✿ Benign Conspirator ✿

Barona castle: vases, flags, and Victoria. (Adulthood, +Lambda)

FROM: Kiriko's card voting game.
FORM: a small decorative box
SHAREABLE: 7/8

Leaving Wallbridge and invading Barona Castle. (Adulthood, +Lambda)

FROM: Goldie's latest kissing game.
FORM: little wrapped boxes
SHAREABLE: 1/2

Asbel and Lambda. (Adulthood)

FROM: Uniform design game.
FORM: a spool of thread
SHAREABLE: ?

North Barona Road: a great view and great dreams. (Childhood)

FROM: Lorelei's underwater exploration game.
FORM: a small square of nori
SHAREABLE: 1/2

- Until 2:16.
- TL;DR: he has big dreams but doubts his ability to carry them out.

Cedric makes his move. (Adulthood, offscreen)

FROM: Jorgi's mini-Cry Wolf.
FORM: a brittle card (crush it)
SHAREABLE: no

- In which Cedric and the knights make their move against the king.
- Highlights include: Cedric murdering Richard's father in front of him, Richard being horribly wounded (to the point of death, but Lambda heals him) and "hiding" in a pile of corpses, then fleeing for his life into the catacombs.

Revenge on Cedric. (Adulthood, +Lambda)

FROM: Nimue and Mulan's experimental trauma game.
FORM: bubbles and a dagger
SHAREABLE: 2/3

- 5:42 to video end, boss battle, and 4:30 to 7:30.
- Some of Richard's memories have worried due to his erratic/violent behavior. Honestly, he doesn't feel any regret about this one in terms of his actions towards Cedric. Would it have been better to have an official execution? Probably. But Cedric deserved what he got, and Richard is not sorry for that.

Gralesyde, Dalen, and plans. (Adulthood)

FROM: Hades' puppy-raising game.
FORM: a golden ring
SHAREABLE: 2/3

- 0:25 to 1:27, 2:47 to 7:18. Also the skit Jealous Much?
- Mostly political backstory and planning.
- ... Pascal is overly perceptive in some ways. Hm.

TOMODACHIIIIIIIIII! (Adulthood, +Lambda)

FROM: Lorelei's dating auction.
FORM: a strand of pearls
SHAREABLE: no

- 8:40 to 10:00.
- I SEE THIS IS AN ARGUMENT THAT WE HAVE ALWAYS HAD.

Lambda and the aftermath. (Childhood, +Lambda?)

FROM: The Gingerbread Witch's selfishness game.
FORM: a burnt biscuit
SHAREABLE: 4/4

- 1:42 to 2:58.
- Afterwards Richard finds himself back in the palace cellars where he briefly manages to indicate that Asbel and the others need help, then looses consciousness again. When he finally wakes up (in his own room), he's told that Asbel, Cheria, and Hubert will be fine, but that Sophie was killed.
- His left eye and his chest feel a bit strange...

Wallbridge: the key. (Adulthood, +Lambda)

FROM: Heart games.
FORM: spiral-shaped starburst spun sugar sweets
SHAREABLE: no

- 0:09 to 3:44.
- Ah.
- Well.
- Yes, he can see how he and Lambda perhaps were not the healthiest combination sometimes.

Reuniting with Asbel and Sophie. (Adulthood)

FROM: ???'s story game.
FORM: a blank white card (write on it)
SHAREABLE: no

- 8:38 to end.
- ♥ ASBEL ♥

SKILL: Burst Artes 2 CC: Lightning Blade, Hurricane Thrust
FROM: The Velveteen Rabbit's design-a-friend game.
FORM: a small plush knight dog

Richard can now perform his most basic artes, as well as simple attack combos that end in artes.

SKILL: so many novels
FROM: Maleficent's title swap game.
FORM: a coral pen

When you're a bored and lonely prince, what do you do? You read books. Lots of books. Stupid adventure novels, romance novels, and just generally anything that isn't about politics and/or the real world. Richard has a scarily good memory for details, too.

SKILL: Title Stat Boosts
FROM: The Beast's story game.
FORM: a storybook

Graces is different from other Tales games in that its titles are all linked to certain abilities, resistances, and boosts that can be permanently learned. This skill contains all the stat boosts from Richard's titles. It ups his stats across the board: HP, strength, defense, magic, etc. It's nothing superhuman (for an RPG character), and it won't be much use until he gains more of his combat abilities back. But he's definitely sturdier than before!

Exploring the secret passage as a child. (pre-game, offscreen)
FROM: Heart games.
FORM: colored sugar in the shape of pancakes
SHAREABLE: no

Richard, being the bookworm he is, discovers some documents that mention a secret passage under the castle. He's already familiar with the cellars because of spending time down their hiding out in his forts, so it's easy for him to locate it. It takes him a few tries to work up the courage to explore it properly, but it's very exciting secret all of his own.

Inside the cocoon. (Adulthood, +Lambda)
FROM: Handless Faith's risks game.
FORM: a card (rip for memory)
SHAREABLE: 1/2

- To 8:23.
- Also this picture.
- I'm pretty sure Richard is only semi-conscious during a good portion of the cocoon. Richard doesn't want to be in control, Lambda does, and besides, both of them are resting and gaining energy and eleth. So mostly what Richard's going to get from this memory is a sense of temporary safety and of him and Lambda literally against the rest of the world, and of... growth? They're creating something new, and Richard himself is physically changing as well.
- It should be noted that while Lambda is in the driver's seat, that doesn't mean that Richard doesn't approve of what he's doing. This is all consensual.

Heading for the secret passage to meet his friends and collapsing. (Childhood, offscreen)
FROM: Cheshire's Truth or Dare game.
FORM: a vanilla mouse-shaped cakepop
SHAREABLE: no

Richard goes from being super excited about sneaking his friends into the castle to feeling as though something's not quite right by the time he gets to the cellars... he goes to the ruined statue to sit down for a moment, and then unconsciousness overtakes him. He doesn't really have time to wonder what's going on.

Barona: encountering Aston and Hubert, and making plans for later. (Childhood)
FROM: Darkness-Three's trauma game.
FORM: a sweet dried date
SHAREABLE: no

- To 3:32.
- Kind of self-explanatory. He's super excited to have his friends visiting them and wants to show them the castle. There's some slight underlying weirdness with Hubert's behavior and the strange man Aston was talking to, but Richard's having such a good day and is looking forward to spending more time with his friends, so he doesn't really pick up on it.

Leaving Lhant: standing up for Asbel and giving him the ring. (Childhood)
FROM: Baker's eating contest.
FORM: gummi worms
SHAREABLE: 6/7

- To 4:38 and then from 5:18 to 6:05.
- Richard is lying about being the one to ask Asbel to show him around, and Aston knows he's lying, and Richard knows Aston knows he's lying. But he wants to stand up for his friend (and he can use the power of his position to protect him, which is good -- it should protect someone, at least).
- He's genuinely shocked and worried to hear that his father is ill, since he was fine when Richard last saw him. He doesn't suspect any foul play just yet.
- He gives Asbel the ring not only for the reason he says -- so that they can meet if Asbel visits -- but also because he really wants some physical proof that what happened in Lhant wasn't just his imagination. When he sees that the ring is gone, he knows he'll remember Asbel (and Sophie), and he hopes Asbel will think of him when he sees the ring.
- ♥ Asbel ♥

Lhant Hill: Bryce and falling off a cliff. (Childhood)
FROM: Hades's getting to know you game.
FORM: a golden ring
SHAREABLE: 7/8

- To video end.
- Apparently he didn't tell Asbel and Sophie that he was the prince right away. In the memory, his identity being revealed makes him feel like whatever small spark of hope he had for connecting with them has vanished. In Aather, he'll be grimly unsurprised that he didn't tell them initially.
- Bryce is part of his retinue. He is also a bully and a generally unpleasant person, but there's nothing Richard can do about it. While he doesn't like Bryce, his betrayal is still a surprise and a blow.
- Richard is sure that he's going to die, and he's also sure that he's going to get Sophie and Asbel killed as well. Feels bad, man. He's so paralyzed with fear that all he can do is watch while they battle Bryce.
- Before he can even calm down and start processing what happened, he slips over the edge of the cliff, and drags Sophie and Asbel with him when they attempt to help.
- NOT A GOOD MEMORY :| Even though he knows in Aather that it turns out all right, everything that happens here is terrifying.

An assassination attempt. (pre-Adulthood, offscreen, +Lambda)
FROM: Heart games.
FORM: a crystalline sugar cog wheel
SHAREABLE: 1/2 (small bites)

- We know that Richard has likely survived numerous assassination attempts. This is one of them. In the middle of the night, he wakes up because someone has gotten into his room. He attempts to fend off the assassin and is mostly successful, but in the process gets stabbed quite badly -- or so he thinks? When the guards rush in to help, he finds that the injury is much less serious than he had assumed. It must have been his imagination, in the heat of the moment. (No. It was Lambda.) He's ~15 at the time.

Rejoining the party in Barona Castle. "N-no... Stop... Don't come out..."
FROM: Mira's exploration game.
FORM: gold rings. (they'll get tarnished and turn to ash after 3 views)
SHAREABLE: 2/3

- To 2:42.
- In the basement of the castle, surrounded by corpses. UHHH.
- A new face: Cheria.
- For some reason, things seem a little weird between him and Asbel. He's still happy to see him, but at the same time... not? Also, Asbel mentions a wound, but Richard doesn't feel injured.
- Confirmation that Cedric did in fact poison him next. And near certainty that Richard's father has been murdered by this point.
- Anger, helplessness, desire for vengeance, sadness... all sorts of emotions here. And most importantly, they're not all his own. There's someone else in his head. He can tell that for sure now.
- tl;dr: ??????? ?!?!?!?!? ?????!!!!!

SKIT: "The Necessary Motivation."
FROM: The Raven's cabin design game.
FORM: a magazine page (with a picture that kkkkind of relates to your memory)
SHAREABLE: no

- The whole thing.
- New face: Malik ("Captain"). New names: Hubert, Cheria.
- Great, another set of weird ruins. Also, something's... different, but he's not sure what.
- Asbel is being pressured into getting married? And apparently Malik thinks that Cheria would be a good candidate? Richard doesn't seem quite as sure.
- OOOH, CAPTAIN~
++ tendency to troll (especially other trolls)

Hiding out in the storeroom fort and reading. (pre-game, offscreen)

FROM: Heart games.
FORM: a rose made out of edible gold flakes
SHAREABLE: 3/4

- As a kid, Richard would escape down to a secret fort he made in an unused storeroom in the basement of the castle whenever he felt overwhelmed. We don't actually see this in game, but here's how Richard describes it to Sophie:

Richard: Here we are. Hmm... This brings me back. When I was young, I was always surrounded by people. Sometimes I wanted a place where I could just be alone.
Sophie: So you built a secret fort?
Richard: Right. I was going through some tough times, and when things got to be too much, I'd come down here.
Sophie: What did you do?
Richard: Sometimes I'd wrap myself in a blanket and eat apples until I wanted to pop. Sometimes I'd read silly adventure stories. It calmed me, somehow. Gave me the strength to make it through another day.

- Mostly this just confirms his impression that life in the castle is anxiety-provoking for him and kind of sucks.
++ BOOKWORM. He's probably always going to have a book checked out from the library now. Even the trashy stuff. ... maybe especially the trashy stuff.

Learning the truth about his father's "illness." (Childhood, offscreen)
FROM: Jörgi's first game.
FORM: a walnut-sized blue glass ball
SHAREABLE: no

- Richard returns from Lhant after hearing that his father is ill, only to learn the truth when he gets back to the castle: his father isn't sick at all. He was poisoned. And more than that, he was poisoned by his own brother, Richard's uncle Cedric. His father will survive, but Richard knows that Cedric won't stop his attempts, and will likely go after Richard some day as well.
- He's a prince! The crown prince, actually.
- The things at home that were "complicated" in his starter memory were likely political infighting amongst his family.
+ (unsure) about family and politics

Lhant Hill: the friendship pact. (Childhood)
FROM: Peter Cottontail's Ambidex Game.
FORM: a brightly colored egg that splits down the middle (with a piece of chocolate inside)
SHAREABLE: 1/2

- 10:20 until the end of the video.
- Friendship?
- Friendship!!1!
- Friendship is great.
- It's obvious that he was a very lonely and fearful child...
- He doesn't get any names from this, which will kind of befuddle him ICly. But he now has a(n eleven-year-old version of a) face for his friend from his first memory, and he'll be able to recognize Sophie as well. It also gives context as to why he left his letter for Asbel at the tree.
++ I have friends and they care about me and we will always be connected and THE POWER OF FRIENDSHIP CONQUERS ALL.