Okay, finished the second door, and oh boy there is a lot to unpack here. (I might have written a bit too much lol)
HUGE SPOILERS, ONLY READ AFTER FINISHING DOOR 2
This door starts of a bit slower, with the introduction of the ‘monster’, it slowly learning human words and acquiring the mannerisms and starting to resemble a “human”. The monster calls himself Bestea when the maid asks him for his name .
After a while, a trader visits the mansion, which Bestea ends up killing after the trader mentions a knife he has on him to protect himself from the monster the villagers are talking about.
We are then briliantly misled into thinking that the merchant Bestea killed is ポーリーン’s beloved. I really enjoyed how here it cut straight to ポーリーンbeing told her beloved was killed, since the merchant also mentioned a sweetheart he has back home. It didn’t even occur to me that the merchant here had no sprite at the time, even though ポーリーン’s actual beloved did in the later scenes…
From then on, every week he kills another human who wonders into the mansion to satisfy his craving for blood. Eventually, a white haired girl who is described to be near identical in apperance to the door 1 white haired girls appears at the mansion. (So a descendant? Could their lineage be somehow also connected to the mansion in a deeper way?) When bestea goes to kill her when he’s sure she’s asleep, he finds out she doesn’t fear him killing her like all the other people he’s killed up till then. She couldn’t see Bestea since she was blind, and kept telling him how he’s a human and not a monster. (Here I really just thought “Huh, so it’s like a beauty and a best kinda twisted scenario?”). From then on, he kept her by her side, as she didn’t reject him and he felt like she could help him achieve his 平穏.
Then next week, into the mansion visited another “beast”. In fear, Bestea runs away from it, but makes a stand to “protect” the girl. He slays the monster, but that breaks his mental state further. Then he tells us of his past, how first thing he remembers is the village and being called Bestea. (I liked how here, it misled us again to think, that Bestea killed because of the fear and rejection pointed towards him by the humans and not because of an actual desire for killing. This entire door really was keeping us in the dark quite briliantly.)
Then we find out, that ポーリーン came to the vilage to look for him, and after talking to ハビ a few times, whos parents and friends were all killed by Bestea, he leads her to the monsters mansion, where finally, the big bomb is dropped on us. ポーリーン recognizes Bestea and bangs on the door, and whe he opens, she calls him ユキマサ, her beloved… And this is the same scene where Bestea killed another “monster”, just from ポーリーン’s POV…
Now at first, this doesn’t really make sense, but since ユキマサ saw himself as a beast and was from the same country as ポーリーン’s father, it isn’t too hard to imagine what’s going on. The villagers saw him as a beast since he was a different race (heavily implied to be japanese), right after he had amnesia after drifting ashore and was on the verge of death. He then saw himself as a beast too due to the villagers, and ポーリーン who was half of the same race, then seemed a beast to him too.
We also learn of ユキマサ 's past memories through his dreams, all the while he’s becoming more and more unstable. In those memories, we find out that he had the desire to kill since the beginning, and truly enjoyed it. It was also funny how after learning this, one interaction between ユキマサ and ポーリーン was shown again, this time taking on a much different tone, similar to how the scene from childhood was shown in door 1 at the end.
At the end, the single person he wanted to protect, the white girl, is killed by villagers while ユキマサ was at the village trying to buy medicine for her. He then returns, finds her killed and thus loses his “chain” binding him to peace. In the cellar, surrounded by men from the village, the door closes…
Oh boy this was such a wild ride. Was really starting off slower and felt a bit long at times, but it gradually did build up interest and the twist really reminded me just how much impact on a story can the perspective from which it is being told have. Really liked how well this door was able to mislead me, only to then drop the brutal truth.
poor ポーリーン
Smiling ポーリーン
But don’t forget, the sea is pretty
Umineko called, they want their seagulls back
.
. At least there was no mention of him learning to read so far. I love what an enormous shift this story is, from the problems of nobles to violent beastmen. I loved all the mood setting descriptions of how the place has become ruined and the surrounding natural beauty and conflict. It’s probably good I’m reading this now that I have enough experience with Japanese to appreciate writing style elements a little better.
I have to confess this door is not pulling me in as much as the first one did. But maybe it’s just getting started…
