Lisel Solves the Mystery of Umineko

Zea started up a topic to get his good friend Lisel to read through Umineko no Naku Koro ni, a very popular Visual Novel on Board 8.

While his updating has been a bit slow, his topics have been praised for it's very entertaining and funny write-ups.

Just a warning that there are MSPaint pictures and fake screenshots done by Lisel himself within these write-ups.

Just sayin'

Episode 1

. . .It begins

Man this art is terrible. I didn't expect it to be THIS bad. It's kinda charming in a hilariously bad way, though.

"Liqour is my friend"

this guy

Apparently his name is Kinzo. Nice. Apparently he's on medicine and if he keeps drinking so much he will eventually rot or something. Fat, bald doctor wants Kinzo to trust his judgement. Here's to hoping Kinzo does no such thing and continues to drink. How else is he going to enjoy watching the game while his wife makes him a sandwich? So anyway I continue and Kinzo half-smiles. Excellent.

"Genji. Another glass."

Aw yeah Kinzo. Do it FOR AMERICA. Wait, what? Water it down?! Aw, come on man. . . Jeez I already forgot all of these guys names and they're still on the screen.

Apparently the liquor he drinks is venemous and green. Now that's a manly drink if I ever heard of one.

He thanks the bald doctor and the bald doctor makes a passive-aggressive shot at him for not taking his advice. Genji smirks at him again. This guy. Apparently they play chess together or something. Ah, I remember when me and Zea played chess a few times. Maybe when we're really old we can make passive-aggressive shots at each other and then mention chess as if it's relevant. . . And apparently that makes it seem like they're even. Wait, what?

Are you guys sure there's no sex scenes? Cause sex scenes with this terrible art would be hilarious. . .

He's trying to find out how much time he has left and the bald doctor is screwing with him. I think he's just mad that he's bald or something. Okay, now instead of giving him a direct answer (but at least he finally gave him one) it has something to do with him dying before this chess game is finished! So, I guess the one thing I should take away from this is that Kinzo is awesome and he's also going to die.

". . . . And what is a will, Nanjo?"

A miserable pile of secrets!

So here we go on to learn about inheritance and regrets or something like that. I kinda fell asleep (just kidding).

Kinzo has nothing he wants to tell or leave behind. Like a true champ.

"I was born with nothing and I will die with nothing!"

Now he's getting pissed and shouting. That's why people don't like when he drinks so much! I guess he doesn't like his kids or something, he thinks they don't deserve any inheritance. He gives not a damn. He wants no tomb, no coffin!

oh snap he just mentioned a witch

there's going to be witches in this game?! SIGN ME UP

Now he wants to see Beatrice's smiling face before he dies. Oh, Beatrice. Apparently she's invisible and mocking him right now while he rants. I kinda like the monologue/rant thing that's going on. Reminds me of Shakespeare.

"For the love of God, Beatriiiiiiiiiiice!!!"

I'm treated to a short cutscene that kinda also has terrible art. . . Then. . .

October 4, 1986

Some guy is talking about planes but I'm pretty sure it's not Leonardo DiCaprio. Then some other poorly-drawn guy calls him Battler-kun so I guess that's his name. Battler looks pretty bad, too.

"Owaa! G-George-aniki. . ."

His name is George. All three guys in the intro had Japanese sounding names and this one poorly drawn guy gets a boring name like George. On top of that, what kind of name is Battler? He better love to fight. Apparently he never thought about whether a plane would crash or not. That's a great philosophy on life, y'know?

It's been six years since Battler was small and he's not a kid anymore. I can't think of ANY age range where this makes sense so I'm going to assume he's X years old. I mean, if you were 12 you're already a pre-teen and then 6 years later you'd be 18. On the other hand, if you were like 8 you'd be a kid, but then 6 years later you'd only be 14 and still a teen. . . Oh wait, I forgot. In Japan you're an adult once you turn 13. I guess that means he's like 13 or 14 years old now, though. No wonder he's drawn so poorly.

Man, George sure laughs a lot. I wonder what's so great in his life that makes him want to laugh all the time like that. . .

"ihihihi"

This laugh.

They talk a bit more about boring stuff like how he drinks and it'll make him stay short but he doesn't care if he stays short. Okay, so he must be like 13 years old. I'm also going out on a limb and guessing he's Mr. Kinzo's son since the other guy mentioned drinking like your dad. Wait, what. He's 5'11"? What kind of 13 year old Japanese kid is 5'11"? And why would the other guy mention him not growing anymore if he's already huge?! This makes no sense!

Oh, wait. Hahah. He took suspicious drugs and does nonstop muscle training. Now it all makes sense.

Then he shows me his name in Japanese and asks if I can read it. Which I cannot. And his last name is the same as Mr. Kinzo. Yeah, I got it! I feel smart. Apparently the people who named him are at the top of his must-kill list. Man, this guy is crazy. He wants to KILL his PARENTS. Oh, wait, he's probably just kidding. . . Eh, well, anything goes in Japan. Plus he's 13 now, old enough to make his own decisions.

Mind Blown

Based on George, his cousins, age (23 - 5 = 18), Battler is actually 18. So when he was 12 he was a kid even though Japanese people become adults when they turn 13? I'm just going to keep referring to him as 13 because it makes more sense that way. That means George is 18.

Next we're going to meet some more people who want to talk about Battler's height, which he specifically mentioned he didn't want to talk about but seems okay with now. . . .

Alright, since my first appointment took much less time than I had anticipated, I'm going to continue for a little bit right now while I have some free time! Also I just learned that this game is like 40 hours long so I might be giving slightly less detailed write-ups. I mean, if I keep playing at that pace I'll likely be playing this game for like a year and a half.

I load the game back up and. . . learn that George's dad is named Hideyoshi. Does no one else see anything wrong with this? George is so out of place. . . Hideyoshi is the best uncle ever because he gives Battler allowance and he's really nice to kids.

|

I see a suspiciously ugly lady, I'm talking DQ Female level of ugliness, and then

hihihi count +1

And they talk about Battler's good looks for a bit (his aunt is coming on to him) until I finally learn that her name is Eva. Almost as out of place as George but since they're related it becomes less suspicious. Although I'm sure there's still a mystery here to be solved! Now we're joined by a still poorly drawn but slightly less ugly girl with white hair and someone says namunamunamu. Whatever.

Oh, by the way, is there a way to go backward if I accidentally skip a line? I've only done it once so far but it'd be nice to know. . .

There's a few more ihihi's and then something happens that I kind of don't understand. Is this white-haired girl his mom or something? She looks about the same age as him. Then Battler reveals she is indeed his stepmother and not his real mother. Mystery solved.

AHH! AHHHH!

Battler's dad is ugly as ****! And I think he just tried to rape Battler! What is going on?! I thought there were no sex scenes in this game! . . . Oh, he just pinched his ear. Hihihi. . . Okay, this up up down down left right left right business is suspicious. That sounds just like father/son rape to me. And his ugly dad's name is Rudolf. Wonderful.

Eva and Rudolf taunt each other for a little bit and there's something about roundhouse kicks. When people attack each other in this the screen just kinda shakes. I think it would be better if we got hilariously bad battle artwork too, but I guess you can't have it all. I can't believe Battler is just sitting there watching this. I would have walked off to get peanuts or something by now.

"What an awesome kid. Share some of that with my dumbass son, will you."

Hihihi, ugly Rudolf is actually kinda cool with lines like that. Next I learn about some sick child and how sick kids should stay home. Sound sensible enough to me. Almost too sensible. I think there's a mystery here that needs to be solved. . . How do I investigate the sick child?!

Rudolf and Eva bicker some more. . . Battler kinda admires George for a bit. . . Then, some more people show up! Here's a poorly drawn girl with red hair. And a poorly drawn girl with dirty blonde hair! Two for the price of one!

Uu-

Rosa mentions Battler's height (score) and she kinda acts like a ***** toward Maria who I'm guessing is her daughter. Also George's name is starting to seem less out of place now. Mystery Solved

Well, Zea told me that the anime introduced all of the characters within the first 30 seconds of the first episode, which I find kinda odd since I've been sitting here getting introduced to them for like 3 days now (partially my own fault, maybe I should find more time to play).

Loading. . .

I'm greeted by some sweet piano music aw yeah. Oh God Battler's dad is still UGLY.

Here's a few things I learned despite the terrible artwork (using text clues): Battler's dad is ugly. Battler is supposed to be tall for a 13 year old Japanese kid. Battler is supposed to be handsome.

So anyway, apparently Rosa was late because the "trains weren't running well". What does that even mean? She's already suspicious, I've moved her up to number 1 on my list ahead of George. Maria-chan says some more stuff with Uu- at the front of it. I wonder how old she is? "Uu-" Jeez, is she like semi-handicapped or is that just a Japanese speec thing? I honestly can't tell, especially if she can't remember her own height.

According to Battler's step-mom, Maria "turned 9 this year". Well, cross-referencing this with Battler's and George's age, she's actually only 4. She looks pretty mature for a 4 year old but that's Japan for you.

"Nine years old. Uu-" And George calls her fat. More Uu- as Battler "lifts her up". Which, in this game, constitutes as. . . Actually, nothing. The screen didn't even shake slightly this time. Apparently tugging on someones ear causes an earthquake but lifting a 4 year old girl above your head causes no movement whatsoever.

Wait. Wait a minute.

"When I met Maria before it was six years ago and she was only three."

. . . Does anyone else see a problem here? When Battler first met Maria, she was -2 years old?

She's been officially moved to the absolute bottom of my suspicion list. There's no way a handicapped 4 year old could get away with anything (Or COULD she? Hrm. . .). On the other hand, Battler has moved up to my most suspicious person since he's apparently capable of meeting people two years before they were born. He was already doing this when he was 7 years old, I shudder to think of how much his power has grown.

Rosa slowly and carefully explains to Maria who Battler is and she still seems confused. Yeah, I think my earlier suspicions were correct. ".......Nii-sans son is? Nii-san is son.......??"

I almost feel bad for her.

Maria is handicapped.

Mystery Solved

"Uuuuu-....."

She probably uses that Uu sound to fill in the blanks when she can't understand a complicated explanation.

Uh, I think Battler is in my side here. The proof is just adding up when he's making in-game statements like that about her.

George, the voice of reasons, steps in to slowly and carefully explain it to her in a way she might be able to understand. "Battler is your cousin. Like me." Jeez, I hope this sticks. If she can't even understand that much I'm going to feel terrible later when she inevitably gets killed and/or eaten by a Witch. (actually I hope that happens, it sounds awesome)

She kinda stares off into space and mumbles a few words that don't have much to do with each other, then makes an Uu- noise again, signifying that she's still confused. Poor, poor Maria. . . Now she has to get eaten by a witch!

Battler fantasizes about getting married to George and then we move on to the next scene. Hopefully.

Maria looks at me and flashes the most "I just trolled you" smile I've ever seen in my life.

o__o

Hold it. I think I've been fooled. I'm not buying this "handicapped" shtick anymore. It was all too perfect. Everyone played right into her hands, but not me. After seeing her smile at me like that, with a cocky "Battler-kun. . . Uu-", I've realized that Maria is most likely the one pulling the strings here. She only pretends to be mentally deficient so nobody catches on to her game.

Maria is most likely the murderer

Wait, nobody has even been murdered yet. . . I'm getting ahead of myself, but I've moved her to the top of my suspicious person list. Right now it looks something like this:

Maria Rosa George Battler (You never know when you're actually the one who did something) ... Kobe Bryant (Hey, you never know) The step-mom Battler's ugly dad George's parents (not suspicious at all)

. . . Did I forget anyone? Either way I'm pretty confident at least one person on that list has murdered or will murder someone. And it's going to be soon. Maybe on the plane?! Don't get on the plane, Battler! You might end up murdering someone without even knowing it!!

"Batler Batler Batleeerrrrr", she shouts in half-drivel. Yeah, that's right Maria. Keep up the act. I know what really lurks behind that dangerous smile. The mind of a killer

After that they "horse around" for a little bit. I think Battler must have already figured it out too, and he's just playing with her to make her think we haven't figured out her true identity as the killer yet. Battler is one smart dude. He's doing exactly what I would do in his situation; Get physical with the 9 year old. Er, 4 year old. He seems to think she hasn't changed much since she was -2 but I can't be so sure of that. Maybe Battler is trying to fool me?

Battler shows me some more Japanese and asks if I can read it, just to taunt me. No, Battler, I can't read Japanese. You win, okay? Now stop!

Man, Battler sure is an arrogant dick.

Battler goes on to talk about names and such for a little bit, and he talks about Rosa for a little bit. Yeah, that's right. You may be working against me Battler, but here you are revealing detailed information on my 2nd most suspicious person. Maybe you're not as smart as I thought!!

After that they board the plane and the person tells what order they'll be getting on the flight. I almost feel like making a seating chart but I went through it too fast and don't feel like going back. Plus I'd probably just end up confusing myself and somehow end up with a picture of a cat eating it's own crap.

And with that, we're finally on the plane

Mystery solved.

Well, let's see. I spent a little bit of time going through the case file, looking for some facts that might help me out. I only picked up a few interesting things.

1) Maria has the ugliest hands I've ever seen. 2) George's mom (Eva) inexplicably has a belt strap coming over her left shoulder that's attached to nothing. 3) Maria doesn't have a dad. 4) Maria and Eva have the same hair color.

Using this, I've concluded that Eva is, in fact, Maria's dad. Which means that she is secretly a man. Which means that the identity of George's mom is still a mystery that has yet to be solved. Now, I have two prime suspects; One is Kyrie. Her and Hideyoshi hooked up before she ever met Battler's dad. They like to throw twists like that at you in mystery stories. The other one is the little girl we have yet to meet, the sick one. . . Only from the future. Obviously she was sent back in time to watch after and later fall in love with her son George (depending on her age). Of course it could end up being someone totally unrelated but I guess we won't know until we've solved the mystery.

Anyway, back to the plane. . . Where Battler is freaking out. (I'm writing in my notebook right now that Battler is afraid of airplanes in case I need to use it against him later)

Apparently it fast-forwards through the plane ride, but I can assure you that I felt Maria's gaze on my back the entire time. . . Watching me. . . Plotting her next move. I'm going to keep an eye on her from here on out.

Then, suddenly, poorly drawn opening credits. I think. Why are they crediting characters that don't even exist?

". . . Shoul've taken the boat. . . .

. . . The boat. . ."

Maria starts shrieking like a wild monster as soon as we step off the plane. Rosa tells her to shut up and probably smacks her, then she kinda taunts Battler for being afraid of planes. Battler's ugly dad calls him a disgrace of a man. Then his aunt (i forgot her name) starts hitting on him again. Oh, it's Eva. Then his step-mom agrees that Battler should go with her to get some "training".

Incest.

|

Battler starts feeling inadequate that he's being picked on by a 4 year old girl and so the group decides to split up and take separate taxis. Then they get on boats or something. Actually, I'm not 100% sure what just happened. There must have been a short time skip.

Some inexplicably blonde, poorly drawn girl named Jessica shows up and it's obvious that she's going to be George's love interest because they have normal names and they're around the same age. Battler starts talking about her chest. Smooth. I can only assume he's trying to make himself look worse to help his boy George out. Taking one for the team, aw yeah Battler. Oh, now he's saying he wants to rub them. Maybe he's serious. She claims that she's 18, which means she's really 13 which means. . . She's just old enough to be legal! George, I didn't know you liked little girls! I guess that explains why he's still single at his age.

Then we learn that Jessica is also their cousin which is perfectly normal in Japan. Keep pining for your 13 year old cousin, George! Keep trying to touch her chest, Battler! This is all perfectly acceptable in your culture, and I can respect that!

Anyway, Battler starts talking about how he likes to get beat up by girls and it turns him on or something and then she makes a joke about his junk (I think?). After beating her up and insulting her, Maria finally jumps in and puts Battler in his place by shouting some jibberish. It's the only thing she's capable of without breaking character and revealing how cunning she truly is, but it was well-played enough to drive the evil Battler away for now.

Someone named Kuma-something shows up, who I'm going to forget about immediately and who Battler says he could never forget. Good thing, because I guarantee I will forget about her and she'll never show up again. I would say 'If the artist took time to draw her, she must be important' but it's pretty clear he doesn't spend more than 30 seconds on any given characters design. She's around 75 and her body is already rotting.

They talk for a little bit and then Battler admits he doesn't want to look anything like his ugly dad. Ugly dad tries to say that they have similar noses but I just don't see that at all. Maybe he had bad eyesight. Then again, how can he even see his own nose? Maybe the artist intended for them to have similar noses but he was so drunk when he drew the characters it didn't come out right, but he didn't feel like changing the script either. That probably makes a lot more sense.

Mystery Solved

Welcome to another installment of maria no naku koro ni

http://img.imgcake.com/mariapngqa.png (drawing courtesy of Zea)

At this point the focus shifts away from the younger characters and Rudolf proceeds to form a love triangle with his two sisters and Hideyoshi. Then some old lady who I don't recognize says that she's jealous of Rudolf. Gross! 90 year old lesbian no thanks.

Maria commands the peons to get onto the boat and then instead of doing so everyone talks about the boat for a little bit. They should know better than to ignore Maria's commands, or else she will cut their throats while they're asleep. . . On the boat. . . Do people sleep on boats? I guess people who live on boats sleep on them. I've never been on a cruise or anything but I GUESS you get your own place to sleep. I wonder if it's comfortable. I don't think I want to find out. When you head onto the high seas you run the risk of being eaten by a whale or a giant squid and that's no good.

Battler gets a bad feeling about the modded boat (That's the opposite of "I had a good feeling"), and then the screen shakes for a little bit so I guess either someone is hitting someone else, having sex, or possibly they're on a plane again. Sometimes I really can't tell what's going on. There's a timeskip and we're greeted by Rudolf's face and he's making small talk with Battler, so I can only assume he molesitted his son again.

The screen keeps shaking and everyone is talking but it's not showing anyone's portrait. It's still pretty easy to figure out what's going on. The one who keeps saying "Uu-" is obviously Maria, and the one who is hitting on Battler. . . Well, that could be any one of his aunts, Jessica, or possibly his dad. Then Battler starts going absolutely crazy, like he's having flashbacks or something. I'll have to investigate this later. Hopefully they explain why he's so afraid of boats and planes. Maybe he was in a tragic plane accident when he was a boy and developed amnesia or something. After that they finally agree to slow the boat down for him and then Battler makes some kind of agreement where he'll have the right to fondle her breasts at a later date for some undisclosed reason.

Battler continues to talk about Maria as if she's stupid (He should really be keeping his guard up). After that, George and some old lady I've never seen before bring out drinks and Battler tries to think of something to talk about that's not embarrassing. So I guess they decide to talk about their parents and studying and stuff like that. Battler lets it slip that for some reason he lives in two houses and Maria jumps on him, trying to pry into him for any clues that he might be trying to hide that she can use to frame him later.

Jessica distracts Maria with some shiny object or something and then Battler reveals that he's been living with his grandparents or something because of his dad doing something even though he's not really mad at Kyrie. . . Or something.

Er, Mystery Solved. . . I think. . .

In light of recent events I made a quick chart to educate the youths of Board 8 on just how easy it is to get AIDS.

http://img.imgcake.com/AIDSChartpngte.png

By looking at this chart we see it all starts with Kyrie. Because of her and her AIDS, anyone with a line connected to them by anyone else now has AIDS and is dying. Following from the top and going down you can see that she most likely has had sex with Rudolf at least one time and we all know Rudolf is banging his son. If Battler and Jessica haven't done it yet they probably will, so she might as well have AIDS. Battler and Eva may not have hooked up yet, but they do already have AIDS and they're going to so I figured a line there wouldn't hurt. I'm sure we all remember that Eva is secretly the father of Maria, so she clearly banged Rosa at some point and since Kyrie has already banged Rosa at least once (Well, I like to imagine that Kyrie and Rosa had sex. . . Multiple times. . . .) Unlucky Hideyoshi winds up with AIDS after only getting to bang the very, very ugly Eva.

While George is sad about not getting LAID, Maria and I are just happy about not having AIDS.

And that, kids, is why it's important to have safe sex. That's also why it's important to play Visual Novels, because they are filled to the brim with traditional family values such as these. . . You just have to know where to look for them! Luckily for you guys, I have a great eye for this kind of thing so I can speed up the sexual education process.

In conclusion:

Luster Reloaded (8:28:56 AM): Looks like 3 of the characters don't have AIDS based on that chart.

Thanks for that, Luster.

After that some old woman shows up (Why do they keep introducing new, old characters instead of more attractive young ones?! I swear there's been like 8 old ladies just since we got on the boat) and apologizes for something. Crap, I forgot what was just happening because I got so caught up in the AIDS chart. Oh well, I'm sure George knows what's going on, I'll just listen to whatever he has to say.

Instead of talking to George, Battler decides to work against me by going to talk to Maria and Jessica. Or does he? Maybe that's what I secretly wanted you to do Battler! Hah!

. . . Just as planned.

After that Battler starts to tell me about the island and make up some BS reason for why it doesn't exist in the real world instead of just admitting he's in a work of fiction. I hate when fictional characters can't admit that they're fictional. I don't have a problem with them or their kind or anything like that, but I think they should at least recognize that they are second class citizens. If they don't have the courtesy to do that, then they shouldn't have forced me to download this game, change the language settings on my PC, and play it just so that I'd have to interact with them. In fact, why am I the one who has to change my language settings? Maybe Battler is the one who should have already been speaking English. After this he goes on to complain about being rich.

Then, suddenly, Maria notices that the turtle god shrine is missing!

Engage New Mystery!!

So back to the missing turtle god shrine.

Jessica seems to think it doesn't matter. "whatever" (she will be the first one to get killed)

Some old lady shows up to say something cryptic about lightning bolts striking the missing shrine down. Apparently that's a sign of misfortune. (Jessica will be the first one to get killed) Although it's later revealed the old lady might just be teasing us, Maria is the only one who takes the mystery seriously. After all, she is the main character. It's a classic scenario where the main character knows something is up and nobody else believes them.

George assures her that nothing scary is going to happen. Maria starts repeating the word "misfortune" over and over again. Battler says that this is a habit she's apparently had for a long time and for some reason Rosa never took her to see a doctor and maybe get some medication to help with her OCD.

Maria raises her finger, presumably to pierce the heavens.

http://img.imgcake.com/MariaDrillpngru.png

"Who the hell do you think I am, Battler?!"

Then, without warning, she summons a typhoon! The only thing Battler thinks is strange about this is the fact that he won't be able to go to school on Monday if the weather doesn't get any better. On a secondary note, he mentions the fact that girls her age tend to first start being sensitive to the supernatural if they have that kind of ability. That's a big "if", as summoning typhoons could fall under any category really.

George, realizing something is amiss, immediately begins challenging her powers by insisting that by tomorrow the weather will have already cleared up. Maria stares him down, obviously not phased by his insinuation that her powers were still weak just because she's a kid. No, the typhoon that she was summoning might even destroy the entire island! Obviously George is just trying to make himself feel better about his impending death. Battler also taunts her by saying "soon it'll go away", then Maria starts freaking out.

She makes this face XO and then starts going uu- uu- uu-

I think it might be some kind of attack chant. Any second now she might push Battler off the boat.

Luckily for Battler, that doesn't happen. Jessica chases some old lady off the deck of the boat, telling her not to ugly the place up with her oldness, and then after that Hideyoshi comes outside to play with the kids for a bit. Maybe him and Eva got into a fight.

Well, since Hideyoshi is here everyone immediately begins ignoring Maria. There's no way treating a kid like that won't turn them into a villain. Just then, George takes the time to comfort her to ensure that doesn't happen. Oh, George, always watching after yourself by making sure 4 year old girls don't turn into villains and kill you. See, that's why George will probably last longer than anyone else and Jessica is going to die first. . . In my perfect world. Who knows what's actually going to happen!

After that we get some lecture about togetherness and the power of teamwork or something and I decide it's about time to go play BlazBlue.

Back on the boat Jessica accuses Maria of being seasick and then the harbor is drawing near. Finally. It feels like we've been on this boat for days. Some really ugly guy. . . I mean, REALLY ugly, probably uglier than Rudolf, comes out to greet us. I hope he gets killed soon I don't even want to look at him. Battler tells Jessica he wants to put his shoe inside her or something and then the screen goes black.

Oh, this ugly dude's name is Gohda. Yeah. . . He really needs to die. Anyway, Battler introduces himself to him and then we move on (hopefully).

As the boat leaves the captain waves and only the main character, Maria, waves back at the captain. Rich people are so rude.

After that, Battler talks about the "nyaa nyaa" cries of the seagulls. I was almost sure that "nyaa nyaa" was catgirls, but I guess Battler would know best. I'm probably still going to ask Omega about it later for good measure, since he seems to be the expert on that subject. I guess Battler is lonely because no seagulls (or possibly catgirls) came to greet him this time. If it really was catgirls, I could probably understand a little bit better. . . But who really misses seagulls? I thought they were generally regarded as being annoying.

After Maria and Battler team up to torment Jessica for a bit, Maria makes this weird cry like "kyakkya kyakkya". I don't know if it's supposed to be a laugh or what. Apparently it's enough to make Battler decide that Maria is now his number one follower. Typical main character shenanigans, becoming someones follower. We all know eventually Battler will die (in episode 8) and Maria will take over as the main character.

oh man these reese's peanut butter cups are so good

my mom bought a huge bag of them for like 2 dollars

i've been eating them for like 3 days

i'm probably going to get sick from eating so much candy

Anyways, George comes to Jessica's defense because we all know he has a crush on her. In this scene we learn that since Maria is "slow", even if you make a joke she will believe that it's true. Unfortunately, Battler isn't awesome enough to put this information to good use and instead he just apologizes. Now Rosa steps in and accuses the seagulls of making "myaa myaa" cries. I'll probably take Rosa's word for it cause she just has that sense of style that makes you want to do whatever she says. Then we compliment George on how good he is with kids for a while and Rosa asks Battler to keep "playing with Maria".

"Rosa oba-san winked at me, giggling a little"

damn do all of his aunts want him? this game is messed up

okay I've got more reese's peanut butter cups and I'm ready to continue

(can someone give me a rough estimate of how much longer before someone dies without spoiling anything?)

Rudolf acts like an old, grumpy bastard causing Gohda to step in and flex his muscles at his before chanting something strange about a guest room. Then, the weirdest thing happened. Battler says something:

"Kumasawa-san brought up the rear"

?

I'm trying to figure out who this Kumasawa-san is and the only thing I can come up with is that it's Battler's imaginary friend, a legendary general that is going to lead Battler to victory, Battler is throwing random, unrelated lines into the story just to screw with me, or Battler is finally going crazy. I remember in Higurashi people started going crazy and killing each other for no reason so I think this means that the killing is about to start soon.

A serpentine, twisting path led into a dim forest. It ran a bit uphill.

We reach the guest house and Battler stops to admire the flowers. It looks like the author really took the time to add some detail to these scenes that were obviously drawn in MSPaint. Here's my own rendering of what the garden looks like.

http://img.imgcake.com/masterpiecepngyz.png

For those of you who have played the game, you can probably confirm that my art is about as good as or better than the official art.

The music, on the other hand, is excellent. The piano track that's been playing for 5 minutes while I took the time to draw that picture (okay, it was more like an hour but I had to put a lot of effort into that masterpiece) was AWESOME and drove my heart to the heights of artistic inspiration.

Battler remarks that the rose garden looks like it has "powered up". He sure is a poetic guy.

Oh, I just noticed this. . . Does it look to anyone else like Kyrie has holes in her shirt? Like on the left side there's a bunch of squares cut out of it. Like. . . Her belly is showing through these random holes in her shirt. Was that by design? Could she just not afford the whole outfit (I'm assuming she had to decide between covering her belly completely and splurging on that ridiculous clip that keeps her tie firmly attached to her breasts and she went with the clip)? Did it get ripped somehow? I'm a bit let down that we aren't given more background on why these characters wear the ridiculous outfits they do.

After that, Kyrie and Rosa start flirting a little bit, which is kinda hot. This piano track makes it sound like they're going to start making out in a very beautiful way. Then Rosa accuses her brother of being a womanizer. I'm sure Kyrie knows that if she ever needs "comfort" she can come see her step sister any time.

AHHH!!

Some scary old lady just popped up on the screen. I'm gonna get past this part and then save it and take a break for a while. My heart can't take that kind of shock repeatedly.

Oh. Wow. That is awesome!

After that Maria uses her superior detective skills to notice that one of the rose's is withering. Obviously this is foreshadowing or symbolism for how Rosa is going to kill Rudolph and claim Kyrie all for herself. Jessica and Battler make remarks about how that just means the rose blossomed faster than all of the other ones around it. Speaking of blossoming early, that leads me to something that I noticed the other day but haven't really brought up yet. Is it just me or does Maria kind of have breasts? Considering her age, that's really, really weird.

George marks the rose so they can come back and investigate it later, like a true detective.

Woah, I also just noticed Maria has fangs. What is Rosa feeding this kid? Human hands?

As Eva and Hideyoshi come on the screen I start to wonder exactly how the two of them ended up together. Sure, Eva is the ugliest female in the game so far but it still seems kind of weird. They just don't really look like two people who would be married and have a eighteen year old kid. . . Especially considering how young Eva looks.

Suddenly, some random bishounen shows up. I actually thought he was a girl for a second. Apparently his name is Kanon. I feel like I heard this name somewhere before but I'm not sure. Kanon seems unsociable and he also seems to think that they are 'furniture'. I guess he doesn't like being a servant or something.

I think they're setting him up to seem suspicious but then in the end it won't actually be him. I'll move him to the bottom of my suspicious person list. Jessica explains that he's only 11 years old.

A hag pops up between Kanon and Gohda and knocks over the wheelbarrow that Kanon was pushing. What an evil woman! Battler steps in to help him with the sacks of fertilizer that were too heavy and I start to become more convinced that Kanon is actually a woman. After that, she leaves.

We focus on Rudolf for a little bit, who is talking to himself, and then Battler starts incoherently babbling about this Kumasawa character again. Maybe it's some kind of monster that lives on the island. I hope we get to see it eventually. There's a slight focus on Kanon, trying to make her seem more suspicious, but I'm just not buying it. Although I do want to know what she mumbled.

As we're being shown to our rooms, Hideyoshi gives a little speech about glorious nippon and nearly flat out refusing to stay in this house since it's not Japanese enough for him. Racism

Kyrie seems to know that Battler was thinking dirty thoughts about her, which is a little scary. Battler's ugly dad warns him to watch what he says in front of "Dad", which I'm assuming is Battler's grandfather, who should be Kinzo. Apparently Kinzo is the only sensible one around here that isn't into incest. He's just the kind of character we need to set these moral deviants straight. I can't wait till we get to meet up with him again.

Next Battler starts telling awesome stories about how Kinzo used to beat his sons and daughters with his fists and with a wooden sword. O__O

George is, of course, the favored grandson while Jessica apparently gets slapped on her ass with a wooden sword. All is right in the world.

George tells Jessica that grandpda sexually abusing her with a wooden sword is because that's special attention because she's the heiress, to which she replies that she could just turn the inheritance over to him. I think we'd all be happy if she just did that, since George obviously deserves it more. He's the number one grandson for a reason.

Yesss, I get to share a room with George. Awesome. Apparently Battler gives Maria special permission to come in and out whenever she wants. . . As long as she keeps it a secret from her mom. I don't even want to think of the implications of that.

After that the adults decide to go to the mansion and leave the kids here to play. Eva wonders if it's okay to leave George, since he's actually an adult now and not a kid, but Hideyoshi doesn't see any problem with it.

After that the screen shakes around for a bit and there's some "power up" or "healing" sound effects that lead me to believe something sexual happened between Maria, George, and Battler. Looks like I'll need to draw a new AIDS chart. Everyone is infected now!

They continue to rape George for a little bit. . . Maria makes a "Kyakka kyakka" noise again ( I still can't figure out what this is supposed to be). . . After that, they mention some girl named Shannon who George obviously has a crush on. She's probably a fox. . . girl. . . A foxgirl!

Next it switches to where the adults are and we're introduced to someone named Natushi. Apparently she suffers from headaches and anxiety. Rosa gave her some tea. Apparently she's the mother of Jessica (I kinda guessed that) and three years younger than Eva. Eva seems to be picking on her for some reason.

After the mood is apparently dark, Kyrie suggests that they drink some of the tea. Rosa goes along with it, of course. Natushi says that they shouldn't, since a servant was going to bring some tea.

After that, a fox girl shows up. I wonder what's going to happen next!!

Eva starts relentlessly beating the fox girl.

http://img.imgcake.com/foxpngga.png

Then some other stuff happens, like everyone but Kyrie making fun of each other in a very "high class" way. I guess it's because she's the one who isn't directly related. They must be a very nasty family! (although they seemed to have been getting along before, maybe it's just that nobody like Natushi)

Kanon is out in the hallway and it looks like him and the fox girl are sisters or something. Or maybe not. They've been using some wierd honorifics in this so it's hard to tell. They don't look related. She says that Eva and the madam can go to hell. I guess Kanon isn't a very loyal servant. She alludes to someone else known simply as "that guy".

Oh. It was Gohda.

Mystery Solved

Gohda is in the kitchen flexing right now, celebrating that his plan to make fox girl look stupid worked.

There's also a scary old hag watching from the shadows, but I don't know what she's trying to do.

After that, there's a clock and then it returns to where the kids are. I think the clock popped up just as a transition but it might hold some significance. Like time! Time for someone to die!

No, not yet. . .

Maria promises to let Battler rub her chest when she gets older. Man, he really is a pervert. Everyone talks about how they are so happy that Battler is here. The main character just happens to be the most popular and well-liked one. When do we ever get to play as a main character who is despicable and hated? I want to play as a villain for once!

After that the fox girl from before shows up, bringing food for them. Battler immediately starts flirting with her. Battler tries to touch her breasts and she silently takes it like an obedient servant. Luckily, Jessica elbows Battler on the back of the head, saving her from his lecherous, despicable advances. George makes a deal by ordering her to slap Battler the next time he tries to touch her chest. This is of course because George has a secret crush on her. After all, up to this point the only person he got to have sex with was Battler and Maria.

After talking for a little bit more, we finally decide to head to the mansion to get our food.

Yay!

Met once again by the magnificent rose garden, we continued onward as it came into view. . . the intimidating mansion of the Ushiromiya Head Family.

Right now it's playing a BGM that I think I've heard a few times before. This must be the stock "nothing is happening" BGM, cause frankly nothing is happening.

We enter the mansion and we're greeted by Genji, who I think I might remember from the intro. He's the one who watered down Kinzo's wine for him. As we all know, I was fully against that idea and I therefore hate Genji. However, I won't let that bias affect my suspicion of him. I still see him as one of the least suspicious people because he could have poisoned Kinzo in the intro and he didn't. On top of that flex-master Gohma seems far more suspicious.

We leave fox girl behind and Genji joins the party instead, in traditional RPG fashion where our group has a maximum number of guys and can't surpass that limit without swapping somebody out.

Battler lv 18 Jessica lv 18 George lv 22 Genji lv 60 Maria lv 200

Battler is surprised to find a giant poster of some hot young model hanging on his grandfathers wall. Sure, people don't usually hang up sleazy posters like this in a mansion but he is an old man after all; Give him a break, Battler. Besides, aren't you a huge pervert yourself?

"So. . . . . Who is she then, this woman?"

"Uu-! Maria knows. She's Beatrice!"

Now hold on a minute. I remember that name from the intro.

. . .

After doing some quick fact checking I do indeed remember correctly. She's the invisible woman that was spying on Kinzo in the beginning. He just wants to see her one last time before he dies. Something weird like that. So this isn't just some random model, it's a girl that Kinzo is obsessed with. Well, I guess it makes sense that he would be going after young, pretty girls now that he's old and rich. She obviously wants nothing to do with a wrinkly old pervert.

This is obviously a small plot point that has nothing to do with the rest of the story of Umineko.

Mystery Solved

George then explains that Beatrice is "the witch". Some lady I should have heard about long ago. The thing about this that strikes me as odd is that she doesn't look too old, meaning that when Battler was a kid she wouldn't have been much older. Unless she really IS a witch. . . In which case maybe she doesn't age or something.

. . . In which case. . .

Er, I'm not really sure. I don't know what a witch really has to do with rich old guys. I guess we'll find out later when this substory has no relevance whatsoever to the plot.

In all seriousness. As a bonus, since this witch is probably important, I went back and took a screenshot of the portrait to remember her by.

http://img.imgcake.com/portraitpngbe.png

Probably the best artwork I've seen in the game so far.

After that Battler explains the legend of the witch and why it was created; to scare children. So this Beatrice, is basically the Jesus of Umineko. After explaining the legend of the witch, he assures me that he probably really does remember. Sometimes I just come up with stories when I don't remember what actually happened, so that little comment about him actually remembering helped to verify the tale as true. Essentially, the witch is completely made up and his grandfather is crazy.

or so Battler believes

In my mind, this Beatrice is sounding more and more suspicious. She might even eat children or something cool before I'm through with this game.

Battler thinks it's funny that he had a picture painted just to scare the grandchildren, but Jessica explains that Kinzo has been going more and more crazy; He's been blurring the line between reality and illusion and he really believes the which exists.

"....... And I'm sorry, but she just doesn't exist."

Good thing for me I already know better than to ever listen to anything Jessica has to say. Genji asks her not to repeat anything like that in front of the master. He is, after all, a loyal servant. Either that or, like me, he just has enough common sense not to listen to Jessica.

George urges us to continue so we don't hold everyone up. I kinda just noticed this but he gets this really weird glare on his glasses sometimes. . . Like villains sometimes do. Maybe this was just an aesthetic choice but to me, that has moved him up a few ranks on my suspicious person list.

...... Only a small portion of this island was controlled by the Ushiromiya family.

All of the wild remainder. . . Was the witch Beatrice's domain.

......One could say she was the being who actually ruled over Rokkenjima

Battler gets stuck staring at the portrait and thinking about how Beatrice really owns this entire island. After a moment, Maria urges him to hurry up. Battler hurries after them and finally arrives outside the dining room.

Does this mean we're finally starting the dinner scene?

You guys made it seem like I was still way far off!

Rudolf greets us by calling us "brats". I wonder when Battler is going to get to punch him in the junk.

Grandpa and somebody names Krauss were still missing. I'll take this time to point out that Krauss is an awesome name. Not really a Japanese name but I think Battler already has that covered (since he talks about it each time a new person is introduced).

Next comes Eva, who is apparently ranked #3 based on her power level. I never would have guessed that.

Ugly Dad = #4

1. 5 is Rosa

1. 6 is Jessica, apparently it goes straight to the kids instead of the people who married into the family. They get no power because they aren't blood related, obviously. You need to have grandpas blood in you to inherit his strength.

George is across from Jessica and Battler sits beside her. Opposite from Battler is Maria.

Next comes #9, Natushi. She is the one nobody likes. Across from her is Hideyoshi.

Last is Kyrie. The final seat is empty because, as we all remember, Maria was born out of incest between Eva and Rosa. Rosa doesn't have a husband because she's. . . "like that".

http://img.imgcake.com/Tablepnguz.png

Thankfully, unlike in the plane, I was smart enough to make a chart. Now if somebody gets killed I'll know who was sitting where. Obviously the killer won't be Battler. Right now he's too busy experiencing complicated feelings about how this seating system is unfair to women. He considers taking a Women's Studies course when he gets back home and goes off to college, to make himself feel better about his sexist grandfather.

Natushi (who even I'm beginning to hate. . . How old is she supposed to be anyway? She looks way too young to be just a few years younger than Eva) starts to talk to Battler. She's another one who wants to mention how tall he has gotten but he takes it in stride this time. 'What a nice guy'

He is 180cm, which is equal to. . . 70.9 inches. He's actually not REALLY that tall. Not even six feet.

Battler tries to make a joke but she doesn't get it. She pretends to laugh anyway, as women are known to do. No wonder she got stuck lower on the ranking system. Battler reveals that he doesn't like her very much either, despite the fact that he tries to be nice to everybody.

Even Battler doesn't like her.

It seems that Natushi has been cursed!

Mystery Solved

Huh. Are you sure you guys don't just like her because it's so moe~ that everyone hates her and her life is miserable?

I'm not making any judgments yet because I haven't seen much of her, but for the context of my playthrough she is cursed and everyone hates her.

Also, prepare to have your minds blown when you realize she has two different hair colors.

http://img.imgcake.com/Natsushipngba.png

Seriously, boot up your game and check right now. Two hair colors.

I am the first person in the documented history of Umineko to ever notice this.

Mystery Solved

Apparently she makes Battler uncomfortable because she never got along with the kids or the other parents. She's a lonely outcast. So mooeeeeee~

I THINK I LOVE HER NOW

He's not sure how to approach her.

You know what else I just noticed? At first I thought she was kinda flat but if you look she does have breasts. . .They're just shaped oddly and hidden by her handkerchief. No, really. If you moved that thing out of the way the positioning is just too awkward.

Jessica explains to Battler that even though grandpa used to always be strict about showing up on time, lately he hasn't been showing up for meals and he's been growing more and more distant. Well, she seems to feel better that he's not here. . . Despite the fact that he's an awesome, lovable drunk.

Lol Jessica.

I hope Battler doesn't end up in some kinda weird incest relationship with her. All she does is give bad advice and rag on the best character, Kinzo.

". . . Jessica!", Natsushi scolds her unruly daughter. The look on her face is almost like she's smiling. She looks like this: ^__^ I guess that's how some mothers look when they scold their daughters. Jessica looks the other way and sticks her tongue out but we don't get an animation for that. Probably too suggestive anyway.

Battler's twitter: "We're just sitting here waiting for the awesome Kinzo to show up" updated at 12:20 PM

After that, there's a scene change. . .

We return to a scene where master Kinzo appears to be in his study. He is impatiently reading a book, much like I was doing last night. I finally picked up The Gathering Storm and for some unholy reason the prologue is like 60+ pages long so I'm kinda trying to get through that and back to the main story. I imagine he's doing the same thing, and will promptly fall asleep within 10 minutes to find that he is still not quite finished with the prologue yet.

Poor Kinzo. I can really sympathize with him.

Someone has been knocking on the door for a while, and Kinzo finally gets fed up and slams The Gathering Storm down on the table before standing up. He starts shouting at, apparently Krauss. Krauss tells him everyone has gathered for the family conference and begs him to come out of his study.

O__O

Kinzo starts ranting about how his family needs to be killed and he needs to drink more green liquor because of the fairies that are whispering in his ears or something. And, for once, this is what actually happened. I didn't make any of that up. Kinzo starts going even more crazy and begins to cry manly tears. Krauss is just sitting on the other side of the door with a smug smile on his face. Oh, the doctor from before is there too but Kinzo doesn't want to see him.

Krauss seems annoyed and says that his father is dead already. He leaves to go to the lunch scene, stopping to send Genji in while he's on his way. Genji enters and Kinzo seems to calm down a little bit. He's probably just pissed because the prologue is so long. I mean, I just kinda got bored and fell asleep but this guy is a crazy, senile, alcoholic so I could see how it might drive him mad. He's even talking about the apocalypse and stuff. @__@

It goes on to describe how Kinzo has installed locks on his study as well as on his room to keep people out.

Everyone is pretty much okay with this and just tries to avoid him because they're overwhelmed by his awesome drunken aura.

In his study are a bunch of forbidden, cursed, and sealed books that he has access to because he has enough money that it doesn't matter. Once you are paid like Kinzo is paid, you don't even have to worry about being cursed. Unfortunately for the cursed Moesushi, she is like 15th in line and will never be as paid as Kinzo is.

There's also a bunch of black magicky stuff. I dunno. Like a candle? Religious and/or demonic scriptures? (it's hard to tell the difference)

Genji pours him some of the venomous green liquid. Nice. By adding sugar he somehow turns it white and makes it taste better. Kinzo regains his composure and thanks the servant for his drink. Kinzo insists that Genji drinks the last of what was left in the glass. "My friend". He says it twice. Kinda creepy.

Kinzo starts complaining about his stupid ass kids.

Krauss spends too much money. Eva wants to make him into a broth. Rudolf is a womanizer. Rosa bore a baby out of lesbian incest. Jessica is incompetent and illiterate. (This one I agree with) George doesn't have what it takes to be a man. Battler is a fool with no honor!

Oh man, I thought this was going to lead up to him realizing Battler was the only worthy heir. I guess we'll have to wait till the end of the story for him to realize that.

Maria is obscene to the eye.

^ I'm not actually sure what this one means but I think he just doesn't like being reminded of exactly how she was born. I wouldn't want to think about it too much either. Of course, he could be referring to the fact that she's mentally handicapped. . .

"Why, why is the Ushiromiya blood so incompetent?"

He starts ranting about the Golden Witch, BeattriiicceeeEEEeEee, a little bit more. There is a wild Kinzo and a regular Kinzo living inside the same body. He starts to go crazy again and talk about how magic and parting the red sea have to do with incalculable odds and demon roulettes. Then he tears a bed in half with his bare hands.

Krauss and his eye bags come back to announce that Kinzo won't be coming for lunch. He tells Gohda to go ahead and get the meal started.

http://img.imgcake.com/eyebagspngyh.png

Eve has a catty smile on her face as she asks Dr. Nanja if it would be best for father to at least show his face. I'm starting to notice a trend of her subtly picking on other people, especially when they're cursed, crazy, or drunk. Rudolf complains about his mood, especially since they took time off from their busy schedules to come see him. However, Krauss cuts him off and tells him not to complain. . . If Rudolf wants, he can go try to convince him to join the rest of the group. Rudolf just responds with "Are you kidding?"

Of course he's not kidding. He's Krauss! He's got eyebags! He wears white shoes! Is that the kind of person who kids?!

Apparently, Rudolf is the kind of person to complain but not actually do anything. I can't wait till the Demon Roulette that Kinzo summoned descends upon the mansion and starts killing people. If only.

Here's my top list of people who should die: 1) Rudolf 2) Eva 3) Jessica

It's in reverse order because I couldn't bear giving Jessica first place in anything.

Rosa and her messed up choppy hair seem genuinely concerned. She asks if he seems like he'll be okay by dinner time. Krauss says he doesn't know but it's better to just leave him alone for now so his mood can get better. Jessica flashes a fang-smile and says something about Genji being granpa's best friend. I don't really pay much attention to what she says since she's illiterate anyway.

Krauss verbally slaps her down by telling her not to speak out of turn. What a boss. XFD

Jessica pouts and shuts up.

Battler and George start to talk amongst themselves about how trill Kinzo is and how he's managed to survive through sheer willpower and badasssery despite the fact that he should have been dead 9 months ago. The meal begins and nobody seems to feel uncomfortable about the fact that the man who built this estate out of nothing is now absent. His legacy is being forgotten!

Battler's twitter: "Hey, we just finished eating lunch after a timeskip. Man, Jessica sure is dumb." 1:20 PM

The Ushiromiya conference was held once every year.

For some reason I get the feeling a boring explanation part is about to happen.

He talks about the family conference and then goes on to describe a little bit about Krauss. Krauss, like his wife Moesushi, was hated by everyone. But in his case it was because he's kinda a dick. He's unreasonable, and spiteful. So in a more awesome way than his wife.

After that it shows a picture of Krauss, Rudolf, and Eva all smiling in a row.

By the way, hasn't the pace of my updates increased a bit since before? I think it's because people are actually reading this now and it makes me want to continue with the write-ups. Also, I started playing Touch Detective so I might actually be updating less than I have been the last 2 days, but still more than I was before that.

Mm. Reese's cups. . . (yes I still have some, what kind of monster eats them all in one day?)

Apparently Nanjo took the last seat, across from Kyrie. They adults start talking about exams and Jessica doesn't want any part of that.

(Jeez, I thought that timeskip earlier meant lunch was over. Seems like it's just getting started.)

Actually, rather than lunch, it seems like Battler is just giving that long boring explanation I felt coming on. Now he's talking about Kinzo. Apparently Battler thinks if he went by a nickname like "Goldsmith" that would be 'totally awesome'.

Now it's giving me Kinzo's backstory. . .

Apparently there was an earthquake and then he was in charge and he did some businessy stuff. He made connections with the occupying forces. During this entire time he seemed to have incredibly good luck. He obtained a vast fortune and his own island in just 20 years. There's a bunch of black magic stuff going on.

After that his story ends and Battler decides to talk about food instead.

Rudolf verbally abuses Battler and everyone laughs at him. Ah, the warmth and love of being surrounded by family.

Gohda starts flexing and telling his story next.

This must be the backstory segment. . .

Moesushi always has these WEIRD expressions on her face.

http://img.imgcake.com/moesushipngha.png

I don't get it!

After that foxgirl and some old lady bring in dessert and battler begins describing that as well. Maria climbs on the table, not giving him the time to be boring and describe the food, and starts eating some sour paste. Rosa tries to stop her but George says it's probably okay so she abides by his judgement and lets her child make a mess all over the place.

Battler asks Shannon what kind of sour paste the red stuff is, but she doesn't seem to know. I think she has memory problems or something. The same thing happens to me a lot. Next there's a weird part about mackerels that I didn't really get and Rosa seems to be embarrassed because Maria doesn't get it either. Finally, Gohda actually gets around to describing what is in the desert;

Something hips.

Mystery Solved

After learning about the hips, Battler goes on to comment on how awesome the dessert is just because it had rose petals around it.

That Gohda sure is a talented chef.

Moesushi makes some weird faces and complains about headaches.

Hmm. . . This may be cause for investigation. I'm moving her up on my suspicious person list. I think we all know the one who pretends to be plagued by something like chronic headaches is always secretly a mastermind.

After everyone heartily laughs about mackerel jokes, the lunch finally ends and the party is chased out of the dining hall. . . To find that they have prepared some of that black tea Rosa had brought earlier. "The old bastard" chases the kids outside, refusing to allow Maria to drink the black tea. This is where a grudge is first born.

Soon, very soon, Maria shall have her revenge. It will be much sweeter than black tea when she brutally slaughters Rudolf. Bwahahah.

I notice George chooses to leave with the kids instead of staying with the adults again. Maybe his growth and development is a little slowed due to the fact that no one in the group is around his age. Since he's been used to hanging with the kids for so long and all of the adults are significantly older than him, he doesn't really fit in anywhere. These feelings of seclusion will soon drive him to murder. . .

Maria, being the main character and the party leader, decides that we should go to the beach. Since Battler is important too, Kyrie asks him to watch out for her.

After the party leaves, we stay behind to examine the scene with the adults for a bit.

They talk about the difference in ages between children and adults. Rosa says she still doesn't feel like she has grown up. I still wonder exactly how old she is. I'm thinking 27-29 sounds about right but she could be even younger. Krauss calls her "pitiful". Aw, poor Rosa. Eva seems to be on his side. Seems like they play the dickish older siblings well. Actually, it seems like Eva is always trying to put others down. Krauss responds to her with a retort of his own, saying her sarcasm isn't well-timed. . . Whatever that means.

". . . . . . . ."

Rosa doesn't seem to want any part of this conversation.

Why did they start arguing again? I guess they just don't like each other for some reason. Is that how siblings are supposed to be? I get along with my sister pretty well!

After that, Rudolf suggests they enter into the main topic. Oh boy, I finally get to learn what the main topic is.

The main topic is apparently the fact that Kinzo's life expectancy is negative nine months. Ah, are they going to talk about the inheritance? Moesushi doesn't want to talk about it since Kinzo is "still in good health". They ask Nanjo to give some details about his health. Nanjo explains that even if his body is weak, his mind is still strong enough to keep him alive. When Kyrie goes to ask a question, Rudolf tells her to "keep quiet for a while". What a dick! She just takes it and apologizes.

Eva says some more snarky things. Moesushi makes some more weird faces. Krauss keeps one hand in his pocket at all times to let you know he's business but he's also business casual.

We learn that they want to move Kinzo to a hospital, but he doesn't want that. He won't take medication and won't agree to be hospitalized no matter how bad his condition gets. Nanja feels like his examinations are pointless since Kinzo won't let him actually do anything to help.

Since Rudolf seems to think that they all agree (all except for Krauss. . . And anyone else who might not agree) that he could die at any time. . . The topic of his "fortune" isn't "premature". Ah-Ha! So it was inheritance! (And Rudolf is looking mighty suspicious too)

Mystery Solved

Looking at this right now you can see that along with her red hair, Maria surely inherited that trollsmile from Eva as well.

"Father's personal funds probably reach as high as ten billion yen, right?"

Ugh, why is she so ugly anyway?

I guess it's to make us, the readers, dislike her or something. I remember when I was trying to find some Eva hentai to show GMUN, so that he could draw that Eva/Battler scene for us and there was, like, literally none. Nobody finds her appealing. Also I think GMUN was just trying to get me to find hentai for him because as you all know he still hasn't even drawn one picture for our topic.

Anyways, her and Rudolf start comparing the money to cake. With little chocolates on top.

Mmmm.

Natsushi still doesn't think this conversation is needed since the head is still alive. However, Eva basically tells her to shut up and implies that she is from a poor family so her words carry no weight here. Natsushi yells at her and calls her rude. Even when yelling she has a moeish, half asleep, just plain weird face.

Hideyoshi tried to smooth things over. . .

Hideyoshi failed!

Tension increased by 50!

Dr. Nanjo excuses himself, not wanting to be around these saucy people. Apparently, he's not the only one who wants to leave. But he's the only one who can. Ushiromiya fools, you are all trapped in this room!

Everyone argues a bit and Krauss monologues a few times. Characters who monologue are badass. Characters who monologue with one hand in their pocket are giga-badass. Also he mentions "Delsney Land". I think that's a play on Disney Land. There's no way that's a real place!

They continue to talk about money and financial stuff.

Eva's constant nagging seems to make Moeblobsushi's headache worse.

"Oh, my headaches are getting so sad! Won't you please pity me!"

Maybe if she didn't keep standing up and shouting her headaches wouldn't happen so often.

But maybe she's secretly tsundere for Eva.

She heard about how Maria was made and now she wants another child of her own. Not another illiterate baby like the ones that Krauss's seed produce. She needs an autistic mastermind like Maria it carry on the Ushiromiya namesake!

. . . Eh, maybe not. She did totally transform from a moeblob that kept making weird faces to a shouting moeblob that makes weird shouty faces though. I guess it's because of the mood.

They go on to talk about the building of hotels and other projects that Krauss has started and failed, then accuse him of embezzling Kinzo's funds to support his next projects. I'm not going to go into detail, cause it was a little complex, but I think all of you have read this already before.

It's weird, but I think I've heard from people that this part of the story was supposed to be kind of boring? I'm finding it pretty interesting how they're interrogating Krauss and I kinda want to know his side of the story.

If only Moesushi would stop yelling and let him explain! She gets angry and tells Eva to leave.

Eva doesn't seem to be following her instructions. After all, Eva is actually much higher than her in Ushiromiya Power Level due to the way the system works. (as explained earlier when everyone was seated) There's no reason why Eva should have to listen to her. In fact, Eva could probably tell Moesushi to leave if she wanted to.

She tells Moesushi to "bow down"! I saw something like this coming. . .

Eva calls moeblob a borrowed womb, shabby, and tells her that she's not even allowed to wear the one-winged eagle (I was wondering what that symbol was up until now).

The BGM they're playing is pretty awesome right now, too.

The story also calls Eva unattractive. So that makes sense. I guess she's supposed to be that way. I thought all girls in video games and anime were designed to be "hot" or "cute" or at least "pretty", but I guess there are some exceptions.

blobsushi begins crying

"Whaaat? If you have something to say, please, say it now. Come on."

Natsushi's fist trembles, but she is unable to do anything in response.

Krauss actually tells her to leave. To "cool off her tension". I did not see that coming, actually. Interesting.

The music suddenly changes to something kinda unfitting. Moesushi begins yelling at Krauss now. I think she's upset that he didn't stand up for her or something. She begins crying and runs out of the room after shouting some more. Krauss just shrugs.

". . . I apologize for my wife."

Eva just giggles victoriously. I gotta say, I'm pretty sure Krauss and Natblobshi lost that battle. You would think a guy with a hand in his pocket and white shoes could have done better against an ugly girl like Eva, though.

The scene changes to Natsushi crying out in the hall.

After that, it begins to describe why Eva and Natmoeshi hate each other so much. Apparently it's because Moesushi was unable to have kids and Eva used that to take advantage of the fact that she married outside of the family.

So wait. . . They encourage incest? Is that what I'm hearing?

I have to go back and refer to my seating chart now because I'm wondering who comes first in the terms of Battler, George, and Jessica.

Okay. So it is Jessica - > George - > Battler - > Maria (knew she was last)

I guess the fact that George was born first doesn't matter. . . I think it makes more sense to me now.

The BGM changes again, to something adventurous. I think we've switched back to where the kids are now.

Back to the Main Party!

Battler lv 18 Jessica lv 18 George lv 22 Maria lv 200

I equip Battler with an Anti-QQ shield and proceed out into the hall. Everyone stops to stare at the portrait of the witch once more.

"............... So this is the witch, Beatrice." "..... Is it true?"

"Uu- Battler doesn't believe?"

Maria starts whacking the painting with the her ferocious ****** strength. (Seriously? ****** is an auto-flagged word?)

Battler assures her that he doesn't doubt anything she's said.

And now I have to go to the Pharmacy so I'll continue later!

Current Female Character Ranking: Maria > Rosa > Kyrie > Kanon > Foxgirl > Moesushi > Eva > > > Jessica > > Creepy Old Ladies

http://img.imgcake.com/moeblobshipngva.png

I got bored and decided to draw Moeblobshi. (notice her sad eyes and lack of Ushiromiya one-winged eagle)

"she seemed to accept it, sticking out her chest and proudly uu-uu-ing"

So I finally resume the game and am greeted by this, which leaves me thinking 'what exactly was I playing again'?

Let's see. . . From what I remember we're on our way to the beach or something.

Instead, everyone wants to talk about a riddle about some gold or something. Since George is the only one wearing glasses, naturally he'll be the one who knows the story behind the riddle. Jessica thinks the story is fake (because she's dumb). Man I can't wait to start looking for that gold!

According to this, Kinzo sold his soul for 10 tons of gold to the GOLDEN WITCH BEATRICE and that's how he got rich in the first place. Well, that's kind of what I assumed to be the case anyway but I guess now it's confirmed.

Since it is written on the epitaph on the painting, that clearly makes the legend of the gold true. Or so Battler believes.

. . . Hell, I believe it too just because Battler obviously has main character hax and anything he believes must be true, otherwise he wouldn't be narrating it to us. Still. . . When you examine it logically it doesn't make sense. How exactly does that make the legend more believable? I could write anything I wanted on a painting and that doesn't make it any more true.

According to George, writing this down where everyone could see it made everyone think Kinzo is a genius. I like how George chooses his words carefully, though. He's almost saying "Everyone is dumb and thinks Kinzo is really smart, just because he wrote this down somewhere and they read it." I think George is the only person who agrees with me here, obviously because he's the only one wearing glasses.

George thinks it wasn't really a witch, but Kinzo just referred to her as one since it wouldn't make sense for anyone to lend him so much money. While this obviously sounds more true, the law of fiction dictates that George is wrong and will be made a fool out of when the witch actually appears.

Jessica says something else dumb, I dunno.

"George-aniki folded his arms and tried to remember the market price of gold"

Damn George is so smart. He just KNOWS this off the top of his head? He even spouts off these random factoids about how much gold is estimated to be on earth and how much we've mined already. Nobody memorizes this crap. GEORGE IS CLEARLY A WITCH!

So Jessica's 10 kilogram speculation would be worth about 20 million yen. I guess that's a lot of money. Since Maria weighs 28 kilograms, she is worth over 50 million yen. (Holy crap she weights 61 lbs? That seems like a lot of someone her age) 10 tons = 20 billion yen.

"what the hell!"

Battler accuses Maria of eating too much shortcake, I think, which might explain why she is chunky for her age.

After that, George explains why logically the legend of the gold can't possibly make sense, Jessica accuses Beatrice of being old and ugly, and Battler laments that he would be able to rub the pictures imaginary breasts. Some more stuff happens.

"Witches exist! Witches exist!", Maria insists. Jessica frowns at Battler in a really ugly way and tells him to stop smashing Maria's dream since she is slow and still believes that stuff like Witches exist. Yeah, at least she can read, Jessica. Also, apparently, in school when Maria was asked what she wanted to be when she grew up she told her teachers "a witch". Man this girl is awesome.

But wait. How did George know that?!

George is a witch!!

Maria starts crying. Battler speculates that since Maria wants to be a witch when she grows up, the existence of someone like Beatrice being real served to reinforce her dreams. Battler speculates that Maria secretly yearns for and lusts after Beatrice. What a sick freak! She's just a kid, Battler!

Nobody wants to see this:

http://img.imgcake.com/thispngve.png

After seeing my picture, George and Battler hastily admit that witches and Beatrice do exist. Heh. Battler even tells her that the witch comes to the mansion every night and that she should "watch out" for her.

After this, Fox Girl shows up and she's surprised that we were all standing around since we said that we were going to the beach like 5 days ago when I stopped playing. You know what, Shannon, I'm also surprised that we aren't at the beach yet. What gives?! I wanna fight dolphins!

Shannon says something about how the picture is fascinating and that Beatrice is truly beautiful. Jeez, Beatrice is like some kinda chick magnet. This story is about to get hot. George encourages her, of course. After that, they start talking about how grandmother must have felt about this Beatrice. She thought that Kinzo was cheating on her and stuff. If Beatrice really is so beautiful that even chicks recognize it, couldn't Kinzo have just asked for a threesome?

Maria starts sniffing Shannon's basket because apparently it smells good. They are cookies that smell like vanilla! George tells Shannon to go get them a blanket to sit on and then they're going to go outside and eat the cookies. Possibly (finally) at the beach?

After that the part finally gathers and exits the building!

in honor of solid snack winning I will continue playing

but I refuse to draw any more pictures for a little while

cause I'm eating dinner and playing and if I tried drawing then I'd be doing three things at once which is just too much

I return to a scene with Battler's ugly dad saying that while the witch OBVIOUSLY is fake (obvfake witch), the gold is very real.

Eva confirms that she heard a rumor that Kinzo showed "some gold" to somebody "one time" as proof that he had 10 tons of it. Real convincing!

Krauss seems to agree with me, that old men are senile and smell. Somebody else should take care of them, but not Krauss. . . Or me. I can barely take care of myself! Hideyoshi tells Krauss that we should respect our elders because he is a fraud.

Battler's ugly dad suddenly knows more information about the rumor and elaborates on it, telling us that this other old guy actually saw ALL OF THE GOLD, and had it examined, and it was 99.99% pure. And it had the one-winged eagle carved onto it. By the way, I noticed some of the servants have the one winged eagle but Moeblobshi isn't allowed to wear it. That's hilarious. XFD

Krauss continues to insist that the tale is obviously made up. He also insults them for acting like kids in a nursery. Apparently, to please Krauss, you can't be too young or too old. He knows exactly what he wants, and he demands that you are aged just right!

I wonder how old Moesushi is?

"Just right", that's how old. Or is she? Maybe that's why he made her leave the room. There's a mystery to be found here but I can't quite sniff it out yet. Is Krauss cheating on Natmoeshi? Is he molesting one of the servants? Maybe!

AND JUST WHEN YOU THOUGHT THERE WEREN'T GOING TO BE ANY PICTURES

http://img.imgcake.com/dinomariapngug.png

BOOM MARIA ON A DINOSAUR

TAKE THAT JESSICA BWAHAHAHAH

Krauss continues to explain that the witch story was made up so people would forget that Kinzo conned them with fake gold. When he asks Rosa if she believes she says "I don't know if it exists or not. . . But I want my share".

XD

Now that logic is KING.

Now, suddenly the great confrontation. Krauss realizes they think that he's the one who stole this imaginary gold since it's the only way he would have been able to obtain such funds! Both Eva and Rudolf smile in their really ugly way and begin to accuse Krauss of having already found the 10 tons of gold bars.

Eva threatens to have his financial estate examined after Kinzo dies and if it turns out he really was hoarding the gold "you know what happens", but Krauss doesn't seem to have any idea. Me either. Maybe she's into organized crime or something? It'd be pretty sick if she cut Natsushi's head off and left it in Krauss's bed (they don't sleep in the same bed anymore since Krauss is having an affair with Kanon).

After that they try to trick him into admitting that the gold exists by offering 12.5 billion yen and making him pay them 7.5 billion yen or something weird. Eva must have come up with this really convoluted plan to try and trick him, but it's not working because Krauss realizes that what she's saying is just weird and makes no sense.

However, Krauss seems to be agreeing on the stipulation that if anyone else finds the gold they'll turn it over to him. If he doesn't actually have the gold then why is he even making the deal? It seems like he stands to lose a lot of money. . . Especially if they find the gold and decide to screw him over. . .

Then some white text on a black screen confirms that they're making him pay for gold that doesn't exist, and if they find the gold they won't give him any. Man, he's really getting screwed here. 750 million to each of them is a LOT of money. Him and Natblobshi are going to be poor by the time this story is through.

This was more of a threat than an offering, since the chance that Krauss was embezzling money was incredibly high. . . Or something like that. That's what the game is telling me, anyway.

Now the white text on the black screen is telling me that they had let "one thing slip"; The fact that Krauss is smarter and more classy than all of them. Oh snap! I wonder how he's going to get them back!?

With a confident laugh Krauss agrees to the deal.

"just as planned"

Rosa suddenly gets really uncomfortable at his cocky laughter, remembering the time that Krauss molested her when they were kids. Due to Rosa being molested and not Eva, Eva was "unable to wipe away her feelings of insecurity". Thoughts like "Why not me? Am I not pretty enough?" continued to run through her head.

No, Eva. You're not pretty enough.

Krauss says something like "u think I have motives? lol, nah. there's no motives ;)" while continuing to never take his hand out of his pocket, ever. So BOSS.

Rudolf seems to be able to read into his genius-level subtext, realizing that what Krauss really means is "I have motives". Realizing that Krauss having motives might be bad for him, and might mean that Krauss was going to try and screw them over, he immediately breaks out the contracts for them to begin signing. That's what I always do when I'm worried about a deal going bad!

Krauss, before agreeing to sign, and after making them all uncomfortable, decides that he'd rather just not pay them the 750 million up front. So, basically, he is now taking command of the deal. If they want their shares of the gold they will have to forfeit the 750 million they thought they were going to get and still agree to the deal. . . But wasn't the 750 million what they were all really after anyway?

Everyone immediately becomes suspicious of him, but there's nothing they can do at this point. Krauss has already activated his trap card.

Krauss causes everyone to avert their eyes with his KING gaze, except for Hideyoshi who is caught in his eye beam power. While his will is broken, Krauss decides to verbally attack Hideyoshi. He reveals that he did some research into Hideyoshi's company and apparently there were all kinds of things going wrong with it.

"THEREFORE, MORE THAN ANYTHING ELSE, HE WANTED A LOT OF MONEY RIGHT NOW...... !!!!"

Is what it boils down to.

Rofl. As Krauss attacks Rudolf, Rudolf immediately lets slip "It'll all be settled with the money". Are you stupid? You're basically admitting to Krauss that you suck and are trying to con him! Right in front of his face! Jeez, no wonder these guys can't stand up to Krauss.

Krauss: "Long live capitalism"

He is my hero.

Rudolf and Rosa both get "THEREFORE, MORE THAN ANYTHING ELSE, HE WANTED A LOT OF MONEY RIGHT NOW...... !!!!" messages and then one thing becomes clear:

Krauss, the capitalist dictator who they were trying to threaten, was the only one who didn't urgently need money. Meaning, they actually were not in a position of power at all. He doesn't even have to sign the contract if he doesn't want to. What does he care? He's a capitalist!

He will just pay migrant workers 5 cents an hour to sign it for him.

After that the white text on black screen comes back to tell me that Krauss is sly (as if I didn't figure that out by watching him outsmart the other three). He knew about their weakness but waited for the right time to strike.

Krauss basically tells them in a really snide way "gee I wish I could help ya, lol ;)"

Meanwhile, Natsushi is in the other room masturbating all over their huge pile of gold.

REVEAL IT! REVEAL IT UMINEKO! I KNOW THIS TO BE TRUE!

Mystery Solved.

http://img.imgcake.com/Kraussjpgga.jpg

Hahahah. . . I love how he is like "o wate". Man, Krauss is awesome. He is gaining so many points for this scene.

. . . Wait, is the game just trying to trick me into thinking he's cool because he's actually the murderer!?

Hm. In response to these shady tactics I have moved Krauss up several spaces on my character ranking as well as my suspicious character list.

"just in case"

Eva says "don't make me laugh" like 5 times. After that Rosa tries sheepishly asking what Krauss can do for them and he responds by verbally molesting her in the form of telling her that he will only find loaners that will give her the highest interest rates possible. XD

Krauss also causes Kirie and Rudolf to begin having marital problems. Yes, he can do that. With his eyes.

He's got crazy divorce eye beams. HE IS THAT GOOD.

He tells them that maybe tonight they will go and find that imaginary gold and then begins laughing his ass off at how stupid they are.

After that the screen fades to black to emphasize that Krauss is a true action hero, American, and astronaut.

Man, I don't know how many of you know this but I never had a dad growing up. My mom and my father were never married and he left her as soon as he found out she was pregnant. I have also never wanted a dad or thought "I wonder what it would be like to have a dad?". Right now, however, I want Krauss to be my dad. HE IS THAT GOOD.

We switch scenes to Kanon reporting to Kinzo, as he was apparently spying on the others while they were talking about the gold. Kinzo seems amused that they are trying to solve the riddle and find his gold.

Holy cow! The gold is real!

. . . Or is it?!

YOU'RE NOT FREE FROM SUSPICION EITHER KINZO! BECAUSE YOU ARE OLD AND I DON'T TRUST OLD PEOPLE!

I guess this at least confirms that Krauss and Kanon weren't sleeping together. Or if they are it's only so Kanon can spy on him.

You worthless piece of furniture! Go have sex with that middle-aged man and spy on him!

Ew, who would want to have sex with furniture anyway?

Anyways, Kinzo seems pretty satisfied to let the "demon games" begin. His plan is to let everyone else die so he can see Beatrice's smile one time. So, uh, he sounds like he might be a little crazy but, you know, whatever. He's Kinzo.

After that Kinzo explains how magic works. It has something to do with overcoming impossible odds with your spiral power. He tells Kanon that even if he was the one to solve the riddle, he could become the rightful heir. Weird. For some reason Kinzo seems to have a closer relationship with any of his servants than he does with his family.

Kanon says he's not really interested because he's too dumb to solve it, but Kinzo tells him that he's going to try and solve it anyway so that Beatrice can be revived. Alright then.

After that the two servants outside talk for a while and then it reveals the riddle that is written down.

It's a pretty long riddle but it boils down to a lot of killing and then when nobody is left alive the witch will be revived.

AND WE'RE FINALLY AT THE BEACH!

Okay, we're here at the beach where we learn from Battler that Maria wrote the whole golden witch riddle thingy down because her mom told her to. Highly suspicious. Or wait, maybe it was just because she forgets stuff a lot because of the, uh, "way that she is".

Since Maria has the notebook, they're all going to challenge the epitaph while walking down the beach. Nothing like a long, relaxing walk on the beach while solving an impossible riddle to find some imaginary gold that's going to get everyone killed by the demon games.

"Jessica and the rest had already tried to solve it several times, and had already gotten bored with it."

Lol Jessica.

After that, George puts his insane random knowledge skills to use and tells use which river in Odwara has sweetfish in it. Because he memorizes stuff like that. Maria says that she hates fish and Battler says some really weird stuff about wanting to lick salty sweetfish. o__O

After that Shannon pops out of nowhere and asks Battler if he wants a biscuit. Where did she come from!

Hey, you know what I realized yesterday? Shannon is wearing a corset. Does that mean she's secretly fat, or at least chunky? It kinda makes sense since her breasts are kinda large looking for how thin her frame is. But if she took the corset off she'd actually be kinda chunky (I guess George likes thick girls aw yeah George). I have solved the Mystery of whether or not Shannon is fat or not! Take note that I am the first person who has ever played Umineko that has ever noticed this.

Anyway, since she didn't have any chores that chunky foxgirl is keeping us company.

Rofl. Battler says that since the only person close to her age is Jessica, that must get wearisome. Man, even in-game. . .

Using the power of Logic, Battler deduces (with George and Shannon's help) that the second checkpoint is Odwara castle. Man, if George wasn't there to give him all of these random facts, he'd have to spend like hours looking this crap up in the library or something. Wait, do they have Google in the Umineko universe? Maybe George is looking it up on his Droid or texting KGB. . .

Maria says that castles are boring and amusement parks are better. I totally agree.

Sannon shows off her powers of knowing random facts as well and then suddenly she says "I'm not interested in the gold, it's just that George-sama told me about it before. . ." and starts blushing.

The next line says "There sleeps the key to the golden land", and Maria is excited that she was able to read it. It's not normal for a kid her age (4) to be able to read, is it? She's some kind of mutant autistic genius! When she grows up she'll be even smarter than George. . . Maybe.

After that they talk about some stuff that possibly invalidates the entire Odawara theory, since Kinzo might not have even grown up in the same place as the main Ushiromiya family. Battler thinks it's better to just forget about the entire first five lines since they don't really need a key if they can smash any door open.

It's weird how these guys all get along so well but all the older people don't get along at all. I guess it's because these grandkids weren't directly raised by Kinzo and didn't suffer his awesome abuse. This makes me think that Jessica is going to turn evil soon. . .

Anyways, Shannon seems a little bit nervous since "In the next part it quickly becomes disturbing. . ."

George starts reading off the next lines and then . . .

http://img.imgcake.com/sacrificesjpgja.jpg

Lol, look at that smile as she talks about sacrifices to revive Beatrice. That is one evil, evil kid.

As a result, the witch would be revived at the ninth twilight. That much is guaranteed.

"...... So everyone will die in the end."

Shannon still seems pretty worried about everyone dying. No one else, oddly enough, seems that bothered by it. Jessica actually has a weird, cheerful smile on her face as she jokes that if everyone is dead then it would be pretty hard to reach the Golden Land. George thinks it's possible that the person holding the key won't be included in the "none shall be left alive" part. Meaning that the person with the key would actually sacrifice everyone else, and would still be alive in the end to reach the Golden Land.

Meaning. . . To revive the witch, and find the gold, you have to let everyone else die. Which is exactly what Kinzo plans on doing!

Battler points out that the second treasure would be the resurrection of all the souls of the dead. In that case, all of the people who died would just come back anyway!

And Jessica of all people actually puts this entire theory together in the end (to be fair I figured it out way before she ever did).

http://img.imgcake.com/Jessicajpgyj.jpg

Sounds like a fair trade to me!

After that Battler and Jessica start laughing about how dumb the story of a made up witch is, which, of course, pisses Maria off.

http://img.imgcake.com/breadjpgar.jpg

My favorite thing about this line is that she starts with an awesome power like being able to KILL PEOPLE and BRING THEM BACK TO LIFE and then somehow ends up talking about the witch being able to make bread with her magic. Gee, what an awesome power.

After that, they start looking at pictures of the witch that Maria drew in her book, to prove that the witch is real.

Pictures of her flying through rainbows and drinking tea and, uh, doing other stuff.

I assume they look something like this:

http://img.imgcake.com/beatricepngyq.png

. . .

So anyway, George explains that to Maria the epitaph isn't really about the gold. It's actually about reviving Beatrice. Maria, at this point, is too young and naive to even care about the gold. Interesting theory, George! He's probably right.

Since Maria doesn't seem to want to forgive Battler or Jessica, Shannon tries to help out by telling a story that was passed down among the servants.

Apparently, there was a rumor that the mansion had a master of the Day and a master of the Night. During the day, everything would be happy and normal funshine world. But at Night, the witch would come and play invisible pranks like turning lights on and off, stealing peoples bikes, and putting "stuff where it doesn't belong".

Maria takes this as undeniable proof that the witch does, in fact, exist. Jessica confirms this by saying it must be true since sometimes she was unable to find her shoes before she left for school (because that has nothing to do with how dumb she is). Battler decides it's best not to just say anything. He refuses to admit that he was wrong, like a real man, but also doesn't want to tell the truth and hurt her feelings, like a true gentleman.

Shannon goes on to explain that servants sometimes see will-o-wisps or shiny butterflies, or even hearing footsteps of the invisible witch while patrolling the halls at midnight. She says it happened a long time ago, but she heard the invisible footsteps as well.

Battler says that's "scary", but Shannon thinks that since Beatrice is just another ruler of the mansion she wouldn't do anything bad as long as you respect her.

So wait, you're trying to tell me that this witch isn't evil? She wants to kill 11 people!

And she's a witch!

Witches are evil!

George says that if you don't respect her, though, something really bad might happen. Shannon confirms that a while ago somebody who said something bad about Beatrice fell down the stairs and broke their back and had to leave the mansion. Uh, am I the only one who thinks Kinzo probably just pushed the guy down the stairs? He is a little obsessed with Beatrice, after all.

Maria says that anger will definitely be brought down upon Battler and Jessica.

Awesome. xD

Battler gets scared and starts apologizing and begging for his life.

Jessica also apologizes with a really ugly looking frown on her face. Maybe it's just because of the bad art but it almost looks to me like she doesn't want to apologize or isn't apologizing sincerely. Beatrice can tell, too! You'll be the first to die, Jessica!

They ask if the witch can forgive them and Maria is just like "I dunno".

Apparently the witch is very fickle.

George asks her if there is some kind amulet or good luck charm they can use to protect themselves. As Maria looks through her notebook, Battler notices that there is a lot of creepy black magic stuff written down in there. Not just for play, but seriously. She must have inherited her obsession for black magic from Kinzo.

Maria searches through her bag and finds these scorpion charm bracelets that increase resistance to magic. Of course neither Battler or Jessica take her seriously but they still humor her and act like the bracelets are going to work, even though Battler clearly says he thinks they look like cheap toys.

While Maria tries to explain to Battler how the scorpion was some kinda sorcery repellent thing from ancient times, Shannon also says that she had heard that as well. I guess black magic is pretty common in this world. Weird, cause it didn't seem like it at first!

Battler says "I really wanted to make fun of this worthless looking charm". Hahah. He is such a dick!

After that they go on to talk about black magic for a while longer. After every response that Maria gave, George and Shannon would act surprised and agree with whatever she said. Hm. . . It's interesting how you can't really tell if George or Shannon actually believe her or not. To me, it seems like Shannon actually believes in the witch and all that stuff but I could be wrong. I guess we will find out later when the DEMON GAME begins.

Which better be soon.

After that George feels a raindrop. Since it's about to rain soon, and since Shannon has to return to work, I think they're finally going to decide to return to the mansion. It's already well into the evening!

By the time they finished cleaning, the wind was already blowing strongly. It seemed that the storm Maria had summoned with her spiral power was finally reaching the island.

On the way back, they stop in the rose garden. Battler thinks that after the storm tonight all of the roses might be blown away. Therefore, this might be their last chance to see them. Maria remembers the rose she marked earlier and starts looking for it. Though everyone else was helping, they are unable to find it for some reason.

She starts getting pissed again and says that it's definitely in this place, even though it clearly wasn't. Weird! Maybe somebody moved it just to screw with her. . .

After that, Rosa seems to show up out of nowhere. She asks what's going on, and if we were looking for something or not.

Maria says that Rosa needs to help her look for Maria's Rose, too. George explains about what happened earlier and how the rose was marked. . . Battler says he thinks she might be remembering it wrong though. Then, Maria starts yelling more and insisting that it's definitely right here.

After that, Rosa seems to get really annoyed and yells at her, telling her to stop saying "Uu- Uu-". O__O

It was weird that she seemed so laid back and Battler seemed to think she was the "cool mom" type but she lost her temper pretty quickly.

Although, apparently, she has been trying to get Maria to stop Uu- Uu-ing for a long time. Like probably her entire life. What is up with that anyway?

Well, Rosa is going to help look so I guess it's okay.

After that, they all start looking for Maria's Rose again. Even though they are sure it wasn't there, they all go along with Rosa and decide to continue searching. However, Rosa quickly also decides that the rose definitely isn't there.

"Did you mistake it for somewhere else?"

She has an exasperated look on her face.

Maria starts yelling and the screen is like, shaking and stuff. She's mad that her mom doesn't believe her and she keeps shouting Uu- Uu- more and more. Oh man, I bet Rosa is about to get really pissed.

The situation escalates a bit more, with Rosa continuing to tell her not to Uu Uu, the screen shaking, and Maria yelling more.

Then, Rosa finally loses her temper and slaps Maria! The music changes to really sad music that's supposed to make me feel bad for Maria for getting slapped but, hey, sometimes you need to beat your kids. It's the only way they will learn who is the supreme commander.

"In that instant, Maria was shocked into silence."

"Of course, it was only for an instant."

Apparently even violence doesn't work on this kid. Once she realized that her "dreams" had been "rejected" she starts yelling even more and even louder, while apparently tears are pouring down her face. She continues to scream uu-uu-uu-uu-uu-uu over and over again and lament about her lost rose.

"Didn't I tell you to stop that weird habit?! That's why all the kids in your class make fun of you!!"

Hahahah. What an awesome mom. Rosa is so badass.

Rosa slaps her again and Maria starts crying even harder. As Rosa raises her hand to hit her again, Battler intercepts and tries to smooth the situation over with diplomacy, saying there's no need to get serious since Maria is just a kid.

Rosa tells Battler and the rest of them to leave, so she can have a little "talk" with Maria. Oh man, this is about to get serious. Maria starts shrieking like a little demon, saying that the rose is definitely here and that nobody believes her. After some more yelling and escalation, Rosa hits Maria so hard that she falls over.

Battler tries to butt in by saying she shouldn't get so violent like that. Apparently they still haven't left yet. Battler moves between Rosa and Maria, to protect her. He says that even though problems between a parent and a child weren't the business of an outsider, he couldn't just stand by and watch this.

Rosa says it's weird that she keeps uu-uu-ing but Battler says that for a girl her age it's cute. However, Rosa's RAGE increases and she grabs Battler by the collar.

http://img.imgcake.com/cutejpgvu.jpg

You know, that is some pretty sound logic.

Rosa continues to thrash Maria, and pushes Battler out of the way. After that, George feels like it's a good time to start explaining what's going on instead of trying to help the situation at all. George rationalize what's going on and forces the rest of the party to retreat, leaving Maria alone to fight the final boss of this scene, Rosa. "Bye Maria! We'll see you later and pretend as if nothing happened!"

There is nothing in this world that can ease their guilty consciences!

After that, Rosa gets pissed as well and decides to leave Maria out alone in the rain and wind to look for her rose.

If there's one thing I've learned from this scene it's that all problems, even minor issues between parent and child, can and should be solved by violence. Rosa, you are a role model to us all.

Greatest heel turn of all time. Rosa and Krauss need to get together and make super cocky, violent, ******** incest babies.

SCENE CHANGE

UH OH

Kinzo noticed the sound of the raindrops beating on the window.

"Don't beat on my window, raindrops!!"

The sound of rain is the sound of silence. As a result, Kinzo approached the window. He was prepared to take on every single raindrop in a massive free for all.

The rain makes him remember that humans are alone from when they are born until they die. Because he forgot.

"...... You're late, Beatrice."

UH OH

BEATRICE IS HERE

NOW THE DEMON GAMES ARE GOING TO BEGIN

MANSION OF SLAUGHTER

BANQUET OF MIRACLES

"There are many fitting sacrifices for you. Four of my children. Three of their companions. Four of my grandchildren."

Kinzo has officially reached antagonist status. . . . . . . . I think?

Willing to overcome all odds, Kinzo throws away the inheritance of the Ushiromiya family. He opens the window and takes off his ring and flings it outside. Man, I can't wait for Maria to find the ring and become the new head of the Ushiromiya family. While she's at it, she should find that key and start killing people to revive Beatrice.

Since she's the main character and all.

http://img.imgcake.com/kinzojpgda.jpg

After that, the screen shatters and then the scene changes once more.

The main party is just sitting around watching TV. The magic glowing box tells them that there are rain and flood warnings, but Battler seems to think that the rain that they can actually see and hear all around them confirms that. He also thinks that when it's raining this hard, that means it's probably going to stop. (?)

Jessica says since there's a typhoon it's going to stay like that all day tomorrow. George is glad that he cleared up his schedule just in case, since they probably won't be able to head out on Sunday. Battler starts to wonder if Jessica takes a boat to school every day, which apparently she does. Okay, I have to admit, that's pretty boss!

After that they have some boring talk and character development for Jessica.

Then Kanon shows up to tell us dinner is ready. Battler feels bad for her for having to walk all the way to the guest house in the rain. I think Battler has a crush on her.

omgomgomg the fabled dinner scene

I just realized I don't know if anything is actually going to happen or if this is just some kind of milestone that I needed to reach. But I think I'm there!

Jessica uses the word fabulous and makes me want to push her into a pit even more than I already do.

After that, Kanon asks where Maria is but nobody seems to know. They thought she was with Rosa. Lol.

Now you've spurned the main character of Umineko. Prepare to face her wrath !!

Let's see. . . At that time, Rosa is apparently asleep on some sofa somewhere. Apparently she tired herself out from beating her kid too much. . . ihihi. When Genji brings a blanket to put on her, she suddenly snaps wide awake with a JOLT.

Genji takes out a pocket watch and tell her it's slightly after 6. Even though the clock a minute ago said it was 6:30. ~__~

After some small talk, Rosa finally remembers that she left Maria out in the rain like an hour ago. After beating her.

XFDXFD

".... Maria ...... That's right, Maria?!"

Knowing Maria's nature, Rosa realizes exactly what she has done. She pushes Genji out of the way and runs outside, into the rain. Apparently it really looks like a typhoon outside. It wasn't as windy as a typhoon, but it was still a windy rain.

At around the same time, Battler starts to get worried that Maria might still be out there rebelliously searching for that rose. George says he wishes he could say differently but it's definitely possible.

Kanon tells them he didn't see her, and as far as he knows Rosa was just chilling and taking a nap. Surprisingly, this fact doesn't make ANYONE mad. Anyways, Battler says him and Aniki should RACE OVER THERE. So that's what we're going to do.

As they arrive at the area, George spots Rosa and calls out to her.

"Where is Maria?! Isn't she with you?!"

Rosa seems angry. ~__~

After a short exchange, Battler suddenly happens upon "something white". It's actually Maria holding a white umbrella. Yay.

She has a funny look on her face, it's like a mix of :| and :S

Apparently she has mud and stuff on her, though the artist didn't bother to actually draw that. Still, based on text alone, it's apparently a pitiful sight. Rosa runs over to start hugging Maria and apologizing. Maria is still grumbling about not being able to find the rose. I guess her brain seriously can't process information such as "the rose isn't here".

Or perhaps this is all part of her master plan !!

Rosa says "I'm sorry for being such a bad mother", and hilariously no one objects. George is just like "Okay then. Let's go to the mansion!"

Kanon says she will have a towel ready for Maria.

and stuff

After that, they begin to talk about the umbrella that Maria was carrying and she tells them she didn't pack an umbrella. I totally saw this coming, actually, as soon as Battler felt the need to make such a point of the umbrella in the earlier narration.

Mystery Sol-, no, wait. HOW/WHERE DID SHE GET THE UMBRELLA FROM?

"Uu! Beatrice!"

A sudden weird sound effect plays when she says that. Or maybe the music changed and I can't hear it well over the rain/effects. Still, it's obviously supposed to be an ominous thing. Obviously Rosa doesn't believe her and tries to ask again "nicely". Maria of course gets mad but Rosa doesn't press the issue further.

After that we switch to an inside scene. Nanja tries to convince Kinzo to come to dinner at the very least and of course fails. Kinzo is too focused on the chess game which he wants to finish tonight, before the world ends.

Krauss returns with Nanjo to announce that Kinzo won't be coming, which causes Rudolf and Eva to snicker. None of them really wanted him to come anyway. After that, Krauss tells Gohda to go ahead and begin with dinner.

The long awaited dinner scene begins~

http://img.imgcake.com/Rosajpgse.jpg

In this next scene, everyone is going to say they didn't give her the umbrella and then we're going to start to wonder where she got it from.

Apparently, Rudolf and them were having a "friendly" chat in their room. To me, this could mean one of two things. . . And surprisingly only one of those is perverted~

Krauus confirms that at the very least it couldn't have been him, Eva, Rudolf, Hideyoshi, or Kyrie. I will take them off of my list!

Which I haven't made yet.

Only because I feel like there's going to be a big reveal coming up and it will be a waste of time to start gathering proof.

It wasn't Gohda, or Genji, either.

http://img.imgcake.com/somoejpgse.jpg ^ it's sad when even YOU know you're a screw up

Maria insists it was Beatrice. Kumasawa (this might be the first time I've actually typed out her name in my entire playthrough), and Shannon confirm that it was not them either. The list of suspects is growing thin !!

Nor was it Natsushi, who went to her room immediately because she had a headache. Or is this all part of her master plan to make it look like Beatrice is real?!

You're the only one who doesn't have an alibi, Natblobshi!

Her plan is to make it look like Beatrice is real so that Maria will join her side. Not only does Maria have Main Character Hax powers, but she already has Krauss on her side as well. Brining over Maria would possibly bring over Rosa, George, and Battler as well. Jessica is not allowed on the dream team.

This is all part of her master plot to form her own clique that will vote for each other in user contests to prevent them from being selected by the demon roulette.

Mystery Solved !!

Uh, anyway. Next on the list. . .

It obviously wasn't George or any of the kids. Battler says he wouldn't have given her an umbrella but would have taken her out of the rain anyway, so obviously that theory is shot.

After narrowing it down considerably, and taking into consideration that nobody would lie about something since there was no need to hide it (or so they think. . . I'm looking at you Mastermindsushi), Rosa starts to become baffled.

Nanjo says "Of course, it wasn't me". Is it just me or did he put a weird emphasis on 'of course'? And remember earlier in this scene when him and Krauss were in the hell? Together?

It all falls into place. Nanjo is already part of Natmoeshi's super clique.

+3 Natsushi !

+3 Natsushi !

+3 Natsushi !

Oh God, I could just see her finishing first in her division.

This is going to be a disaster~

Battler says "Wait a sec. Isn't this starting to get a bit weird? I mean, who's left. . . . ."

Nobody except for THE GOLDEN WITCH !!

Rosa assures us that she doesn't think anyone did anything wrong. She just wants to thank the person who gave Maria that umbrella. Despite that, no one raised their hand. People began to whisper about how "weird" this situation had gotten.

"Calm down, Rosa. Why don't we just ask the person who was lent the umbrella?"

God, Rudolf is such a d-bag. She said it like 4 times since this scene started.

'That's what everyone had been thinking since the beginning'

Okay. . . Were NONE OF THEM listening to Maria when she said it earlier?

Hideyoshi asks her and, of course, Maria cheerfully answers "Beatrice!"

There's also a weird sound effect that sounds like a spring.

what the heck

The dining hall was wrapped in silence for a moment.

Then it was wrapped in laughter.

XFDXFD

BEATRICE IS NOT REAL YOU STUPID FOUR YEAR OLD

YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND HOW THE WORLD WORKS OR ANYTHING !!

http://img.imgcake.com/bossjpgug.jpg

Krauss is such a boss.

Maria cracks a cheerful fang smile and says "Just like Krauss oji-san said, Beatrice lent it to me! Uu-uu-!"

Krauss continues to laugh DIRECTLY IN HER FACE and says something really snarky about how he's jealous of such "purity". But we all know what he really means is "stupidity".

Krauss was laughing with a face that was clearly mocking her, but Maria, apparently feeling that her claim was believed, was overjoyed.

. . . Or so it seemed.

What I know, and what Krauss doesn't know, is that Maria is only pretending to be ********. This is all part of her plan to make them let their guard down. Once she has all of them believing the witch is merely a joke, by pretending to be stupid and believing in it, she'll find the key and then begin slaughtering them one by one.

Jessica has to ask Battler what's going on because she's incapable of following the conversation on her own.

Both of them agree that since Maria is too dumb to tell jokes (or is she?!) they should believe what she says. But isn't that confusing, since that would mean a witch really appeared out of nowhere and gave her an umbrella?

Outside the servants begin to talk about the situation. Since the list had been narrowed down completely, the only one left was Kinzo. However, Genji states frankly that Kinzo doesn't like Maria. He probably would have just ignored her and not given her an umbrella at all.

Cross the last name off the list.

A witch did it!

Mystery Solved !!

Gohda comes into the hall, flexes his trapezious muscles, and tells them to get back to work. . . Especially Genji. Which seems to piss Kanon off, but there's nothing she can do. That is until she goes crazy and plunges a shard of glass into Gohda's neck in a murderous rage.

After the others leave Kanon and Genji in the hall alone, they have an interesting conversation. Both of them seem to accept the fact that Beatrice really did appear without question. However, they're more curious as to why. Has Kinzo's ritual already begun? Yes it has! Now prepare to be thrown into the meat grinder! THE DEMON ROULETTE BEGINS!

http://img.imgcake.com/rulersjpgdy.jpg

ihihihi

After that, they sort of brush over the details of the dinner quickly.

Krauss finally speaks up, saying that it's a shame that the dinner Gohda worked so hard for was so poorly received. Eva puts on that really ugly expression and agrees with him, saying that nothing would taste good today because of the 'mood'. Krauss says he wants to know why she feels that way, and that he wants to 'cheer her up' as an 'older brother'. This can only mean one thing, and it's perverted. . . In my mind.

Battler notices that this comment makes both Eva and Rudolf not look too happy, and remarks on it. Natsushi just says "Really? I don't think so." But Battler thinks that she looks kinda in a bad mood as well. Hideyoshi tries to make a remark to let Battler know that the adults had a "complicated" conversation, and tries to brush it off with a laugh. However, Kyrie and Natsushi, who he had directed the comment to, just ignored him as well. What a tense mood.

Kyrie suddenly changes the subject and starts talking about Battler's future. However, he just responds with an offhanded joke about constipation.

At long last, Fox Girl and Old Lady returned with a serving cart full of coffee and tea to give to everyone. . .

After that Maria asks if the dinner is over. Rosa tells her that's not lady-like and instructs her to stay in her seat. So, of course, Maria gets right out of her seat and begins fishing through her handbag for some kind of magic artifact. No one seemed particularly concerned with what she was doing (not even Rosa, who had JUST told her to stay in her seat). . . Except for George.

"What's this? This, where did you get it?"

This draws Battler's attention as well. When they looked, they both noticed Maria was holding a beautiful western-style envelope. On the front of the envelope, the Ushiromiya one-winged eagle was done in gold leaf. Furthermore, it was sealed with red wax. I guess that somehow means it was clearly not something Maria just brought as a prank.

"...... Maria-chan, what is that?"

Natblobshi seems to also have noticed, and because of her tone, this drew the attention of the other "adults" seated at the table. Because Jessica wasn't mentioned, I'm going to go out on a limb as assume she's just staring at a wall or something.

Everyone puts in their two cents, Rosa looks a bit exasperated, however, Nanjo quickly recognizes it as one of the envelopes used only by the Ushiromiya family head for private use. This is obviously an. . . Unusual thing for a child like Maria (especially a child that Kinzo hates) to be holding.

The three Umineko dads immediately all want to see it. However, Maria says "no wai". She wants to read it. Apparently, she was instructed to read it to everyone!

http://img.imgcake.com/memejpgdu.jpg

Battler tries to crack a joke, but no one goes along with it. Eva, sounding pretty serious, asks what is in the letter. So NOW everyone suddenly wants to believe in the witch, huh? As Maria opens the letter, everyone studies the wax seal to confirm that it's from Kinzo. Krauss has doubts, thinking that since everyone has received a letter from Kinzo at some point, they could have created a fake. However, more interestingly, someone mentions that the seal is found on his ring. Well, Kinzo threw that ring out the window earlier so. . . Yeah. . .

One by one, everyone rejects Nanjo and says that just because of the seal, that doesn't mean the letter was from Kinzo. The truth, however, is that they were just afraid that Kinzo had sent some bad news about their inheritance.

http://img.imgcake.com/dugjpgez.jpg

lol

George basically simplifies the situation, saying that because Beatrice gave Maria the umbrella, she also gave her the letter. This is assuming that Beatrice is real. Hmm. Interestingly, Moesushi says that she "agrees with her husband". It's just a dubious letter handed over by some suspicious person and they shouldn't pay any attention to it. Reverse psychology much? We all know that Natblobshi was the one who created the letter, using the ring that had been tossed out to press the false seal into it. Pretending to be Beatrice, so that she could fool Maria. . .

Though she says they shouldn't pay attention to the letter, when Battler says they should read it anyway since there's no harm in doing so, Natsushi chuckles to herself. "Just as planned".

Not only that, but by objecting she has cleared herself of all suspicion.

She is truly a mastermind!

As Maria prepares to read the letter, Rudolf makes one last statement. . . Asking Krauss if he thinks that Kinzo really sent the letter. Krauss just basically dismisses Maria's existence as a joke and says Kinzo would never use someone like that to deliver their important news.

Even Eva and Maria's own mother, Rosa, just agree that not only would Kinzo not rely on her. . . But Maria is too dumb to pull off a prank as clever as this.

After that Maria asks if the dinner is over. Rosa tells her that's not lady-like and instructs her to stay in her seat. So, of course, Maria gets right out of her seat and begins fishing through her handbag for some kind of magic artifact. No one seemed particularly concerned with what she was doing (not even Rosa, who had JUST told her to stay in her seat). . . Except for George.

"What's this? This, where did you get it?"

This draws Battler's attention as well. When they looked, they both noticed Maria was holding a beautiful western-style envelope. On the front of the envelope, the Ushiromiya one-winged eagle was done in gold leaf. Furthermore, it was sealed with red wax. I guess that somehow means it was clearly not something Maria just brought as a prank.

"...... Maria-chan, what is that?"

Natblobshi seems to also have noticed, and because of her tone, this drew the attention of the other "adults" seated at the table. Because Jessica wasn't mentioned, I'm going to go out on a limb as assume she's just staring at a wall or something.

Everyone puts in their two cents, Rosa looks a bit exasperated, however, Nanjo quickly recognizes it as one of the envelopes used only by the Ushiromiya family head for private use. This is obviously an. . . Unusual thing for a child like Maria (especially a child that Kinzo hates) to be holding.

The three Umineko dads immediately all want to see it. However, Maria says "no wai". She wants to read it. Apparently, she was instructed to read it to everyone!

http://img.imgcake.com/memejpgdu.jpg

Battler tries to crack a joke, but no one goes along with it. Eva, sounding pretty serious, asks what is in the letter. So NOW everyone suddenly wants to believe in the witch, huh? As Maria opens the letter, everyone studies the wax seal to confirm that it's from Kinzo. Krauss has doubts, thinking that since everyone has received a letter from Kinzo at some point, they could have created a fake. However, more interestingly, someone mentions that the seal is found on his ring. Well, Kinzo threw that ring out the window earlier so. . . Yeah. . .

One by one, everyone rejects Nanjo and says that just because of the seal, that doesn't mean the letter was from Kinzo. The truth, however, is that they were just afraid that Kinzo had sent some bad news about their inheritance.

http://img.imgcake.com/dugjpgez.jpg

lol

George basically simplifies the situation, saying that because Beatrice gave Maria the umbrella, she also gave her the letter. This is assuming that Beatrice is real. Hmm. Interestingly, Moesushi says that she "agrees with her husband". It's just a dubious letter handed over by some suspicious person and they shouldn't pay any attention to it. Reverse psychology much? We all know that Natblobshi was the one who created the letter, using the ring that had been tossed out to press the false seal into it. Pretending to be Beatrice, so that she could fool Maria. . .

Though she says they shouldn't pay attention to the letter, when Battler says they should read it anyway since there's no harm in doing so, Natsushi chuckles to herself. "Just as planned".

Not only that, but by objecting she has cleared herself of all suspicion.

She is truly a mastermind!

As Maria prepares to read the letter, Rudolf makes one last statement. . . Asking Krauss if he thinks that Kinzo really sent the letter. Krauss just basically dismisses Maria's existence as a joke and says Kinzo would never use someone like that to deliver their important news.

Even Eva and Maria's own mother, Rosa, just agree that not only would Kinzo not rely on her. . . But Maria is too dumb to pull off a prank as clever as this.

Oh man. After Maria opens the letter an AWESOME music track begins to play.

I just kinda sat there listening to it for a few minutes. <__<

Okay, on with the readthrough-ish-ness stuff.

The letter basically states that Beatrice is the Alchemy Counselor of the Ushiromiya family. However, starting today, Kinzo terminated her contract. As a result, this letter is her resignation. In addition, there is one other thing that she feels should be mentioned to all of them; She did lend him a vast amount of gold many years ago. As stipulation for the severance of the contract, not only does she get all of her gold back. . . She also gets everything of the Ushiromiya family. As 'interest'.

While everyone else is saying things like "Ridiculous!!", Battler just kinda laughs about it. He says it sounds like some kinda deal with the devil, and that since the witch is all old and ugly now she's just trying to collect retirement funds. George tells him he shouldn't joke about this, but Battler doesn't really see why not. I get the feeling he's the only one at the table who still doesn't believe this witch crap.

http://img.imgcake.com/clausejpgeb.jpg

Oh boy. I wonder what this special clause could be?

Hmmmm. Basically, if someone finds the gold before she finishes collecting everything, she will give everything back. Seems simple enough. However, this gold doesn't seem to exist anywhere, right? It is probably very complicated.

Doesn't Beatrice already know where the gold is? Hm. . . I wonder.

Anyway, the first thing that was collected as interest was the Ushiromiya ring. Nanja mentions that it did seem like the ring was missing when they were playing Chess earlier (it wasn't. . . he threw it out AFTER he was playing chess. . .), and Natblobshi tells him to shut up and not say things so carelessly that might not even be true. Could they be secretly working together?

Kyrie thinks that the only way to confirm it is to ask Kinzo directly.

While Krauss and Natsushi continue to say this letter is obviously nonsense, since Krauss is control of all of Kinzo's assets, everyone else seems to like the idea. Whoever finds the gold will inherit the entire fortune, right? Obviously, each one of them is thinking that it's possible for them to be the one to find the gold. It's a very tempting idea.

http://img.imgcake.com/goldenjpguv.jpg

Immediately after that, the scene switches to Kinzo's study. Krauss, Rudolf, and Eva violently pound on the door. . . Trying to get in so they can question him. Up until now, they wanted nothing to do with him, however. They aren't fit to be graced by the presence of the almighty Kinzo.

Kinzo just continues to ignore them, eating his meal alone, in silence. Shannon and Genji, who are both with him, ask what they should do. However, Kinzo just tells them to "leave it". He doesn't really seem to care what anyone out there is up to. Kanon, however, speaks up. He questions that since Maria receive a letter from Beatrice, maybe they just want to test it's authenticity.

Kinzo just laughs at them, like a true KING, and then the screen SHATTERS and the scene changes.

Back with the rest of the group, we see things from Battler's point of view finally. I was actually a bit curious how the kids were reacting to this news, since it was mostly just the adults talking during the big reveal earlier. Apparently, Battler is just kind of disgusted by how greedy everyone is being. By looking at Jessica, he seems to think that she feels the same way. . .

Since no one "needed them", they left and decided to just go "hang out" somewhere.

http://img.imgcake.com/xfdxfdjpgub.jpg

XFDXFD

JESSICA CAN'T READ

She's the only one who isn't equal

I somehow forgot to point that out earlier so I take the time to do it now.

Let's see. . . Anyways, back to Battler and the others just "hanging out". Jessica is all complaining and stuff about how the adults are acting. She starts to understand why Kinzo didn't want to come and eat with them. Battler says he's already completely disillusioned with that old bastard Rudolf, and nothing could really make him think much worse of him. Then Jessica is like "Oh. Yeah. ME TOO!"

Nice try.

Battler sees right through her. She was always talking about how bad her parents were, but maybe she didn't feel that way deep inside.

George actually stands up for the adults, justifying their actions by trying to explain to them that getting money is a serious thing for adult. He won't try to force them to understand, since they are minors. And, of course, they both kinda jump on him for saying that.

Battler and George agree they probably shouldn't talk about this, and should just stay out of the parents way. Jessica thinks that is "boring".

George asks Jessica to not start hating her mother and father, even if she can't understand. She just responds by telling him to leave her alone for a bit. Heel turn, heel turn, just as I called it~. Battler decides it's best to just leave her be instead of taunting her. Apparently he has grown over the past 6 years!

After that, George wanders off as well. Surprisingly, Kyrie shows up and starts having an interesting conversation with Battler.

Does he actually think a 19th person on the island exists?

This is tricky, because it implicates someone of the original 18 on the island as a guilty party, depending on how you answer the question. I'm not sure Battler gets it. At this point, maybe Kyrie and I are the only ones who have thought of this (if you take my Natsushi theory seriously~)

Battler thinks her line of reasoning is too hasty. While it's easy to prove that Beatrice does exist, if she simply appears, it's almost impossible to prove that she does not exist. At this point, they can only make assumptions. . . And that's exactly what Kyrie is doing. What I wonder is why she came to Battler of all people with this. Weird~

http://img.imgcake.com/chessboardjpghu.jpg

No explanation needed for why that had to be screencapped. Awesome.

Battler explains the awesome phrase, turn the chessboard over, which he apparently picked up from Kyrie. Massive awesomeness points for her. By examining the evidence some more, Kyrie believes that some scheme has been set into motion by some person who wants the others to believe that a 19th person named Beatrice exists.

And then, Kyrie suspects that Maria may be working with someone.

It begins.

Someone has finally begun to unravel Maria's master plan. I didn't think it would happen this soon!

Then, Kyrie tells Battler that because everyone denied the existence of the witch and mocked her, Maria won't open up and reveal the details to any of the adults now. Ah, I see exactly where this is going now. Kyrie has been manipulating Battler from the beginning. What she really wants is for him to get the information that she wants from Maria.

Of course, Maria is over there by herself, crying.

Kyrie says Maria is "holding the key", which she has said the word "key" in this conversation like TWELVE TIMES NOW. I wonder if this is foreshadowing that Maria is going to be the one who finds the key. Like I called a million hours ago when they were still on the beach.

Then she'll start SLAUGHTERING EVERYBODY WHO DOUBTED HER.

Battler and Kyrie continue talking for a bit and man, Battler just has this really DUMB grin on his face the whole time. Does he not even realize he's being manipulated?

I thought he was supposed to be SMART.

After that Rudork pops up, calls us brats, and talks about how he wants to wear make-up.

He says he wants to have a "family chat" and then reveals that tonight he thinks he will probably be killed.

Battler and Kyrie get a little freaked out and then Rudolf leaves and, after a moment, Kyrie follows after him even though he told them not to.

After that, Natsushi is out in the hall, giving thought to this proposal by Beatrice.

Well, since whoever solves the riddle would inherit everything (not just the gold), that meant that this was going to undermine Krauss' position as the family head. Obviously this was very desirable for all of the younger siblings who could inherit the entire fortune instead of only a piece of it. They could steal all of Krauss' money by solving the riddle.

Natsushi assumes that this whole thing is just a plot drawn up by Kinzo, who likely had one of his servants dress up and pretend to be the witch. She thinks it was probably Shannon, but isn't Shannon kinda fat? LOL

After that Krauss and Natsushi start arguing about how she is useless, and then he leads her to his secret padlocked torture chamber.

. . . Well, actually, what was in there was the single gold ingot that Kinzo had used in the past to prove that the gold existed to the people he loaned money from. What this means is. . . The imaginary gold is real! That means Krauss really should be worried in case someone manages to find it.

Natsushi starts to get all emotional, which annoys Krauss, and then she says that she thinks he doesn't need her anymore. Krauss says "that's fine". She asks if he doesn't want her to get involved. He says he ESPECIALLY doesn't want her to get involved. These problems have nothing to do with her.

What a BOSS.

After that, we get some sad piano and Natsushi internal conflict.

Then Jessica shows up. "...... O ...... Oh, it's you Mom."

After some mother/daughter bonding, Jessica passes the Scorpion Charm onto Natsushi. Obviously this is going to come into play later when the witch starts blowing stuff up.

I wish. ~__~

After that, we form a new party. George, Battler, and Jessica are going to carry the sleeping Maria back to the guesthouse with them. Rosa was going to come and help originally, but since she can't Shannon is going to come instead.

Battler Lv. 18 Jessica Lv. 18 George Lv. 23 Shannon Lv. 16

Shannon brings along some umbrellas for us to equip and then Rosa thanks us again for embarking upon this quest. Rosa mumbles an apology into the rain that nobody else hears. She's such a pushover.

Battler makes a breast rubbing joke.

After we get inside, George asks Shannon to stay and hang out with us for a while. Oh la la~

She has to go check the schedule to see if it will be okay, and leaves the party temporarily.

We deliver Maria to the destination and then Quest Completed!

In the other room, Shannon runs into but Kanon and Genji. Apparently, Krauss changed the schedule and has moved all of the servants except for Gohda to the guest house.

. . . In preparation for him killing Rudolf!

Yeah, go Krauss!

Let's do it!

Ugh, whatever. Kanon reveals it's because Krauss probably suspects one of them. . . Not because he's going to kill Rudork.

How lame.

Shannon admits that she is "a little happy" she was sent to the guesthouse.

Bwahahah..

http://img.imgcake.com/raisinsjpgsy.jpg

ohohoho

ihihi

Shannon tells him that she was invited to come and play, and Kanon flatly tells her that she can't. It's their job as furniture to take care of the midnight shift. So he's counting her. . . Or something. However, Kanon tells her to go see them and apologize and she can come back whenever or something. I think it's some kinda loophole strategy for him, since he's so bent on obeying the rules.

Genji tells him he should go play as well, however he says he's just furniture and he wasn't invited anyway.

Maybe if Krauss was there he would go~

Back in the other room, apparently Jessica and Battler are alone. Just a moment ago, Shannon came back and then left with George. ~__~

Jessica seems to think that the signs have been pretty obvious. Yeah, maybe she's not as dumb as I thought. I mean, I could pretty much tell since Shannon was introduced! Battler is just now realizing that George has been overly nice to Shannon.

Hmm.

Someplace else (I'm not sure where), George and Shannon are having some kind of boring ass private conversation that doesn't involve George molesting her. However, I learned something funny. Apparently, Shannon was raised in some kind of orphanage that offers children the chance to grow up and become servants.

Ah, what a wonderful life.

George asks her how much money she has saved up from working here. She tells him a few million yen, but she doesn't have anything she would like to buy. I have no idea how much yen is compared to dollars but it seems like that's a lot for an 11 year old girl to have saved up.

She's been working here since she was 1 by the way.

George calls her Sayo, which is apparently her real name, and which causes her to act all embarrassed. After flirting with her for a little bit more, George finally breaks out this ring. Oh, I wonder what that cold signify. He orders her to take it (which is hilarious by the way). However, he can't order her to accept it. . . Or something weird like that. Apparently, she's either going to wear it tomorrow or not, which will be a silent answer to his forbidden question.

I so called it.

Good luck, George!

After that, George leaves to return to the guesthouse and Shannon goes back into the mansion. She prances into the servants room, where Gohda is just sitting there doing a crossword puzzle. She asks him if he can do anything else, and Gohda tells her to patrol the halls and do his job while he sits there and finishes his crossword puzzle. Ahahah.

Take that, fox girl.

However, I have a bad feeling about this. If Krauss or anybody sees her, I think they're going to get more suspicious. Especially Natsushi, who was already suspecting her earlier. Even more especially after they specifically instructed her to leave. EVEN MORE ESPECIALLY after she lied and said Genji told her to come here when he didn't.

Oh man. This is not going to turn out well.

At that time, she thought she saw something flickering across the hall. . .

Oh, no, wait. Nothing there.

. . . It must have been her imagination after all.

Because of that, however, as she continued to check the windows she began thinking of that ghost story. The master of the night, Beatrice, would sometimes take the form of glowing butterflies.

After that it shows Beatrice portrait, shows all of the characters, shows the portrait again, and then. . .

Timeskip!

October 5th, 1986

6 AM!

Kanon and Genji are there, getting prepared, and then they leave the guesthouse together. Apparently they are both prepared for the special schedule to be extended which would mean Kanon working the midnight shift and then the morning shift as well.

As Kanon heads into the kitchen to greet Gohda (who I thought he didn't like), Gohda is nowhere to be seen! Oh my~

He tries calling the room where Gohda would be sleeping if he had overslept, but the phone isn't working. Oh my~

As he heads to the place where Gohda would be to wake him up. . . The scene suddenly changes to Natsushi waking up.

Apparently she can't sleep without medicine. ~__~

As she longs to stay locked away, safe inside her room, she begins comparing herself to Kinzo. Who she secretly admires for being able to do so. However, she has responsibilities and stuff to take care of. Also, her headache starts getting worse. Man, does she have a tumor or something? She should probably get this checked out. I mean, it's 1986. Medical science should be able to do something about her condition by now. Or is there just no cure for moe?

Now it's revealed that she had left the scorpion charm hanging on the doorknob overnight. Heh.

This reminds her of the charm she wanted to give Jessica in return, and she breaks out the magic mirror that's hidden in her drawer. Which apparently repels spirits or something like that.

After that, Genji arrives to tell her that the phones have broken down. She thinks that's not such a bad thing. Oh, by the way, Gohda is missing too, LOL.

"What you say?!"

To Natsushi, this is a bigger problem than the phones not working.

She tells him to just do whatever it takes to get it to work, even if someone else has to prepare the breakfast. Then, something interesting happens.

http://img.imgcake.com/evidencejpgme.jpg

Genji just says he will clean it up later. Natsushi says it's vulgar and disgusting. Probably a prank by one of the guests. Even though she assumed she knew who it was, she decided it would be better to have just pretended not to notice.

When they arrived in the parlor, Eva and Hideyoshi were already there waiting!

Eva makes a jab at her, she just kinda brushes it off, then Kanon appears to tell them that he still hasn't found Gohda. Natsushi just tells him to take care of breakfast himself. However. . . Genji reveals now that they've been unable to find Krauss as well. Two people missing!

Don't Natsushi and Krauss sleep together? I figured she would have noticed already if that was the case. . . Well, I guess not.

But wait, that's not it. Rudolf, Kyrie, and Rosa are missing as well. Oh boy.

Natsushi thinks that they're probably all just outside somewhere, continuing the discussion from last night. After that, Eva puts forth the idea that they might be in Kinzo's study. She teases Natsushi a bit more, saying in a sarcastic tone of voice that since Kinzo trusts Natsushi he would come down and join them for breakfast if she asked. Genji, sensing that Natsushi would be in trouble if she can't get Kinzo to join them, offers her the key to Kinzo's study.

Aw yeah, Genji.

Though she wanted to thank him, by that time he was already leaving.

After some more jabs by Eva, Natmoeshi finally departs for Kinzo's study. . .

Apart from the mansion, Maria wakes up. However, even though George, Battler, and Jessica are still sleeping she confirms that they are there and have not disappeared like some of the others.

So, apparently, the people in the guest house weren't touched. I'm actually wondering what happened to Shannon since she was in the mansion but nobody has really gone looking for her yet. They just kinda forgot about her.

Then Maria starts going crazy.

She begins jumping on their beds and shrieking at them, using her secret talent to be an annoying little kid and wake people up when they're trying to sleep.

How is nobody pissed at her?

I bet if Rosa was there she would smack Maria across the face. XFD

Everyone gets dressed and prepares to head for the mansion to help Maria look for her mother.

Elsewhere, Natsushi uses the golden key to enter Kinzo's study. Inside, he is already awake and just staring out the window in a creepy old man fashion. She fails to convince him to leave the study, however he tells her something very important.

It doesn't matter if you have a one-winged eagle on your clothes, as long as you have a one-winged eagle. . . In your heart !!

It's going to be so awesome if she yells this out later when she pushes Eva off the back of a moving train.

Speak of the devil, right outside the study she runs into Eva. ~__~

ohoho

after that Natsushi just burns Eva and walks off, leaving her there

Since Eva is afraid of Kinzo, she can't even bring herself to knock on the door to the study to try and figure out what happened in there

When the two of them returned to the parlor, the four children as well as Nanjo had already returned as well. Genji reports that the other who were missing have still not been found. This does not bode well~. Now, they also finally add Shannon to the list of missing people. Kanon returns shortly after to report that the missing persons were not outside either. After Natsushi leaves, Kanon reveals that there was something "odd" about the storehouse, but he won't say what it is. He leaves to get the key and offers to go and check on it. Genji, Eva, and Hideyoshi follow him as well, their curiosity piqued.

When they arrive, they find. . . Well, this.

http://img.imgcake.com/thisthingjpged.jpg

Eva suggests that they quickly paint over it so no one else will find the scribble. At the same time, Genji begins to think about where he saw a familiar red substance on the doorhandle of Natsushi's room. . .

And they open the storehouse to find. . .

Damnit, another scene change!

Okay, Battler and the others, blah blah blah. Genji comes back, out of breath. . . He quickly approaches Doctor Nanjo and asks him to come quickly. Out in the hall, they bump into Natsushi. Genji whispers something to her and she comes along with them as well. In the other room, George notices them running outside through the window. George convinces Battler and Jessica to come with him to check it out as well, but. . . They leave Maria alone. . . Somehow seems like a bad idea with people disappearing and all. . .

As they approach the storehouse, Natsushi quickly rushes over there and tells them not to come. She instructs them to go back to the mansion right away. However, they look past her and manage to see. . .

Aw yeah, dead bodies. Krauss, Kyrie, Rosa, Rudolf, and uh. . . I'm not sure who else. All dead though! I think those are the only ones that Battler recognized. I wonder about Shannon and Gohda. . . And. . . Was anyone else missing? I don't think so.

Also there's some pretty cool music playing now ~

Eva blocks George, and Natsushi blocks Jessica. However, since both of Battler's parents are DEAD, he continues on to the storehouse to get a better look inside. Confirmed Gohda death as well as apparently a BUNCH of others. But wait. . . Still no confirmed Shannon death. ~__~

Apparently their FACES are completely PLOWED.

Battler starts having a nervous breakdown and yelling a bunch of screwed up stuff, which causes Jessica to start screaming as well. Nanjo and the others try to calm him down. . .

Then. . . Hideyoshi confirms a Shannon death as well.

Oh man.

Oh God.

Oh God.

Oh man.

George starts crying. I feel so bad for him.

He asks to see her, but Hideyoshi won't let him. Apparently her body is mutilated just like the others, and Hideyoshi doesn't want him to see that. He says he wants to see her last face, but Hideyoshi says that he should remember her by the last face that she showed to him yesterday.

http://img.imgcake.com/lastfacejpgqa.jpg

George asks him to check to see if she's wearing the ring. Kanon looks and sees it almost right away and points it out. Oh man, she was even wearing the ring. That sucks even harder. Poor George.

However, knowing that she was wearing it cheers him up a little bit.

http://img.imgcake.com/battlerjpgum.jpg

This is how Battler deals with death.

Natsushi instructs Kanon to take Battler and the others back to the mansion. At the same time, she instructs Genji to go ahead and call the police. Although the island will remain isolated until the typhoon passes, the police will at least be able to tell them what to do next.

After that they start talking about how this is a crime scene and what happened was obviously murder, so they don't want to tamper with the evidence. The key to the storehouse might have fingerprints on it, but since it was passed around it probably won't help much. . .

Hideyoshi comes up with a strange theory that seems to indicate that whoever had "hidden" the bodies here actually wanted them to be found. . . Based on the fact that they drew such strange grafitti on the place and even returned the key so it could be opened freely. I'm kinda surprised nobody is suspecting Kanon at this point. . .

They take a fresh lock out to lock up the storehouse with, so the killer can't come back and tamper with the scene. Natsushi takes the lock as her responsibility and locks the place up as all of them decide to leave.

I could really see this coming back to bite her in the ass later. . .

Everyone returns from that HORRIFIC scene to find Maria just sitting on the couch cackling evilly.

http://img.imgcake.com/trolledjpgur.jpg

I think we know who the true killer here is.

So anyway, since none of them really know how to tell her that Rosa is dead. . . The room is quickly enveloped by silence. What an awkward position they've all been put into. Maria gives them a weird look and then they just join her and sit down on the sofa with her.

Natsushi and Eva leave to go tell Kinzo what has happened. After that, Kumasawa appears to tell them that. . . In the dining hall. . . She found blood!

George rushes to the scene immediately, with Hideyoshi and Nanjo tagging along. Battler and the others followed as well.

Compared to the scene in the storehouse, it wasn't enough to really shock them. However, there were traces of blood on the floor. Nanjo says that this is probably the place where they were killed, before they were brought to the storehouse. Hideyoshi confirms that this is where they were having their little meeting.

Battler giggles and says something kinda dickish, which of course upsets Jessica.

Lol Jessica.

Battler and Hideyosh urge everyone to leave so no one gets more upset, and so they don't tamper with the crime scene any.

Genji returns to report that. . . He was also unable to contact the police, due to a failure of the radio or perhaps something else. Hideyoshi starts getting freaked out, but there's really nothing they can do. Until the typhoon passes, they're all trapped on the island. Six people are dead. And the killer is still running free!

Jessica says she will find the killer herself and slice him into bits. And then she starts crying.

Lol Jessica.

Oh boy. Now Maria finally comes over and starts paying attention. She cheerfully asks 'who died'.

evil, evil child

This pisses Jessica off and she . . . Well, she lets the cat out of the bag. Not delicately at all, either. Maria. . . Uh, she doesn't seem upset or anything. Maybe slightly confused. She asks how many people died. Jessica reveals it was six people, and Maria responds to something else that the writer felt the need to block out with ***. My curiousity. . .

Before Battler can ask her to repeat it, Natsushi returns.

"He wasn't there. . . . . The room was empty."

Oh boy.

Kinzo is either dead or the killer. Or something else.

Ah. . . Who knows? x__x

As Natsushi and the servants depart, the others are left alone. Battler asks George about the ring, and if he gave it to Shannon. . . Classy, Battler. Real Classy. XD

Jessica berates him and he realizes that was probably not the right thing to ask at a time like this.

They talk about it a bit more and George starts feeling guilty. After all, if he hadn't given her the ring she probably would have come back to the guesthouse and not been killed. . . Battler tries to cheer him up some more but Eva just tells Battler to leave him alone.

So, instead, Battler talks to Eva for a bit.

While Eva's logic implicates the servants . . . And possibly someone in control of them (either Natsushi or Kinzo), when Battler thinks about it. . . The people who seem most suspicious are Eva and Hideyoshi. Or, more specifically, Eva who was talking to him right now and trying to make the servants look like the suspicious ones.

Eva openly confirms that she is the suspicious one, and so Battler asks her about an alibi. . .

[ At this point the write-ups stopped making sense completely and no semblance of story could be found ]

oh man

I've been focusing more on reading through instead of doing write-ups

anyway Natsushi just came back WITH A GUN

"awesome"

Kanon and Genji talk more about this Beatrice situation, which only those two seem to really know about

Genji confirms that the bloodstains outside of Natsushi's room indicate that someone tried to get inside but couldn't (which is what I was thinking earlier)

Kanon laments that if Natsushi had been chosen as a sacrifice instead, Shannon might not have needed to die

"what a dick"

and then Battler appears out of nowhere

ihihi

After interrogating Kanon for a bit, the servants explain to him that Beatrice is real, which of course Battler doesn't believe.

Maria shows up to confront him, telling him that without the scorpion charm he would already be dead by now.

Battler starts laughing at her.

He lost the charm a long time ago.

LOL WITCHES AREN'T REAL

George is a master detective

oh man

Beatrice is going to collect everything of the Ushiromiya family

which means everyone is going to be killed as "interest"

which means that Kinzo's conversation with Natsushi that morning was entirely different from what she thought it was

it doesn't matter if she is wearing the one-winged eagle or not,

because she has one in her heart, she's STILL GONNA GET KILLED

o__o

Just finished the Natsushi interrogation scene. That was intense!

Also LOL at Jessica for having asthma.

Knife in the forehead!

Eva and Hideyoshi DEAD.

It seems the killer has made a fatal mistake in killing Eva and Hideyoshi.

Because now Battler is PISSED.

oh man Kanon is getting awesome right about now

noooo Kanon D:

I'm at the part where they are in Kinzo's study now.

I can't believe Battler is JUST figuring all this stuff out about the sacrifices.

Natblobshi takes control of the situation and forces all of the suspicious servants out. . . As well as Maria.

Also Battler lied about losing his scorpion charm earlier.

I had a feeling at the time that he had been bluffing. . .

For a second I thought moesushi was going to start shooting everyone. That would have been a GREAT way to end it.

So Battler is sitting there reflecting on how terrible it was to kick all of them out, then

apparently

he heard from George that Jessica also liked Kanon.

Oh, come on. Now her story is a RIPOFF of George's story, too. Could she get any worse?

LOL ASTHMA

After that, Battler starts to look around and do some research to try and find out what the last magic circle means.

Unfortunately, since most of the books aren't even in Japanese, he doesn't have much luck.

After that, they explore Maria's reasons for wanting to believe in the witch some more. . .

George and Jessica start to admit their feelings of guilty for throwing the others out.

Battler reasons out that the letter may have been some part of trap. . . Where since the killer couldn't get through the door, they tricked Natsushi and the others into sending more sacrifices out to where they could be killed. Battler asks Natsushi if she would have chased Jessica out of the room if Jessica was the one standing behind her. . . She doesn't answer the question directly. Jessica asks if they can please all stay together instead of forcing the other "suspicious" people away from them. She thinks they shouldn't have to suspect anyone.

Around this time, Battler finally finds the magic circle in the book he had been flipping through.

Apparently it's meant to cause discord and create a group's downfall from the inside. Basically, exactly what was happening right now.

Then, the phone!

Apparently all they can hear is someone singing on the other end. George and Battler resolve themselves to go, but Natsushi tries to stop them. . . Then, they agree to all go together. Battler equipped himself with. . . A candlestick.

When they reach the parlor, George offers to be the one to open the door and put himself in the most danger. . . Like a real man.

As they enter the parlor, searching for signs of an attacker. . . They are greeted with a room covered in blood. Genji, Kumasawa, and Nanjo. . . All dead! And with wounds that match the descriptions all the way up to the eighth twilight. Maria is standing there, all alone, just signing her creepy song~

They learn from Maria that those three were chosen as sacrifices, but Maria was safe because of the scorpion charm that Battler had given her, and had prayed for her safety upon.

As Battler gets more and more frustrated, unable to believe that the witch exists. . . George suddenly notices that Natsushi has disappeared as well. Uh oh. o__o

Natsushi escapes after picking up the letter, locks the children in the parlor by wedging the candlestick against the door, and heads out into the hall alone. She goes to where the portrait of Beatrice is and yells out her challenge. Soon, golden butterflies appear to meet her challenge. Natsushi challenges her to a duel, and the butterflies form into the shape of a human figure.

At the same time, Battler manages to break through the door which had been barricaded. . . They hear the sound of a gunshot and go running to the entrance hall. However, when they find Natsushi. . . It appears as if she shot herself in the head. Battler and Maria argue a bit more, and then Maria runs up to. . . Apparently, Beatrice.

Battler readies the rifle, which he took from Natsushi's body. . .

However, guns are useless against a witch.

Also, the time has run out. The witch has won.

Hm.

And so it ends.

Final Results: Everyone dead except for the four children, who went missing.

Based on what it said in the final scrolling credits thing. . .

Maria's jawbone was found sometime later, meaning she was probably killed but her body was never found. George and Jessica were also never found. Because Maria, George, and Jessica accepted Beatrice as a witch, they were allowed into the Golden Land. Because Battler did not accept the witch, he may or may not have been allowed into the Golden Land.

George chose to revive Shannon. Jessica chose to revive Kanon. Maria chose to revive Rosa. (but somehow all of these people are still dead or missing)

Does everyone else get revived? I thought the rules said they did.

What about the lost love stuff?

What about the gold?

Mystery. . . Uh. . . "Solved". I think?

Tea Party ep. 1

Purgatorio

I'm greeted by. . . Uh, Battler. Who thanks me for beating Umineko episode 1. Thanks Battler~! Other people show up to explain to me that because they were so busy trying to catch the culprit, nobody tried to solve the riddle. As a result, time ran out and we got a "bad end". Well, yeah. That's what I thought anyway.

Jessica talks about how Shannon was so beautiful but half of her face was smashed in (This has a little to do with my theory which I'll post after I finish reading the Tea Party).

Next they talk about Kanon's death, which Shannon says was probably a big hint. This also ties in with the theory that I had started to develop late into the story. As a result, the Tea Party reinforces my belief!

George starts lamenting that he thought it would be a regular mystery novel, not fantasy. I think the same way, actually. My theory is based on the idea that a witch does not, in fact exist. I simply refuse to believe it!

Everyone starts staying it was definitely a witch. All praising Beatrice and stuff.

Battler better not agree with these guys. At least he is still on my side!

Everyone starts getting ready to solve the riddle and. . .

"Wait a minute guys. . ."

Aw yeah, Battler. He shuts down the theory of the witch completely. Ihihi~

Something like that can't possibly exist!

Operating on that assumption is where my theory will be built!

Ugh. . . Battler is starting to explain stuff in more detail. I'm starting to wish I wrote my theory first. Otherwise, I'm going to read something he says that I was ALREADY thinking and it's going to make my theory seem less impressive! Oh well.

Might as well finish now.

ugh damnit

he's talking about people pretending to be dead

which is what my theory relied on already

Okay, well, let it be known that I thought of this before reading the tea party. ~__~

AUGH DAMNIT

NOW THEY'RE IMPLICATING DOCTOR NANJO TOO

They argue for a little bit more and then. . .

Beatrice finally appears!

She uses her magic to explain how she killed Eva and Hideyoshi, then kill everyone in purgatory.

However, this isn't really happening in the story so I don't accept it as evidence.

After that, she challenges Battler to try and prove that she does not exist!

annnddd. . . The credits for the first episode begin to roll!

Tea Party Cleared !!

After this I'll post my theory on the first episode.

??? Episode 1

Okay, I guess I'll read this next. . .

So it starts out with Beato and some other witch named Berkanstadt. . . No, wait. . . That's not it. . .

Ah, whatever. Who cares what her name is?

I looked over her profile quickly. Apparently she's a loli with a cat tail. . . Who likes to drink wine?

"what the"

Beatrice likes black tea and ice cream.

Woah, apparently you can execute and resurrect them, too. O__O

Does this have any impact on anything?

Hmm. . . I just killed Beatrice and the story is continuing on. I guess not. They talk about some kinda powers to kill without fail and. . .Being able to succeed as long as the odds aren't zero. . . And other witch powers. Then Berkandal says that Beatrice is scarier than some other witch because she can't understand her.

After that, Bernkastel tells me how to defeat Beatrice.

Apparently, because she is the cruelest witch, Bernkastel is going to help me defeat Beatrice or something.

And then the scene ends. Well, aright then. After that, I unlocked Tips.

I'll probably read through these eventually. . . But for now, I'd like to use them to do a character ranking.

Episode 1 Extras/Theories

Lisel's Umineko Case Files #1

Krauss Ushiromiya

http://img.imgcake.com/motivespngbe.png

Age: Aged just right.

Level: 49

Occupation: We're not sure. Probably an astronaut or a space lawyer.

Relationships: Natsushi (married, but they don't sleep together anymore), Rosa (molested when they were kids), Kanon (banging her on the side)

Strengths: Best Umineko dad, being sly, white text on black screen likes to explain his plans to us

Weaknesses: None, being married to Natsushi, having Jessica as a daughter, none, and eyebags

Powers: Capitalism, Divorce Eye Beams, KING Gaze, various other eye beams and eye related powers, molestation, and verbal molestation

Suspicion Level: Incredibly high

Awesomeness Level: Somehow even higher

Best Moment: Telling brothers/sisters that maybe tonight they will go and find that imaginary gold and then beginning to laugh his ass off at how stupid they are.

Lisel's Umineko Case Files #2

George Ushiromiya http://img291.imageshack.us/img291/4879/umi.png

Age: 18

Level: 23

Occupation: Hanging out with kids even though in Japan you become an adult once you're 13.

Relationships: None.

Strengths: Knowing **** that nobody in their right mind knows off the top of their head, being good with kids, really freaking smart.

Weaknesses: Never growing up, will never be as important to the plot as Battler since he's not the main character.

Powers: Ignoring the fact that Battler is trying to molest the girl he likes right in front of his eyes.

Suspicion Level: Absolute zero.

Awesomeness Level: Above average.

Best Moment: Knowing the exchange rate of gold as well as like 10 factoids about any subject that anyone discusses at any time.

Most Likely Theory

I developed a couple of theories while playing through the game, but I never actually talked about them during my write-ups. Instead I just posted joke theories like Maria is going to kill everybody, Natsushi is really the killer, etc.

Stuff that was obviously fake.

Out of all the theories I started thinking of, here is the one that I find to be the most likely.

Firstly. . .

Main, Irrefutable Facts - Battler is not guilty. Since portions of the story were told during Battler's point of view, and in his internal monologue he clearly didn't know how people had been killed or why, it's impossible for him to be guilty. - Natsushi is not guilty. Mostly for the same reasons as Battler. A good portion of this episode was told from her point of view and she obviously had no idea what was going on. Making her the culprit would just be. . . Bad writing, really. - Kanon is not guilty. He firmly believes in the existence of the witch, and we even get a scene from his point of view where he has a showdown with the culprit where he obviously doesn't know who it is. This excludes him not only from suspicion of being the culprit, but also from working with the culprit. . . Which a lot of people are not immune to. - Jessica and George are most likely not guilty. They're with the main group the entire time, plus Natsushi has a clear view of them when the letter is placed in the room. If they're working with the culprit they did a ridiculously good job at hiding it and had almost no motive whatsoever. Mostly, even though there isn't as much evidence as some of the others who have been proven "innocent", it just doesn't make sense. - Krauss, Shannon, Gohda, Eva, and Hideyoshi are most likely not guilty. They are the ones whose faces you can clearly see after they have been killed. - Doctor Nanjo is almost certainly working with the culprit. This is because my main theory relies on the use of the guilty party faking their own death, which Nanjo has to be on the scene to confirm. On several occasions he's also the one who suggests for them not to search the crime scene and leave as quickly as possible without gathering any evidence.

My Theory The most likely culprits are Rudolf and Kyrie. When their bodies are found, they are two of the only three whose faces are smashed in completely. This means the only way to identify them is by their clothes, and assuming that Nanjo is working with them, he would confirm the fake bodies as being dead when they actually weren't. Before this, their only alibi for the night before is that they were with each other. Kyrie could have easily at this time dressed up as Beatrice and given the umbrella and the letter to Maria in the rose garden. Even if she cut it close, due to the weather outside Kanon wouldn't have noticed her. . . Just as he didn't notice Maria on the way by.

Was Rosa working with them? It's possible and it would explain a few things. I think it's probably more than 50% likely that Rosa was working with them. Why? Another main reason I suspect Kyrie and Rudolf is the fact that through most of the sacrifices, Battler was spared. You know who else was spared? Maria. Even when she was put in danger. It's possible that this was only because Maria was manipulated so easily, but in that case you also have to consider that Rosa would know how to manipulate her better than anyone else. This also makes for them being able to have two "Beatrices" walking around at the same time, which could increase their psychological warfare potential as well as their ability to kill people in different locations to set up some of the weird alibis and times of deaths that were established.

If so, was Rudolf actually working with Kyrie and Rosa? Once again, it's only possible. I think the most suspicious person here is Kyrie. She could have been working with Rosa, Rudolf, or even both of them. Rudolf seemed to know that he was going to "die" ahead of time, and warned Battler. After that, him and Kyrie leave together and were never seen again. He could have known Kyrie was going to kill him, could have just suspected that something was up, maybe was just being weird, or letting Battler know that they were going to fake their deaths was just all part of the plan.

Why I think two people was more likely than three: I think Kyrie/Rosa or Kyrie/Rudolf was more likely, with the third person being used as an actual corpse. The reason all three of their faces were smashed in completey? In case people decided to actually stick around and investigate the scene. It would seem less suspicious for all three of them to have their faces smashed in completely. However, if it was just the two of them and they were discovered as fake bodies, people might start to suspect them right away. That strategy seems a little too meta, but Kyrie seemed like she was really smart. Possibly the smartest person on the island, which is why I suspect her.

Why I think two people are more likely than one: Kyrie is probably smart enough to pull it off, but some of the killings, using my explanations, require two people to be in different places at the same time. If it was just Kyrie and she used a trap to kill Kanon in the boiler room, somebody would have seen it.

The rose garden storehouse murder: Those who faked their deaths were never actually locked inside. After they used the tools in the storehouse to mutilate the bodies and the fake corpses, they were already either outside or somewhere in the mansion. Mystery solved.

Getting Kinzo out of his study: Battler, Eva, and I think Natsushi, proposed several different theories for this one. I'm just operating based on the assumption that they found Kinzo wandering around some time after he left his study, with the thoery of him having just been hiding under his bed or something and having left after Natsushi and Eva checked on him being the most likely.

Getting inside the fully closed off room to kill Eva and Hideyoshi: Either the second, third, or second and third person were already hiding in the room. This one seems simple enough and I'm surprised Battler and the others didn't figure it out. They never searched the room thoroughly. The killer/s could have been under the bed, in a closet, or even hiding somewhere in the bathroom and waited until Eva and Hideyoshi locked themselves in the room. They killed Eva and Hideyoshi and then waited until everyone left while at the same time the other accomplice set up the trap in the boiler room. After Nanjo got everyone to leave the Eva/Hideyoshi scene and the scare in the boiler room caused everyone to flee from the hallway quickly, they could just leave without even having to worry about the lock since no one would come back there, making it seem like. . . "a witch did it".

Killing Kanon in the boiler room: The remaining accomplice killed him in the dark. Due to the psychological nature of the crimes and the servants believing in the witch Beatrice so strongly already, it wasn't hard to make him believe that he was fighting the witch. If there were three accomplices, (Rudolf/Kyrie/Rosa), one of them could have distracted him while the other one hit him with a sneak attack. However, if it was just Rudolf or something he could have easily shot Kanon in the lungs with the stake-firing weapon without even having to worry about the kid getting near him. After that, they fled out into the courtyard and got away. This part, to me, makes it hilariously obvious that the guilty party is a human and not a witch. Why run away into the courtyard, leaving the door open in your haste to escape? Why so afraid of the rifle if a witch can't be harmed as guns? If it was really a witch she would have just turned into butterflies and slipped away. Instead, the killer (probably Rudolf), panicked and ran outside into the rain.

Sepearting the survivors after they trapped themselves in Kinzo's study: Oh boy, another case where the almighty "witch" is unable to get past a locked door. However, Kyrie at least seems like she was smart enough to plan ahead and gave Nanjo the envelope he would have needed to place there which would make the already worn down Natsushi panic and drive part of the group out into the parlor. I don't think they were counting on Natsushi being crazy enough to force Maria out into the open, however, the little girl being "favored" by the witch and having the scorpion charm both make for a good reason that the "witch" spared her. Kyrie appears and tells Maria not to watch as Rudolf/Rosa begin slaughtering the unarmed survivors. This is another suspicious tactic which makes me think of the "witch" as being just a scare tactic used to make killing the people on the island more easy. Why would she care if Maria watches or not? Simply, she doesn't want Maria to see the accomplices and begin doubting the existence of the witch or tell Battler and the others who she saw killing people. As long as Kyrie continues to wear her Beatrice costume, Maria will do anything she says. At this point, Nanjo already delivered the letter he was meant to and he becomes disposable. Alternately, he COULD HAVE faked his death as well but I get the feeling Kyrie just didn't need him anymore and used him as one of the sacrifices.

How the heck did she get Natsushi to commit suicide?: Natsushi brandishes her gun. Beatrice "appears" to answer her challenge to a duel. . . This is another part where having more than one accomplice comes into play. What exactly is stopping the bigger and stronger Rudolf from grabbing the frail and weak Natsushi, bending her arms back, and shooting her in the head with her own rifle while Kyrie is distracting her with all this "witch" nonsense? Absolutely nothing, that's what. Then, Rudolf quickly slinks away and hides as they wait for the children to come running. Alternately, if Kyrie was working alone or with Rosa, maybe she offered Natsushi some kind of deal. At the end of her wits, I could see her finally accpeting the existence of the "witch" now that she finally comes face to face with it. . . It's possible she might have agreed to kill herself if the "witch" promised to spare Jessica.

What happened there at the end?: I wish the story was more clear on that. Battler, George, Jessica, and Maria's bodies were never found. However, the notebook that Maria used to write down the events of the story was found many years later. I guess whoever was behind the crime used Maria's fragile psyche and convinced her to write down the story of how the witch killed everybody, further adding to the mysterious atmosphere of the crimes. . . Ensuring that people would continue to look at it as a supernatural case instead of trying to investigate further what happened to those who died or disappeared. Interestingly, Maria's jawbone was later found. I still don't know what this could signify, but I'm assuming that Kyrie didn't want to wear that Beatrice costume forever. If they were able to dispose of all of the other bodies without them ever being found, why was only Maria's jawbone left behind? This part is just so weird to me I can't even begin to explain it.

Either way, that's my "most likely" theory. Obviously it's not bulletproof, but this is the solution to the mystery of episode 1 what I developed, just based on the clues I found in my initial readthrough. I thought of other theories as well, but this is the one that seemed to fit the best based on how the crimes were set up and the fact that the people who I found most suspicious' children were the ones who were continually being spared by the "demon roulette". Is it really main character hax that is protecting Battler until the end of this episode, or is it the fact that Kyrie and Rudolf don't want to kill him unless absolutely necesarry? Did they even kill him at the end, or did the whole family just disappear together, along with the Ushiromiya Gold (which is proved earlier by Krauss actually existed). I think Kyrie is smart enough to have found the gold already, once again making her even more suspicious.

Episode 1 Character Rankings

BEST tier

Kyrie - IF my theory is correct. . . She is awesome. Easily top tier.

Krauss - What more needs to be said? It's Krauss. If only he hadn't died so soon. . .

Maria - Kihihihihi. What an excellent troll. I actually started liking her less later into the story, but she had such a strong and hilarious start that I still consider her among the top three.

Awesome Tier

George - George knows EVERYTHING. If only he was just a little bit more stubborn, like Battler, he could have helped more to solve the mystery. I get the feeling that while he knows a lot and he's very intelligent, he's not as good at putting together theories as Battler or Kyrie is. As a result, he's one of the smartest guys on the island. . . But clearly nowhere near being the best detective.

Kanon - He is the 0 on Beatrice's Roulette. That part sent chills down my spine.

Moesushi - Holy crap moe girl with a gun. And she actually goes crazy a couple of times. Easily the most improved character. When she's first introduced she is PATHETIC. But later she becomes AWESOME. She is even worthy of challenging Beatrice to a duel.

Jessica - Okay, I lied. Jesica is probably the most improved character. She wasn't just pathetic. She was dumb and I hated her. However, as the story went on. . . As much as I hate to admit it. . . I found myself agreeing with almost everything she said. She didn't have many lines, but typically she would either put together things Battler was figuring out and put them into words, or voice her opinion on something and it was like she was always saying the exact same thing that I was thinking. I just kept making fun of her anyway, just to throw you guys off my scent.

Slightly Less Awesome Tier

Battler - Battler is kinda dumb, but he seems to be probably one of the best detectives on the island. . . Even if he's not "technically" the smartest. Still, the whole dumb main character thing just frustrates me which holds him back a lot.

Rosa - She just has this really passive, eerie nature about her. . . Especially during the scenes where a lot of arguing is going on. Plus, if my theory is correct and she is the one who is working with Kyrie that automatically gives her enough points to boost her rank a bit. I think a lot of people consider her a pushover and hate her for hitting Maria but. . . Whatever.

Kinzo - He is the one character who always did things so ridiculous I didn't have to make crap up. For that, I salute him. Besides, without him this story wouldn't exist.

Everyone Else Tier

Hideyoshi - Likable enough. Doesn't really do anything "awesome" but his interactions with George were good.

Shannon - lol she's fat

Rudolf - I guess I didn't hate him as much as the characters who I found to be kinda boring.

Eva - See Rudolf. Loses points for picking on Natsushi.

Nanjo - In no

Genji - particular

Godha - order

Kumasawa - old people

EP1 Anime Adaption Watchthrough

Episode 1

So I'm going to watch the first five episodes of the anime and compare them to the first episode of the VN. Mostly because of how bad I've heard the anime is, I just thought it would be fun to do and it shouldn't take too long.

To start out the OP is pretty darn awesome.

It's kinda weird how the characters don't really look much like their VN counterparts. I guess that's because of the art style.

Things that were made much bigger than their VN counterparts: - Every female character's breasts - Maria's eyes

holy crap they take up 80% of her face

So the pacing was. . . Very different. They covered pretty much what took me several months to read (albeit at a slow pace) in a 20 minute episode. It must have been almost 2 hours that they condensed into such a short time. I guess they wanted to get through the intro faster. They didn't really flesh out any of the characters as much as I would have hoped, though. For example, Rosa just seemed really bad when in the VN she at least seemed good for a little while. They cut down Krauss' ultimate scene considerably, making him seem just kinda. . . I dunno, not awesome at all.

As a plus, Jessica didn't seem nearly as dumb starting out. People who watch the anime first will probably like her a little bit more and hate Rosa a bit more as well.

The animation was decent, I guess. Voice acting. . . I dunno, seemed average I guess.

Ending theme was okay.

Overall it wasn't as terrible as I was afraid it was going to be but it wasn't very good either. I wouldn't actually show it to any of my friends and expect them to like it.

This episode ends with Maria getting slapped around, Kinzo throwing the ring away, and then them finding Maria with the white umbrella. Interestingly enough, they actually showed Beatrice approaching Maria (but didn't show her face or anything). In the VN, I never actually saw Beatrice until the tea party.

Episode 2

Woo, watched through the second episode. Not much to say here. It wasn't too bad aside from them removing virtually all personality from all of the characters. They took out the interactions between Natsuhi and Eva and cut the interactions between all the other characters short. It's like they're just trying to move the plot forward at the fastest pace possible.

This episode covers everything that happens from the time after Maria gets the umbrella, the dinner scene, up until they find the bodies in the storehouse and the scene ends with George seeing the ring on Shannon's dead bodies finger. . .

Episode 3

OP is still awesome.

I find myself actually watching these with interest, so it's not too bad at all really. Although the series might take a turn for terrible later. After all, I'm only two episodes in at this point. One interesting thing is because of so much of the plot being cut out and things like that. . . At this point I would probably be suspecting Eva and Hideyoshi if I had watched the anime first.

They haven't even mentioned which faces were smashed completely and only partially yet!

Also people whose hair looks really, really dumb in the anime: - Eva - Rosa

. . . Yeah.

So anyway, this scene opens up with a continuation of the rose garden storehouse scene. Lol.

Eva is still a *****, I still feel bad for George, etc. The stuff that happened was way less emotional than when I was reading about it though, because they move forward too quickly and too much.

This episode ends with Kanon finding Eva and Hideyoshi dead in the "closed room".

Episode 4

Pretty straightforward episode. Troll Maria is great.

This one ends with them finding Genji, Kumasawa, and Nanjo dead while Maria is in the room singing. Almost done! Just one more episode!

Episode 5

Finally at the last episode of the anime I need to watch before continuing on with the VN!

See, it barely slowed me down at all~

Barely even a day~

Woo, last episode was alright I guess. They made it seem like where Natsushi killed herself was right outside the door where the kids were in side, when I thought in the VN it was further away.

The tea party seemed a lot cooler to me for some reason in the anime then when I was just reading it though, so bonus points for that!

Episode 2

. . . It begins.

Again.

ahahahahah

no

say it isn't so

Episode 2 starts with fat Shannon

http://img.imgcake.com/fatshannonjpghe.jpg

oh my god

I KNEW IT

I KNEW ONCE SHE TOOK THAT GIRDLE OFF SHE WAS FAT UNDERNEATH

Didn't I call this like 200 posts ago?

I am the greatest Umineko detective that has ever lived.

Woah, George is in casual clothes too. Are they on a date or something?

George compliments her outfit, saying it looks good on her. Aw yeah, sparks flying already! Rofl. Apparently he is teasing her? And that makes him want to throw rocks at himself? What is going on here?! This is more confusing than the end of the last episode. I guess that's what romance is supposed to be though. The greatest mystery of all.

However, even if rocks were thrown at us now. . . It would be just like confetti celebrating us.

Bwahahah. XFDXFD

Anyways, George continues to display his master fact-recalling abilities by telling her some random **** about the fish tank. That's how you gotta impress girls. WITH YOUR KNOWLEDGE! IT TURNS THEM ON!

Anyway, Shannon starts going on about some crap like if you're stuck in a fish tank and you believe it's the sea that really makes it the sea.

Yeah right. ~__~

After that, some opening credits!

Oh, I think I saw a name I didn't recognize! How exciting !!

I guess there's going to be new character(s) this time. . . George and Shannon head to the cafe and both of them take less food then they normally would, to try and impress each other, even though they're both still FAT. After that they both tell each other that they should eat more. "What a wonderful world we live in."

George she is 11 you are 18

WHAT IS GOING ON HERE

Hahah, after that George continues to tease her. He is so awesome. He preys on fat, underage girls with low self esteem and then picks on them. XD

After feeding each other cake they go to the beach and Shannon starts confessing that she is scared of their forbidden love. George says that magic must have brought them together and she agrees. "Aww". Romantic music starts playing and then they talk about their names and stuff. ,

After that at a weird scene. I think it's from Kanon's point of view but I'm not sure. Apparently he breaks some mirror. Wait, maybe it was Shannon? I don't know.

"Beatrice-samaaaa!"

Then, another set of opening credits with some cool music. And stuff. Animation is pretty neat.

By this point I'm completely used to the terrible art so it looks fine to me.

Credits end. . . More monologue. . . Krauss, Hideyoshi, and George seem to be talking now. For some reason. . . Everyone is getting along. HIGHLY SUSPICIOUS. WHY ISN'T ANYONE FIGHTING YET?

Haha, then they all start making fun of Jessica. That's more like it.

http://img.imgcake.com/jesjpgyz.jpg

"pissing me off"

XD

So, I load up the game and am pleasantly greeted by the smug visage of Krauss scolding Jessica. If only these peaceful days could last forever. After that, Eva cuts in and says something to agree with Jessica and make her feel better. However, she's probably just taking Jessica's side because she hates Krauss. She's jealous of his awesomeness.

http://img.imgcake.com/kraussvspowerrangerspngja.png

It's not like Eva could singlehandedly murder all five of the original power rangers at the same time with her bare hands.

For now, it's just this subtle social nuances that she has at her disposal to fight her eternal war against the insecurity of living in Krauss' shadow.

After that they all continue being nice to each other for a while and then I think Eva is flirting with Jessica for a bit or something.

Jessica gets mad at her mom and storms out, bumping into Shannon on the way by. Then, everyone gets mad at Shannon for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. There's some kind of weird, tense atmosphere but George cuts through it like a knife with some casual conversation to try and make Shannon look less pathetic than she is. Then, Hope starts playing. George, of course, knows what kind of tea she is making just by the smell. God, he is so awesome. He's like a computer or something crazy like that. Then, he starts rattling off some more random facts that are related to that specific brand of tea.

Because George knows everything that he will ever need to know at any point in time.

After that, the tea is served and everyone begins praising George for his awesome Knowledge stat.

Outside, Shannon and Jessica start having some random girl talk in the rose garden. Jessica asks her if she has fallen in love with George. She just says a bunch of awkward crap. Steamy.

George walks over to them at the opportune moment. He reveals that. . . Uh. . . WOAH. In this version of the story. . . Kinzo actually came out of his study. . . To have a discussion with the rest of the family. . . WHAT'S GOING ON HERE? Kinzo is supposed to be awesome and crazy and a recluse.

Well, hopefully he's still awesome and crazy.

Jessica calls the rest of them pigheaded and stingy, ahahah. They talk for a bit and then Shannon starts to get totally hot for George. She thanks him for helping her out earlier and then Jessica calls George a show off again and starts laughing at him. George just laughs along as well because he's so baller it doesn't matter what she says. After all, he's 23 and smart as **** and going on all these business ventures. She's like 18 and she still can't even read. No matter how she would try to attack George, it would always just be some kind of joke to him. That's how small she is compared to him.

Jessica notices that Shannon is getting all hot for George again, so she decides to attack in a different way by asking George if he has a girlfriend. Her plan to **** block George backfires and causes some weird, awkward flirting between Shannon and George to happen. Jessica laughed at them cause she totally knows what's going on here.

She decides to try and set them up on a date. Aw yeah.

Then, Eva shows up out of nowhere to screw everything up.

"Damn you, you ugly hag!", is what George is thinking right now. Then she starts to explain some kind of evil, arranged marriage plot. Why does she have to ruin everything with her old age?

Besides. . . Shouldn't arranged marriages be illegal by this point in time?

She lectures George about how arranged marriages are awesome and true love is complete **** in comparison. Totally knowing what Shannon and George were just up to, she tells her to know her place and stay the hell away from George. She starts totally burning her and making her feel like a worthless pile of crap. After that, she drags him away to have some important discussion with Kinzo. Jessica and Shannon run off together to practice making out or something. Steamy.

Once Shannon gets back inside Natsushi starts yelling at her almost immediately.

Man, is she going to commit suicide in this episode? They're really not letting up on her.

Natsushi mentions someone named. . . Runon?

o__O

Anyway, she starts fantasizing about George and then. . . Kanon shows up, or something. He says some harsh words about Runon, who is apparently some kind of troll to all of the other servants. She intentionally cuts corners and makes herself look good by leeching off of Shannon's work. Hahah. I can't wait to meet her, she sounds awesome.

Jeez, they stand around talking for a while longer as if Shannon isn't a SERVANT who just gold told to go CLEAN THE RECEPTION HALL. Maybe if she did her job instead of being so chatty all the time she wouldn't keep getting in trouble.

She goes into the reception hall and starts masturbating all over Beatrice's portrait for a while.

The little Beatrice laugh sound effect plays, actually startling me a little bit. I didn't expect that. o__O

The portrait answered her. Was it just her imagination? Probably. All the stress from constantly being picked on for being a failure has started to weigh on her mind.

Awesome piano theme as the portrait talks to the now crazy Shannon.

She turns around and. . . Beatrice is standing there! This theme starts to get a little more awesome as it reaches the next part of the song, too. She starts using some crazy witch logic to break down Shannon's psyche and then offers to use her powers to make Shannon's wish come true. Also, even though she would usually demand something as payment. . . She decides not to because she's in a "good mood".

Beatrice also transforms her from furniture into a human.

With her "powers".

Just like in Beauty and The Beast!

Beatrice asks her to go to the nearby shrine and break the mirror. Oh, okay. So that's what was happening earlier. Well, jeez. I already know she's going to accept the deal since it already showed her breaking the mirror earlier. ~__~

Wait, she was saying that it was only a request and that she would reward her. . . But now she's saying that she will only grant her wish IF she destroys the mirror. What a stingy witch. I wish Jessica was there to talk like a boy and call her stingy.

Beatrice uses some witch reverse psychology strategy. She also tells Shannon that the offer will expire if George hooks up with another girl. Since she's not a demon, she can't tear two people in love apart.

The girl at the marriage meeting has better grades, is more beautiful, and is all around better than Shannon in every way.

Also she's probably not fat.

When Beatrice reveals this, there's basically no way that Shannon can refuse the deal now.

Kanon shows up suddenly and tries to act all badass but then ***** his pants when he realizes that Beatrice is about to turn him into a frog.

http://img.imgcake.com/Kanonjpgne.jpg

So we're back to the present with some more Shannon stuff. She tells Jessica she only went to the aquarium because she likes fish "and stuff". Is she trying to be a tsundere? Because she's not a very good one! Jessica seems pretty pissed that Shannon went all the way to Okinawa on a trip and her and George didn't even end up banging.

Haha, man. She is so irritated. That's great.

Shannon continues to be pathetic, and then Jessica continues to get more angry.

Hahah, then she start to have an asthma attack from getting so angry. Shannon gives people asthma. After that, Shannon tries to leave the room but Jessica hits her in the head with a pillow again.

Then suddenly Jessica starts acting all weird and loses all the points she had gained a moment ago.

Shannon goes outside and is greeted by none other than Beatrice.

Beatrice says some stuff and Shannon's inner dialogue reveals that she still thinks of Beatrice as a creepy being even though she has appeared other times before and she is the one who helped Shannon get together with George. She offers Beatrice some sweets and then tries to think of her as a friend.

They have a little tea party and talk about some stuff, and then a frog hops out of the bushes. That frog is Kanon. On the outside he seems respectful, but there was a look of hostility about him. . . Like he's still pissed about being turned into a frog or something. Jeez, you think he'd get over it by two years time. Beatrice leaves and then Kanon starts saying that Shannon shouldn't be hanging out with a witch. You think as a frog he'd be a little bit less racist. . .

Kanon accuses her of being furniture, but Shannon actually replies by saying that she is not. Finally.

Kanon continues to be a douche but instead of being pathetic Shannon she just continues to refute his brainwashed ideas. She is no longer furniture. She is human! The sea is deep blue!

. . . Stuff like that.

She hands over the butterfly charm to Kanon. Weird, I thought she was going to give it to Jessica. Kanon heads back to the garden where he runs into Kinzo. Kinzo is rambling to himself about how much he misses Beatrice and. . . According to Kanon, Beatrice is standing right there, behind him the whole time. Kanon has some kind of weird revelation and then the scene changes again. . .

I'm at some kind of fair or. . . Town market. . . . Or something.

Oh, it's the cultural festival that Jessica was talking about. They're going to play light music. . .

After that some people I can't see start talking and one of them says KYAKKA KYAKKA

. . . But it's not Maria.

When Jessica smiles she has two fangs instead of one. It almost makes her look like a snake.

Her friends start teasing her, saying that her boyfriend won't show up. . . Which is probably likely since she doesn't have one.

After that she has some flashback about Shannon trying to get her to take Kanon to the festival. Shannons also says that Jessica is a tsundora, according to George, a word that wouldn't become popular for at least a few decades. Man, George is REALLY smart.

. . . And, of course, in the present, Kanon shows up. But what the heck is he wearing?

As Jessica and Kanon have some weird exchanges, all of the girls start going crazy every time Kanon says anything. Jessica uses the powers that she inherited from Krauss to thrash the whole room full of girls and then makes Kanon get out too cause she's in a bad mood or has a headache or something.

Then, Kanon's inner dialogue reveals that Jessica is probably drunk.

Then I started playing K-On! the VN for a short while before it turns back into Umineko and we're on the island again.

Oh, and Natsushi is on the PTA. God, she looks just like the kind of mom who would be on the PTA.

How predictable.

Jessica has no interest in this boring discussion and rudely slurps her pumpkin soup, which she of course also gets scolded for. Then she gets scolded for not responding properly. Ah, man. If only George had fallen in love with her instead he could use his powers of charm to always be saving her from getting scolded instead of Shannon. I think Eva would have been happy with that too, since a little Ushiromiya incest would have moved George's ranking in the family up by a little bit. . . I think?

After being scolded more and finishing her meal Jessica heads outside to the rose garden. A little while after that, Kanon shows up.

Then, suddenly, asthma.

xD

Jessica basically tells Kanon in a nice way that using the excuse that he's "furniture" over and over again just makes him seem like a pathetic tool that has given into fate. Meanwhile, while she was born under and unlucky star, Jessica continues to struggle against her fate (by being dumb instead of smart like she's supposed to be).

"I think that's just sad."

It sure is.

She tries to get Kanon to tell her his real name, but he lies and says that he forgot and that it's not important anymore. He's so stubborn that even her uplifting speech didn't reach those ears. Jessica tells him that he is human and then he snaps back, saying that he is not. Jessica is stunned.

Then she yells something about furniture and ducks.

Kanon insults George and Shannon's relationship, but Jessica refuses to stand for that as well. She tells him that no matter what, George is too awesome to give up and he will definitely bring Shannon happiness.

Then, Kanon outright rejects her. No matter what, he could not ever love her.

He says some more weird stuff and then she, like, kinda forgives him or something. Man, what does she see in this douche? I guess it's just because he's the only guy on the island that is even remotely close to her age.

Then, suddenly, BEATRICE!

• cackle cackle*

You're done for now, Kanon!

Kanon takes out the butterfly brooch and shatters it. Yes, his stubbornness is even powerful enough to defy magic and love. He accuses Beatrice of toying with Shannon's emotions and continues to get more angry and stuff. She just laughs at him. She reveals that she does use her powers to bring two people together who wouldn't normally be brought together, just so she can watch them fall apart. What a cruel witch!

Kanon tells her to both disappear and to get out of his sight. He uses his power of being a stubborn dick to banish her. Er, sorta. She kinda just leaves of her own free will.

Then, randomly, there's an old lady in the hall.

So we come back to Shannon being shocked about George saying something about wanting to build a castle before he marries her. Oh my God. She says she can't do that because she's "furniture" even though like two scenes ago she just had the stunning revelation that she wasn't furniture anymore. Did she suddenly forget that scene even happened?

Maybe she's just trying to put him down nicely. XFD

Oh, I just noticed his shirt says Tomitake Flash. Awesome.

Anyways, in this version of the story, he's going to announce his engagement publicly. If she accepts, that is. Oh man, can't wait to see how Eva reacts to this one (if Shannon doesn't die first). It's gonna be great.

George says if people don't like their relationship, there's no need to look at their faces.

What a smug dude.

(Still not as smug as Krauss, though)

• insert really weird, short scene here*
• cackle**cackle*

YES!

YES !!

FINALLY. MARIA.

Jeez, it took long enough for someone awesome and plot relevant to show up. At this point I would have even been happy with Battler. Haha, oh man, oh god. She's trolling already. This is awesome. It's like that long, drab, Shannon-centric crap made me forget how awesome Umineko was and I just remembered all at once.

"I DON'T WANNA WEAR THESE DUMBASS WESTERN CLOTHES! I WANNA DRESS LIKE A WITCH!"

Rosa is of course pissed already but there's nothing she can do about it (except maybe slap the **** out of Maria)

Since earlier, Rosa had warned her many times to lower her voice but Maria hadn't obeyed at all. Ballin'. If you don't give her sweets, she'll pull a prank! Uu- Uu-!

Ahahahah

"I don't have sweets to give you! You just ate breakfast!"

Just as I'm thinking "Look how pissed off Rosa looks", Maria makes an even more pissed off face than her mother.

http://img.imgcake.com/deliciousjpgyh.jpg

A fat old lady takes out a piece of candy and gives it to Maria. Maria continues to yell but now has a happy look on her face. She shoves the candy in Rosa's face, gloating triumphantly.

Happy Hallowee~n!

Oh ****. Rosa gets pissed really quick and they start fighting, then she slaps Maria and takes the candy away. She offers it back to the fat old lady who doesn't really know how to react to what just happened. She makes the old lady apologize, somehow looking more pissed while at the same time looking more composed. It was more of a calm, fierce anger directed at the innocent woman.

She realizes that the entire train has fallen silent, and was watching them. Then, they begin to whisper amongst themselves quietly as Maria continues to freak out, kicking and screaming like a BOSS. As the train stopped, Rosa grabbed her by the arm and dragged her off the train.

As usual, Maria didn't stop crying. Rosa took her to the end of the platform and smacked her again. Rosa starts dragging her by her hair and/or neck.

http://img.imgcake.com/viciousjpgan.jpg

It's a vicious and hilarious cycle.

The station attendant comes over, trying to break it up and Rosa yells at him as well. Is she going to start beating the crap out of him, too? That would be funny as hell. Nah, instead she just transforms back into normal Rosa and starts hugging Maria and apologizing and stuff like that.

But man. That scene on the train was great.

Anyway, some kinda sad music is playing right now.

Then, Rosa and Maria both agree that she was just being possessed by an evil witch. Jesus, what kind of ideas is she putting in this kids head? No wonder she turned out the way she is.

Well, after that they decide to go shopping for pumpkin sweets so Maria can have a Halloween Festival.

We return to the mansion and Natsushi is apparently asking Krauss why he's creeping around in suspicious places. He tells her to shut the hell up and mind her own business, which she does. Scene over.

"Hello, Gohda here!"

Hahahah, who says that? That's like something SantaRPG says when you call him up. "Thank you for calling jp, this is jp. How can I help you?"

"I'm anxious to put my skills to work for the big annual job!"

After that, there's some dialogue between the servants. Maybe it's because I had to read so much stuff about Shannon's mundane life earlier and having to listen to Kanon ***** for like 2 1/2 chapters straight about being furniture, but I'm finding it hard to care about anything they have to say right now. Hopefully one or both of them does something awesome in the near future. Gohda is still awesome though.

• flexes*

George is in the bathroom practicing ORDERING Shannon to put the ring on. Hahah. That's how you get a girl. You don't give her a choice. You tell her to put that damn ring on and if she doesn't like it, too bad. After that, Rudork comes into the bathroom. He says something about George's ass bursting and then leaves.

Okay, I gotta admit. That was funny.

He leaves the bathroom and asks Kyrie if Rosa has shown up yet. Very suspicious, since the three of them are WORKING TOGETHER! Oh my God, yay! It's Battler! What a grand reunion! We're finally back at the airport and everyone is together, doing stuff that matters.

My only regret is that I never got to see what Runon looks like. God, I bet she was beautiful.

Maria shows up and Battler threatens to play a prank on her if she doesn't hand over her "sweets". For "some reason", this makes Maria happy.

Kyakka! Kyakka!

Scene change!

Jessica is hanging out at the place where the Beatrice portrait is, when Kumasawa comes to check on her. Jeez, Gohda was right. She is just loafing about. How did she manage to live so long last time, anyway? Surprisingly, Jessica is already thinking about some relative of Beatrice showing up to claim the gold unexpectedly. She always thinks that things like this might happen around the time of the family conference. Isn't that interesting? Maybe she's smarter than she lets on!

Or, at least, perceptive?

Kumsawa says some eerie stuff about Beatrice and stuff.

Then there's a Rudork flashback. . .

I guess they're trying to make his character more tridimensional or something.

At the Ushiromiya mansion, Nanjo has a conversation with Kinzo about not wanting to attend the conference this year. Kinzo alludes to the demon roulette ceremony, then Nanjo changes the subject. When he mentions something about Battler coming and expects a reaction. . . Kinzo just seems let down. He doesn't give a crap about Battler.

Or anybody.

Just BEEEEAATRRIIIIICEEE!!!

Some more stuff happens.

Awesome piano, etc.

Then, Battler does the "OBJECTION!" finger point. Ballin'.

Beatrice sure does have a pointy nose.

After that the rose garden scene happens again, but differently. Battler asks Maria what Halloween has to do with witches, and troll Maria comes to the surface to troll him and make him feel stupid for not already knowing. As she starts to explain, George cuts in with some random knowledge that he pulls out of nowhere, like always. Maria continues to talk down to him as she explains some sun cycle halloween witch crap. Kihihihi.

Eva decides to troll Rosa by asking how old Maria is in a really snarky manner.

After everyone leaves for the guesthouse, Rosa takes out her frustration for being a total pushover on Maria some more.

She throws her candy on the ground and then stomps it.

It probably looked something like this:

http://img.imgcake.com/stompgifaq.gif

After that, she'll leave Maria lone in the rosegarden again and head inside so she can cry and try to rip her bed apart with her fingernails.

Outside, apparently Kanon approaches Maria. Maria does her witch laugh and tells Kanon that she is alright. He calls Rosa a horrible person, saying he can't believe that she's a mother. After that, though, he doesn't really know what he should do to make her feel better. At the very least he's not ******** anymore. They talk about Beatrice for a bit. . .

Inside, Nanjo and Natsushi have a conversation with the others about how badass Kinzo is. Holy crap, I just noticed for the first time that Hideyoshi is wearing a pink tie. Bwahahah. Rosa and Kyrie have some weird conversation near the window while everyone else is drinking tea. As Eva and Rudolf try to turn the topic back to the real conversation, Rudolf responds to them in a really cocky manner, like he already knows what they want to say and already knows how he's going to refuse them. As it starts to rain, Rosa rushes outside to make sure that Maria comes back inside.

She quickly finds Maria this time and runs up to her, begging for forgiveness again. How many times has this cycle repeated?

Maria tells her not to go back to the mansion since Beatrice will be coming soon. Then, out of nowhere. . . Beatrice appears.

Instead of a dress, she's wearing western-style clothing. For the family conference?! Maria offers her the candy, which as been stepped on and smashed. "Can Beato return it to normal......?" Hahah, I thought that was just a name that you guys called her. Awesome. Beatrice uses her butterfly magic to return the candy back to normal, which, of course, shocks Rosa just a little bit. She hands the envelope over to Maria, telling her not to open it. Kyakka! Kyakka! She gives Rosa a separate letter, telling her to read it aloud at dinner, when all of the siblings are gathered.

Beatrice tells Maria to go back to the guest house, then she heads inside the mansion. Genji greets her as she enters and. . . Doesn't seem shocked at all. At that time, Kyrie came out of the parlor. And although she saw Genji following a witch, her expression did not change at all. Weird.

Kyrie greets the witch.

The witch responds oppressively, and then leaves her standing there alone.

Also, did she actually just change the portrait to reflect her new outfit or was that something else?

Cause to me the new portrait looks way better than the old one.

When Beatrice tries to enter the study, the scorpion charm doorknob thing burns her hand. . . Genji offers to open the door for her, but. . . She says that she doesn't want to meet Kinzo anymore. Witches really are fickle.

After this we get a scene in which Kanon and Beatrice interact. She methodically breaks him down until reducing him to the point where he kneels before her and kisses her feet so that Beatrice won't choose Shannon as a sacrifice. I get the feeling she's going to do it anyway just to screw with him. . . Can't wait to see how he reacts, then!

In the parlor, the adults and kids are all gathered. Apparently Maria is watching TV and going kyakka like a TV kid. . . Whatever that means. Battler gets a blanket and lays down on the sofa, falling asleep cause he was tired and bored.

At the same time. . . The "original" Battler and Beatrice, from episode 1, are in Purgatory or wherever arguing about some other stuff. Since his argument before revolved around whether a 19th person existed or not, this time she chose to reveal herself directly to prove that there really was a 19th person. They discuss the stuff about the candy being fixed, but he has no excuse for that either.

After that, the scene changes and returns to the parlor. At this time, Kyrie is telling Rudork and Eva about how she saw Beatrice earlier. Both of them say they've never met anyone like that before! They're not sure if they really believe she's a witch or not. . . Something more like a person claiming to be the real Beatrice who would control Kinzo's assets, or a daughter of Kinzo's mistress who wanted to claim the inheritance for herself. This puts a significant damper on their plans to try and corner Krauss like they did in episode one, since there's another person involved who might have their own claim to the Ushiromiya fortune.

Kyrie uses her powers of Logic and then some other stuff happens.

Somewhere else, Rosa is having a discussion with Maria about the woman that they met earlier. Maria reveals that she has met with Beatrice every year in the past. Rosa thinks it sounds pretty insane that some suspicious woman was at the family conference every year and nobody noticed her before. However. . . She was there, so, really, does Rosa have any basis on which to deny it?

Maria tells her that Beatrice is always on Rokkenjima, even when the family conference isn't being held. Hmm. . . You know what this is making me wonder? Earlier Beatrice said that the reason Kinzo, Krauss, Natsushi, and the others couldn't see her was because of the blood of the Ushiromiya family. For some reason, they all inherited that wavelength problem that Battler supposedly has where they wouldn't be able to see witches and stuff. . . So why is Maria the only one that can see her? Wouldn't she have inherited the same blood from Kinzo?

They better explain this later!

She tries to open the letter that she got from Beatrice earlier, not wanting to wait until the dinner conference to get to it. However, Maria stops her. She says you can't break a promise with a witch! Rosa starts to get an idea that because Maria is Beatrice's disciple, anything that she does while Maria is around. . . The witch will know about it.

Hmm. It fast forwarded all the way to 6PM just now, even though it was 1PM a second ago. I guess they're trying to skip through these events quickly this time.

Shannon, George, and Jessica talk about the relationship with George and Shannon a little bit. George actually says something cool about how no matter what Eva says or tries to do, it's only up to him who he can spend his life with. Jessica seems to think it was cool too. ~__~

After that, Shannon realizes that she was late and was supposed to be working. Genji calls, but Jessica tells him that they were the ones who held her up and not to scold her.

After that. . . Dinner will be ready soon!

So, anyways, in the kitchen Gohda is all pissed off because he can't bring food to Kinzo even though he prepares it with all of his love, and then Genji doesn't want to let him serve food to Beatrice either. He yells at Kumasawa for being all turtleish and old and standing around not doing her job. After that he just starts talking mad **** about Shannon even though he's standing right there. What does he care? Not like she could do anything to him. His muscles are trapezious. She's just some random fat chick.

Kanon sneaks into the room like the sneaky little **** he is and starts saying bad stuff about Gohda. OF COURSE

he won't come out into the open and say it.

Then Shannon asks him if the honored guest is really Beatrice. Kanon tells her there's no mistake. It's definitely her! Kanon tries to warn her that Beatrice is going to hold some kind of bizarre ceremony and do something unimaginably horrible. Kanon tries to convince her not to accept George's engagement ring, so Beatrice won't choose her as a sacrifice. . . Then he says a bunch of weird stuff about them going to the Golden Land together and "true love" and it kinda sounds like he's jealous or something. lol u mad kanon. Anyways, Shannon says she will take the ring anyways. Kanon starts crying and saying more weird stuff.

Then, Genji comes over. Apparently he's been calling for Shannon for a while and she was just ignoring him. Oh, then Kanon disappears. wtf?

Gohda threatens Shannon with a glare that tells her not to make any mistakes as she delivers Beatrice's dinner.

Upstairs, Krauss and Genji try to convince Kinzo to come downstairs and eat. Jeez, why doesn't Genji just tell him that Beatrice is there? Then he would surely come out! Instead, Nanjo and Kinzo just have this sentimental, brotastic discussion about how Chess is all about spending time with your bro and not really about trying to win.

Then, Kinzo tells him to not come back to the study ever again and "gee i hope you don't get killed by the demon roulette i summoned". What a bro.

Anyways, at around this time Shannon entered the honored guest room. Beatrice compliments her on the color of her face (?).

"Beatrice, there's so much that I wanted to ask you. . ."

"Yes, Shannon?"

"My thoughts are all jumbled up. . ."

"Hoh."

http://img.imgcake.com/hohjpgvu.jpg

Then, some other weird stuff happens.

http://img.imgcake.com/didtheybangjpgsu.jpg

also it sounds like they banged

did they bang?

After that they argue for a bit, then something fabulous happens at the family conference;

Dinner!

Oh boy. Are they going to go over the seating chart again? In detail? Instead, they start talking about the food that Gohda cooked in great detail. Then, they have more conversations about the food they cooked. . . After Gohda talks about the food that he cooked some more. Natsushi makes a weird face, as usual, then everyone gets into an argument about. . . The food that Gohda cooked. Seriously?

Kyrie uses her powers of Logic to figure out that Natsushi doesn't know anything about the mysterious "guest" who has arrived. Then Battler asks about it as well. . . LOUDLY. DRAWING EVERYONE'S ATTENTION TO GOHDA. Ghoda reveals that it's Beatrice and Maria goes crazy. Uu! Uu!

Rudork and Eva say some **** but Krauss just tells them he has no idea what they're talking about. Mostly because he actually doesn't, but I'm sure that even if he did he would just brush them aside like the dirt off his shoulders. Natsushi yells at Gohda, telling him to call for Genji immediately. They try to press Krauss some more, but he insists that the witch actually existing is ridiculous. . . Well, until Rosa announces that she met with the witch earlier. Kyrie also says that she met the witch, but the witch didn't tell her what her name was.

There's more yelling and then eventually all of the umineko parents tell all the little umineko children to leave before Genji gets back. . . Even though they haven't finished eating yet. Well, I guess it can't be helped. Nanjo decides to leave as well, and then they also kick Gohda out once Genji gets there.

After that, they begin to question Genji. . . However. . . The scene changes once more.

In the guest house everyone eats the cake but for some reason it doesn't taste as good because instead of Gohda talking about how awesome he is and how great the cake is, they have Kumasawa talking about fish. Which would gross out just about anybody.

Nanjo is there to.

They start to talk to Maria about the witch that 'exists' and came to visit her and play with her every year at the family conference. They explain stuff that's already been explained a bunch before. blah blah blah

battler makes a joke that's not funny

everyone stares at him awkwardly

He does that a lot, doesn't he?

Now, they start saying it's unrealistic for her to just appear openly like she did. . . But. . . In episode one. . . They all used the same exact logic to conclude that it was unrealistic for her to not show herself. What the.

Do these guys like to just sit around talking about how nothing makes sense? Is that what they do for fun? So no matter what happens they're all going to just agree that it didn't make sense?

Jessica tells them they are being dumb.

Way to go Jessica.

Battler is all like "Oh, it's alright. Nothing will hapen. She's not even a witch, LOL!"

Of course, this causes troll Maria to rise to the surface and start trolling Battler. She makes him admit that he can't prove witches don't exist. GG, Battler. You just got beat by a nine year old girl.

Time to pack it up.

Umineko is officially over.

. . . But seriously.

Battler counters with some dumb logic. "I can't prove it, but I can claim it without any evidence and just some ignorant bias because I think they don't exist".

Well, alright then.

Anyways, he tells Maria that if Beatrice can perform some miracle before them that a human couldn't possibly do, he'll admit that witches exist. Somehow, I don't see that happening. No matter what she does he'll just act really stubborn and deny it. 'classic Battler'

Kumasawa tells them to settle down. Then, George. . . Uh, George. . .

• warning; strong language*

http://img.imgcake.com/georgeipngza.png

After that Kumasawa stops talking and everyone moves on as if nothing happened.

Battler and Maria continue to argue, and Maria makes some kind of chess comparison. Basically, if Beatrice shows him a miracle, he will be in check. If he can counter it with some kind of logic/bs argument, his kind escapes. If he can't find a way to explain it, then that is checkmate and he has to admit that she is a witch and witches exist. Sounds like fun!

Maria tells him that because Beatrice isn't human, it's not like playing chess at all. After all, in chess, your opponent can move their pieces in the same way. In this game, Beatrice can move her pieces in ways that Battler can't comprehend or predict. Sounds like he's pretty screwed! She also tells him that chessboard thinking won't work here either.

After that the scene transitions to where. . . Shannon is hanging out. Oh boy.

It looks like she is telling George what was going on inside the mansion. Shannon for some reason lies and tells him that she doesn't know if she has met Beatrice before. . . Even though she has. Wtf? George better see through this. George asks her if they talked about anything when Shannon brought her dinner and she LIES AGAIN AND SAYS NO. Augh. Why does she have to lie to George?

Is there relationship already going to be founded on lies?!

Oh, wait. They're going to die anyway. I guess it doesn't matter what it was founded on since it will last like 4 hours.

They have a weird conversation about what it means to be engaged. Apparently, it's the same thing as being married except where you don't actually have time for the other person yet. Gotta clear up that busy schedule first.

George tells her that the engagement ring is suddenly a wedding ring. When he gives it to her, they will automatically be married without having a wedding or anything like that. Haha, man. George doesn't give a **** about rules or tradition or the way the world works. He can just say whatever he wants and that's what happens. Awesome.

She takes the ring and puts it on and then. . .

Boom! Married!

Also, there was a sex scene.