#underground blossom spoilers

[eigengrauone]

connecting the dots, didn’t connect shit, etc etc

[kinswaya]

make one more demand and i will mix your yearbook photos back up just to confuse you

[femmefatalegoth]

This parrots Crimes as of Underground Blossom:

Torture

Murder

Kidnapping

False Imprisonment

Theft

Possible Criminal Negligence (deliberately causing an allergic reaction in a child)

[trupowieszcz-moved]

throwing peanuts at school children on the metro rn

[noridal]

I was just going to reply to @sunshine-herricane under the original post, but I figured why not make a longer infodump. So, mind your spoilers and get ready to click a read more link, because it's time to enjoy my personal

Harvey lore rant

Harvey is one of the first two characters to be introduced to us in Cube Escape: Seasons along with Laura. It is known to us that he's a relevant character because otherwise Rusty Lake wouldn't bother to make Cube Escape: Harvey's Box, in which you play as him; plus, if he wasn't relevant you wouldn't need him alive to complete Seasons.

The thing is, I think it's easy to forget about him, or brush him off as a secondary character, since we only see him as a sort of "sidekick". Apart from Harvey's Box, he just makes minor appearances and gets nearly killed by Laura on various occasions (Think of the scene in Cube Escape: The Mill in which Laura, as a corrupted soul, almost chokes him to death).

Things change with Rusty Lake Hotel, where, if you manage to give Owl the Rusty Lake Cigars, it's revealed you're playing as Harvey. This is huge, because at this point you find out that Harvey isn't just a pet, but a character that can be compared to Mr Owl or Mr Crow, which up to this point are the people playing puppeteer with the other characters of the plot.

This is why it's logical to imagine that Harvey's role, in this situation, is to act as a butler for Mr Owl, and one can easily assume that it was Owl's idea to kill the hotel guests. In other words, Owl is the boss, and Harvey is just following orders, whether he likes killing those animal-people or not.

Before getting to Paradise, I think it's important to make a quick stop through Cube Escape: Birthday, in which we see him with his humanoid form for the first time:

And we also get to see an interesting piece of lore about the corrupted souls of the hotel guests breaking free from their containers and attacking both Harvey and Mr Owl. This way we learn that Harvey is also a shapeshifter, and contrary to Owl or Crow, who have a human and a hybrid form, Harvey seems to be naturally a bird that somehow achieved this (I'm assuming) "enlightened" state of half bird, half human.

This is important information because it indicates that Harvey is likely immortal. This is in line with Rusty Lake Roots: judging from that level in the Emma storyline, Harvey is around the lake in 1891, and is also around Laura's death (1971 according to Cube Escape: Case 23). Now, I know nothing about parrots, but 80+ years is a pretty long life for a parrot that seems suspiciously to never age.

One could argue that this could be just a similar parrot or whatever, but we also know that Hotel takes place in 1893, and Harvey is definitely in that game at least.

Now we get to the infamous Paradise Easter Egg: it's fairly missable, but you can find Harvey sitting on the window sill during the third plague

This happens in 1796. And being Paradise Mr Owl's origin story, well, this is clearly evidence that Harvey has been around longer than him. This is a theory of mine- but he probably was Caroline's pet, or the one that sparked her research around the lake and immortality.

Point is, this is a huge turn on the Harvey-Owl dynamic: where at first Harvey seemed to be a servant, now he feels a lot more like an equal. At this point of the story I thought that Harvey could've been the one to suggest to Owl to take revenge on his family/hotel guests, and Owl could've been the one saying "let's go for murder".

Except that underground blossom came out.

I won't share screenshots of it because it's another stance of the Rusty Lake franchise being weird about nipples, plus I don't want to spoil much of that game, but to cut it short: toward the last few stations, Harvey decides to torture a pickpocketer for stealing Rose's timepiece.

This is another strong statement about Harvey's personality, since it's clear that he really had no problem killing the various people during Hotel. This puts a bunch of things into perspective, because I mean, c'mon, he deliberately hurts unaware bystanders who just steal shit and aren't really involved (so far) in the plot. One could've said that the Hotel guests "deserved" it (since it's clear they aren't really pleasant or good people either, even before Paradise came out), or again, Harvey was just doing what he's told. But this one scene screams "Harvey is a sadistic bitch" and at this point I'm not even mad about it.

Now the only thing left to find out is when he actually gains his human form- but by the looks of it, the clues are pointing towards him being the oldest immortal bird-person in the lore, and probably the one who knows the real secret to reach ascension and enlightenment.

[arglemouf]

stayed up until 2am speedrunning this game 100% (took me about 2h40). i think i played it too fast i didn't give myself time to absorb it LOL but i can't wait to have a deeper look at the ARG >:))

[innalheid]

I want to paperclip aldous' nipples together SO bad

[thebvbbletea]

"Finally, I can see the blossom. My mother, I know she's here for me. I can live another life, without sorrow. The lake belongs to me."

— Underground Blossom (2023)

[axelein]

Do you think Rose was part of the Albert Hate Club or do Frank and Leonard would have to wait for her to leave the room to start talking shit about him bc I can just imagine the absolutely rambunctious stories they had to tell about him

[hannukahmatata]

OH FUCK!!!!

[eigengrauone]

I was screaming this at him while playing btw

[pharrell-the-formation]

The long-awaited (by me) “Underground Blossom” was released today. I played, enjoyed it and want to write down some of my thoughts regarding everything shown there.

🔴 If it’s not already obvious, achtung: there are spoilers everywhere, so continue to read at our own risk! 🔴

🦜It seems that Harvey actually remained enlightened for much longer than people in fandom previously assumed. UB doesn’t shy away from metaphors, but the fact that Harvey actually replaced Laura’s parent and somehow successfully handled responsibilities of caring for a human child, as well as the fact that other, non-important children also saw the parrot precisely as an anthropomorphic bird in a suit, quite directly illustrates that this guy all this time, throughout the girl’s growing up, really was like that, and not just a normal pet parrot. I believe in this version of a story: Harvey the Hotel worker, Harvey the confidant of Mr. Owl, Harvey the Eilander family killer did not die and was not reborn, descending along the wheel of Samsara to the level of an animal. Enlightened ones simply know how to temporarily change their form to an animal-like one, and this is precisely what he did, perhaps in order to hide from the same embittered escaped corrupt souls or for some other reason. Mr Crow did something similar in “Cube Escape: Paradox,” if my memory serves me right, turning into the more familiar for us form of a crow. This would explain why Vanderboom depicted our anthropomorphic protagonist in one of her drawings as a pet parrot in a cage. And also the fact that he retains his completely human mind in animal form (demonstrated when solving puzzles in “Harvey’s box”) can be explained this way.

💧I still adhere to the idea, that Rose in this game was not really eager to resurrect Albert. This idea is rather based on my personal preferences, because Rose, who renounced her father, appeals to me as a character much more, so here I ask you not to treat this exact point as a full-fledged theory regarding canon events. Let's discard my old partially-hypothesis-partially-AU about “The past within” and “Underground blossom” being different timelines (like something similar that has already been shown before - in the Bob’s fate, where in some games he dies or commits suicide, and in “The White Door” forgets Laura and begins to live a normal life). It is clearly not the case; now it is more than clear that one game is directly connected to the other. However, here's what could happen: Miss Vanderboom receives a letter from recently deceased Albert, along with a mission to bring him back to life. Initially, she is interested in this and actively works on the task, but at some point something clicks in her and the understanding comes that it is better to leave a possibly dangerous person where he cannot harm anyone. Perhaps getting closer to her cousins ​​had an impact. So, Rose no longer wants to carry out this ritual, and this automatically calls everything into question, because even though she in the Past may have completed her part of the work, now, without her desire in the Present, she from the Future may not complete hers. A paradox. Albert's soul, of course, did not appreciate the joke and wants to make sure that his daughter does what she should, whether she wants it or not. When Harvey begins to visit to her, she already understands perfectly well that her father will not give up so easily. She understands that he will most likely try to harm her or her daughter. She understands that she may have to make very serious sacrifices so that Laura, the most precious thing she has left, does not suffer at the hands of her grandfather - and disappears from her life. Afterall, She will be better off with Harvey.

🌳 I'm still sticking to my Naraka theory. Rose somehow managed to preserve her humanity even in this form, and she thanks her old friend for all the help, and by giving her beloved daughter a piece of her soul - the petals - she helps her start living from scratch, now not suffering from psychological problems so much. I don’t know how literally the final level should be taken and how much the girl’s return to life depended on the mother (after all, in “Seasons” everything was presented kind of differently), but I think you can perceive it as you like.

To sum it up, I just want to say that “Undergroung Blossom” left me feeling incredibly warm and.. cozy? An impression that I honestly never expected from a game in this series, full of darkness, suffering and all sorts of devilry. Despite the fact that there are such things too, the theme of family and sincere care for someone dear to you runs like a red thread throughout the entire story. And all this is consolidated with such a bright ending, after which even Rose’s terrible posthumous fate is ultimately not viewed as critically as before, which... I can’t. It’s wholesome. As wholesome as Rusty lake game can be.

[hazeerror]

//SPOILERS FROM THE PAST WITHIN / RUSTY LAKE ROOTS

This post is just basicly me ranting about my favorite game so don't take it that seriously ^^

Hyperfixation goes brrrrrrrrr

Something that I really loved about The Past Within is that how it tells the story from an unreliable perspective. This really showed when I played it with my boyfriend, someone who doesn't know the lore of the games and there for doesn't know Albert's history. It's clear that the story is told trough a bias towards Albert since he made the cube and we play as his daughter, Rose who also probably doesn't know the full story or just ignorant towards it. So when we played the game, for my boyfriend Albert just seemed like a weird old dude who really loves his daughter, but for me, I knew that the photo in the box of Ida was an evidence of his obsession towards a woman who he could never get and there for brutaly murdered her then made a lombic baby with her egg, that's Rose. He doesn't loves Rose bc she is his daughter, he loves her bc she is the only connection he could ever had with Ida, a trophy of some way. I think there was like one single reference that Albert had blood on his hands and that was in my side. And there for the ending has mixed messeges too, for those who knew the lore and for those who don't. For those who don't, it was just a father-daughter reunion. But for us who knew, we just witnessed one of the most dangerous man of the series return and basicly running free in the world while also having the rarest cube in his position.

I'm very exited for Underground Blossom and for how they will continue this ending and also about how this clif hanger will effect Rusty Lake itself, both the story and place.

[dinaniktorl]

Hey, I guess people DO want me to explain Rusty Lake Lore :D

Okay-okay, so,

Chapter 0 out of ???

I prefer to put all Rusty Lake games and storybits into 4 parts:

1) Eilander arc (RL Paradise, RL Hotel)

2) Vanderboom arc (Samsara, RL Roots, The Past Within)

3) the Dead Woman and the Detective arc (cube escape Collection, cube escape Paradox, Underground Blossom)

4) Best Kept Memory arc (the White Room, ARG)

Take a notice, that one arc can and DOES overlay with others.

Also, NOTHING HERE IS SET IN STONE.

New RL games keep telling details from different arcs, altering and giving them a new meaning. They never come out in chronological order.

I am not an expert in RL, also English is not my first language, so please tell me if I've made a mistake.

WARNING: I will heavily spoiler each and every game (+ARG, a movie and trailers). Please play/watch at least some of them before reading this.

| Next chapter >>

[knivesofthemind]

!!POSSIBLE UNDERGROUND BLOSSOM SPOILERS!!

Just finished playing and completed my card. No bingo. But to be fair, I haven't unlocked any secret levels or anything.

[innalheid]

Me, watching @alexandercakedust play underground blossom, hinting him through cuz I 100%'d this morning: who else might like a donut babe...?

Him: well, he was only there for that one bit..

Me: DO YOU. ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT DALE BECAUSE HES A COP??????