#The Girl Called Murder

[quess-art]

I need D'Urge to be a companion 😭 Especially since he's canonical even when you create a custom Tav

(Some headcanons, some based on little snippets of dialogue from the game)

[kozukenbsf]

I can read a 500 page book or 100k word fanfiction in one sitting, but the moment I have to do a required reading for uni I suddenly don't know how to read

[almostsweetangel]

what do you mean james somerton faked his suicide then got found out bc he posted his dick and balls

[lenny-zesty]

when im in a give a shitty excuse to hate a female character competition and my opponent is an uzi hater

[cormorant-red]

I played 999 recently at @xivu-arath's recommendation, and I had so much fun that (inspired by that one polygon video) I illustrated my liveblog about it!

If you haven't played 999 and you are even a little bit intrigued by a puzzle/mystery visual novel with multiple timelines that all guide you towards wild plot twists...probably don't read the text! 999 is the kind of story that is best experienced with no knowledge besides the basic premise.

Transcript below the cut:

Cormorant: characters in this game really just say shit like "have you heard the story about the crystallization of glycerin?"

as a matter of fact i haven't, june, please enlighten me

Storm: "I know we're stuck in a freezer but. let's talk about weird mythical science!"

Cormorant: it's also killing me that junpei is dressed like marty mcfly and isn't sharing any of his jackets

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Cormorant: this game is leading me to arrive at mathematical concepts on my own. what the heck

Storm: kshgushhsg

I take it you're having a good time then

Cormorant: trying to check lotus's work and it turns out that no matter what group i arrange to take through a door, the people left behind will always have the same digital root

so to get through door 7 with snake missing, i could either send a group with sum 16 (junpei, ace, clover, and june) or with sum 25 (clover, june, seven, and lotus), but it doesn't matter because the remainder always have root 9 and can't get through doors 3 or 8! wild!

Storm: yeah the numbers and which doors end up barred to you is so cleverly deliberate

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Cormorant: i'm glad i finally checked what novel mode meant, because this is way more fun

Santa cocked his head to one side, like an inquisitive bird, and looked at them.

After several long moments, during which it became apparent that Santa had no idea what the cards meant, June took pity on him.

i'll have to go back and redo the beginning after i get to the first ending

Storm: oh yeah! as I recall that was done differently when it was originally a dual screen game... but it's much better when in novel style. gimme all the descriptions

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Cormorant: I had a long day of sitting though presentations and so I entertained myself by calculating digital roots

I discovered that adding 9 or any multiple of 9 to a number has no effect on the digital root, which is awfully interesting bc I got to the part where snake gets killed. Assuming door 3 was opened with 12 and not 21, the options are 7+3 (motive?), 6+4 (they’d both have to be REALLY good actors), or 9+1. And if bracelets work without a body attached, and if ace picked it up in door 5…

That would be a really useful tool to get around the 3-person minimum without altering the digital root

I’m also very intrigued by the theory that zero is also in the game but I don’t know what to do with that yet

Storm: forlornly having to keep myself from saying literally anything

Cormorant: Understandable, please don’t give me any hints! I’m just calling shots for the joy of being wrong

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Cormorant: and how do you know that, my traitorous friend?

Santa: “The RED doesn’t need a person, you know.”

Santa: “All I need is the bracelet.”

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Cormorant: y’know what i think he’s bluffing. he does need June specifically and that’s why he refused to consider leaving her when they first found door 9. if all he needed was a hostage, he could have grabbed junpei and forced ace to come along, and then he would be dealing with two people under duress instead of three

i peeked at a guide and apparently i found the ending adjacent to the true ending(?) first, oh well. time to see the others!

santa: i said i don't want to leave seven alone

me: bud you can't do a heroic sacrifice too, it'll mess up all the math

reader, he was not doing a heroic sacrifice

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Storm: got any character opinions or theories to share so far?

Cormorant: hmm I’ve got soft spots for santa and lotus maybe just because they were in the first group I went with. I like that the game makes a point of showing that lotus is quick with the math/technical knowledge. I warmed up to clover and seven more than I expected to! I have no evidence to mistrust ace….but I don’t trust him

Snake died before I before I could say two words to him

Or…didn’t. Forgot clover said he didn’t

I got info about the previous experiments from clover and I wonder if we’re like…reenacting the past somehow? Experiencing morphogenetic resonance with the last voyage?

Again no evidence i just wonder where the pseudoscience is going

Storm: santa was so my type as soon as I started playing that I just picked all rooms with him on my first run skugrhsghu

Cormorant: AHAHA that makes me feel better about going “yeahhh door 4 I like the cut of this guy’s jib”

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Cormorant: “the bracelet comes off when your heart rate reaches zero” interesting then that we’ve brought up cryostasis

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Cormorant: i simply don't trust him not to have a spare bracelet in his pocket!!!

They climbed into the elevator and Junpei listened to it creak and rattle its way to the bottom deck. Only Junpei, Ace, and Lotus were left.

As the elevator rumbled out of sight, Ace spoke.

Ace: “Lotus, would you be so kind as to go with me?”

Cormorant: “bad end” YEAH I’LL SAY

Storm: lkksghr yeah there's a few of those!

Cormorant: santa was really quick to declare that he, june, and seven needed to go with clover. waht's his game

june and ace could have done it just as easily

Storm: they could have! good catch

maybe he just thinks seven is cooler than ace,

Cormorant: i'm imagining clover taking all her grisly trophies to the door only to find it already engaged, because lotus needed no persuading,

and regarding the true ending requirements, it's also funny that santa's like "i hate this bookmark! get it out of my sight!" and this is a huge help in junpei befriending the girl who's otherwise about to snap

Storm: load bearing bookmark

Cormorant: good thing you threw that tantrum bud or you would have been killed with an axe

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Cormorant: in my suspicions i forgot a critical detail, which is that he didn't actually go into the door with the body this time

of course seven has been propping doors open, so it really could have been anybody

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Cormorant: "where have these 16 boys and girls disappeared to?" eight for each game and then an experimenter? again with the idea that zero might be in the game...

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Cormorant: bad endings complete! on to the normal ending, which hopefully has less of junpei getting stabbed to death

puzzling over who could have done all those murders, especially in the sub ending...or did everyone get killed? clover thinks that snake's death was faked. or did snake do all the murders, since he was the only one unaccounted for?...and then i remember what kind of game i'm playing. can't discount the ice mummy as a suspect.

Storm: you truly cannot ignore the possibility of the ice mummy

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Cormorant: ah no, so santa's sister was the kid that died...

i can't figure out the connection between events! why did the last games have the veneer of a science experiment, while this one has no context given? why was it all kids last time, and a random mix of ages this time, with some repeat subjects?

-----

Cormorant: called it!!!!

Junpei: “Ace, Guy X, and the 9th Man’s bracelet.”

Junpei: “That was all you needed to open door [3].”

Cormorant: called it before i even got to an ending ehehe

what i’ve been saying!!

Ace: “(9) is a potent ally in the Nonary Game.”

Ace: “Adding (9) to any set of numbers won’t alter the digital root.”

Ace: “As you can see, (9) is a very useful number here.”

Ace: “With it, one can go anywhere, with anyone.”

Ace: “It is, I suppose you could say, a game changer.”

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Cormorant: okay, normal ending finished! junpei did not get stabbed but we also didn’t resolve much…I’m now thinking that ace with his pocket drugs could have easily played dead in the sub ending

glad to see that snake is okay and hopefully can stay okay in the true ending. where did clover get that riddle, and will she still have it?

0=6. how much do I read into this

still don’t understand how we get from here to santa hostage situation. he’s been so consistent about not even considering betraying or abandoning people, so either he’s a better actor than ace…or it’s staged. are he and june in cahoots

Storm: augh so close now!! soon I can actually say things

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Cormorant: O FUCK

Seven: “Santa’s always in the room with her. That’s what you’re saying, isn’t it?”

Snake: “Yes, that’s right.”

Clover: “What about it…?”

Snake: “That’s quite simple, really.”

Snake: “You told me that the first time you came to this room…”

Snake: “…Santa was the first to refuse to leave June behind.”

Snake: “Now, doesn’t that beg the question “why?” Why would Santa do such a thing?”

Snake: “The answer is easy.”

Storm: B)

Cormorant: i've been thinking of them as a pair because it makes the math easier! if you've got 3 + 6 + 8, just cross out the ones that make 9 and don't even bother with the addition, your root is 8

Storm: B) B) B)

Cormorant: but god!! they are a pair, do not separate (or the jig is up)

Storm: they hid it soooo well

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Cormorant: was wondering when we would see the last cradle guy and oh duh, he was guy X

i did think it was odd that santa phrased it as "i need to leave two of you behind" rather than "i need three of you to come with me," but if he was responsible for everything (most things?), he knew that snake was there, and he was setting up a group that could follow him. excited to see where this is going!

[dreamy sigh] this game is so elegant. what a little puzzle box

Storm: yeah it is, it's just so wonderfully crafted. so little is wasted!

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Cormorant: oh boy [akane vision label]

"through the morphic fieldset we were resonant, and we were as one" i don't think i've mentioned it before but i'm constantly pleasantly surprised by the narration in this game. it's not flashy but it's evocative in a way that's really working for me

Storm: this is where the port falls short a bit of the original version... the ds really worked well with this aspect

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Cormorant: the number of times i thought "this will be totally wrong but i'll say it to storm anyway"

hello??? [arrow pointing back to the message “I wonder if we’re like…reenacting the past somehow? Experiencing morphogenetic resonance with the last voyage?”]

Storm: Y E A H

Cormorant: laser-guided spitballing

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Cormorant: man i said that 4+6 would have to be really good actors if they were the ones that opened door 3...and while they didn't kill snake, i sure underestimated our queen of the stage akane kurashiki

the baseline was NOT where i thought it was

Storm: no one does it like her

[nerdy-hyperfixations]

Also as a side note can I say: yes I know Bill is an unreliable narrator. I fucking love reading unreliable narrators, so as someone who loves reading unreliable narrators I wanna mention that "unreliable" doesn't mean "everything they say is a lie" if that was the case, what would the point of even reading it be.

It means read with skepticism and analyze the text to see what might be true and what might not. If an unreliable narrator tells you the door is yellow that doesn't automatically mean the door is actually purple!!! Just be careful of how their warped perception of reality actually distorts the text

So yes. Technically, Bill could be pretending to regret destroying his universe. Technically, the part in Ford's where he grows distant and calls the being that destroyed his universe a monster could be an act, or the entire part of that journal could be fake and made up by Bill. But consider: if the parts were fake why would Bill include the random anecdote of Ford going out in the blizzard that doesn't serve to grow sympathy for him and only proves he was a "bad muse" that didn't help Ford out. Why would he include any of the parts where him and Ford argue at all really? Plus, considering he seems to argue with the account, saying Ford didn't get his humor, lends the idea to me that this is Ford's real, lost journal entries. And if it is, why does Bill keep a dust particle of the last remaining piece of his dimension in his hat for millenniums? Is it more understandable to assume this is the truth at this point than search for radical explanations on how Bill fabricated the events to lie?

There are parts that are obviously fabrications by Bill. Obviously, when he says he "wasn't upset at all" over Sixer, he's lying, and the punch-line is the next page shows an actual account where he's crying. You can tell he was lying because the text shows a different story than what he says. In general, the story is told by a very unreliable narrator and should be read with skepticism. But you should also take in to account when the story is telling the truth.

The book is *supposed* to make you feel bad for him, but that doesn't mean everything he says to make you feel bad for him is absolutely 100% a lie.

[fortjester]

“Eulogise her,” said the Emperor, through his hands. “For God’s sake, eulogise her anyway. Eulogise them both.”

lyrical musings on Loveday Heptane

"64 Little White Things" by Cake Bake Betty / "Murders" by Miracle Musical / "Thumbs" by Lucy Dacus / "Moonsickness" by Penelope Scott / "Sun Bleached Flies" by Ethel Cain

[youleavethetardisbrakeson]

There are approximately three (3) people who could get away with telling Corlys that he's being ridiculous and needs to knock it off: Rhaenys, Laena, and now Baela.

Give him hell, Baela. You're doing your mama and grandma proud.

[brahmenbones]

“You’re the Last. Make Us Proud.”

[graciereadshannigram]

asked when she'd be free to bounce some ideas around for RA and–

[umblrspectrum]

dude theres like no art of her what the fuck

[your-fuccked-up-dad-volume61]

she wants me ….. I scare the shit out of her 🔪🌹

[lucyshypemaster]

I can't breathe oh my god

[tacosaysroar]

I just knocked on Adelaide’s door to find her on a FaceTime with two girls from school — one a constant bestie and the other a girl she was estranged from this year. Which is big.

Adelaide and the estranged girl were thick as thieves last year and then a frenemy wedged herself between that girl and Adelaide’s usual group. I was very sorry to see that happen, especially since the frenemy came with getting in trouble at school and home. That girl had a hard year because of it.

I’m delighted to see she’s working her way back in, and I hope that continues.

[matchamabs]

some really shitty scribbles from the server all with questionable context. some of these were requests lmao. also the fabulous macho dog Lady Diamond, Princess of Venice Beach belongs 2 @inkythealien teehee

[triglycercule]

wahhh wahhh triglycercule post more NON jk fashion au related content i whisper as i post this. double post today because i genuinely love jk!dream and also if i dont post the dreamtale twins together i will actually die! you might consider her crazy way of somehow getting into trouble a form of bad luck but i see it as more of a being too pure for the world meeting a world that's not all that great. jk!dream lives up to her name she is a idyllic dream

valedictorian. practically a million extra curriculars. she can sing she can dance she can cook she can do advanced math she can fix a car jk!dream is everything jk!nightmare isn't (a loser). the types of trouble she gets into though aren't manmade (like some guy trying to rob her) but instead are naturally occurring. like one day the dreamtale household washing machine explodes because dream used it and coincidentally it was because it was faulty or something like that. really really crazy coincidences

nightmare is a fighting force in keeping her little sister alive i swear to god. she has to monitor dream a lot and when she can't she gets one of the mtt to do it for her. because if she doesn't there is bound to be something that hurts her. and because jk!nightmare is an absolute fucking loser who's stupid she came up with the genius idea of roleplaying a bigger issue than the one that dream's about to encounter (because then she gets to keep her safe and also feed into her pretend villian persona). like for example with the washing machine thing earlier nightmare would probably distract dream with some sort of evil monologue and then put her own load in the washer before she could. that way it won't FUCKING EXPLODE (comments from currently existing jk fashion au sanses :3)

"ah, my younger kin, dream. quite an enigma she is. on one hand, she's the epitome of perfection. even i can admit that, for she's loved by our school, family, and i. but of course, like all aside from i, she has her faults."

"for example, last week, our bloodline was strolling around the kingdom on the search for a new mirror of truth, as the one in our castle bathhouse had shattered. how did that happen? uh, i might've maybe... i shall maintain secrecy."

"returning to the point, dearest dream had almost lost herself in the shopping district, claiming she had seen a lost puppy in a mirror that she wanted to help. a chivalrous reason indeed, but my, dream can be quite... foolish sometimes. nevertheless, blood is thicker than water, and our bond has never been closer."

they still love eachother in this universe because there was no corruption thing. also nightmare's bullies were just other elementary school kids in this au so it wasn't like fully grown adults vs a 6 year old at least. she's recovered from it (somewhat) and doesn't blame dream. dream's too perfect for anybody to hate her. dream supports nightmare's delusion and nightmare keeps her alive. equivalent exchange (dream has no idea nm is doing this. ok now the mtt‼️

"oh. my. god. dream? like, dream dream? she's literally my idol, i love her so much! i'm the 7th member of her fanclub out of like, the entire school, which is like 300-ish students! she's cute, and pretty, and she gets this a lot, but her voice is literally like an angel's~ i've never heard what a hymn sounds like, but it probably sounds like dream's voice. and no matter how much i search up online, i can never find any dirt on her too! she's got a perfect online footprint! huh? why was i searching dream up? eh... haha... let's move on~"

"dream? she's really cool. there's a reason she's part of the star students at this school, along with swap and ink. nobody really knows what it takes for someone to become a "star student" though. none of the students know, none of the teachers either. apparently it's a title given to a student specifically from the principal? still, dream probably deserves it though. she's good enough to win a nobel prize. one day she's gonna cure cancer or something."

"oh, dream? that girl with the angel halo crown thing? yeah, i know her. she volunteers at the dog park i bring my dog to, the bakery i go to get snacks, the local art museum, the ice cream shop during summers, nightmare's gang, the... car dealership? wait, hold on. how many volunteer opportunities is this girl doing? is she not getting paid? that has to be illegal. or at least some form of monster rights violation..."

both of the jk!au dreamtale twins are soooo silly i love them. the more and more i elaborate on jk fashion au the more i realize that this is just turning into sans aus but anime tropes but its okay i like it its funny. jk fashion au was always meant to be silly and slice of life and fluffy anyways. anyways i love her i'm literally her number one fan. i mean i AM the principal of this school aftersll,,,,,, this really was our,,, jk fahsion au. says dream at the end of the au (there is no end because this au has no lore what am i talking about