User:Harmonea/Lily Theory

I thought I'd make a page organizing all my collected thoughts about a theory I have. So: A writeup of why it's likely the story's main antagonist is much closer to us than we think. Note that I'm writing this page pulling logic only from what's available in global as of August 2022.

This page includes spoilers for pretty much all currently available content, including main story, personal stories, cards, and events.

Beyond Heirson

First, let's understand the structure of what's going on:

The NXX story mainly centers around Heirson Health Products at this time, but there are some things that are "off" about this that indicate Heirson may not be the true enemy.

It's mentioned multiple times that NXX research was originally the territory of only large, well-funded labs like Pax and Crimson. Luke in particular notes that if Heirson is the source of NXX related research, he's not sure if that's a good or a bad thing. I'm presuming he's thinking this is possibly good because Heirson is a much smaller entity, but possibly bad because it's so much smaller that it indicates he doesn't have the whole picture.

In fact, do we remember that lab from the beginning and end of Chapter 5? The one where Jerome Adams and mister "???" speak in detail about Heirson and its employees and plans.

I think a lot of us assumed this was a Heirson facility because of Heirson being the subject of discussion, but we've had no actual indication of this. In fact, when we've seen Heirson branding in game, it's block text in various shades of blue, such as on their Effervescent packets here, which is a stark contrast to the textless, flowing floral logo all over the lab and on Jerome's labcoat pocket. I believe this logo depicts a lily, which is important. We'll come back to this.

I feel like it's not too large of a logical leap to say the unknown lab with the lily logo is the real antagonist, the organization pulling Heirson's strings. Jerome and "???" speak of higher-ups in Heirson, like Tyson Turner, like they're pawns, with lines like "Have things been dealt with?" or dismissing Tyson, Heirson's literal founder, as a "useful musclebrain." They discuss setting Heirson and the NXX team against each other rather than removing either side, to establish "time and dominance."

Chapter 6-22 also includes some idle side-musing between Marius and Vincent on where Tyson might have gotten the funds to found Heirson; the only thing they can determine at this time is that foreign investment is involved.

The importance of lilies

Let's change course briefly--but not too much--to explain why it's important that the unknown lab has a lily logo.

Each of the male leads is associated with a flower. You can see this in several places all over the game and marketing, but currently it's easiest to look at the gift boxes given to the player for our personal Birthday celebration:

• Golden Camellia Blessings Giftbox - Luke
• Plum Blossom Blessings Giftbox - Artem
• Coquelicot Blessings Giftbox - Vyn
• Tulip Blessings Giftbox - Marius

Of these, I want to focus on Vyn.

Coquelicot is a French word for poppy--in fact, Vyn's flower is the white poppy, which is a flower symbolizing remembrance and peaceful rest, associated with funerals in the east.

Vyn carries this association through to a western funeral flower: to lilies. Much like his dual identity, he has a dual association with both flowers, established through repeated use in-game:

• Vyn and Rosa sit in a field of lilies in the second CG of Vyn "Between Good and Evil"
• Vyn points out that the Ace of Spades in his deck of cards features a lily.
• Bouquets given to Juno in Vyn "False Tears" and Rena in Vyn "Lingering Warmth".
• Vyn is seen in a lake of water lilies in Vyn "Flickering Moonlight" and buys Rosa a pygmy water lily to take care of.
  • Extra note: Initial TL of the card identified these as lotus - Hoyo specifically went back and fixed this which makes it seem important.
• And lilies are used so heavily and to such huge effect in Vyn "Medieval Suspense" that it deserves its own subsection...

Pure distilled foreshadowing

In Medieval Suspense, Vyn and Rosa take part in a True Crime game, a LARP-y murder mystery in which the group has to figure out which of them did it or all face punishment. Rosa plays a noble girl, the Lady Viscount, who has amnesia. She's given no script and forced to figure the case and character relationships out from scratch, while the other players were given full backstories and knowledge of what their characters were doing while the murder was taking place. Vyn plays a young Duke, ascended to the seat when his father, the game's victim, was killed.

It's revealed through the course of the game that Vyn's character is the killer, but how this is revealed is the interesting part: Lilies, as a symbol of the church, are something the Duke should hate due to his upbringing, yet he's discovered to be hiding lily-embroidered items given to him by his lover: Rosa's character, prior to her amnesia.

I want to stress that point: The Duke's association with lilies is the specific detail that closes the case.

Breaking Character and other mistakes

Okay, so Vyn is vaguely associated with a flower that's also vaguely associated with an unknown lab. Seems like a big reach, right? But he's made other mistakes that give the game away.

In his personal story Chapter 2, Vyn and Rosa plan a roleplay in which Rosa has taken the bait and fallen for a PUA named Wayne, but she reverses the trap to get Wayne on her hook instead. Part of this involves Vyn playing a rich suitor that Wayne needs to fend off to claim Rosa as his, but Wayne's claims get Vyn impassioned enough to break character and start telling the truth about himself: "In terms of wealth, I have my own enterprise, which is listed among the top of the world. In terms of background, I am descended from a long line of aristocrats. We are no less powerful than the infamous Pax."

Via Vyn "Food for Thought" and the Big Data lab entry on Svart unlocked in Vyn "Gentleman's Game", we know the second statement is completely true: Vyn's father is an "Eirik Haspran," and the Big Data Lab notes that the duchy of Haspran is the most powerful in Svart--more powerful than the country's royalty.

Knowing how true the second statement is, I think we can assume the first is true as well. So Vyn has his own enterprise, which is listed among the top of the world. This hasn't been explored further in-game at all, and I think it's Chekhov's Gun.

And there's a second big mistake: Rosa's parents are researchers, recruited to a secret project while she was in university. Aside from occasional gifts of money and holiday cards, she no longer has any contact with them. During Vyn "Snowy Fairy Tale", Vyn comforts Rosa in a moment of melancholy, asking if a side character's situation is making her think of how she misses her own parents at the holidays. Rosa, stunned, praises Vyn's memory and says she doesn't even remember mentioning her parents to him. Oops.

In my opinion, the secret project they're involved in is taking place at this "Lily Lab," and that's why Vyn knows about them.

Finally, note that in Vyn "Committed", Vyn and his mother have a phone conversation in which it's hinted Vyn is still keeping important plans from Rosa:

Reina: Does she know you are serious? Have you... told her anything at all?
Reina: And is she aware of your thoughts and plans?
Vyn: She is not aware of it for now, but she will soon.
Vyn: I will tell her everything.

Speculations on motivations

It's noteworthy that even considering all this, Vyn is the one who founded the NXX Investigation Team. It's also noteworthy that Jerome and "???" clearly (I feel) think of the NXX Team as neutral to antagonistic. So if this theory is true, Vyn's playing both sides. Why would that be the case?

Well, maybe we're wrong and Vyn's tracking the backer of the Lily Lab because he genuinely thinks what's happening there is bad and wrong, and maybe he's close to its backer (following the plot of Medieval Suspense, maybe his father, or someone else he knows) so he's dealing with this in secret. But I don't think so.

This section is purely speculative. There's no hard evidence, though I'll still try to support it, but they're just the conclusions I've drawn.

What do we know about Vyn?

He doesn't like rules holding back progress.

• When trying to have Janus apprehended: "I do understand the predicament the police are in. I simply think it is regrettable that we know where to go, but are held back by the great wall of regulations. The path is before us. So close, yet so far."
• When scanning the school's physical files on Medilla against regulations: "Then should you satisfy your conscience by foregoing the safety of someone who has been missing for an entire month? Do not forget: every second we delay increases the danger for the missing person. I am not asking you to approve of such extreme measures, but everything I do is to prevent even greater dangers from occurring."

He laments the slow pace of medical development.

• "Rene's illness was untreatable... But there are new ways to treat it now. If medical research moved faster. People and families including Mrs. Riker might be very different right now."

Combining the above points: he might be willing to circumvent a lot of regulations for the sake of medical progress that will make the world better.

Despite this, I think Vyn understands the weight of responsibility in conducting unregulated experiments and letting NXX get into the hands of entities like Heirson.

NXX started heavily affecting the Stellis population in 2027. Vyn moved to Stellis in 2028 and founded his research center and the X-NOTE Investigation. He even indicates in a recorded diary that he'd previously doubted collaborating with others in the investigation, since he loses some of the freedom he'd have alone. This shows he'd be doing this even if the team didn't exist.

Consider the fact that misbehaving Heirson employees and their associates are dying and disappearing with alarming frequency. Gordon Grant, who was known to experiment on children, is dead. Simon Bloodworth, the Heirson employee who supplied him, was disposed of. The dialogue in Chapter 5 vaguely suggests that Jerome himself may have been ordered to infect Tyson with his acute cancer after Tyson had decided to take down the X-NOTE Team. The lab that tried to heal Tyson (at which more child experimentation took place) was burned down.

I don't think Vyn wants to shut down NXX research in general, but I think the X-NOTE investigation might be his way of keeping a high-level view of NXX research and pruning those entities who are behaving badly. If he were present as part of one of the companies involved here, those around him might try to control and edit the flow of information to him when he looks into, say, which batches of Heirson packets were contaminated. A third-party oversight into his investments that keeps the research focused on doing something good might be just his style.

As long as the rest of the team is on board with stopping bad NXX research, Vyn's goals and theirs are aligned. When the team finds themselves in a position to stop all NXX research, Vyn will stand apart, and the game board will change completely to one that sets the rest of the main cast against him.

The house of cards

Vyn knows that eventually, the team is going to discover all this, especially with Rosa involved. The fact that he knows and thinks about this is clear in his most prominent theme, the question he repeatedly asks her in many different ways:

Will you be able to continue your pursuit of the truth even when you don't like what you find?

• On refusal to change her mind knowing the outcome of her choice: "I hope that you will always remember your words today. Even if there comes a day when the world is against you, may you still stand by your decision."
• On the outcome of Medieval Suspense: "Sometimes, the truth will bring misfortune. Ignorance is bliss. When faced with a choice like that, will you still be able to pursue the last bit of truth as you always have?"
• The in-character letter from the Duke to the Lady Viscount, which Rosa can't help but feel is relevant after the game ends: "I will always accept and embrace your strengths, your flaws, your everything. I hope for you to do the same, and take hold of what you long for: the absolute truth."
• After his thoughts on slow medical progress: "If there comes a day where we must go against the world... What would you do then? Will you choose to stand beside me...?"

And these are questions Vyn has surely considered for himself, too. He knows he's not a good guy in all this; he knows the X-NOTE cases are blood on his hands. But he'll pursue his ideal to its end, even if the world is against him.