LightningQueen11

Text in 1st image:

"CIRCE!"

"Careful what you wish for!"

Text in 2nd image:

"Those idiots..." "HEY JOKER, LEADER OF THE PHANTOM THIEVES!"

"Are you really going to just sit there and take it?"

"Any rumors today?"

Text in 3rd image:

"your info."

"Is it a mask? Is it a shadow cast by the hat? Who knows!"

"I hear you deal in information. Tell me, what do you know of the Phantom Thieves?"

---

Ok so Witch, as I've been calling them in my head because that's their codename and I don't have an actual name for them yet (recommendations appreciated) is partially a replacement for Ohya. Not for the Devil arcana nevessarily, but for the 'reporter' trope.

Witch is the president of the newspaper club, though you wouldn't know it from how her clubmates talk about her. She's a bit of a loner- not bad with people or anything, just generally unwilling to get to know anyone on a deeper level out of her own personal choice. Witch doesn't trust people, she thinks everyone has an ulterior motive and won't actually say what they mean. This is why she's part of the newspaper club, dedicated to uncovering the hidden meanings and the context behind what people say.

It's part of her work trying to peel back the layers that leads her to follow Ren, Ryuji, and Ann and consequently get stuck in the Metaverse for the first time. I'm torn between whether this is in Mementos or in Madarame's palace, but either way she manages to escape the Thieves' notice and starts to explore the Metaverse on her own. She hears the mad ramblings of the Shadow Self, and finally she sees that "this is it! This is the truth I've been digging for!" She writes down everything, both disgusted and somewhat vindicated to know that people truly are as two-faced as she believes- nay, knows them to be. But as she's distracted a shadow corners her, backs her against the wall and she can't find a way out, she's going to die here.

Cue awakening, pictured in the 2nd sketch page. Her persona is Circe, the witch who turned men into pigs because she believed that was their true form. Witch narrowly escapes, now knowing the Phantom Thieves' true identity and how they operate- partially. She doesn't know how they 'change hearts' yet. After some deliberating, Witch decides she's going to keep that little tidbit a secret. The Phantom Thieves expose people for who they truly are deep down, and she can respect that. The other information though? The things shadows say in the metaverse- Witch could uncover so much. She could know everything, about everyone! All she'd have to do was find their shadow and listen.

From there, Witch begins her journey into becoming a sort of information dealer. She's pretty loose in terms of morals, after all, no one is innocent in this world, and rapidly begins to become something of an underground legend in Tokyo. The witch, who can reveal anyone for the pig they are. She keeps a loose eye on the phantom thieves, and Ren comes to her occasionally for tips on the goings on around school. Beyond that, they mostly interact through rumors. Occasionally mementos shadows will mention The Witch that lingers around, always listening, a distinct figure from the Black Mask.

Witch herself learns about the Black Mask pretty quickly in her metaverse escapades, it's not like he's ever needed to truly hide from Shadows. Her and Akechi interact little, he knows of her and her information dealings and has an inkling that she's the same person as the one in the Metaverse, but doesn't see her as a threat and occasionally goes to bargain for info. Witch doesn't care too much about Akechi one way or another, she appreciates the role detectives play but still sees him as just another two-faced liar like everyone else. She won't give him anything useful on the thieves, she doesn't want them caught, but she'll treat him like any other client should he come around.

Eventually Witch and the Phantom Thieves meet in Mementos. Sometime in the middle of Okumura's palace, I think. Witch has gone on a couple tailing adventures and knows who most of them are except for Futaba/Oracle and Haru/Noir because she wasn't here last time. The thieves are wary of Witch, who greets them all curtly by codename. They ask who she is and what she's doing here, and she introduces herself as.. Witch will do. Futaba goes "hold on, like, THAT Witch? The info broker?" Witch neither confirms nor denies, and Ann connects her to the lurking witch that shadows keep talking about. Obviously, they're one in the same. Witch congratulates them sarcastically for that incredible revelation, she's so glad she was interrupted for that totally-not-obvious fact. Anyway, as for what she's doing here.. she's investigating for a client. And if they're worried about her telling people who they are or what they do, they shouldn't be. She hasn't ratted them out so far and she's not planning to do so now. Ren, finding Witch oddly familiar, decides to offer her a seat in the monabus so they can drive her to whoever she's investigating. It's not worth chancing the reaper. Witch declines, says if there's nothing else she'll be on her way, and actually starts walking away. Ren, being a little bit of a little shit, decides to drive veeeeery slowly behind Witch until she gets fed up and goes "FINE!" The Phantom Thieves don't know how to feel about this.

Witch isn't a party member, she won't follow orders and instead acts rarely on her own to cast spells with Circe. Still, Ren learns that she's not a particularly combat-oriented Persona User. Circe's skills are all one stage below the Thieves', though she is able to use a wide variety of those weaker elemental attacks. Every time she acts, Witch prioritizes afflicting an ailment of some sort and then, if she can't flee, doing technical damage to win. Her persona has a very boosted chance of ailments overall, and it makes a decent amount of sense how she survived against shadows much more powerful than her.

The party eventually arrives at Witch's destination, and decide to watch as she goes in and just starts... Talking to the shadow, a notepad and a pen in hand, she listens to everything the shadow has to say, occasionally steering the conversation towards whatever might be the most valuable as potential blackmail. She's very careful not to directly anger the shadow, pretending to be sympathetic and agree with all their horrible points until she's finally got enough and puts the notepad away. Raising an eyebrow at the thieves, she asks if they're one of the targets too or if they can go. It isn't, so they can.

Noir asks what's going to happen with the info she got, and Witch tells her she's going to ask a couple more shadows about this guy, see what she can dig up in real life to back up what she heard here, and hand this off to her client. "Yes but, what will the client do with it?" Witch shrugs. "Blackmail, probably. Every so often it's an undercover cop/PI, or a rich person wanting to know if someone's trustworthy. I couldn't tell you for sure, I don't ask questions." Again, the thieves don't know how to feel about this.

Before parting ways, Joker decides to ask how Witch might feel as a Phantom Thief. He can convince the team if need be. Witch rejects immediately. Not only does she want nothing to do with the Phantom Thieves, they don't even know who she is! Absolutely not, she's not joining. Ren, of course, takes this as a challenge and tracks down Witch in real life. It's not hard, they're in the same school and Ren has interacted with her pretty often. Witch doesn't find it all that impressive, and still declines to join the Thieves, but you finally start her confidant at least! I'm not gonna get into that because it's not currently necessary and because it's also not entirely fleshed out.

From here Witch just keeps getting approached by the thieves for one reason or another and at first she still really doesn't want anything to do with them. She's not a 'team' person. She definitely doesn't do trust. Yeah, she writes favorably about them in the school newspaper but that doesn't mean she wants to be a part of their little band. Interacting with them though, learning about their experiences and telling them about hers, she finds that she doesn't particularly mind their company. Occasionally, you'll find Witch in Mementos and have the option to have her tag along in your party, with increasing frequency as she grows closer to the thieves.

Of course, Witch doesn't believe that the thieves are responsible for Okumura's death and continues to support them, no matter what. It's not like she had anything to lose from doing so, she's just the newspaper club girl. She tags along a little during the school festival, but isn't a part of Akechi's blackmail. They'll meet in Mementos once, Witch will tell Akechi they're occasional allies of convenience. She doesn't take part in their 'phantom thievery.' Akechi blithely asks if they know each other in real life like the rest of the team, and Witch just smirks and goes "wouldn't you like to know, Mr. Detective."

After Ren's reported death she makes her way to LeBlanc and strongarms her way into seeing Ren's alive. Witch thought- God, Witch doesn't know what she thought, she just knew it was way too likely for the cops to have killed him or something and she couldn't stand that. She doesn't want him to die. The thieves ask for info on Masayoshi Shido, even offer to pay (her rates are expenssssiveee) but this one's on the house. Witch has heard a lot about Shido in her info-gathering, none of it good. He's a captain, running a tight ship throughout the underworld. The Thieves ask one more time if Witch wants to join them, and Witch shakes her head no for the last time. She's got to focus on damage control in the real world. Find the people involved in the conspiracy, so when the thieves finally take Shido down she can spread the word about every single person that even breathed near the guy. Consider it her one and only act of charity. (I consider this her 'big moment' in the game, she's always meant to be something other than the PTs.)

The thieves defeat Shido and true to her word, Witch releases everything. It's a lot, even for her, and yet no one cares. Finally, FINALLY, Witch joins the team for the trip into Mementos to steal the public's treasure. It's late game and honestly I have doubts about how useful she'd be, but I don't care about gameplay viability I just wanna blabber on about my cool OC. She's pretty shocked to hear a lot of the stuff from the thieves about how they operate- she's never entered a palace after a calling card, security level's too high, so she's never seen a treasure. Honestly, she just kind of thought they beat the Shadow up and told them what they're doing is wrong. Which is... Not entirely false. Besides this she doesn't actually have a big exciting moment in mind for anything like the confrontation with Yaldabaoth, outside of the general thief moments everyone has.

Witch does participate in third sem! Outside of Joker and Akechi, she's the first to realize something's up and break out. Her 'wish' is something that I'll probably figure out when I get to her confidant. I have ideas, though. Anyway, Witch once again becomes a member of the thieves and really hates Maruki, almost as much as Akechi. Akechi? She can tolerate, she appreciates his honesty at least. Better to be honest about your depravity than hide it behind the guise of selflessness like Maruki is doing. Really, she and Akechi parallel each other a lot in the third sem. Maybe, by the end, they could even be friends.

Post-game Witch closes down her info business, cashing in a lot of favors and using Futaba's help to abandon all ties to what she did before. She has a group of friends now, and is absolutely LOADED alongside Ren and Haru. Things are finally looking up.