour deaths.

What annoys me is that in a previous part Kumasawa defined herself as someone who was also blackmailed and cared for her life in front of Krauss and Natsuhi so she should know they were threatened to take part to that prank and yet, she's not worried at all?
I mean, I'm not sure about Japanese laws but I guess over there blackmail should be a crime as well and if they needed to be blackmailed and threatened to take part to a prank they probably won't just laugh the thing off once the joke is finished.
They could sue Yasu to the police who can make investigations and find out that Kumasawa had been paid to be an accomplice with money Yasu was illegally owning.
Really, I would think twice before taking part to such a thing.

In a fashion motives are truly Umineko's weak point.
Not only Yasu's motive for doing all this but also the others' motives for playing along in something like this.

It'll be different if Kumasawa were to think Krauss and Natsuhi were also playing a prank and having fun at it but if she know they're blackmailed/threatened into it... well, matters change.

The same for Krauss and Natsuhi that accomplish with Yasu's demands in an apparent rather passive and calm way.

I won't go into Genji who's really too robot-like.

A guy that hid Yasu from his master when he believed this could not be the best for her is now passively letting her murder lot of people when he should hold some affection for some of them. After all he saw Kinzo's children grow and the same can be said for the innocent grandchildren. Doesn't he feel some pity for them? Not mentioning the whole plan includes Yasu's death as well. All he has to do to stop it is turn off the bomb and restrain Yasu. Why isn't he doing it?

Next installment. This should be the second to last one. I'm getting close to the end.

Again thank you very much!

This summary sort of reflects how I feel, but also ties into something I've been noticing. The parallels between the who Yasu and Battler's promise and Ikuko and Battler's amnesia. Battler's sin was not reneging on his promise, but forgetting it. Here's a thought I've only half formed:

- Battler has amnesia, and forgets whatever new life he had begun with Yasu/Shannon (so maybe did come back for her or whatever)
- When being reminded of Battler, he goes into painful attacks of something
- He somehow seems ok with reading the forgery about the incident (prepared according to Beatrice "on a whim" (so maybe written beforehand or for some other reason))
- Meta-Beatrice is playing a game to get Battler to remember he made a promise, and for it she must constantly put him through the paces or seeing his family murdered in different ways (writing forgeries with him, enjoying the game but not realising until later that he actually feels real pain about it)

I am phrasing this badly, but basically, what if the white horse promise is just a representation of what Battler actually forgot, the fact they were going to start anew together. It is a little bit 'the vow' or whatever that movie is. Battler never sinned against Beatrice (Ikuko) but forget the relationship they had that began it all.

It makes Ikuko the culprit, because she is killing them over and over again just for her "ceremony". It doesn't go any way to explaining prime though (in which something clearly happened) and still has Yasu as a selfish enough person, but it fits with the story nicely.

As for what did happen on Prime, there was clearly an explosion incident, and Yasu probably had some part in it. But when you are playing with explosives, you don't need to actively kill every person individually, it just needs to happen.

I only really can't decide why Yasu wouldn't just be upfront about it, though Battler did ask that himself.

It'll be interesting if actually Battler remembered the promise and he and Shannon escaped before the storm started, going to live together in hiding in some place using Yasu's bank account. Maybe they even left a letter explaining things to the parents who in the meanwhile made a mess and managed to turn on the bomb.

Then, while Yasu's out let's say for groceries and while wearing a disguise, Battler turns on the tv and hear what had happened in Rokkenjima. In shock he wanders out of the house until he finds himself involved in a car incident. Meanwhile Yasu finds out as well and come home just in time to find Battler injured and in a confusional state.

She figures the island was blew up by the bomb and that if they were to admit who they are they would look suspicious as they have illegal money and they just left the island before it exploded and so she decides to hide Battler who meanwhile had lost his memory and herself, keeping up her fake persona identity.

Yet she can't deal with Battler having forgot about her again ence the pushing on him to remember with her novel in which she involves him as well and her sense of guilt toward Ange.

I always tought about that this way: everything Yasu did was blamed on one of the personality-characters-MPDresults. Like, if she was feeling antsy or resenful towards someone, she was Kanon. If she felt serene and happy she was Shanon. If she felt angry or half murderous, she was Beatrice.

She linked the personalities to the actions she did. Like 'I pushed that maid downstairs. But that wasn't because I (as Shanon) didn't like her, it's cuz Beatrice totally possesed me.' or 'I stole the keys, but Gaap posessed me so it really wasn't me, it was Gaap.' She could condition herself to show certain emotions in the daily basis -"summoning furniture", like the "counting to ten and breathing steadly" done by normal people-, but when pushed she went sour or disrespectful and some of the furniture came to take the blame.

Basically, I can say that I have a furniture that's really troll and bitchy named Mera. So everytime I'm feeling bitchy it's because I'm being possesed--Mera came to play. When I'm calm you can call me Patchy, who is a cool big sister that does everything right (because she's always here when I'm calm and less prone to spill the tea on the lady's face).

So she decided that everytime she thought of Battler, it was because Beatrice was possesing her. Before, that heartache was all Shanon's, but then she blamed Beatrice's random apparitions for it.

Well, actually it's more complicate than that.

Firt Yasu's immaginary friends were a way to deal with her loneliness.
Shannon was there to place the role of the friend and older sister (family) she didn't have, supporting her. Sure, Shannon was a bit too biased toward Yasu but considering at first Yasu didn't seem to realize Kumasawa looked at her like she would with a grandaughter, probably she needed someone fully on her side who would believe she was special and would become better than anyone else.

That's true Gap got blamed for the things Yasu were to lose but I think Yasu also got pranked by the other girls so probably it wasn't always Yasu's fault. However it was likely too sad to think the other girls would prank her in such way so Gap took responsibility for Yasu's failures as well as for the pranks.

However when Yasu believed the gap between her and Shannon was shortening she was forced to face the fact she still couldn't get friendship and respect by the other girls. She tried being good, likely she tried hard but it didn't work.
Pranking the girls though was something Shannon would never do and Yasu back then didn't want to become something different from Shannon and yet... temptation was too strong.
It seems in Japanese myths there's some sort of legend about people being caught by 'a passing demon' that pushes them to act out of character all of sudden and then... leaves them.
Yasu might have felt something someting like that, something she wanted to do and yet rejected, a perfect fight between Id and Superego. That's likely why the blame goes to Gap, because there's a 'fracture' in her between what she wanted to do and what she should do. It's not her acting and yet it's her.

So in her embellishment of the story Yasu places the role on Gap but, at the end of the prank she's forced to face this 'dissonance' inside herself.

She has to become Shannon but now she realized being Beatrice might be more fulfilling. Yet she has to become Shannon. In a fashion, with the story of leaving Shannon, it's possible she tried to represent how she tried to cage and keep far from her those wishes, indulging in them only rarely.

It's as if she tried to hide/to cut away from her her childish/fantasy-prone side sort of like telling herself 'grow up, don't act like this anymore' and all the times she acts like this again are the times she falls into temptation again.
She sort of does the same thing all over again with her love for Battler, when she tries to erase it by passing it to Beatrice and then forgetting she had done it.

I think 'Beatrice' is the name she gives to all the sides of herself she wants to erase because they get in the way of how her superego, Shannon, has to be.

'Kanon' is instead the name given to the bitterness and lack of hope growing inside her.

So there's no Beatrice or Kanon. There's just Shannon/Yasu trying to deny some parts of her that act or want to act in a way she deems not proper and feeling increasingly bitter but unable to cope with it and things could go on pretty normal until she decides to act them out as if they were separate people.

When she started playing Kanon's role (I assume she did it not when 'Kanon' had birth in her mind but later, when she discovered she was the head and could tell Genji to orchestrate the whole thing so that no one will notice Kanon is her) giving herself a second identity that interacted with people and could act in a certain way all the time I think she really did herself more harm than good.

Even if before it was all symbolic she likely was already having self identity problems as she was denying part of herself. Add to this she discovered she was Kinzo's daughter/grandaughter with problems on her sexual organs and now she finds herself pursued by Jessica in her Kanon-role that probably allow her to express feelings she previously had to keep bottled up and yet be accepted anyway by Jessica and you can see how things are worsening leading her into further confusion about how she should be, how she should act, who she should be.

And then Battler comes back and I think a side of her blamed him as the source of all her troubles (if he'd come back sooner she wouldn't have sunk that deeper and she might not have discovered some things about herself) while another likely just wanted Battler to act as a prince and save her (she probably felt around Battler back in the past she acted more like herself and hoped he might have been able to accept her and take her away from that situation sparing her from deciding if to be Shannon or Kanon) but what if Battler has really forgotten her or had just made a joke back then?

Not only he wouldn't save her NOW but he never planned to save her EARLIER.
She'd been a drama queen in wailing over Battler's lack of return and fussing over it and the mess she got herself in would be solely her own responsibility. So let's try and make Battler remember and then let's see how it'll plan.

If in Prime Battler is supposed to remember thanks to a game, a story or something equally innocent Yasu probably hadn't touched the bottom yet and, had things not gone wrong she could have still be saved.
If she really murdered people to make Battler remember... well, she was beyond salvation. She's mad as a horse and, even if Battler were to remember, he wouldn't be able to save her.

Surely the Yasu of the gameboards is beyond salvation. Was the Yasu of Prime beyond salvation as well? We'll never know...

UsagiTenpura

2012-09-23, 15:20

jjblue1

2012-09-23, 17:43

Maybe Beatrice is just the name of a novel Kinzo lost during the war and couldn't get over it because he never got to finish the story.

More seriously tho, I think murders in the story don't reflect any reality of prime.
Just like losing a meta-battle can result in "dying". Just like George winning an argument against his mother was depicted as a fantasy battle that lead to her death in arc 6. Beatrice's murders of everyone in the story probably refers to something similar. If anything I can't help but think about arc 2 where the adults dies after believing in Beatrice/magic. "I defeated them all with my tricks" could be very well what this represents...

... I can almost see it being represented by a meta-battle occurring with victims and Beato always winning. Kinda like Kyrie vs Leviathan in arc 3.

Well, for sure it's unlikely the gameboards reflect exactly prime's reality as they're merely tales born prior and after prime.
The real question is: how much of the gameboards also happened on Prime?
Assuming the info we learn about what's outside the box are true all we know is:

- a boy that was assumed to be Kanon went to Jessica's school
- in George's house were found letters sent by Shannon that presumably implied closeness between them
- Rudolf's family minus Ange, Eva's family and Rosa's family went on the island using first a plane and then a boat, Jessica and Kumasawa went to get them.
- Battler, as usual, made a rucus on the boat
- Rosa was likely seen beating Maria while on the train. The social services also suspected her of not being a good mother
- letters were sent containing what was needed to get to a bank account with lot of money in.
- apparently messages in the bottles containing tales were sent before the incident
- all the siblings had money troubles
- by a while Kinzo wasn't showing himself to the servants who weren't Genji, Shannon or Kanon (and possibly Kumasawa) or to other people that weren't Krauss, Natsuhi or Nanjo.
- a bomb exploded at midnight
- Eva escaped with the head's ring and reached Kuwadorian
- Battler also escaped through an underground tunnel (possibly with someone else) but didn't reach Kuwadorian. He managed to leave the island through and no one heard of him until he showed up in front of Ange years later
- Ryukishi said something along the line of how it's easy to figure out the adults did something that caused that mess.

Now... if the first 2 gameboards represented tales written prior to the incident at best they can represent what Yasu had in mind to do (a game or a mass murder based on the epitaph) and how she planned to attuate it (hiring accomplices) while the other gameboards might contain bits of how things really went.

Which are those bits however is hard as hell if not impossible to say for sure.

tempteste

2012-09-23, 19:53

When she started playing Kanon's role (I assume she did it not when 'Kanon' had birth in her mind but later, when she discovered she was the head and could tell Genji to orchestrate the whole thing so that no one will notice Kanon is her)
Except Kanon appeared on Rokkenjima a year before that as a special servant like Genji, Kinzo treated him nicely and was teaching him how to use guns.
And why would she even start playing Kanon's role? Is there any particular reason?

Wanderer

2012-09-24, 05:16

GuestSpeaker

2012-09-24, 07:02

You know, the manga makes it seems like Rudolf killed Rosa and Maria in game 3. I wonder what the disagreement was about...

GoldenLand

2012-09-24, 08:36

I have a really hard time with the idea of Natsuhi's pride being such that the most sensible way to get her to go along with Beatrice's plan is to tell her that people will really die and to threaten to kill her and her family if they don't do what she says - particularly in a situation where Natsuhi was unlikely to trust in Beatrice's guarantees of their safety. Doesn't make sense.

There are, surely, better ways to go about that. There's no need to up the ante by telling Natsuhi that it's any more than a fake murder game. What about blackmailing her with info that would damage the honour of the family if it got released? "If you don't go along with this harmless game, I'll release information about Krauss's failed finances/Kinzo's death and the big cover-up/Kinzo's skeevy past/the child from 19 years ago, but if you do go along with it I'll give you loads of money and never say a word."

Drifloon

2012-09-24, 12:45

You know, the manga makes it seems like Rudolf killed Rosa and Maria in game 3. I wonder what the disagreement was about...

...Seriously? Could you elaborate on that? Because Will's "no contradictions in their final moments as told" pretty much confirms that it was either Eva or Yasu, to my mind.

jjblue1

2012-09-24, 15:23

Except Kanon appeared on Rokkenjima a year before that as a special servant like Genji, Kinzo treated him nicely and was teaching him how to use guns.
And why would she even start playing Kanon's role? Is there any particular reason?

It's such an old theory I didn't include it in my explanation but here it is:

After Kinzo's death 'Kanon' was 'hired' by Natsuhi and Krauss to play the role of Kinzo's faithful servant.
In short 'he' should have been another witnesser of how Kinzo was alive, expecially in front of the siblings but possibly also in front of other servants. Where's Kanon when he's not being seen and Shannon is at school? Serving Kinzo, cleaning his room and stuffs.
Otherwise you should pay one of the servants who knows the truth to fake serving Kinzo in front of the other servants.
Also when the siblings are on the island if the staff was solely of Genji, Kumasawa, Gohda and Shannon it might look a little too small.
Genji after all is the head servant, who shouldn't take care of small tasks and Kumasawa is old and not judged a great worker.
Gohda is supposed to work in the kitchen so who remains? Just Shannon.
If Ep 7 is to take into consideration the Ushiromiya used to have a higher number of young servants in service at the same time than just 1.

Natsuhi & Krauss' coperation insures that:

- the servants' schedule, which is also checked by Natsuhi, always allow Shannon & Kanon to never have to be at the same time in a place along with a third servant who's not aware Kanon doesn't exist

- Shannon and Kanon will never have two different works in two different places that can both be witnessed by external observers at the same time so that someone will realize that one of them isn't there

- Kanon can be introduced as a person different by Shannon to everyone else by someone who won't be suspected of lying so that the resemblance between the two will be viewed as a casuality

- As Jessica isn't always on the island the fact she didn't met Kanon until a certain time can be explained with the fact that when she was on the island, Kanon's schedule placed him some other place. She would have no reason to suspect she's been lied about when Kanon was hired.

- The other servants might have been replaced short after Kinzo's death so they wouldn't be able to testify Kanon wasn't there previously as servants usually don't work for long time for the Ushiromiya (Shannon/Kanon, Kumasawa and Genji being stated as exceptions)

- Kanon's bad manners aren't scolded by Natsuhi as much as she would do with other servants (somewhere it was stated Natsuhi for a while seemed to have a weak side for Kanon according to the servants) as his lack of social manners would be part of the disguise (the less Kanon talks and look at people in the eyes the less chances there are he's recognized)

- Although Kanon didn't come from Fukuin along with another bunch of servants no one would notice. The new servants would think he got on Rokkenjima a year earlier than them and that's why he didn't do the travel with them, Genji, Natsuhi and Krauss on the other side would be aware he's just a disguise and won't have troubles about it.

- Prior to Kinzo's death Yasu had no way to order Genji to help her to cover up for everything that includes her playing a second role, starting from hiring her on disguise along with other servants, cover up the fact that Kanon just didn't come from Fukuin to their schedules, to the fact that Kanon, a newcomer, was chosen to become Kinzo's special servant (everyone else with that role is a seasoned servant). For her to keep up playing two roles without any accomplices for such a long time and from the position of a common servant without being discovered by Genji or Natsuhi or any other servant would be impossible.

- If Kinzo or Genji were to ask Shannon to play two roles it could work but it would be totally odd and isn't foreshadowed at all. It's implied that Kinzo didn't recognize Yasu as his daughter/son/grandaugther/grandson before she/he solved the epitaph though he hoped she/he was still alive. Genji might have done it but there's no trace of Genji being involved in Kanon's birth as Yasu/Clair narrated it.

- Yasu had no real reason to give life to Kanon two years prior the incident apart from companionship and, if that's all she wanted, an immaginary servant like Shannon originally was would work just fine.

- Kanon's memories about being taught to shoot by Kinzo might have been merely Yasu's memories. As shooting is more a male activity than an activity fitting for a girlish girl like Shannon, she handed them to Kanon so as to form his background.

You know, the manga makes it seems like Rudolf killed Rosa and Maria in game 3. I wonder what the disagreement was about...

The only reason for Rudolf to kill Rosa would be because she had confessed they had discovered the gold and he wanted to get rid of her as a possible rival. Next would come Hideyoshi (it was implied it was Kirye's gun that shot Hideyoshi) and then likely Eva, Natsuhi and Krauss.

This though would give Ep 3 2/3 culprits instead than just 1, Yasu/Beatrice (who, for sure, killed Nanjo). I think the possibility of EP 3 having more than 1 culprit was discussed not much time ago but no one managed to find a theory that persuaded everyone.

...Seriously? Could you elaborate on that? Because Will's "no contradictions in their final moments as told" pretty much confirms that it was either Eva or Yasu, to my mind.

I've always thought Will's words just mean that 'no magic trick' was involved.
In short Maria realy died by strangulation and Rosa was really stabbed by the fence. In short nobody lied about this and there was nothing suspicious in how they died.

This however doesn't point out to a specifical culprit, just at the manner of their deaths.

(after reading Our Confession I've been wondering if it's possible the culprit first shoot Rosa in the mouth and then stabbed her on the fence to cover the fact she was shoot as murdering her by stabbing her to the fence looks rather unpractical but it could have been an incident in which she was pushed and fell and Maria was strangled because she witnessed the incident)

I have a really hard time with the idea of Natsuhi's pride being such that the most sensible way to get her to go along with Beatrice's plan is to tell her that people will really die and to threaten to kill her and her family if they don't do what she says - particularly in a situation where Natsuhi was unlikely to trust in Beatrice's guarantees of their safety. Doesn't make sense.

There are, surely, better ways to go about that. There's no need to up the ante by telling Natsuhi that it's any more than a fake murder game. What about blackmailing her with info that would damage the honour of the family if it got released? "If you don't go along with this harmless game, I'll release information about Krauss's failed finances/Kinzo's death and the big cover-up/Kinzo's skeevy past/the child from 19 years ago, but if you do go along with it I'll give you loads of money and never say a word."

I think this is a weakness of Beato's tales.
Motives.
Even Kumasawa and Co. playing such an elaborate prank aware that someone else believed he was being threatened just to get some money that yasu owned illegally... well, that too seems weird.
though Natsuhi in EP 5 also will show she is too easy into believing in this sort of things (because really, who just killed your daughter and her cousins along with Rosa and a servant surely won't kill Krauss if you do as he says... but she was believing this guy even sooner, when he had captured no one and had no way to prove he was who he said or that she did what he said...)

Renall

2012-09-24, 15:59

jjblue1

2012-09-24, 16:41

Kanon's memories in ep6 are actually a huge problem and they're so fleeting that it seems largely irrelevant, yet the details seem... really important?

I mean, the part about hanging out shooting guns off with Kinzo and pranking and whatnot portrays a level of relationship between Kanon/Yasu/Somebody(?) that isn't really touched on anywhere else. Just how close was Yasu with Kinzo in the first place? If Genji's goal was to shelter Yasu in plain sight, would he ever allow her to become close to Kinzo and potentially spend some time alone with him? If he was truly concerned about Kinzo "repeating his mistake" the way he supposedly claimed, he would never permit that to happen. Moreover, it would utterly fly in the face of the way Requiem seems to portray their relationship and Kinzo's recognition.

I'd say it's contradictory or meaningless and confined to Dawn, but it doesn't have to be... it just has to cast the Prime relationship between Yasu, Genji, Kumasawa, and Kinzo in a very different light than what is implied otherwise.

I find it very difficult to believe Kinzo could have a close - even foster-fatherly - relationship with Yasu and never once notice anything about him/her, even if it was done strictly in the guise of Kanon (although if it was, we have serious time issues because Kinzo shouldn't even be alive very long and certainly shouldn't be out and about). That leads me to wonder one of two things, both of which would make the entire "presentation" scene heavily metaphorical: Yasu really was Beatrice's child, and Kinzo knew it all along but pretended he didn't, acting as a father figure to Yasu while trying to be actually fatherly. He chose to pass his legacy and fortune to Yasu either admitting to their relationship at long last or because Yasu really did solve the epitaph.
Yasu wasn't really Beatrice's child, so Kinzo never saw any resemblance; however, he grew close to Yasu and formed a strong bond. Yasu eventually was challenged to solve the epitaph and did so; Kinzo then symbolically proclaimed Yasu to be the heir he wished he had had, and divested everything to him/her. This may or may not have been part of Genji's plan all along, for whatever end Genji may have had.
Essentially, it wasn't really "some guy I barely know creeped on me while I was in a dress because I solved his dumb puzzle," but "Kinzo, with whom I have a very close relationship, chose to pass on everything to me as a symbolic act of atonement [because I am his lost child and he knew it and tried to make up for his sins / because I was able to help him through his regrets in a way his real children couldn't or wouldn't and he has taken me as his own in gratitude]."

It's at least a bit less weird and unsettling, and might redeem Genji a bit. It's also 100% speculative with nothing backing it up, but it would sort of explain Genji's seemingly robotic loyalty if the whole Yasu thing was an intentional ploy on his part to get at Kinzo's money and when Yasu was given control of everything he was forced to follow her instructions because otherwise there'd be no way for him to get at it.

It's an interesting theory even if I admit I've always viewed Kanon's memories as a counterweight to all the bad memories Yasu seemed to have and it's particularly meaningful they're told from Kanon's eyes as Kanon was the one always grumbling and complaining about everyone.

It's sort of: yes, they had some serious bad sides but they weren't completely bad. There was also something nice in them.

At the same time I don't think they were all that many happy memories.
It's sort of like when Natsuhi said that once, when she was in a good mood, she shared with Shannon which one was her fave season.
How many times Natsuhi was in a good mood and felt like being friendly with Shannon?
It's possible they weren't so many yet for Shannon they probably were meaningful.

The same can be applied to Kinzo. Maybe a bunch of times he felt in a good mood and felt like making pranks with Yasu's help. For Yasu surely those moments were important, especially after she discovered he was her father but... how many times it happened in reality?

To be honest it's not possible to say if they happened often or rarely.

As Umineko present a setting that, from Yasu's perspective, is more painful than pleasant I'll say few. It can be it was more often but Yasu was so depressed she was unable to notice it.

Genji is really poorly explained, isn't it?
In an ordinary story I would say since we learn little about him what we learn is to take at face value without doubting it... the problem is his behaviour makes so little sense than simply accepting it becomes pretty hard...

Renall

2012-09-24, 16:51

jjblue1

2012-09-24, 19:08

See, I view it the opposite way: I don't think Shannon's memories of Natsuhi's good moods would be something she'd even have any recollection of if Natsuhi didn't have them with some degree of regularity. "When she's in a good mood" implies that Natsuhi was often not in a good mood, but given Natsuhi's tendency to swings in mood I have to imagine she was in one more often than "that one time she told me her favorite season."

It honestly doesn't even make sense any other way. I doubt Natsuhi would tell Shannon such an inconsequential detail if she weren't reasonably conversational with her when she's in a good mood, which probably happened semi-regularly. They'd have to steer the topic in that direction, and that necessitates that Shannon/Yasu and Natsuhi had actual conversations more often than any of the backstory otherwise implies.

Likewise, Kanon mentioning hanging out with Kinzo to me seems to suggest this was a more regular occurrence than "Kinzo hung out with me once." The entire phrasing of the memory scene strikes me as Kanon cherry-picking out fond memories that happen to come to mind, not single distinct happy events that were completely isolated from anything else that he ever experienced.

In other words, I'm inclined to think that Yasu was pretty close to everybody who lived on the island full-time, and probably had more good memories of them than bad memories. Hell, Jessica seems to consider Shannon her best friend, but we know nothing about this in any appreciable sense. Did they hang out at school? Did they talk? What did they talk about? Did they ever hang out in Nijima together? When they were cut off from Rokkenjima by weather, did they wait it out at the same apartment or at least the same complex? There's a lot unsaid there, and yet I have to think the answer is "they probably did hang out a lot." Yet we hear very little about this. If the answer is the opposite, we hear remarkably little about that either.

Yet it seems like this stuff is pretty important. If Yasu does have a very close relationship with everyone in real life, I cannot even begin to imagine she'd ever desire harm to come to any of them no matter the reason. And if she doesn't have a close relationship, where are all these fond memories coming from?

Actually I've experienced the opposite.
Exactly because I saw certain people rarely in a good mood, those moments impressed me strongly than the others of another person who was in a good mood more often.
For me it wasn't a big deal as I didn't have emotional dependance on those people, it was more like a 'how weird, she's in a good mood, well, it wouldn't be bad if it were to last' but for Yasu who's desperately seeking for affection those moments can have taken a way bigger importance.

'Oh, madam spoke to me today and she wasn't angry! maybe she's starting to like me! How nice we like the same season, doesn't this give us something in common? I wonder if she'll speak nicely with me tomorrow as well...' and so on.

I don't really find that topic too hard to come up as it could have been all very casual. When someone is in an expecially good mood he/she could end up saying 'he loves X' all by himself, without a really big prompting. Natsuhi liking fall isn't such personal information she has to keep it hidden.
After all Natsuhi said:

On a Fall day long ago, I happened to be in a good mood, and I mentioned that Fall was my favorite of the four seasons.

which seems to imply if she wasn't in a good mood she wouldn't have mentioned it at all, and she said mentioned, which seems to imply more to a passing comment than to a real discussion.

But honestly I find all this very hypothetical as each person differs in why they would remember something. For example from your words I guess that for you it would be easy to remember something if it were to happen more often, while for me it worked in the opposte way so we can't really figure out if Yasu is more similar to you or to me.

Again it's entirely possible that Kanon had many good memories with Kinzo... or that he's giving giant size importance to tiny details that, for her, were meaningful (a little like how she obsessed over Battler's promise).

Without a reliable point of view it's impossible to tell how good Yasu's relations were with everyone and, after all, according to Yasu's perception whatever objective answer we were to give could be irrelevant.

If Yasu thinks Natsuhi... let's say hates her for her their relation is horrible, if she thinks the opposite their relation is good, regardless of how Natsuhi feels or how things look on the outside.
Think at little Maria who insisted on how good her relation was with her mother...
we go and say that Maria and Rosa probably had a relation with up and down but we can't really know how often it was up and how often it was down, we give a judgement based on our perception.

In the beginning even Ange let us believe that her relation with Eva was all screwed up but then in Ep 8 she said they also had some not so bad moments.

So, even with Jessica... I think Jessica honestly believed Shannon was her best friend, which probably meant that compared to all her other friends Shannon was special to her. This though can translate in tons of different things.

Maybe they never hang out that much for reason X but the few moments they spend together Jessica was willing to tell Shannon each of her secrets and thrusted her judgement.

This doesn't tell us though how Shannon perceived what Jessica did.
Was it nice for her to have Jessica as a friend or she found it more torubles than worth? Was she honest with her or she felt as if she had to act a part because, after all, Jessica was her boss' daughter? Did she have a time in which she genuintely felt friend with her then she discovered she was the real heir and not Jessica and resented her for having the life she should have had?

Most of this is left up to speculation.
To accept that PieceYasu could kill everyone I've to picture her in such an emotional state she believed no one could 'save' her, that she wouldn't regret the loss of those people, that everything was wrecked and so on.

Beato killing Kumasawa in Our Confession is a pretty horrible scene but, if you think at it, Yasu had no problems at stabbing in the back Jessica in Ep 2, shooting George in Ep 3, killing them both in Ep 4, causing them pain by faking her own death as well as the death of their own families.

PieceYasu has reached a point at which she doesn't care for anyone anymore. So really, even if she might have cared for Jessica at some point, those days, in Rokkenjima, it's unlikely she still did.

We wonder if PrimeYasu can reach the same level but, from the little said about her, I really don't know. If I take Ep 6 as a parallel I would say that PrimeYasu was stopped from reaching that level and, as Ep 8 said, she never killed anyone for real. However I can't prove she never had the intention of doing it or that she refused to do it because she cared.