HISTORY
INNOCENT SIN
Ten years ago.... that was when it all began.
When Tatsuya was just a child, he and a few other misfit kids met at a festival, where they'd been wearing maks representing different characters from a popular sentai series, Phoenix Ranger Featherman R. These children— Eikichi Mishina, Lisa Silverman, Jun Kurosu, and Maya Amano— ended up deciding they would always play together while wearing those masks, dubbing themselves "the Masked Circle." Maya, the oldest of the group, taught the other kids the game "Master Persona," which would later give all of those children the ability to manifest and summon Persona. For a time, the children were happy together.
But all good things must come to an end, and so it was for the Masked Circle. Maya revealed to her dismayed friends that she had to move away. None of the kids wanted her to leave, and Eikichi and Lisa came up with a plan to lock her in the nearby shrine. They hoped it would force her to stay if she wasn't around when her parents moved. Tatsuya disagreed with this plan, so he was locked in the shrine with her.
That night, the shrine was set on fire by Tatsuya Sudou, the son of Japan's Foreign Minister and a troubled man who had long since descended into madness. Tatsuya (Suou) was stabbed in the back by Sudou, and his Persona awoke from his rage and burned out one of the man's eyes. Sudou fleed, and Tatsuya ended up hospitalized afterwards. All the children believed Maya died that night, and the trauma of the incident caused them all to repress everything, including their friendship.
In the present time (1999), Tatsuya is a third year in high school and an aloof loner. Lisa, by now a second year harbouring a crush on Tatsuya, brings him a letter stating that a student from their school has been kidnapped by the gang leader of a rival school. Tatsuya is instructed to go alone if he wants the girl to live, but Lisa joins him. The letter turns out to be a ploy set up by the gang leader's friends to get Tatsuya to join their band, Gas Chamber. Lisa derides the gang leader, Eikichi, leading to him getting into a fight with Lisa and Tatsuya using his Persona. Lisa and Tatsuya's Personas re-awaken, and the three pass out and meet Philemon, a mysterious being who tells them about their power and that rumours are becoming reality.
When the trio awakes, Lisa decides to test the notion of rumours becoming reality by trying out the one about a being called Joker showing up to grant your wishes if you dial your own phone number. Lisa, along with Eikichi's three friends, test while Tatsuya, Eikichi, and Miyabi (the girl who had been kidnapped) watch on. It works, summoning what looks like an evil clown— Joker. But Joker claims the dreams of Eikichi's friends and turns them into Shadowmen (shades of their former selves that no longer care about anything and slowly fade away as they're forgotten by everyone who once cared for them). Joker moves to kill Eikichi, Lisa, and Tatsuya.... but when he realizes they don't remember him, he angrily says he wants them to remember so they can truly suffer, and then leaves.
The trio decides to investigate what's going on, soon discovering that Philemon was right— Rumours are really becoming reality, no matter how big or small. They are soon joined by Maya and her friend, Yukino Mayuzumi, in their quest. None of the trio recognize their childhood friend, and Maya doesn't say anything to remind them— she's repressed the memories as well, with only a lingering phobia of fire as a memento of that time.
As the five investigate Joker, they run afoul of a cult called the Masked Circle— a name none of them recognizes at first. But as they spend time with each other, their memories slowly come back to them. They remember Big Sis, and when they end up being locked in what turns out to be the same place they'd hidden their masks after the Shrine Incident, they remember— Big Sis is dead, though Lisa suspects that Joker is actually Big Sis, having her revenge for what they did to her.
The confusion soon gets cleared up, and they realize that Big Sis is actually Maya, who didn't die in the fire as assumed, but had escaped and moved with her parents as planned. So who is Joker, then? Even as they're searching for more answers, a new widespread rumour has emerged that the Fuhrer had survived World War II with his secret forces, the Last Battalion. All rumours become reality— which means that the Last Battalion is now trying to forcefully invade their city.
They finally discover who Joker is— it's actually Jun, the last member of their group, whose memories of what happened were twisted and he blames Tatsuya, Eikichi, and Lisa for Big Sis's "death," refusing to accept at first that Maya is Big Sis. The party fights to stop Joker and after he's defeated, he's stripped of his Persona and left to die by the real force behind all the trouble, Nyarlathotep. Yukino gives him her Persona-using ability and a remorseful Jun joins the party.
Joker's plan had been to gather Ideal Energy from his victims using crystal skulls to awaken the ancient city of Xibalba, another rumour turned reality. Tatsuya and the others work to stop this, eventually ending up on an alien spaceship in Xibalba. There they fight the Fuhrer, who was wielding the Spear of Destiny (the spear that is said to have pierced Jesus Christ). They defeat the Furher, and find out that the entire events of the game was basically the result of an argument between Nyarlathotep and Philemon. Nyarlathotep fights Tatsuya and the others, but the fight, he strikes Maya with the Spear of Destiny and kills her. This causes the fulfillment of an end-of-world prophecy, and the Earth's rotation stops, causing the destruction of everything on the planet save for Sumaru City. Philemon tells them that the only way to prevent Maya's death and the destruction of the world is to create a new timeline where the group never met, in exchange for their memories.
ETERNAL PUNISHMENT
....but Tatsuya stubbornly clung to his memories, which ended up being major trouble for the new timeline.
Tatsuya ran into Maya one day and she smiled at him, asking if she'd met him somewhere before. He ran out of there and tried to force himself to sleep, to hide away mentally in the body of this world's Tatsuya. But Nyarlathotep wouldn't let him sleep, telling Tatsuya he's waking and branding Tatsuya with a mark on his right hand: the mark of a sinner possessed by darkness.
To atone for his mistakes and keep things from ending the same way here, Tatsuya takes it upon himself to fight alone and stop this world from ending up the same way the last one did. Nyarlathotep is trying to cause the same fate in this world, so Tatsuya makes it his goal to seal Nyarlathotep away and make up for his mistake in holding onto his memories. What's worse, if Maya, Eikichi, Lisa, or Jun have their memories returned, it will undo the spell that restored this world. So it's with an almost fantical fervor that he throws himself into working alone.
The events of the new timeline start to imperfectly echo the old one. A person called "Joker" is causing havoc whenever people call their own phone number— except this time, instead of granting your wishes, Joker is killing people at the caller's request. This Joker is not Jun at all— Rather, this time it's serial arsonist and murderer Tatsuya Sudou. A police woman named Shiori puts out a hit on herself to the Joker, trying to draw him out and take him down. Tatsuya finds her when trying to confront Sudou himself, and through Sudou ends up discovering that Shiori's little brother died in the incident at the shrine— without him there, another person's life was taken. Tatsuya fights Sudou, but the murderer escapes. Shiori insists that Tatsuya stays at her place during his quest, and he agrees out of a sense of guilt.
Meanwhile, it seems that Sudou remembers "the other side," and tries recreating events in an attempt to bring about the chaos of the old world. That way is what the world was meant to be like, or so he thinks. When Sudou as Joker is summoned to the school to kill the Principal and reawaken a student named Anna to her position in the old worl'd Masked Circle, Tatsuya shows up to save her— but so does a group consisting of Maya and a few of her friends, including Tatsuya's brother, Katsuya. The group is unconscious after they fought off some demons, but Maya wakes up as Tatsuya checks on them. He tells Maya to spread a rumour that the school's emblem will keep people safe from Joker, then tells her not to get involved any more.
Sudou's next goal is to reawaken Jun's memories and make him be the Joker once more. Tatsuya finds Sudou and tries to stop him— but so does Maya's group. Sudou tries to get Maya to remember everything too, but Tatsuya tells Maya to try not to remember anything and stops Tatsuya. Tatsuya and the group ends up trying to escape in a blimp, but the blimp ends up crashing. Tatsuya pushes his brother out of the blimp and tells everyone else to jump out to safety. Jun is one of the last to leave— giving Tatsuya his lighter, saying that for some reason he feels like Tatsuya should have it. It's the same one he'd given Tatsuya in the old timeline. Tatsuya murmurs that he has nothing to give Jun in return, then shoves him out of the blimp too. The last one to leave before him is Maya, and though her group looks for him, he manages to avoid them when he too escapes the blimp.
When watching a TV program that states everyone who called Joker will themselves turn into Jokers, Tatsuya realizes this means Shiori is going to turn into one as well. Alarmed, he goes out to find her and tracks her down. He ends up at a lab— one with obvious signs that Maya, his brother, and their friends are there. Many of the people turning into Joker had been kidnapped and ended up at this lab. While he's heading out to protect Maya and find out who's kidnapping people, he runs into Eikichi, who had broken into the lab to try and find a classmate of his (one who had tried to kill him with Joker, but that won't stop Eikichi from trying to save him). Tatsuya gives Eikichi a Sevens school emblem to try and protect him.Tatsuya helps Eikichi break kidnapped victims out of the lab, then goes back to rescue Maya's group.
While hunting down the group, Tatsuya finds out that Sudou's father, Tatsuzou, is (in addition to being the Foreign Minister) the head of a secret conspiracy called the New World Order. They're the ones who have been experimenting on the kidnapped Jokers. Tatsuya makes the connection that Tatsuzou is being used by Nyarlathotep. He keeps going, eventually finding a demon being restrained in one of the labs. That demon, he quickly discovers, is what's happened to Shiori via the experiments. Enraged, Tatsuya attacks the doctors and demands answers. It turns out the person who supplied the theory for the experiment is Takahisa Kandori (who, fun fact, was supposed to have died in Persona 1). Tatsuya finds out where Kandori is and tries to kill the doctor, but stops himself when the mark left by Nyarlathotep starts to ache. The Shiori-demon attacks, but Tatsuya subdues her and pumps her full of anesthetics.
While looking for Kandori to try and find out how to cure Shiori, Tatsuya hears Eikichi's voice again and runs to find Eikichi— and Kandori, and Maya's group, to his annoyance. Tatsuya rescues Eikichi and tells Maya's group to run while facing off against Kandori. The group listens to him, and Tatsuya soon realizes Kandori is another of Nyarlathotep's puppets. They fight, and Kandori gives Tatsuya a hint as to how to save Shiori before escaping.
Tatsuya heads back to the lab with Shiori, and has a brief conversatio with Eikichi where he makes him promise not to tell Maya's group they'd met. Eikichi agrees, and also offers to be a listening ear for him. Tatsuya realizes just how little Eikichi's changed from "the other side," which to him is a good thing. They have a pleasant parting, with Eikichi happy Tatsuya said he'll visit him and Tatsuya mentally wishing him a fond farewell... for good.
Tatsuya drags Shiori to the Velvet Room, where the denizens have helped him before. But Igor says restoring her is not within his power. He tells Tatsuya of a realm that he could go to in order to collect the pieces that make up Shiori, but he cannot get there on his own. Philemon could help— but Philemon is weak. Tatsuya could figure it out on his own— but it would take too long for Shiori. The other was is to ask the legendary Persona User, Swami Chandraputra, for help.... but it will take time for Igor to contact him.
Tatsuya ends up chasing Kandori down to a cruise ship— though that's only a front, one that Tatsuya ends up bombing his way through. Kandori escapes to some underwater ruins, and while chasing him down he runs into Maya's party again. He runs off on his own, but the others aren't far behind, and they all end up fighting Kandori and his partner. Once victorious, the group escapes together. Tatsuya tries to leave again, and he's confronted by the group. He tells Katsuya that he's not really Katsuya's little brother, and asks if they'll leave him alone if he explains. Not given more than a solid "maybe," he still tells them he'll explain at Arya Shrine... where it all began.
Once there, Maya falls to her knees and Tatsuya can see she's starting to remember the "Other Side." He takes her then to Mt. Iwato, using the magic of the reflective waters inside to show visions, memories of their past together. When he tries to stop before Maya remembers too much, the adults insist on knowing more. He explains the rest, that he alone had remembered. He then begs them to stay out of it.... instead, they insist on joining him.
The group heads to Ameno Torifune, an underground spaceship known as Xibalba on "the Other Side." It's a world where your thoughts are made real, usually for worse. This ends up with Tatsuya getting kidnapped by images of his friends, called out from his loneliness. They try to kill him, but he says he can't be punished yet. The group fights the fake friends, then Katsuya lectures him and they move on. As they reach one of the leaders of the New World Order, they also witness as once again, Sumaru takes to the skies. But Tatsuya doesn't give up hope on this world yet— they can still stop Tatsuzou's plan. They fight their way out of Ameno Tortifune, barely managing to escape.
Meanwhile, when Chandraputra finally arrives at the Velvet Room, Tatsuya tells Maya et all that he has to leave, and they inform him he's not alone now, that they can help him. The group passes through the Ultimate Gate and departs for Kadath. Together, the group collects the different pieces of Shiori. When they get to the final piece, they face the Faceless God, Nyarlathotep— who tells Tatsuya he will have to choose between Maya and saving Shiori. Tatsuya falls to his knees, clutching his branded arm. Not quite of his own accord, he then starts choking the aspect of Shiori before them— her darkest thoughts, her Shadow. The rest of the group stops Tatsuya and snaps him back to his senses. They retrieve the last piece of Shori, and are able to save her.
The group eventually catches up with Tatsuzou, who summons Dragons to try and bring about a new world order.... and ends up getting turned into a monster by Nyarlathotep, another pawn in his plans. After the fight, the group gets sucked into the Collective Unconsciousness and face off Nyarlathotep, who has made himself look like Tatsuya this time around— and then the various party members. Nyarlathotep explains he is the Shadow of all of humanity, and reveals he's captured Jun, Eikichi, and Lisa. He tells them that they must show they can face their shadows and he'll free them.... otherwise, he'll destroy the world.
They face off against each of their own shadows, their darkest selves, and face Nyarlathotep.... where they find out that Tatsuya willfully remembered everything, and that the whole situation in this world is his fault to begin with. Nyarlathotep says it was all fate, but the group collectively decides that Fate is bullshit, and they defeat Nyarlathotep. Tatsuya says he knows he has to go back to his world to keep it safe, and then he goes back, leaving behind the world his friends made and vacating the body of the Tatsuya of that world, ready to make the old one even a little bit better
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
