Apologies for taking so long. For the past few weeks, I was going all-in with a personal project that’s actually not game related for once. But well, the first draft’s basically done! But forget my story, we’ve got to return to a story that’s haunted this site for months.

Michel awakens in a new world, and he immediately finds differences from past experiences. For one thing, Michel is actually There. He’s not a ghostly observer like in the normal doors, he was straight up isekai’d into Morgana’s last days. Furthermore, he is not alone. While still trapped in the darkness of the manor, Giselle can hear and see through Michel and aid him. Michel is the player, and Giselle is his chat. Giselle might not have the right ideas 100% of the time, but she’s a boon considering Michel’s poor socialization skills. To emphasize this change in the story, Michel and Giselle’s faces are now shown in the dialogue boxes to show who’s talking.

To emphasize that Michel was actually isekai’d, he gets spotted by the original Mell. They talk a bit, and while Mell’s a bit of a smart-ass, Michel and Giselle agree that he isn’t a straight up bad guy. Michel has the shade of Mell from the previous chapter in mind, as while Yukimasa’s and Jacopo’s were huge assholes, Mell’s shade was sad and guilt-ridden. They decide that Mell will be their first step to freeing Morgana.

Michel asks Mell to bring him to the nearby city, the version of the town Giselle once took refuge in before it was upended. As it happens, a festival is approaching in three days – and when that festival happens, Morgana will die and become Odio.

Taking another step, Michel asks Mell to take him to check out the church, aka, manor before Morgana, and Michel meets the nun, also known as the Saintess. Now, the Saintess isn’t Maria like I originally thought; I completely forgot about her, but the Saintess is actually the original version of Yukimasa’s lover, Pauline. To emphasize this, she sets herself as a big sister figure to Mell, much like her later version did to the kid Javi.

Michel asks if he could sleep in the church. While the church normally lodged the needy, the Saintess turns him down for reasons she doesn’t know about, showing that she was an accessory to Morgana’s torture instead of an active participant. The Saintess, though, at least offers Saint’s Blood as a medication for Michel to take, and it causes the mask to slip and Mell to get suspicious.

Mell takes Michel aside for a bit, and Michel dissuades him from doing more about his suspicions by just saying that he’s merely worried about it using actual blood. He does convince Mell to give him lodging at the church until the festival, since Mell is also lodged there for Normal reasons. Michel and Giselle brainstorm a bit, and figure that if they can’t directly get Mell on their side, they gotta go through his sister.

Michel goes to the lonely cabin Mell and Nellie reside in on a plot to ingratiate Michel to Nellie, which was actually the past version of the house Michel’s supplier stayed in. Giselle and Nellie cringe at Michel’s attempts to get Nellie to like him, but Nellie likes him enough to crown him as her second brother. After getting her to yap about Mell, Michel decides to drop some truths on her.

As it happens, Giselle already knows that the Saint’s Blood is blood, but she thinks it’s from the Saintess, as she was too sick to register the original source of the blood giving it to her directly. Michel reveals the harsher truth that not only is the blood from an unwilling person, but Mell’s an active participant in the exploitation. Unsurprisingly, Nellie strips Michel of Big Brother 2 and kicks him out.

Going back to his room in the church manor – which was actually the original version of the room Michel housed himself in – he talks to Mell. Michel decides, fuck time rules, and just drops to Mell that he’s from the future and knows what’s going on and what’s going to happen. Mell admits to what’s going on, but refuses to give him one of the keys locking Morgana up and threatens to tell the other jailors to get Michel killed. Then the door opens.

Michel may be socially inept, but he’s not stupid. He told Nellie to come to his room to eavesdrop and hear it from the horse’s mouth. Despite all her big brother worship, Nellie is distraught and Mell sinks further into his guilt. But Michel wants them to keep things together. He didn’t want to ruin their relationship, and he recognizes that Mell is comparatively just a guy compared to the other conspirators. So, he gets Nellie to stick around so that Mell could tell his truth.

Mell and Nellie were once members of a rich family. Contrasting their future versions, however, they were effectively disowned from their family when the father died. The siblings tried to rough things out in a lonesome house, and an unhealthy dynamic started to emerge. Nellie started viewing Mell as her prince and developed incestual feelings, and while Mell didn’t like the incest, he did like being seen as a prince. It made him feel important, and he struggled to find a feeling of importance with his banishment. For Mell, he wanted to maintain his princely image to Nellie, less because he cared about her, but it made him feel strong; it feels like a parallel to how future Yukimasa’s love of his White-Haired Girl was more about the stability she provided him than actual love for her.

Then, Nellie started getting sick. In searching for cures, Mell eventually learned about Morgana. He actually tried to strike up a healthy friendly relationship with her, taking her on visits for herbs. Honestly, I feel vindicated that Mell just loves creepy women; in fact, Mell shamefully admits that he could have abandoned Nellie and been Morgana’s prince instead. Eventually, their relationship grew to the point that Morgana revealed her past to Mell and her sincere belief that she’s the child of God. She didn’t want to grow close to Mell, not because she hated him, but she saw herself as existing beyond humanity and felt that she could only find solidarity with similar people. I suppose that’s why she was kinda close to Michel, given his intersex nature; in fact, Mell later explicitly says that Michel gives off the same aura Morgana did.

Mell took Morgana to heal Giselle for the first time. When she was better, Mell invited Morgana for dinner so Giselle could properly meet her savior, but Morgana refused. At this point, Morgana believed that her blood requires belief for it to work and wants to stay anonymous to keep the blood working, thinking that he blessing wouldn’t work if Nellie saw its origin; she was kinda close to believing in the placebo effect there. On repeat visits however, Mell started growing fearful of Morgana. His growing lack of visits and lack of personal time on Morgana’s end wasn’t because he was losing interest in her for everything but her blood like she believed, but he did start to genuinely think of her as something godly and didn’t want to impose too much.

But you know who wanted to impose? The Joker baby. Past Yukimasa – name yet to be revealed – strode into Mell’s house on one of Giselle’s sick periods, demanding that Mell grant him access to Morgana. The swordsman offered to give Mell Morgana’s arm if he helps… but contrary to previous belief, Mell actually refused. To that, Yukimasa decided to just threaten to kill Nellie in her bed, forcing Mell to play along.

Mell got Morgana open to open the door, but now seeing things from his perspective, there’s the implication that Morgana genuinely missed having him around. Yukimasa, of course, made his move and chopped Morgana’s arm off and offered it to Mell. Mell did run off with the arm, not to give to Nellie like Morgana thought, but to throw it in the lake, too guilty and horrified to do so.

Yukimasa visited Mell again to make an offer: collaborate with him and his lord in maintaining the new Saint’s Blood economy. Mell was the only one trusted to collaborate but well, if he doesn’t want to, they can’t let someone that knows the true source of Saint’s Blood running around. And so, facing death, Mell agreed to become part of the conspiracy.

The story returns to the present. Nellie forgives Mell, seeing him as another victim, but Michel is far harsher. Yes, there was no way Mell could have fought Yukimasa, but he could have stuck by Morgana. If Mell couldn’t have fought Yukimasa when they visited Morgana, he could have at least made it clear that he was coerced instead of running away, or chosen not to pick up the arm. Mell is the one made to deliver Morgana her food, but he’s too shameful to talk to her – and Michel insists that he should have been. Mell may not have been a willing participant in Morgana’s torture, but he willingly contributed to her emotional pain by refusing to take responsibility, letting himself get dragged along by the other conspirators.

But Michel offers him a way out. If he’s truly sorry about Morgana’s fate, he should collaborate with Michel. Thankfully, Mell agrees. So, Mell and Nellie go off, wanting to work toward a more healthier relationship, Nellie accepting that she could die but not wanting to live at the expense of someone else.

Two more days until Morgana’s death, and that’s two allies gained!

There’s a mystery on the horizon. Michel and Giselle identify the Saintess as their connecting thread to Yukimasa, but… where is Jacopo’s connecting thread? Only five figures – the men, Nellie, and the Saintess – showed up in Morgana’s recollection. There has to be a version of Maria somewhere since writing from a past version of her was found in the mansion, but where could she be?

For now, Michel must face the next day. After Mell wakes him up, Michel attempts to approach the Saintess. Unfortunately, she’s too busy serving beggars and festival workers food to help him. To pass the time, Michel scouts ahead a little and checks out the tower Morgana’s locked in…

Unfortunately! Yukimasa is here – Michel and Giselle can’t remember his name because they’re European, but I’m sticking with Yukimasa for practicality’s sake. Michel accidentally reveals that he’s not surprised that Yukimasa showed up and outs Mell as telling him the schedule. Michel tries to slip past by pretending that Mell’s totally a friend he’s visiting on his travels and he was just wandering around just because.

To Michel and Giselle’s surprise, Yukimasa strikes up a short conversation. Yukimasa sees a parallel in Michel due to his unique appearance and his own appearance as an Asian man in a vaguely European country. Combined with the fact that Yukimasa isn’t as openly kill happy as he was in Door 2 and Morgana’s recollection, Michel hopes that they could have a civil conversation in the future. Yukimasa still tells him to buzz off, though.

To put a damper on this bit of progress, though, Michel secures audience with the Saintess, who reveals… her name is actually Marie? Beforehand, Mell told Michel about his doubts in the Saintess knowing Yukimasa, and combined with this, Michel and Giselle are put off guard. Undeterred, Michel straight up tells Marie that a girl’s locked in the tower, and she’s not hearing it. Marie insists that the tower is actually a storehouse for the lord’s wealth since people are constantly trying to assassinate him.

Much like my past disappointments in my theorizing being supposedly wrong, Michel and Giselle are bummed. They’re pretty sure that Yukimasa’s doing everything to support Pauline. Michel heads outside where it’s a nice and bright afternoon and, well, whoops, Michel still has horrible sensitivity to sunlight and passes out.

Michel awakens in a cabin. Specifically, Morgana’s cabin, and while Giselle’s not there, the version of Morgana before her kidnapping is there. Was Michel isekai d further back in time to before Morgana’s capture? Is it a hallucination? Is present day Morgana playing another Joker’s trick on Michel? Regardless of the case, Michel chats up the past version of Morgana.

In talking to Morgana, he brings up the parallels between their characters in that they were both born in circumstances that othered themselves in society. They both endured suffering because of the images they projected to the world: Morgana for projecting herself as a healer and being taken advantage of for it, Michel for projecting himself as a man and being discriminated against. In fact, at the end of this segment, Michel openly says that he could have become an Odio like Morgana if he didn’t have Giselle.

Going further, Michel says that Morgana did not ask to be born the way she was, and… and…

….Combined with the fact that an intersex trans man is delivering this talk, there’s no way not to interpret this as a metaphor for living as a trans person. He assures Morgana that she could find a path to normalcy if she finds someone that can truly stick by her, which feels like a reminder of the importance of solidarity.

I earnestly cried during this part of the game and needed to take a break, because man, things really got worse for trans people since the last time I played the game, with the United Kingdom legally defining trans women to not be women. But I’ve seen the protests against that ruling. No matter how dark things get, there’s always a Giselle out there.

Again, the upcoming adaptation better not skimp on or ignore the transgender elements of the House in Fata Morgana.

The past Morgana expresses doubt that she can find normalcy like Michel has as he begins to wake, and Morgana’s present self makes fun of his and Giselle’s hopium in uplifting her and preventing her suffering. Just a real negative nancy, but she’s not exactly moving to stop them…

Michel wakes up as night approaches. Nellie stops by to check on him, and then Mell comes. Because of Michel’s talk with Yukimasa earlier, he invited him and Mell to have dinner. To avoid arousing suspicion, they go to have dinner.

The vibes are so rancid. Nobody wants to eat. Michel and Mell try to maintain the cover they made up for Michel when Yukimasa keeps digging into them. Yukimasa asks Mell the normal theoretical question: if Michel and Nellie were gonna fall off a cliff and he only had time to save one of them, who would he save? Michel kinda calls him out for bringing the vibes down and Yukimasa just acts like an average X the Everything App (blaze your glory) poster about it. Yukimasa decides to leave, and the other two agree that they should watch their backs for the rest of the night.

Before Mell leaves, Michel asks him who the lord is, since Michel and Giselle’s theorizing has been wrong. They’re owned yet again: the lord is actually a man named Jean-Francois Barnier, and not a Jacopo as they expected. However, something gets their brain cells rattling. I excused it as just flavor text in the past, but Jean Francois Barnier has actually been mentioned in the past, specifically through a journal he kept complaining about mundane shit that actually appeared multiple times. He may not be a Jacopo, but the fact that it popped up in multiple time periods makes him an important figure in the tale of the manor…

The brainstorming is interrupted by someone nearly breaking into the room. The invader runs away, at least confirming that it isn’t Yukimasa showing up to kill Michel, but Michel gives chase. The invader was actually the story’s missing figure: Maria, whose original self was a sex worker. Marie hears the commotion and shows up and Maria recognizes her and scoffs at her calling herself Marie. Turns out, the Saintess really is Pauline and she adopted the name Marie when she became a nun; I imagine Michel and Giselle felt vindicated by their theorizing being proven right despite false flags like I was.

Maria and Pauline decide to have some girl time to catch up and invite Nellie into their escapades. Maria decides to invite Michel along to have some fun with, reasoning that he doesn’t have the balls to do anything wrong. Michel’s hurt by the unintentional insult toward him, but she squarely affirms him as a man to screw around with, so no harm done. The girls initially talks about the kinds of men they’re into, and Michel sees it as a chance to confirm if Pauline really is a link to Yukimasa. Maria is about guys that are total subs, you go queen, and well, Nellie’s still into the princely type like her brother, but maybe the incestual feelings are behind her.

Before Pauline says her type though, she demands Michel to share what kind of woman he’s into. Out of curiosity, I made Michel say that he’s not into women. Nellie is initially horrified, thinking that the reason why Michel wants to be around Mell is because he’s interested in him. But then… she sees it as an opportunity for two brothers to be around her all the time, and she starts fujoshiing out. Michel assures everyone that he has a woman as a partner and Maria winks and tells him that she’ll back him up and Pauline states that love can take all forms, giving the implication that they read Michel as bisexual.

It’s all very jokey, but it’s actually sweet that the women accept the idea of Michel being into men and support him despite the setting. Nellie? She’s a kind, all-loving girl yet to be warped by Morgana’s Joker antics. Maria? Look, if her future self’s interactions with the White-Haired Girl means anything, she’s definitely queer. Pauline is a surprise since she gives off the vibe that she’s a devoted Christian – though then again, maybe choosing this option is meant to foreshadow that Pauline isn’t entirely that. It actually makes me wonder how the women would take Michel being an intersex trans man, that maybe they would have accepted him…

Back on track, Pauline insists that she doesn’t love anyone due to her duty to the church. She and Maria start catching up, revealing that they once stayed in the same orphanage. Maria, though, left the orphanage because of the director’s treatment of kids like her, and she escaped to a brothel… which was raided by bandits. Realizing how much the timeline matches with Morgana’s story, Michel asks Maria if she knew a Morgana, and turns out, she does.

Emboldened by the reveal, with Nellie backing him up, Michel tells Maria about the observation tower. Michel and Nellie push on Pauline to believe them and tell what she knows, but Pauline sticks to the official story. Maria scoffs at her for being someone too trusting and too stubborn to consider other viewpoints. Pauline acts defensive, saying that someone like Yukimasa wouldn’t participate in what everyone’s accusing, and Michel seizes the chance to point out she must personally know Yukimasa if she could definitively say that.

Pauline’s finally out-logic’d, but she wants to save telling her truths tomorrow. Everyone heads off, but before Maria takes her leave, Michel asks her if she originally broke into his room to sneak off to have a tryst with the lord. Nope, turns out, Maria actually broke in hoping to murder the lord. Beyond the grounds of the manor, there’s horrible poverty – it’s a repeat of the American economy seen behind the third door. But curiously, despite the resonance of events, Jacopo’s not present yet. Is this Jean-Francois Barnier an alternative Jacopo, or is Jacopo someone we’re yet to meet? Regardless, Maria also promises to talk to Michel some more tomorrow.

Michel and Giselle enjoy a spring snow, and the next day looms. They may not have gained another key, but they have two more allies, so maybe everything will be alright…

…And I will end this post here, because holy fuck, this is a long chapter. I’m hooked, but I need to step away a little bit. There’s some good tension ratcheting up, with truths waiting to make themselves known and a mysterious lord on the horizon. I know for sure we’ll learn about this Pauline and Yukimasa more, but what about everything else? Well, given that Maria was a figure that snuck on the grounds of the manor, it’s possible that Jacopo also did… but what exactly will Jacopo do to earn the ire of Morgana if he’s not the lord that tortured her? Maybe he’s a separate threat that caused Morgana’s direct death? She did die kinda suddenly, after all…

There’s a lot of mysteries lingering for the next part… my medical leave’s finally up at the end of next month, so hopefully I finish up The House in Fata Morgana before my leave ends! Remember folks, introduce good stories like this to those nerds still stubbornly sticking to YA wizard shlock!