prof | Let's Play Umineko, Episode 2 Scene 21: The Human Soul

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In the parlor, Rosa keeps guard. Battler, at Maria's urging, is trying to solve the epitaph.

After Jessica and Kanon, five more sacrifices await. Even if Nanjo and Kumasawa really are dead, there's still three to go.

Hey, what do you know? That's the exact number of people in this room.

What if the epitaph is solved? Will Beatrice stop killing people?

Maria says that it would end the ritual. Nobody else would need to die.

Humans have one power witches lack: Death. By gambling with their lives, they can bring about a miracle.

In chess, there's no chance. You always make the best move you can. Beatrice's game is something different, something more like a gamble.

Gambles are random. Random noise is the weak point of chessboard thinking.

The murders can't be the objective. There would be no reason to draw so much attention to them.

If Beatrice really is a witch, then the correct plan would have been to put everyone's power together and solve the epitaph at the start. Instead, everyone dissolved into paranoia and greed.

The first weakness of chessboard thinking is random noise. The second is an opponent who you don't understand.

The third is seeing yourself in your enemy. A cruel player will imagine a cruel opponent, and possibly make a mistake.

Rosa's words and actions are sometimes abusive. However, they're just the words and actions that were showered upon her in her youth. Cruelty begets more cruelty.

Maria is innocent. She believes from the bottom of her heart in Beatrice's power, and that Beatrice would never break a promise.

However, can we be sure that's true?

Purgatorio

So you're saying a complete monster like you follows the rules?

I won't deny that I am a brutal and unjust monster. However, I am a witch. I use magic. In order to use magic, there are rules that must be followed. Because I am a witch, I cannot neglect them.

Even after everything's gotten so crazy, you're still telling me to believe those rules?

I play tricks. I deceive people. However, that's no different from humans. Not once have I disregarded something I said as a promise. Can you say as much?

Since we have catch-phrases like "keep your promises", it's doubtful that we always follow them properly.

From my perspective, humans are much more selfish monsters. There's nothing as doubtful as a human's promise. Even I sometimes make contracts with humans, but it's hard to imagine how strict an agreement must be made just to grant a single foolish wish. If there's even a small loophole, they'll immediately say something like 'Increase the number of wishes to one hundred' or 'Try changing into a tiny speck'.

Dad often says that there's nothing as scary as contracts. He says it's only natural that people who agree without reading them thoroughly will be chewed to the bone. He made a killing through that vice.

Imagine it. When people are born, they don't know of fraud. They learn it from somewhere. Yes, the crimes of the human world, which must be forced on one another... let me see, I've heard that from a witch somewhere. Oh, well... I'm not as heartless as you think, you see? Hahaha!

Liar! You killed so many people! And you did it in such a horrible way, too, how could you not be heartless?! You say you keep your promises?! Don't say stuff like that! I won't accept you. Never. Not giving that up is the only way I can resist you!

Damn you, babbling on and on about this incomprehensible stuff. Let's continue this eternal torture. I'm prepared to stick around for one or even ten thousand years.

Good, good! It loks like you've regained some of your will to fight. It would be boring otherwise. Come now, don't you often see it in competitive games? Sometimes one player intrudes on their opponent's territory, but the opponent is so weak that it's a bit of an anticlimax, so the first player fails on purpose to extend the game until the last round, when they get serious and shower their opponent with blows.

I don't get what that means.

It's the same as wine. If you don't let it age well, it won't sparkle. You are the same as that wine. I'll carefully raise you to be the best alcohol to color my elegant time... So don't give up after only this much. Keep on denying me. After all, as long as you don't accept me, I'm nothing more than a fleeting illusion. Hahahahahahahahahahahaha!

Rokkenjima

Having broken into the chapel, Gohda, Shannon and George retrieve Natsuhi's key.

As Shannon retrieves the key, the others look on in shock. She doesn't understand why.

Because she doesn't see what's behind her.

BGM: Red Dread

Gohda and George scatter the butterflies, and the three of them rush for the exit.

However, the window is surrounded by broken glass, and they don't have time to get a good footing to crawl through. The front door won't open.

As Gohda is overwhelmed by butterflies, he sees something within them.

The master of Rokkenjima.

The last three sacrifices have been chosen.

Shannon and George can see her, too. Death comes for them.

The three of them rush out into the wind and rain.

The three of them make it back to the mansion, and open Natsuhi's room with the key they just liberated.

As George and Shannon search for the mirror, Gohda looks out into the hallway.

Beatrice is coming.

And so is her army.

The goats are here, and this time, Kanon isn't around to fight them.

Gohda closes and locks the door. However, at Beatrice's command, the door unlocks itself.

Didn't she say it? For a witch, opening locks without the key is child's play.

Gohda forces the door closed with his body for as long as he can, as Shannon and George pry open the box that might be their salvation.

But even a closed door won't stop Beatrice's power.

She vanishes in a sound of clattering metal, and Gohda's chest is pierced a moment later.

He falls, and the door swings open.

Beatrice has reached her full power. All that remains is for the last two sacrifices to be dealt with.

George breaks open the lid to the box.

Inside, a small pouch, but it's too late. Beatrice commands George to die.

But her power is blocked.

Kanon isn't the only furniture with the power to oppose Beatrice's magic.

Shannon has a power of her own.

Beatrice is happy to play this game, of course. She transforms one of her goats into Kanon, and sends him to destroy her feeble barrier.

This is the limit of the power of Kinzo's furniture.

But Shannon isn't furniture. Not anymore.

For just an instant, Beatrice is struck speechless by Shannon's casual destruction of her first servant.

The spirit mirror is lending Shannon power, but will it be enough?

By accepting George's ring, Shannon swore her love. This love is a truth that cannot be destroyed by a thousand years of torture.

Beatrice's harsh words for Shannon's young love are unusually pointed.

Almost as if the notion personally offends her.

Beatrice hurls insults, malice, and destruction at Shannon's wall.

Bit by bit, it begins to falter.

Instead of a barrier, it has become a trap. Neither of them can move an inch, let alone escape, and it's only a matter of time before Beatrice breaks through.

A last request that George is happy to oblige.

October 5th, 1986, 9:00 PM
3 hours remain

Genji was rejected when he tried to offer some food to the barricaded survivors.

Now, unafraid of the fate that may await him, Genji walks the halls where Beatrice's army now roams freely.

While roaming, he finds something, and reports back to Rosa.

Of course, she won't let him in. He has to say it through the locked door.

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