#channeling my inner Kokichi

[rabbitsonthemoon]

Soaking off my nail gel. Definitely did not shape the foil around my fingertips into claws so I could pretend to be Mephiles and make dramatic hand gestures. What a silly idea. I've never commited a shenanigan in my life.

[dawnxblade]

Before The Killing Game

Kaito: "Kokichi! Don't drink all of that sugar! What did the doctor say!"

Kokichi: "Knock it off will ya! You know how much I love Panta! And besides Mom isn't happy how you punched her ex boyfriend."

Kaito: "Listen..I couldn't let that guy cheat on Mom anymore, you said it yourself that the guy was playing mom for a fool. Kokichi, what are we gonna do?"

Kokichi looks at Kaito and then back out the window of their small house

Kokichi: "I don't know but we'll protect mom! We'll bring her money, fame and glory! She'll be proud of us! Team Danganronpa said that when we enter the game Mom will be given money every day! Around like say millions of dollars!"

Kaito: "Kokichi, Mom hates Danganronpa. Why do you think she has forbidden us from ever watching it or talking about it, if she found out that we signed up for the game she will be heartbroken and basically ground us."

Kaito sighed looking at the portrait of a Brunette haired woman with green eyes holding the hand of a man with purple eyes and hair as they smile at the camera, both looking extremely happy

Kaito: "I know it's been hard since Dad died Two years ago and mom has been trying to make us happy, KOKICHI PLEASE LET US NOT JOIN THE GAME AND MAKE MOM SUFFER ANYMORE. Do it for us..for me."

Kaito was in tears watching Kokichi struggle with his inner emotions before deciding to let out the tears that had collected in his eyes

Kokichi: "But it's too late!"

Kaito: "Never! NOW COME ON, Let's go and tell Team Danganronpa that we're not playing their sick game. I won't lose this family to them! That's a promise."

Kokichi brings Kaito into a hug and they both let their tears fall, as they separated the door to their house is broken down and people in strange masks come in and drag them away, both screaming for each other

Kaito: "LET ME GO, KOKICHI! WHERE ARE YOU TAKING US!"

Kokichi: "K-Kaito I'm scared...please don't let them take us."

A stranger pulls out a note and starts reading from it

Man: "The killing game begins once all of the candidates have their memories erased from each other and are secluded from reality, we thank you for your cooperation."

With that the man grabs a strange type of machine that looked like a flashlight and flashed them both in the eyes, all of their memories gone. And replaced with false ones

When their Mom came home she searched for her children but they were nowhere to be found, she picked up the note that was left on the kitchen table and read...She cried.

"Team Danganronpa is very pleased with your sons audition tapes and have recruited them for the game. Here is your first payment, more to come soon phuphuphu."

Shouting the woman picked up a vase and smashed it on the ground, the shattering sound echoed around the empty house, pulling her head up she stared at a portrait of her boys playing in the park on the swings, both wearing capes trying to fly in the air like a bird. The memory made the woman cry harder and she swore when they got home she wasn't going to make them worry about her anymore, Her husband god bless his soul hopefully was watching over their dear children.

With a parting whisper she stood and stared out into the nightless sky

"Kokichi, Kaito my two brave sons...please don't ever forget how much you mean to each other."

After two years of mourning for her husband, she picked up the TV remote and the channel of Danganronpa blared broadcast the new season, She saw her two boys...but they no longer held the same last name and they were arguing...

Kaito Momota: "Listen here you gremlin, stay out of the way! No one wants to hear your lies!"

Kokichi Ouma: "I'll win this Killing game Momota-Chan, stay out of my way if you don't want to die a painful death, or is that a lie~"

Amanda Momota watched as her sons argued back and forth, Kokichi no longer looking at his brother with admiration but instead mockery. Kaito no longer holding his brother in a warm embrace but instead punching him like he was nothing to him, It broke her heart.

What could she do to fix this mistake

[halfling-myth-lady]

I am channeling my inner kokichi ouma

[dirt-and-scrivles]

I’ve never seen anyone address this possibility

[kokichis-dead-dove-club]

channeling my inner kokichi at the doctors office

[golden-redhead]

I started to write a short Oumota fic about Kaito leaving for his six months long expedition to space and Shuichi goes to check on Kokichi because he hasn’t been around lately. I should post it very soon, probably in the next 2 days.

_

“Um,” he fidgets a little, “I haven’t seen you in a while. How are you, Ouma-kun?”

Kokichi presses his hand to his forehead in an overly dramatic way. “I’ve been miserable! Absolutely miserable, Saihara-chan,” he cries, clearly channeling his inner melodrama star. “With my dear darling Momota-chan gone I am withering like a delicate flower! Who knows how long I can keep going like this!”

[ryouverua]

One last time

HE’S BACK -

Fair warning - lots of text below. Like. Lots.

... But first, just before he came to meet with us again -

So all of his classmates in turn talk about how relieve they are that they can work together without suspecting each other, but something about the way she says it rings............ false. But then again, that might be my own bias colouring things. She outright states it in a way that the others don’t, idk. 8′D

Shuichi, though... he’s realized. Maybe not with an exact name, but he knows that isn’t true. He literally can’t bring himself to pretend that it’s true at all.

Oh Himiko...

5 survivors.... or maybe 4, depending on how the mastermind goes out. That’s definitely a new, sad record. :(

I CAN NAME A REASON -

Look who’s back with a brand new ahoge! It’s got that new-hair smell and everything -

H-He was never going to outright attack any of us though, right??? Even if he was willing to let us become collateral damage (which admittedly is super Not Great either, but -). That’s a really morbid thought Shuichi - where did it come from?

And of course, now that his hairpiece is back, he’s gone back to his more deferential, timid self.

“I’m telling you, that ahoge was 95% of my impulse control! Literally!”

But the fact that he’s apologizing now, when he was completely unapologetic before... that has to be that inner voice directing him now, right? But I wonder if it influences his ‘emotions’ (or whatever the equivalent would be for him) as well. Is the voice literally telling him to apologize or does he just ‘feel the urge’ to apologize?

So it is back.

Has it always been that tall???

Maybe if Miu and Kokichi had let him talk before Korekiyo’s trial, we could have followed up on this!!

Honestly though, I’m curious about this too. Is it a literal voice that tells him what to do? Does it appear as a suggestion to him? It sounds like it isn’t ordering him around but more ‘offering suggestions’... something that wouldn’t come across as obtrusive, but welcoming. Something that wouldn’t raise any alarm bells in him. Or maybe he was programmed to accept that just the way things were supposed to be.

.......... Actually the fact that it came up around Korekiyo’s trial, someone else who was revealed to be doing things based on a voice of sorts in his head, is a very strange coincidence? That... may or may not bode well for K1-b0. Is he going to be a foil to Korekiyo, or a parallel?

The inner voice may be good after all if it helped him realize this. 8′D 

Wait, they said there was an accident when he was first created, right? And he reset? This had to have been a fail-safe because something similar to this happened...

As much as I want to comment on the fact that he’s said he can’t cry and he literally is sweating and his ‘eyes’ are ready to overflow, but fffff every single time I see this sprite my heart clenches and I kind of want to hug him. >3>

We’ve officially got everyone on the same side now! ......... well okay there’s technically one specific exception but on the surface we’re all good!

Look at Maki getting better at shedding her tsundere side! She’s getting better at being outright kind and welcoming to people, yay ~

oh my god

This is so..... blatant.... especially with Maki literally saying K1-b0 created this opportunity and Monokuma throwing her under the bus to have another trial. She.... she’s mad at him, isn’t she? And Monokuma too? 

Oh man anyone who doesn’t realize at this point probably thinks it’s one of her anime-reference non-sequiters! But it’s not! It’s definitely a distraction! And she’s totally established herself as someone whose head is in the clouds so she she says random things like this, no one blinks an eye! What other comments has she covered like this?

ARE YOU THOUGH.............

Anyway, it’s time for the trial now so - 

Yeah that’s true - we haven’t actually resolved this clue yet, have we?

I thought your eyesight wasn’t good? But okay, why not! Have a go at it, K1-b0!

Okay before plot progression though, fluff text time -

................................

WHELP THIS IS A HELL OF A FLUFF TEXT

I have so many things to say about this despite the fact that I’ve definitely talked about it before, because I actually relate to the idea of feeling like a different person in cosplay - of, well, letting yourself become the role. And I’ve definitely said that the theme of ‘becoming the role’ is a huge secondary theme of the game, just under ‘truth vs lies’, which is actually why I originally had Tsumugi as my potential mastermind back in Chapter 3. It’s telling that she’s comparing K1-b0 and his ‘personality enhancement’ with her own cosplay though - she’s often said that she only finds herself interesting when she isn’t being herself, so maybe it applies here too. Is this her way of enhancing her own self? Of becoming what she thinks is a ‘better’ self, a more interesting and charismatic person?

With that reveal of ‘Junko’ at the end of the last trial and Tsumugi often comparing cosplay to ‘bringing someone to life’, ‘channeling’ and ‘and being a vessel for the gods’, that means she’s basically resurrecting Junko in a sense... or acting as her vessel? Is that what will happen here? I think it’s possible for her to bring the ‘larger than life’ Junko from history (like the way long-dead historical figures can often become their own entities that walk the line between fiction and reality) as a way to get around the cospox issue unless I’ve really been accusing the wrong person this whole time lmao. It also lines up with all the times resurrection has been brought up in the game which is A LOT - the funeral scene/reviving the Ultimates, Ryoma describing himself as an empty shell walking around (and trying to ‘revive’ himself via a reason to live, killing off the initial protagonist then reviving the role for Shuichi, the Necronomicon, the seance, Korekiyo and his sister, and lastly, Kokichi via Kaito in the exisal. Combine that with my theory of the students just being normal kids who were reborn with the memories of actual Ultimate students who already died... and them even being forced to dress for those roles... this line of hers becomes really important!

Is this going to become a showdown between personalities who died ages ago? But for what purpose? Even though it looks like there’s a decent amount of things that were made up/embellished in those lights, the clip of the funeral, Kaede wearing the helmet and the meteors were shown outside of the flashback light scene - so are we still facing a doomsday scenario?

And back to Tsumugi herself - does she not have enough conviction to follow through with these plans and Monokuma unless she’s in Junko-wear? That would explain why she and Monokuma don’t seem to be on the same page... So which one of them is pulling the strings, exactly?? They’re definitely independent entities!

Meanwhile Himiko is having a grand old time because she’s finally got a friend in Maki. Aaaaaaw ~

We’re, uh, going to have problems if that’s true.

SHUICHI REMEMBERS TOO LMAO

Strength of an old man, average or below-average agility, eyesight and intelligence... what else was there?

And it wasn’t stripped from you???

But... maybe they didn’t realize you had it. Or don’t care? It’s not a dangerous upgrade, so maybe they didn’t realize it could be used in a way that could possibly hinder them...

He says he’s accepted it, but I think it was more out of necessity. It’ll take him some time to adjust to this new state of mind... but I’m happy to hear it, tbh. Just like Shuichi, he’s really struggled with his Ultimate identity up until now, you know? And even though it’s on more of an extreme level, these talents created differences in everyone and how they related to the world, not just him. It’s just a bit more... well, obvious in his case.

It’s all about accepting the good with the bad, K1-b0! And despite some, uh, questionable actions on your part, you really did do so much for us - we never would have gotten to Kokichi’s and Rantaro’s lab, the mastermind’s room, or discovered the flashback light machine without you!

Oh???

.... Uh.

Uh. What. What are those. What.... What are those?!?!

GONTA WAS RIGHT - !

w h a t they’re so stupid and cute

Tiny.... cameras....??? They look like little camera men?

..... I.... I don’t know... if this rules out VR or not. Because if they need little these little guys with cameras, doesn’t that mean they don’t have the omniscient power of a computer program behind them....????

Again, why did they not strip you of these new functions along with the weapons???

First of all, damn, K1-b0! Getting your ahoge back didn’t kill all of that fire in you after all!

Second of all.............. your skin???? Shell??? It’s definitely changed colour? Since when has it been so human-like -

Looks like K1-b0 can still be tough with his ahoge. :D

Oh god, there’s a whole swarm of hivemind Camera-kubs all over the campus? And they’re literally everywhere?!?! wtf -

I guess that’s a similar concept to the regular Monokumas??? Sure there’s usually only one operational at a time, but they always seem to pick up where the last left off. kind of like Kyuubey

First of all, ew.

Second of all, TRAUMATIC BUZZING NOISE FLASHBACKS

THE ONES THAT I STUPIDLY THOUGHT WERE PART OF THE MONITOR SETUP AROUND THE SCHOOL

but that wouldn’t have made sense because there’s nothing like that outside -

So there’s nanotechnology that exists on such a scale............

MONOKAMERA, THE SIXTH MONOKUB, HIDING ALL OVER THE ACADEMY. THE ONE THEY CALL THE ULTIMATE CAMERA GUY. WATCH OUT FOR HER THEM....

Can we note that once again it is Maki declaring that Kokichi was correct? She is doing her damnedest to check her own prejudices against him this chapter as penance and it’s great.

It’s not ideal, but I also wonder if some of the things he uncovered were only possible using his methods. not that you probably actually are happy about that

actually I bet you were pissed about the whole chapter 5 thing too

..... I want to go back and see that tbh

TALK OF REINCARNATION AGAIN.... also lol Himiko that’s kind of mean

Monokuma thinks he’s going to win... and if I’m reading this correctly, he can still win at the expense of Tsumugi losing....? Is that why? Even if Tsumugi’s plan fails and we see past her trap of ‘Kaede is the mastermind’, identifying Tsumugi will still end up being a victory for him....?

And your sudden hope!extremism, yeah? Because that really was something. 8′D

OH GOD WE’RE GOING IN I MEAN... I’M READY BUT I’M ALSO NOT TBH, I’M NOT 100% SOLID ABOUT THE BIG MYSTERY SURROUNDING THE GAME

like

I feel like I ~get~ some stuff but there’s still something just beyond...........

“M-Maki I know you’re trying to put my mind at ease but can we not bring up dying before we’ve even tried to win -”

Real talk - I love Himiko’s spell names.

Y.... Yeah........ but why are you excited about this....?

Then again, I feel like you were actually really attached to Gonta? I mean, you were always defending him, right? Is this your way of giving him some postmortem love? ...... AAAAH I DON’T KNOW -

aslkdjf I know this was the same amount as last time but this is such a small cast left -

Man, we’re just... swinging right back to despair and hope again. Look, I know we’re appeasing K1-b0 but -

Why.... why is it back again. Why is Monokuma back again. Why did the killing game come back at all - what is the point of trying to be Junko? What’s to gain from all of this?

I remember thinking and really liking the idea that this game was completely separate from the last two, so it’s strange to have arrived at this point at the very end, but.... well. Here we go, I suppose.

Well said, Sweetcheeks.

So.... normally I’d have a drawn out map of the crime scene, but this is a pretty different situation so I made this at the trial save point:

It’s a bit small, so I’ll recap and expand on that and a few other things:

“TSUMUGI IS THE FUCKING MASTERMIND AND SHE IS TOTALLY TRYING TO SET KAEDE UP AS THE ‘FAKE’ MASTERMIND TO SCREW WITH SHUICHI’S (ET AL)’S HEADS

She set up the document saying Kaede has a twin and is trying to draw parallels to Junko (to trick Shuichi)

She planted the shot-put ball in the mastermind’s lair

She didn’t talk about ‘birthing a Monokuma’ (when everyone else did)

SHE IS THE ‘MOTHER’ THAT WAS REFERRED TO BY MONOTARO IN TRIAL 4, NOT MOTHERKUMA

So I went into some detail earlier about Tsumugi herself, and over the last few investigation posts I ended up decided on what I outlined above. On top of everything else, I think we’re going to nail her on the idea that while Kaede’s murder occurred, she went to the library via the mastermind’s lab and stole Rantaro’s Survivor’s Perk. The problem is... then what? What exactly will we do after that? Also I swear Kaede thought of the same thing, with no idea what to do once we confronted the mastermind -

As for the general situation, I’m sticking to my guns about the class not actually being the Ultimates they think they are - I saw the ‘talents’ part of the flashback light setup menu. Actually, the flashback lights themselves.... jeez. Okay. Ironically enough, my thoughts on them are that their execution in the game is similar to Kokichi’s lying style.

First the game has a cutscene that’s completely truthful. Kaede and Shuichi remember being kidnapped at the beginning of the game. The entire prologue scene. The funeral at the beginning of chapter 2. The meteors in chapter 3. Hell, the kid at the beginning of this chapter, who seems to be watching them and getting inspired by them...??? Then... that’s when the flashback light comes in and embellishes that truth with fantasy. That funeral? It was for the entire class, and they all see themselves as being part of it (picturing ‘themselves’ in those photos rather than the students whose memories they all have). The meteors? It gave rise to an entire death cult - the Ultimate Despair, in fact - and they, themselves, were hunted (which plays off of the players’ knowledge of knowing they remember being kidnapped off the streets). Or something like that....

I’m just trying to place a few things, like that picture of Kaito with his grandparents in the motive video and the flashbacks of Shuichi and Kaede in the helmets. Where do they get placed in all of this? Was Shuichi able to project the image of ‘Kaito’ he knew when watching the video, or is that part of the technomagic of the video itself? We did have a whole segment of the VR chapter talking about the mind being able to be fooled into overcoming the reality of the situation (dying via simulation murder) so is it safe to extrapolate from there? And did Shuichi and Kaede remember themselves with those helmets separately from those flashback lights, as a delayed reaction (which as of this chapter is proven to be possible) or is that real?

As for whether this is a simulation, there’s evidence for and against that. The flashbacks with the helmets - pro. The physical presence of cameras - false. Though with that said, I’ve done a bit of work in computer programs where you actually have to set up cameras in-program and when testing the animation, it’ll only capture what’s set up in the frame - so then again, maybe not??? Those computerized cameras can be programmed to move along a certain path and the lens/frame/etc itself can also be altered.... and they did counteract having blind spots by swarming the campus with them so. Hm. Honestly, it could go both ways. I don’t want to dwell too much on this only because I don’t think that’s going to be the ‘big’ reveal anyhow tbh...

Still though; roles, escapism, resurrection. That’s what I picked up on the most through this entire thing. So how does that work together...? The students were told they were replaceable, and the game will never end. Rantaro lived through one but died in the next. Did he live through a game with this same group of classmates or other people? Or, hell, were they ‘other people’ but with the same names/personalities/memories, but different physical people? And if he was willing to repeat the game again, then why? Was it for a chance to break the loop? Or is there a goal to be accomplished if he wins it properly?

Okay, I think I’m starting to go in circles here. What I know: Tsumugi is the mastermind, and she’s not in complete sync with Monokuma. She’s trying to get Kaede(’s twin) framed; Monokuma is perfectly fine with Tsumugi being identified. Tsumugi falls back on the Junko persona when she’s in mastermind mode - when she was alone, she couldn’t help but be that way with Motherkuma. It’s a role she’s able to take - maybe passed down. Anyway, the point is, she uses it to ‘enhance herself’ or maybe to ‘escape her plain self’. Almost like an emotional support thing....? I wonder...

A lot of the truth as we know it is embellished. Only things we can trust from the flashback lights are things we saw independently of them as well, I think? At the bare minimum, pre-Chapter 4. After that point we didn’t have any corresponding prologue clips to match with the lights. With that said, the students were given talents and memories to match them - I think the Ultimate students they belonged to were actually killed... by the Ultimate Hunt, perhaps. Either way, these kids were brought in as ‘replacements’, the same way the Monokids were replaced. Rantaro, at the very least, was not a replacement though - he had a chance to do this again and took it, for whatever reason... Is this a simulation for the Gopher Project? Or something else entirely? Why ‘resurrect’ the Ultimate students at all? And why is there potentially a scenario where Tsumugi loses, but Monokuma still wins? WHY DON’T I HAVE A FULLY CONFIDENT ANSWER FOR EVERYTHING FFS -

Oh, and of course, Kokichi Ouma was 25 steps ahead of everyone and had Rantaro’s figure in his room too, so that’s cool.

[kirastrations]

Loved the Way You Hated (me)

"I'm perfect for a killing game, I don't have any faith in humanity!"

Hair the colour of buttermilk swirls framed a face devoid of pigment, lavender eyes clouded over with a mist of hollow nothingness, with a smile that screamed "I want to win."

Tsumugi Shirogane had been instantly sold.

~Tsumugi reflects on her actions, and finds herself pondering over what could have been.

My piece for the @danganevents Valentines event, for @mastermind-madd ^^ Doubling it as a piece for @femslashfeb.

Read on ao3

Read on fanfic.net

The moment Tsumugi is alone with her thoughts, it hits her like a ton of bricks.

Or a box of shot-put balls, to be more precise.

She trudges through the dimly lit academy, drinking in her surroundings through eyes the colour of gravel and monotony, an arrow of doubt pierces her (one of those arrows from Maki's soon-to-be-revealed lab, for sure). Doubt at her existence. Doubt at the journey she'd made to get this far. Had it been worth it in the end?

Conflicting emotions blanket her core, not unlike a corrupted, malicious and double-dealing piece of fabric. Each thread is twisted and tangled, with no plans on loosening any time soon. Buttons of hope sew their way into the ground beneath her feet, and no matter how large and terrifying the darkness seems to be, they don't fall out. They endure each movement, each twist in the road, and it's beyond the cosplayer how it all works. Another voice tells her that hope is just a petty illusion, one that is unreachable and only attainable through fictional mediums. Hope fools the mind and defies all logic, logic which is hurled at one like a bullet from a gun.

Such is doubt.

What even is hope?

Tsumugi... doesn't think she really knows anymore.

Had she ever known to begin with?

Either way, she had been hoping to learn. Hoping that she'd be the one to show her, a final lesson to twist the final nail in a coffin that awaits the seamstress a mere five trials away.

Back to the present, Tsumugi finds herself walking, walking, walking. Where to? She doesn't know, but that's a lie.

Her head snaps up as a second figure comes into view. And the mask drizzles back down her face like a sickly sweet honey.

It's Shuichi Saihara, because of course it is.

As they cross paths, he doesn't bother meeting her eyes, choosing to remain hidden beneath the shadow of his hat. He doesn't even see her. A chill runs down her spine, and a fleeting he hates me so much dances across her mind.

He's so pathetic, says Tsumugi to Tsumugi.

Tsumugi purses her lips. She wants to agree, but knows she can't. She can't now.

She reaches her destination, plainly patterned shoes squeaking to a halt outside the not-so-plainly decorated door. Kaede's lab had been the easiest one to design, after all - there had been an 'Ultimate Composer' the season prior, so all it had really needed was a little bit of dusting down.

Sighing, Tsumugi slips into the leather stool, sliding up the piano's hood. She had no intention of playing it, of course - she'd damage her nails - and her characterisation, she supposes.

A hand ghosts the untouched Monokuma-coloured keys. Freshly-painted teal nails glint back at her, almost mockingly, as if to say you did this.

Kaede... such potentional for a protagonist. Closing her eyes, Tsumugi remembers the grovelling she'd had to do to get her the part. The strings she'd had to pull. The paycheck she'd willingly given up. The lows she had stooped to in the initial writing process. They'd eventually managed to persuade her to "Go back to basics, give the viewers a nostalgic kick up the rump!" And she had begrudgingly complied.

Danganronpa wouldn't be Danganronpa without that one shy-boy who could grow— Not too bad, she could fit that in alright. There'd always be that one student who can barely remember their own name— No biggie, Rantaro would be the best decision for that plotline. Oh, and of course, who in their right mind would be against a spicy romance plot— Astronaut and Assassin, perhaps? Typical normie suggestion, but it's not like she could say no at this stage. Fanservice is a must— Fine, fine, Iruma and Ouma could slot in there nicely. Case Three's gotta be a double whammy with a crazy twist, just like the old days— Eh, wouldn't be too hard, she supposes.

Oh, how naive she had been!

Tsumugi Shirogane had signed her livelihood, her dignity, her life off, for a single chance to see a girl take centre stage for once...

... Only to have her fucking die before the second arc had even started.

Tsumugi's eyes flutter shut. Oh, how fun she'd have been so fun to work with. To get to know. To see the absolute utter despair in her eyes when Tsumugi would finally finally tear off her bespectacled mask, and stab her puppet where it'd hurt most. The heart. Kaede would feel the knife before she'd lay her eyes on it. She'd be forced to look into the eyes of it's wielder, just two stands down from her. And Tsumugi would finally see it. Those eyes that had once been filled with determination and purpose, would be brimming with bitterness and absolute hate.

But even so, Kaede would have changed it all. She'd have changed the course of Danganronpa history. She'd have found some roundabout way of beating the tradition. She'd have rewritten the fiction that she'd confidently stated as loving so much all those months back.

A tiniest fragment within Tsumugi's jaded heart had believed, no, hoped that Kaede Akamatsu would have reignited the firey passion Tsumugi had had for Danganronpa all those years ago when she'd first joined the Team.

“I'm perfect for a killing game, I don't have any faith in humanity!"

Hair the colour of buttermilk swirls framed a face devoid of pigment, lavender eyes clouded over with a mist of hollow nothingness, with a smile that screamed "I want to win."

Tsumugi Shirogane had been instantly sold.

The audition tape plays in the cosplayer's mind on a loop, like a broken CD from the dead pianist's lab. Her stomach bubbles and pops with a feeling she can't quite place a finger on.

Despair, perhaps?

Ah yes, it was probably despair. Tsumugi has a sudden urge to race to the bathroom to relieve herself of the feeling. To dance into her special little room, throw on that blonde wig, and cackle and cry till her emotions run dry.

She'd succeeded, she'd failed, she'd succeeded, she'd failed. She'd finally, finally succeeded in channelling her inner-Junko, something she'd longed to achieve ever since she'd been a little girl, the moment her once-innocent eyes had been tainted with the fashionista's reveal and ultimate demise. But she'd also failed, she supposes.

All of her hard work, all of her endless efforts, all of her hopes to change Danganronpa into something other than what it's been for the past few decades. All of it currently lay crushed beneath a huge grand piano, painted red with blood, and stained pink with deceit.

It's so despairingly delightful.

Tsumugi bites back a shuddering sigh as the memories come flooding back. She chuckles, quietly reminding herself that someone else already has that character this time around.

Actually, speaking of...

Korekiyo. He'd been onto her both before and during the trial. Tsumugi's fists ball into her skirts. He (and Angie, much to her surprise) had been the only two to get remotely close to the 'true truth'.

She refuses be outed by mere side characters, of all people. They'd both have to go, and soon. Tsumugi makes a mental note to make the artist more appealing to 'Miss Shinguuji's' tastes further down the line.

Yeah, yeah, that should work.

Tsumugi absolutely adores the characters that are a threat, she always had done. It was only natural for her to want a whole cast full of them! It's why competent characters such as Korekiyo and Kirumi exist. It's why unpredictable characters such as Kokichi and Angie exist. It's why threats to her very existence, such as Rantaro and Kaede existed.

She loves them.

She loves their hatred.

Another sigh spills from the cosplayer's lips. The classroom is as dead as the night outside, as dead as it's owner, and the man she didn't kill.

And then, it's all empty again.

Tsumugi's empty.

She's empty.

The emptiness... is always there, but Tsumugi is a professional, she's great at hiding it, masking it with normal human emotions. No one is going to ask her why she's smiling. And in a Killing Game, no one will ask her why she's crying either. The emptiness hides everywhere, this emptiness, it floats around in hive-minded swarms, it hides between the cracks in walls. There isn't any getting away from it. The nightmares of her classmates seem to help fill it, the contents of which is mostly irrelevant. The feeling gets lighter with each corpse added to the growing pile of her former peers. Yes... that's it... Something has to go to shit, something has to be imperfect for her world to keep on spinning.

Something tragic. Imperfect. Exciting. Despair-inducing. Unplain. Or else there's no meaning to the killing game. No meaning to life. No meaning to her.

And so, in the midst of the emptiness, Tsumugi Shirogane grieves. There are no waterworks, no theatrics, no speeches of hope and friendship to pick her up off her feet.

Just an the familiar pit of emptiness Tsumugi thought would be quenched with a new kind of killing game.

No such luck.

Tsumugi grieves the loss of her precious new killing game, and with it, the loss of Kaede Akamatsu, the Ultimate Pianist.

She grieves the loss of the most treasured puppet in her collection.

In the world of Danganronpa, trusts are broken, and lies are told. For the puppets to believe in what they seek, they must know what it means to be what they don't want to be.

Being sad will make them realize how valuable being happy is.

Being weak makes them know what it means to be strong.

Being helpless is what makes them determined to be helpful. Mistakes happen tragedies occur, and then the process starts all over again.

But, by looking at the brighter sides of things, they might just be able to briefly smile one last time in life, and in the something just beyond that.

Tsumugi reapplies her makeup, sliding her glasses back up the bridge of her nose.

And she gets back to work, slipping into the classroom adjacent. Those Kubs Pads won't make themselves, after all.

The other puppets are eagerly waiting her arrival, whether they know it or not.

Whether she likes it or not.

[luminaryblood]

♛

my opinion on;

character in general: It took me like one chapter of gameplay to decide that I would trust Kokichi Ouma with my life. It’s an absolutely terrible idea, but I stand by it. I’m channeling my inner Kaito and believing in him because I say so. In all seriousness, I really love Kokichi, way more than I was expecting to. He’s a really complex character who serves as the catalyst for a lot of the game’s drama, but at the same time he’s really funny. I’m also a huge sucker for villain/hero complexes, so the fact that he wears this mask of a stereotypical supervillain despite often being very morally ambiguous is interesting to me.

how they play them: You capture the 1 part adorable, 1 part little shit personality he’s got going on really well! Like, I can go from wanting to hug him to being legitimately creeped out by him in about two lines of dialogue, which is very true to canon, haha. 

the mun: We haven’t talked too much ooc, but you seem super nice! I really like seeing you on my dash, and if you ever want to chat or plot or whatever I’m down!

do i;

follow them: YES!rp with them: Yes, but I seriously have to catch up on drafts lmao (Also while we’re on the topic I laughed so hard at Kokichi saying “calm down big boy” @ Kaito it made my day)want to rp with them: Always ^^ship their character with mine: I actually really like Oumota but it would be a very rocky relationship. They’d be interesting together though!

what is my;

overall opinion: Really nice mun with a very very in character (and cute!) Kokichi! You should follow them because they’re lovely