Part 96: Aces High...

Many people in the thread have pointed out that there are thirteen cards in a suit, not twelve, and they would be correct. Therefore, despite us being twelve routes down, there's still one card type we haven't touched yet... until now.

The Aces.

It is, in fact, possible to get onto the Ace path pre-emptively, but in addition to requiring a specific combination of choices early on you'll also need some other information in order to actually make progress – you'll see what I mean when we get there. For now, let's get started...

In Round Two, Mouse will go explore with Horse and Sheep in the workout room. There, the trio will eventually find a Major Trinket – Sheep's Clothing. After this, the trio splits up to vote, and returns to the cafeteria. After Mouse talks with Sheep, the rest of the group returns and the results are posted – everyone ran, of course.

For Round Three, Mouse decides to go explore with Bunny and Dog, and the three go to a large, forum-style classroom. A true or false puzzle is there, and after some time the trio solve it and gain access to another Major Trinket – The Second Caw. They then split up again to vote, and return to the cafeteria. The whole group continues their pattern of everyone running... only to witness the additional rules given after Round Three ends:

ACCOMPLISHED can only win if they finish first with no more than two other people, and WEAK wants to finish last, which will result in only the two of them surviving.

Like before, the Jade Emperor gives everyone 15 extra minutes to process this new information...

[BGM: Mousetrap]


Is he serious?

Probably.

Then people are going to have to die, aren't they?

Was that true? Then what was the point of all of this? It seemed to undermine everything Brian had said up until now. Unless...

[BGM: Silence]


Wait a second, everybody...

Mouse?

There's something wrong here.

What are you talking about?

What was I talking about?



I said in the previous update that it was going to be the last Bonus Update until the story is finished, and I meant it – but that doesn't mean that the Ace path doesn't still have its own collection of ending paths. ...That being said, most of the endings on this path are functionally just a lock to check if you've either been paying attention, or if you've seen enough routes that you can progress, and that's it. They're all basically an immediate death for Mouse, so there's not really anything to show off – I'll just quickly summarize and show the ending card, and then we can move on.

If Mouse fails to find the loophole that will let the twelve escape as one, the group brushes her off and eventually they split up, with Mouse searching a classroom next to the cafeteria – which leaves her as the first target for one of the traitors (..who is Sheep, obviously). That's it.



[Ending – Ace of Clubs]

Anyway, the obvious correct answer is, well...

The rules don't actually mean two people have to die.

Wh-what?!

Er, Mouse, I'm beginning to question your listening comprehension. Wasn't it pretty clear that the accomplished and weak personalities couldn't work with the rest of us?

Correct. People with those personalities can't win with the group.

So you're defeating your own point!

No, I'm not.

[BGM: That Pesky Rodent]


If those personalities are the problem, then let's just get rid of them.

Can we do that?

I saw no such rule.

Well, I did. Sheep, Horse, and I found a Major Trinket which allows somebody to replace their information with another person's.

At first, I thought this just meant they could steal somebody's ability. However, I now realize that it could also be used to overwrite a personality.

Hey... Mouse is right! That'll totally work!

How intriguing.

For real?! Great thinking, Mouse!



With this, there is a peaceful path ahead of us.

Hold on. There's an issue.

Why do you always have to be such a downer?

If I remember, that Trinket was one time use. Which means we can only save one person.

Seriously?

Damn it! Even when it looks like there's a path to safety, it gets snatched away!

It's alright, Pig, things are still under control. Because there's still a way to save everybody.

Well then, let us hear it.



Dog, Bunny, and I found another Major Trinket. That one allows you to re-use the last item that was input. In other words, it allows you to copy an item, not a personality. If we combined the two...

I believe I'm beginning to see the picture. Hmm. Yes, this should work.

A good thing, too. I'm not sure what I would have done had there not been a solution like this.

So that means...?

Correct. I have the accomplished personality. Had you not worked out a solution, Mouse, well, things would have gotten far more complicated for me. So I thank you for that.

Uh, you're welcome.

I-If, uh, if this is really going to work... Then I'll also admit that I'm the, uh, the weak personality.

...But we can fix that, right?

Of course we can fix it! With these items, we'll be able to work together as a team!

Hoorah!

Yes, hoorah indeed.

[BGM: Dog Days]


It was incredible how quickly the atmosphere morphed from one of defeat to accomplishment. There was a palpable feeling of positivity, like we had beaten Brian at his own game. We had worked out a loophole in his design, and instead of turning against each other, we could all survive. For my part, I felt quite smug about piecing the whole thing together, but I tried to remain humble. Instead, I took out the Major Trinkets to help coordinate things.

We decided that Horse's ability and personality would be the safest to copy. And before long, Ox and Sheep returned from their classrooms, attesting that it had worked perfectly.



It is fascinating though.

What is?

The obvious plan for a team would be to search the entire school for Minor Trinkets. In that search, it is almost certain that we would have found both of these Major Trinkets.

It would not take too much thinking to put the pieces together and save those with a special personality. So Brian was accurate when he said that this was a trial of our character. And he was truthful when he said we could all get out together.

If we were all really virtuous and level-headed, the accomplished and weak personalities would out themselves, and help the group search for trinkets. Then, when the group found those two Major Trinkets, we would realize th at everyone could survive.

However, I wonder what would have happened had we not found those Trinkets before the announcement even played. I think it not improbable that instead of banding together like this, things would have devolved into chaos, resulting in very few of us surviving.

What is the purpose of this thought experiment?

I suppose there isn't one in particular.

Then let's get back to business.



We might have thwarted the Jade Emperor once, but let's not forget we're still in grave danger. We don't know what other tricks he may try, and we still need to actually find the 12 Minor Trinkets.

He gave us an extra 15 minutes to try and sort things out, but it's definitely been longer than that. We need to get back to our search.

Agreed! Let's split up again and search throughout the school.

Yeah! We got this!

Let's clear this game in style!

My, what a festive mood. This morale should help our effectiveness.

Or it'll make us complacent.

Whatever, whatever, we need to start searching, let's start searching.



And start searching we did. The group fanned throughout the school, turning over every room with great efficiency. And, sure enough, we found a fair share of Minor Trinkets. One in a safe in the auditorium, another in the Nurse's office, a third in a locked trophy case. And it wasn't just Minor Trinkets, but Major Trinkets we found too. Blinders which shuffled everyone's positions on the board and made everybody's piece anonymous, a mousetrap which let you move backwards as much as you wanted... Rooster even found a pistol in a classroom on the second floor. ...He did a lot of posing with it before Bunny confiscated it from him.

We continued to update each other on our progress by meeting in the cafeteria at the end of each round.

[BGM: Silence]


Then, in the sixth round, I found something interesting in the computer lab on the third floor. One of the computer screens in the fourth row was open. I figured I should try checking it out. Looking at it, the screen had a PNG file of a giant '9' minimized. ...Weird.

Curious, I tried turning on a bunch of the other computers. Most of them were powered off, but 3 of them turned on. One in each row. The 3 that turned on were locked. They all needed a username and a password. ...But I couldn't help but notice the fact that the profile picture of these three computers were all unique. The first was a picture of an Ox. The second, a picture of a Tiger. The third, a picture of a Bunny. That couldn't be a coincidence. I looked around the computer a bit more, before finding a sign that seemed pertinent.

How to Start a Computer: A Guide:

The username will be the owner's first name. The password will be their role. Possible roles: tool, complicit, judge, killer. Note: Capitalization Matters.

...Yeah, this was definitely one of Brian's puzzles. I didn't quite get it, but I figured there was no harm in giving it a shot.

As you can probably guess, this is the main “lock” keeping players from hitting this route too early, as it expects you to have played enough of the other routes to know the answers. If you fail to unlock any of the other computers, Mouse goes back to the only one that was unlocked and starts digging around, trying to find anything. However, before she can find anything of note, a mystery assailant grabs Mouse from behind and chokes her to death. That's it.



[Ending – Ace of Diamonds]

Anyway, let's actually unlock the other computers – we have all the information we need. Starting with the computer with an ox on it, the username is Davis (his name, which we learned on Mouse's route) and the password is tool, as he was used as a tool to get the guilty verdict, being someone easy to fool.

Mouse unlocks all three computers before bothering to actually look at any of them, so we'll do the same – the second computer with a tiger's username is Zahara, and its password is killer, because of the rumors about her springing from the incident with her mother. The last computer, with a rabbit on it, is Gerry, with the password complicit, as he willingly took the fall for others' corruption and is willing to turn a blind eye to stuff.

Also, before anyone starts thinking about whether this is meant to be some kind of timeline-jumping weird pseudo-knowledge stuff... Nope, it's just Mouse doing her best to remember the names of some of the people involved with the case (information she would have learned considering her father was the defense attorney) and then trial and error-ing her way through.

[BGM: Queen of the Jungle]


I had done it! I wracked my brain hard, remembered the names of some of the people who had been involved with that case, took some guesses... and got through. Though the results were slightly concerning... more importantly, I had gotten all the computers open! It... was weird that the fourth computer was already open, and that there was still a word left unused... Had someone opened that computer already?

...Eh, that didn't matter right now. What mattered was the fact that I had three computer screens to check. I checked all of them, and found the only thing on each of them was an open .png file. The first computer had a 2, the second a 3, and the third a 4. Combining that with the 9 I had found earlier, it was a code of some sort. But... for what?

As soon as I checked the file names for all the images, I figured out what it was. Put together, it spelt 'Pig Minor Trinket'. It was... unorthodox, but I had gotten my hands on another Minor Trinket! Yes! My escapade had helped make even more progress for the group. But I wasn't alone in finding Trinkets. By the start of the seventh round, we had found 10 Minor Trinkets. It really looked like we were on a roll.

...However, it was at that point we ran into a bit of a problem.

[BGM: Lucky Foot]


So, hold on a second. We spent that entire round, and we didn't find anything? That's like... really bad, isn't it?

We are starting to run out of time. It'd be an awful shame if we weren't able to find enough trinkets by the end.

It would, so why are you saying it like that??

Like what?

Whatever, whatever, I don't have time to deal with you.

We've been rather methodical in our search up until this point, have we not? Nobody's been going over ground that's already been searched. If we continue to look for trinkets in vain...

...things could become quite vexing.

You're telling me! We've already done a full tour of this place. What's next, going back to places we've already seen?

How... dreary.



Have some of y'all not been doing your fuckin' job? How hard is it to find these things?

Perhaps they are being found, but simply not shared.

Wh-what are you talking about?

We are currently under the assumption that everyone is on the same page. However, it is pos–

Oh, can it, would you Snake? First of all, we only need one more Trinket. I can use my ability to hitch a ride on one of you guys. I'm sure there have been places we haven't checked yet, so let's keep looking.

I understand the concern. If a mere two Trinkets are entirely out of reach, the entire enterprise falls apart. I'm not entirely unconvinced Brian forgot to label one of his Minor Trinkets.

What are you talking about?

[BGM: Ox's Logic]


Earlier, I found something in the library which has the same shape and build as a Trinket. But there's nothing written on it. No code or anything.

A blank trinket, huh?

Hmm... was there anything else notable about the scene?

Not really? There was a written message that was odd. “I have stolen blood from my kin.” I didn't really get it, though.

Stolen blood from my kin, huh...?

A thought crossed my mind. Something that had stuck out like a sore thumb to me was the fact that certain Minor Trinkets had specific numbers written in red.

Hey, everybody, could we pool our Minor Trinkets on the table right here? I want to try looking at all the ones we've got so far.



I asked, and the group complied. There were three instances of a number in a sequence being colored red. Once on the first digit, once on the third, and once on the fourth. It seemed too important to be coincidental. If the missing Trinket had a red digit as well, that'd be four numbers. Like a four digit code. So, what, was I supposed to just take whatever number was written in red and put that in the place for an original 12th trinket?

If that were the case, then we wouldn't be able to solve this Trinket until we found the missing one. But... that solution seemed overly simplistic. And I felt like there was some pattern I was seeing with the numbers, something I couldn't quite put my finger on. I spent some more time looking at all the Trinkets. Some of the others had already split off to look for more Trinkets themselves. But I was onto something...

Suddenly, I realized the pattern I had been overlooking. All the four digit codes without a red number were divisible by 9. Every single one of them. And every four digit code with a red number wasn't. So that meant... Perhaps the red number was some sort of “false number”? And the real number would be the number that made the four digit code divisible by 9? So for the code 4376, with the number 6 written in red... The real number should actually be a 4. If my theory was correct, then the Minor Trinket Ox found should end with a 4.



I worked out the other red numbers, and got the code '5X24'. '5X24', huh... now if I only had that last number... ...Wait, what was I talking about? If all the codes were divisible by 9... I had solved it! I had pieced together an eleventh Trinket! ...Maybe. Honestly, a lot of my deduction was based off of guesswork. I had no assurance that I was actually right in my line of thinking. Well... there was really only one way of telling for sure.

This was originally an actual puzzle the player had to solve, but Themis took it out at some point because I guess it was deemed too much of a headache.

I made my way into an empty classroom and took out my tablet. I pressed the ITEM button. And I typed in '5724'. When I submitted it, I was worried I would be met with an error. However, to my surprise and delight, the code had worked.

YES!!

I cheered audibly.

What is it?

[BGM: Friendly Bunny]


Ox entered. He had been watching me work in silence for some time now.

I figured it out. I just input the code for the 11th Minor Trinket.

Oh?

Well, good for you. It appears we'll be able to finish things in the next two rounds, thanks to you. Very solid work.

Aw, thanks.

However, I must say – weren't you supposed to use your ability on one of us? What now?

Oh, er... well, you can use your ability. I'll move first, so you'll move one space after me. And then you can use the code I just input next round and I'll use my ability on you. That should get everything sorted, right?

Indeed, it should.