Hey! This is the first continuation of my series on micro-narrative in otome games. I’ll be tagging all the entries under the acronym for “Wizardess Heart universal narrative key” so that they’re easy to find. This post gets more into set-ups and typical tropes/character development that goes into otome, and also with the interesting abbreviation of worldbuilding that characterises the mobile branch of these games. It would be useful to read my introduction first, if you haven’t done so already.

More under the cut!

All right, when you’d left me last I had nominated my wizardess, hight Slaughter Deathblood, to pursue a green man with academic problems.

When I first played this I took a screenshot to remind myself of important moments, failing to realise that I consider “important moments” times at which the screen is particularly sparkly or when I am trying to catch a covert glimpse of nipple. Thus to write this, I possess only a collection of the worst pictures in the world and my faulty memory. I can assure you that time has given this story nuance and sense that it did not have at the time, so do not think I am exaggerating for comic effect. It was worse.

PART ONE: THIS WHOLE SCHOOL IS A PACK OF ASSHOLES

Slaughter Deathblood lives by herself in a picturesque village. Her life sucks because she can speak to animals and she has dead parents. She wants a life of magic and adventure, the magic and adventure that speaking to chickens and having dead parents can’t provide.

The problem is that Slaughter is a bit crap. Her magic’s unreliable, barring her talent of knowing what dogs are thinking, and her spells generally end in sad hijinks rather than fireworks. (They also tend to result in THIS WACKY MUSIC, a song I hate more than anyone else ever could, and I’ll prove it. Play it at my funeral. I’ll come back to life and punch the speakers)

This all changes when she gets an acceptance letter inviting her to the prestigious Gedonelune Royal Magic Academy, a place where she will be nurtured, understood, taught according to her prior knowledge and learning needs, and be around like-minded peers all working together holistically to make success easy!!!!!

Slaughter’s Acceptance letter started abusing her for her stupidity and worthlessness in the first five seconds, handy preparation for her love life to come

Now, the background and worldbuilding of Gedonelune has the stability and care you don’t find in the common card house. I keep trying to make sense of it, but no such fucking luck. Gedonelune itself is a country run by a monarchy, though the game is coy about who this monarchy is or how much it has to do with anything. The majority of its inhabitants are apparently non-magical, but Gedonelune Academy seems to be simply the most prestigious of many magical academies. Slaughter herself appears to not have done anything with her life except send applications off to the school and resign herself to healing small stoaty creatures. The government is wizards – there’s a Ministry of Magical Justice – and it’s heavily implied that the monarchy are wizards, and the most famous sport is a wizard sport and the most famous inhabitants are magical, which is all suspicious. Gedonelune… or the TEVINTER IMPERIUM?????

Anyway, young wizards have a high turnover in this universe, as evidenced by Slaughter’s attendance at a schooll that would make Albus Dumbledore go Slow your roll, guys! You don’t seem to care much about your student body’s safety!

DAILY LENS FLARE RATING: dangerous

Slaughter is excited, because she wants to be just like her idol Serge Durandal, a famous “wizard tamer”. She realises that this will be difficult due to her being shit. Don’t worry if you forget about this fact; she, and everyone around her, reminds you of it so often that you start wondering how she wills herself out of bed in the morning.

She makes it to the campus and wanders around, impressed at finally being at the school she’s dreamed of so much and hoping that she won’t accidentally burn it to ashes. Something starts squealing and biting her, and as she panics, she hears (low, sensual, masculine) laughter.

In a feat of seriously weak comic business, the boy says there is something scary (LOL ROFLMAO HE HE) on her head (HO HO WHEEZE) with lots of teeth and claws (it is not good for him to larf so much). Slaughter falls for this painful flim-flam, setting up the first of approximately six million lie pratfalls with each one shitter than the last.

Turns out there’s a Carbuncle on her cranium:

A recurring creature. I hate Carbuncle, and I hope it dies.

Slaughter is so relieved that she forgets to deliver this guy a quick one-two punch to the kidneys, and turns her attention to him:

Avert your gaze from that thumb

The stranger playfully abuses her for being too stupid to realise that there was a Carbuncle on your head. Slaughter is too busy checking out his earring in his right ear and, I shit you not, wondering if it means… t-that…

I was so busy finishing this sentence as t-that – THERE’S A SECONDS SALE ON AT THE SAILOR MOON STORE that I didn’t realise Slaughter was referring to her curiously 1970s-era understanding of gay social signifiers. I’m surprised she didn’t check him for handkerchiefs.

Phew! As it turns out he also has a 1970s-understanding of gay social signifiers and reassures her with that he’s not wearing it to state THAT, he’s just trying to stealth advertise his Etsy shop.

!!SALE!! OOAK Handmade Statement Piece Bright Green Christmas Light ! £95.50

Slaughter tells this strange student that she’s here at the academy to become like her hero, Serge Durandal.

BOY: i am serge durandal. it was me all along

SLAUGHTER: G-gasp!

BOY: that has always been my name, legally

SLAUGHTER: I’m your biggest fan!!

BOY: first name serge second name durandal

SLAUGHTER: Ohhhh, I can’t believe I’m being hit on by the famous Solid Snake the legitimate Serge Durandal!

It turns out that he is not the legitimate Serge Durandal.

Mere seconds later he tells her that he magically knows everything about her, like for instance… that she’s new to the school. Slaughter is astonished!! It’s almost like she introduced herself that way!!!

At this point the stranger huffs crumbs off her face.

Slaughter, as you’ll find, always takes the time to rake her lustful eyes over the bodies of those presented to her: I think at this point I started cherishing the idea that she’d come to the academy solely to score. This isn’t helped by her continual refrain of THE MOONLIGHT GLINTED ROGUISHLY OFF HIS SIX-PACK or I ADMIRED THE WAY THAT THE SOFT SPRING BREEZE CARESSED HIS BUM.

But mid-leer, something weird happens. The badges on Slaughter’s uniform and the awful boy’s uniform start to glow, and tinkling rainbows issue from both in an array of dazzling Photoshop burn/dodge effects. Slaughter has no idea what’s happening, and the garbage lad seems honestly surprised. This is our first mystery!

Then someone else starts hollering his REAL name – i.e. the name of someone who lives on the second floor, he lives upstairs from you and yeah he thinks he’s seen you before – and Luca Orlem scarpers. A new guy arrives on the scene whom Slaughter instantly objectifies:

You just found Grandma’s man candy.

Poundland Draco turns out to be Elias Goldstein of the famous Goldstein family. Elias is more highly strung than a boutique Bichon Frise and spends his time 1. looking handsome, and 2. nagging. He’s not at all like Draco Malfoy. He’s more like Bert, of the and Ernie fame, in that I would not be surprised to find him fancying pigeons and arranging his shoes by the alphabet. Elias lives a sad and tragic life that involves Luca hitting on him, and as his facial expression communicates, pining to bathe in anti-bacterial gel. That’s not the expression of a gallantly elegant man, that’s the expression of a man who purposely buys aloe-vera tissues.

Elias is mad because Luca has committed the crime of not cleaning up the classroom. Cleaning crimes are big in Elias’s world. You’re given one of your first NARRATIVE CHOICES here:

What will you pick?

> I’M A GRUDGE INFORMER, HE’S BEHIND THAT BUSH, SMH
> I HAVE NEVER SEEN A MAN IN MY LIFE

Slaughter tells Elias that her eyes have never known the sight kiss of an XY chromosome. I was hoping that he would then cheer her up and welcome her to the academy. However, he proves to also be riding the train to Toilet Town, because he tells her to get lost and that she sucks.

At this point we wander around and meet the Kindly Furry but Slaughter’s too depressed to really care, so I’ll skip it. He takes her back to her room to meet her roomie, a person she’s too defeated to feel nervous about.

At this point, I’m feeling down about the whole thing too. You have to understand, this is pretty much the only part of the game that’s one long unbroken take – usually that would have been sixteen story tickets just to traverse Luca’s cavalcade of lies – and I’m missing Long Live The Queen, wherein my lack of knowledge of Dogs would have meant I’d been murdered already with a karate chop from the shrubbery. I’m feeling like picking a spinach dude was a bad idea. I am wondering if any of the potential boyfs in this game are at all palatable, and deciding probably not. I nearly throw in the towel…. and then.

Then I meet her.

The only person who will be unfailingly nice, kind and gentle to you this entire Goddamned game.

Please tune in next time for SEVEN AMELIAS, ALL MY WIFE.