Luminos564

Scarier part is that this isn't even the finale. By the end of the thing I am expecting the ultimate villain to be defeated by Noel's cooking and that Linhua was secretly Jin's time displaced former roommate. Well in any case, the BB story train has reached maximum velocity. I dunno about anyone else but I am equal parts excited and scared outta my mind.

Dear God this thread exploded. Ragna might become a godlike entity. Noel is having an identity crisis powerful enough to set the world on fire. The panda was the science butt monkey all along... Fuck man I can't go on. This shit is bananas with an overdose of WTF.

So let's go over these in order: -So Nine got them all, huh? Looks like if you want to complete a fetch quest, you can't exactly assign it to a murderous Nu-13. I'd imagine this means she was able to top Haku-men after their fight because I doubt he'd give her his willingly. -And most likely looking faaaaaaaaabulous. Seriously Amane, just who and what are you? -Valkenhayn does not appreciate Amane's style of dance (he's a Waltz man himself). Seriously Valkenhayn, what's your involvement in all this? -"Wondering about something"? Like what, how his hat hasn't crushed his spine in half? -Makes sense that Kagura would protect a pretty, young thing like Noel. But from the way you put it Sourenga, I took it as it was Jin that attacks Noel and then Kagura protects her. If so, down Jin. Bad boy! You're supposed to be past this. -Haku-men has a certain way with the ladies, he does. Figuratively blind and misguided ones are his specialty. -Double the grins, for double the amount of dead puppies. As if they weren't enough of a problem when merged, but now there's two of them. Someone go and fire Haku-men. His demon slaying license has been revoked. -Yay Lamb-chops...fighting Relius...the man that created her...who has a nasty penchant for "scientific horrors" . -Oh hey, there is that plot thread about how he went from a human, to a Red Ogre and then to a Red Ogre Cyborg that ASW never showed. Goody. -Ragna has had so many shots of his back but damn does he make them look good. But why do I get the feeling this one will be more somber than the others... Oh no. No no no no no. Ragna...buddy, whatever you do, do not turn your sword to the girl inside Amaterasu. Or Noel, for that matter. All that means is you'll go down like a certain individual whose final plan left many a viewer debating over the outcome. Don't go down that route.

I'll say. All her plans keep getting interrupted with no end in sight. Noel is the "Absolute Entitled", but I'll admit that the detail hasn't been pulled outta thin air. It was alluded to in Act 1 after all. Kagura always wanted to have a go at the Imperator Librarius. Unfortunately for him, she was quicker to the draw. EDIT: Well there we go. Now we see why Nu-13 was nuts. Saya/Izanami is no better. Seriously, if I hadn't been around so long with this series, I'd swear this is CT all over again.

Alright, nuts to trying to comprehend these revelations at 3:00 in the morning. I'll look forward to seeing what else gets dropped on us in the following hours. Nice to see that Platinum (specifically Luna) gets some degree of suffering for her trouble this time. Curious though, so a "higher ranked" Entitled can basically override her world? Guessing that'd be Noel what with all the doomsday talk and stuff.

Hey you can only put up with your superior's drunken orgies for so long before you snap and say "Y'know what, Imma murder that S.O.B in his sleep with a goshdang toothbrush".

I...what...but...how...WHAT THE FLYING F***!? MORI, stop snorting whatever it is you had ground up this morning, sober up and start explaining. I mean it DOES explain why only Noel could be the Successor but geez. So wait, Noel that we know is a clone of Saya, but then we now know the one inside Amaterasu is (supposedly) the real McCoy, making Saya the clone of that Noel and the new Noel the clone of a clone and OH MY GOD I JUST WENT CROSS-EYED .

Makes sense. If she does her kick DD against Ragna, Izanami starts interplaying Saya's voice in-between her own (sometimes even going from Izanami voice, to Saya then right back to Izanami within the span of the same sentence). My only question though: is this Saya trying desperately to see Ragna again or merely a ploy by Izanami to rub salt on Ragna's many wounds? Both also refer to him with "nii-sama" so it's really hard to tell on paper who is speaking at a given time unless you can hear it.

For the same reason why Noel's eyes turn blue whenever she feels like being an exhibitionist turning into Mu-12: it has been decreed as such by Mori. Well OK, stylistic mistakes on the design part aside, it's possible the eye color changing is just them tapping into the power of their respective mode changes. Mu-12 is (maybe) usig the Azure and thus has blue eyes so maybe Tsubaki is doing the same as Izayoi?

Well when you base your own self worth around a pretty, blond bishonen who has a tendency to go apeshit over his fraternal sibling, you...kinda have limited options with how to act. All Tsubaki knows is that Ragna is Jin's target and with Ragna near Jin is far less sane (he's getting better though, thanks to character development and Celica's well-timed Inazuma Kick to the back of his head). Noel being Noel just means she gets caught in the warzone. Not helping is Ragna's APOCALYPTICALLY shitty luck of being the equivalent to a massive target in a shooting gallery. Now bear in mind, I am not saying she is correct in hating him. I am saying however, that I can comprehend why she is the way she is. There's other external factors that influence her decision like her upbringing (I wouldn't imagine knowing you were the first successful result of an incestuous marriage to be very healthy for you), Terumi's manipulations and his mind-wrecking. The fact of the matter is that to Tsubaki, Jin, Noel and Makoto mean the world to her and Ragna, unfortunately was there and the near direct cause of their current wounds. However, as I mentioned earlier, she also seems like the sort of gal who can move past her current character state...depending on how it is written. I wrote before that if she had the chance to interact with the amnesiac Ragna, that it'd be a narrative goldmine where she could see him as more than just "the man who ruined my/Jin's life" (even if said statement is about as true as there being life on the surface of the Sun). But let's see what Acts 2 and 3 bring to the table. EDIT: Ultimately, I wanna bring this out: if Tsubaki's hatred of Ragna is so shallow, then there's plenty of chances for her to let go of it. Far easier than say if her hate had more weight to it.

To be fair to Tsubaki, she really doesn't have the full low-down of the story (that we're aware of). All she knows of Ragna is that 1. he's a wanted criminal and that 2. he damn near killed Jin and Noel, the object of her (somewhat unhealthy) love and one of her dearest friends. You can't exactly fault her for feeling resentment even if the protagonist bigwigs filled her in on the details. She might more or less share Haku-men's point of view on him: regardless of his true actions, he's still too dangerous and needs to be put down before any more harm is done.

Think of the BB world as one singular body. Is it not natural for a biological organism to have defense systems in place against that which would harm it? Like our white blood cells, Jin and Haku-men are fulfilling a task in order to keep the world running (disregarding the ill state it is in). It's just more dramatic since because said antibodies are related to the "virus", Ragna. This being said, they're not without free will and they are capable of ignoring him in favor of bigger threats.

No no, she did explain what said "Order Sickness" is: it is the current world's dependence on the time manipulation shenanigans from all the sources, the most recent of which (as of CP) was the tug of war between Amaterasu and Izanami. According to Rachel, the world has been reset, rewritten, erased and repeated for centuries that it ceased to "function" as it should. Her solution is that someone or something must break the world's current sickly state in order for it to start healing. Notice that hers is about the only claim that wants a slow and steady recovery (y'know kinda like how in real life illnesses are treated). By contrast, the villain party, while correct in their claim that the world is rotting and they share the whole "blow it to kingdom come" sentiment, they all seem to have a hurried result in them. Relius wants the world dead so he can reshape it to his own personal taste and who knows what his twisted mind deems "necessary". Izanami wants to world to be turned into one where death is prevalent, but her actions don't allow for new life to be brought in. Nine wants the world dead so that Celica has no problems afterward and screw anyone else that might be hurt in the process. Basically it's the Dark War all over again for her, only this time on a grander scale. Ehh I am not so sure how much I like the thought of the Idea Engine becoming his Swiss army Deus Ex plot convenience. I mean I wouldn't put it past Mori to do something like this, but I'd prefer leaving the Idea Engine out of the "endgame" scenario.

Small correction but Jubei claimed Ragna would grow up to become either the "Destroyer of the World" or a "Guardian of the Azure". Now, his role as the "destroyer" has been talked about the most (although vaguely), with Rachel herself claiming that the world itself is "sick" with order and that it needs someone like Ragna to bring an end to it. Keep in mind, she didn't say that being the destroyer means "killing every living thing so a big ol' reset button" is pressed. In fact, she didn't even explain how he's supposed to go about doing that. *Side note: both Rachel, Kokonoe and Jubei to an extent are frakkin' terrible at explaining and being crystal clear. People get on Ragna's case all the time for being a walking pile of anger management issues. But if your only sources of information are a smarmy, smarter-than-thou attitude vampire and an amoral scientist with a penchant for blowing crap up and their typical response to your inquiry is "if I feel like it", you'd be pretty pissed off too. But back on track. So we got a small idea on what Ragna's supposed to do as a "destroyer". However, his potential to become an "Azure Guardian" is completely unexplored outside of that one mention in Ragna's flashback to when he met Taokaka as a kid and Jubei spoke of his role to Torakaka. In my mind, this really culminates in him acting as the protector of either the Azure's Inheritor (read: Noel, which he more or less is already doing) or perhaps Amaterasu. Alternatively, you could write it up as his role to "save the girl trapped in the monster". But that last one is unclear since we don't know who the "girl" even is at the moment.

It's probably because of the host body and how it affects her regardless of her own actual will. Remember, she still has no real love for Hazama/Terumi because of what he did to Saya's body and explains it to him that "it still harbors anger towards him". In the same fashion, it seems that because Saya longs for Ragna, Izanami herself offered him a place at her side. Her disliking him might be more in tune towards Saya's obsession with him rather than with the man himself since, as Terumi points out at the start of CP, they didn't need Ragna to live past CS True Ending and yet she let him live for no adequately explained reason (though this is only from his point of view and Izanami could have easily kept him around for "SURPRISE BLACK BEAST MOFOs" at the very end). EDIT: "No, I meant calls Ragna brother, I missed a word there. It might be that it's from Saya that she calls Ragna brother, or it hints that there might be another reason behind it(Izanagi?)" Oh jeez if it turns out that Ragna's housing Izanagi or that Naoto is Izanagi and him crossing over means he and Ragna began merging ala Hazama and Terumi, I will just t(-_-t).

Speaking of nightmares, Mu-12 in CS refers to Ragna as the "World's Nightmare", perhaps indicating that Ragna goes full Beast mode (or that super-duper Lex Luthor evil that's vaguely been foreshadowed by Rachel) so there's that. For reference, Mu-12 refers to Hazama/Terumi as the "True Evil", Haku-men as the "Ancient Hero", Jin's hilariously the "False Hero" as well as "Endbringer" with finally Rachel topped off as "Observer". But take from this what you will.

I second this. A major part of Ragna's more human moments is how he interacts with with each and every Murakumo unit. With Lambda his only moment was upon her sacrifice and by then he referred to her as Nu. But she is clinging to him so dearly that she is able to come back from the dead by solely focusing on his image. Furthermore, she's willing to take on Haku-men, ignoring her own internal defense OS and forcing herself to fight solely for his sake. With Noel/Mu he made sure to treat her like a person as much as possible, even making it a point that it doesn't matter if you are built or born, if your organs are real or constructed, you're still you. It can be argued that Noel is closest to what Saya was to him because he is treating her as a human being even after her revelation that Noel is in turn able to undergo her own character development. Lastly with Nu he's rather antagonistic but that's expected on his side. However he's since made great strides and offered a helping hand to her despite all that happened. It backfired spectacularly though, but it is the thought that counts. But anyway the point is, despite units 11-13 all being clones of his sister, Ragna never treats any of them as Saya's replacement. For better or ill, he treats each of them as their own separate entity. Furthermore, the man himself nearly blew out his voice yelling at Kokonoe for wanting to sacrifice Celica to activate Kushinada's Lynchpin. Do you honestly think he'd be willing to let the same happen to Lambda just so that Saya can take over her body?

It's this one. That one is Ragna's. Naoto has one in the same location as Ragna's own. And Izanami also bears the mark on the white portion of her dress, though you only see it in the group shot rather than on her portrait. Curiously, hers is the only one that's on clothing as both Ragna and Naoto's seem to have been branded on their skin.

Maybe, but there is the "tradition" that in ASW games, the final boss is usually a lady. CT was Nu-13. CS was Mu-12. CP was Nu-13 again unless you count Izanami controlling/commanding Takemikazuchi more fitting to the role. Similarly, so far we can say that the boss of Act 1 in CF is Nine. Act 2 is most likely Izanami herself. Act 3 boss at this point could be anyone, even Amaterasu (assuming the Master Unit even HAS a gender). Oh and I was able to see what cr1ms0n was saying. Izanami DEFINITELY has "the mark" on the lower portion of her battle dress. You can see it in her trailer when they flash over the full group photo with all the central players in CF and there's a close up of Izanami's legs. So now we have 3 characters that bear that mark: Ragna, Naoto and Izanami. Now the better question is: for what reason?

I dunno where you see it on Izanami, but Amaterasu is definitely sporting something that looks similar to "the mark" found on both Ragna and Naoto. You see it on 2 of her "pods" in the background.

Well yeah since we are only in Act 1 officially. Mori needs a flippin' crash course on pacing pronto, because you can't simply toss someone new and start forcefully stitching them to the plot in what is the proposed climax of this "trilogy". Celica had the excuse since she was, technically around since CT, but we just didn't know her name. Same could be said for Bullet and Azrael since they were connected through Tager. But Naoto, not so much. I like him as an addition to the roster and all, but I am more worried about the characterization and plot at this rate. How can you forget Arakune? I mean he's a living garbage blob full of disease, bugs and other weird-ass shit. If anyone deserves to be Pestilence in this case it's him. Question is: who is Conquest in this regard? Ragna...or perhaps, Naoto? I can understand your viewpoint but for me, what a character ultimately is does not diminish their overall feats. You could make him into a deity and it still doesn't change the fact that he constantly reserves his power and wrecks face anyway. Plus, as Axiomatic pointed out, we don't know what constitutes as a "god" in the BB-verse. For all we know, the BB-verse "gods" are simply really, really powerful individuals (like Azrael) who basically do whatever damn well they please. However, I DO enjoy the phrasing you used to reply. For that, just take solace that my predictions are usually completely wrong. And I admit, I do enjoy Azrael for what he is. I only offered up the explanations about his power's source because I like theorizing about it.

Well we're 10 days away from Act 2 and I got some ideas brewing in my head regarding some things. First of all, this "Naoto overwriting Ragna's existence" business. Do you think that is the reason why Ragna lost his memories as opposed to Nine doing it via Embryo? Now yes she has altered memories of the others but didn't actually erase them. So Ragna being an amnesiac is certainly suspect. Additionally, Naoto is called as "someone who doesn't belong" by at least 3 individuals (by my count that would be Nine, Valkenhayn and Rachel). But why could that be? I doubt it's because these 3 care for Ragna's wellbeing so what danger could he present? Second thing is regarding Azrael. Now he calls Izanami a "god" and seems completely unfazed by the revelationand readily accepts it as fact. To me, this implies familiarity. My theory: what if Azrael is like Izanami, a deity inhabiting a human host body? Specifically a deity of war and combat.

Look Tager, I know Noel is cute and all, but this seems highly inappropriate... On a more serious note, what the flying Kakas is going on here? I assume this is a continuation of that image where Tager stands over the bodies of Noel and Kagura. Did we ever get the 411 on that by the way? I swear, it's difficult to keep track of characters that aren't really given the "main character / villain" status in this series.

What he said. I lack the means to screen capture so this is the best I can do for you :(. I kinda hope it is the latter. It'd be flippin' hilarious for the troll (Terumi) to be out-trolled by his own host body. It would make some sense too since most of the big boy players are no longer concerning themselves with Terumi. Ragna is aiming for Izanami. Haku-men is more concerned with Nine. Rachel is chasing Ragna, Izanami and Nine. Valkenhayn is too busy being Rachel's whipping boy. Hell, even Kokonoe ain't paying attention to him. Talk about a cold shoulder. You'd think killing her mamma and auntie would earn him a lifetime of delicious vitamin D (as in vitamin Devious). Alternatively, they are still fused and Nine is simply donning Mu-12's appearance to mess with Noel for shits and giggles. We know she's capable of changing her looks since she took on Nu-13's form in Ragna's arcade run so it is a possibility. I too prefer the development that Noel went through to acquire and come to terms with her power. It was honestly one of the more touching moments in CP.

Speaking of the Clover family, there's even an image of Ignis either detonating something in her hand or is being wrecked herself while Relius watches from behind. Carl also meets Celica at some point and goes on to swat an invisible wasp only he can see. There was also a completely new Drive Emblem. It looks like a bunch of bones strewn together in a sort of ritualistic circle, probably belonging to the mystery character we've yet to have revealed. Some other things I noted: -Mu-12 appears to a kneeling over and crying Noel, seemingly confirming that, at least within the Embryo, they are 2 separate entities as Tokkan pointed out. -Hazama appears to someone with a taunting glee and Amaterasu is behind him. Considering who Hazama is fused with, this strikes me as very odd. Similarly, Terumi is shown being roughed up by Haku-men only for the latter to walk away from him without actually seeming to care that the former still breathes/exists. -These are kind of related, but both Celica and Tsubaki's have some interesting images. Celica is depicted by being surrounded in flames, which could indicate that this is after she confronts Nine. Tsubaki on the other hand is depicted watching over a desolate landscape with a blood red sky. Given the structure it is possible this the land you see Hibiki and Naoto's sprites clash. Why do I bring these 2 up? Because I believe that while Tsubaki was able to see the "truth" (her face shows massive surprise and concern) Celica is instead being shielded/isolated by Nine, likely trying to prevent her from discovering something out for herself. Lastly, there was the single line that flashes after Platinum's image: "There is no truth". Now, ever since CT, the concept of "truth" has always been present in Blazblue. You could very well argue this has been one of the central themes of this franchise. Hell, Terumi made a whole ranting speech about how this world is nothing but lies, which he hates most of all and Nine made claim of an "unchanging truth" that follows Izanami's defeat. So the fact that the opening would put out something like this strikes me as very curious, although we still lack the information to put it into context.