#floor analysis

The Abnormalities//EGO:

Scorched girl ("fourth Match Flame" (Currently "4th Match Flame"))

Happy Teddy Bear (The Forgotten (Formerly "Bear Paws" (Lob Corp))

Fairy Festival (Wingbeat)

Queen Bee (Hornet)

Snow Whites Apple (Green Stem)

happy teddy bear; scorched girl; fairy festival; and snow white's apple, all represent some form of loss or (in the latter two’s case) being betrayed.

The scorched girl was a child who lived a poor life selling matches, in the fires of the lit matches she saw hope for a better world bathed in the warmth that the flames provided, in her longing and pursuance for this better world, she burned to death; The Abnormality of the scorched girl is the soul of this child, betrayed and burned by the flames which promised her a better life.

Happy teddy bear is an abnormality that we have less knowledge of its past, only that it was abandoned and left to decay at some point by its previous owner; longing for attention the abnormality, upon finding someone who cherishes it like its old owner, will ensure that they are never going to leave

For the case of the Fairy Festival, it's the only one of the bunch to be the betrayer rather than not; the fairies of the festival will heal and take care of you, with ideas of them being able to sense goodness in people, and protecting those who are faithful and trustworthy (haha), but then: the hunger. The fairies are carnivorous creatures who simply attempt to keep their prey fresh through their “care”, being able to kill them in an instant despite their perceived nature.

I am not writing about Queen Bee

Snow white's apple, as the name suggests, is the witches poisoned apple from the fairy tale of snow white; the apple, after a single bite, was thrown to the side and left to rot, vermin and worms came over time, attempting to eat the apple, all of them died of the poison. After serving her use to both the witch and snow white, she was thrown to the side to rot, after which she started to look for her own path in life...

Angela and the Floor Realisation:

"Is it a sin that I was born this way?"

The thematic of isolation, which is present in the bear, apple, and child, is quite obvious to the realisation, Angela suffered untold period of pain, isolated from everyone surroundings her, suppressing her desires, her honest urges to stop the suffering of the employees, as doing so would only prolong the play;

Angela was punished for her existence; A machine created to be a human, created only to suffer endlessly where a human would not; Angela was punished for the sin of her birth, condemned to this hell, to orchestrate this play. 

As the finale of the play comes, the Girl who had nothing, who was denied happiness since creation, who was not allowed the warmth of the stage, not allowed to stand alongside the others, saw a future in the light, the whispers of a future she could make, if she only claims the light, Carmen’s promises of her truest desires, mirroring the world seen in the flames of the Match Girl.

As both of these children have nothing in life, the Match Girl and Angela both desperately seek these promises shown in the blaze, chasing the light, their hope of the future, as it is all they have left.

In seeking the future she saw, the Match Girl’s last match burned out, and she, no longer having the warmth to guide her, was consumed by the night.

"If this matchlight goes out, nothing will be left for me."

Angela’s story diverges in the end, being pulled from the light by her one and only friend, not letting her be consumed, forgotten as she was always meant to be.

In relation to the scorched girl, who seeks to burn all that there is in order to gain this sought world in the flames, Angela seeks fulfilment in burning down all that Ayin planned for her, the petty revenge to see the hopes of others burned the same way that hers was. 

 "Maybe I could be free after I’ve burned down all things and then myself."

In the course of Lobotomy Corporation’s story, Angela grew to despise A, her creator, after being abandoned, both left to follow the script, and in the finale, where she is expected to simply lay down and cease after serving her purpose; in this idea of being abandoned Angela Resonates with the Happy Teddy bear. Being modelled after Carmen, in Ayins futile attempt to replace what he had lost, Angela was created, a human machine, despised by her created for existing in the manner he dictated for her; Angela was not abandoned at the end, Ayin had abandoned her the moment of her birth, as soon as she first spoke.

“I remember you… You were a person with a warm smile…"

In this denial of an ending, a place to stand amongst the others as the show concluded, Angela, despite her value, her necessity in the play, was simply used as a blessing for others only to be cast aside, expected to rot.

In this desire of being denied an ending, of being disposable to those who needed her, Angela creates her own ending; In being forgotten, abandoned, left to rot, Angela’s desire for a life of her own is manifest through the library as a whole, and causes her to resonate with the Snow White's Apple:

"My existence was born from a yearning and began as a curse, yet I served as a blessing to others."

Akin to the apple, Angela was made to serve a purpose and be discarded; Both left waiting in their isolation, waiting for someone to come to them, waiting until the last moment for Ayin to look at her; As the apple grew limbs, in search of her own story, her own prince, Angela walks in search of what she had been denied, a life, a story, a happy ending rather than being neglected until the end.

Through the true ending of Lobotomy corporation, Angela makes the ultimate betrayal in defiance and spite of Ayin's plan; After eons of living simply to serve others, to complete this act of the play, she was still unable to stand on the stage with the others at the finale: 

The connection of the fairy festival is one of her deceptions, the presumption of her goodwill and servitude to the plan used to hide her true intentions. As Angela says herself:

"I did everything to care for you, so it’d be only fair that I get something in return."

Just like the famished fairy, being starved, deprived and denied of her innate desires for so long, Angela takes action herself, looking to consume hopes of others, the culmination of this time spent starving, all for herself.

Now, as she attempts to satiate her hunger, the desires that have been aged for millennia, denied for her sin of existing, Angela pilots the Librarians in the same manner that Ayin set the script; The Library’s guests, the librarians, the Sephirot, suffering to make Angela’s will manifest, sending countless to their deaths, to be killed and forgotten, all for her pursuit of humanity. 

"No one remembers those who gave their effort to raise the kingdom. It’s a truth that repeats on and on."

In taking on the role of the Queen, Angela takes the role of her father, forgetting those who suffered, who worked towards the ending, seeing others as disposable, only tools to achieve a purpose.

"There can’t be any meaning to a history that repeats itself. Attain the will to stand up straight by looking back? You know nothing about my past."

[Insert Natural Segue]

The Willingness to Stand up Straight:

Elijah, Malkuth:

Lobotomy Corporation, in regaining the memories of her trauma, Malkuth sees her death, in impatience she tested the substance Cogito on herself, after being denied as a test subject several times. (oh god that is one fucking sentence isn't it) In this recklessness, through her desire to help the Cogito project, her determination to make a difference in the project, Elijah, now Malkuth, died, decaying from the experiment. Writhing on the floor in pain, begging Ayin to turn around and help her, there is no option but to ignore her. Ayin did not remember everyone name, nor respond to or make "meaningless gestures" of praise, which only fueled Elijah's fervor to make a difference in the project, to have the fruits of her effort be tangible.

Overcoming this despair, in competing the Meltdown, Malkuth sees a glimmer of hope for improvement, she cannot continue to look back with hopes of changing her choices, to despair at her own actions. Instead, she sees the possibility of improvement, and gains the willingness to stand up straight, to hold her head high rather than being weighed down through her past.

Like Angela, Elijah was cast aside by Ayin, finding only despair when seeking rewards for her deeds:

Though already having faced her past, overcame her trauma, the Abnormalities on this floor represent Malkuth's, Elijah's, history:

Through Ayin's lack of validation, a desire begins to take place, hollow, demanding to be filled. Only driven further by her impatience, Elijah is driven to take action for this hunger, to finally satiate herself in return for her actions, in the same manner as Fairy festival.

The famished faeries (fairy's? fairies?), being unable to feed their desires for so long, begin to consume other faeries, destroying itself in the process.

"I knew I didn’t have any right to participate in the experiment, that’s why I was so impatient." "Will you finally praise me? I just want to feel proud."

In seeking her desires, wanting validation from Ayin for her efforts, Malkuth loses her hopes, being burned by the supposed source of her rewards, losing hope for the future.

in seeking this validation, like the Scorched Girl seeking the world seen in the flames, Elijah's story ends in a death, alone and forgotten by others.

"Make sure you feel this horrible sense of helplessness to your core, right to your heart."

After working so hard, sacrificing herself to be useful, to finally be praised by Ayin, he refuses to turn around to see her. Not even acknowledging her, even as she reaches out to him.

Just like all the others who have been burned by Ayin in the past, Elijah represents the workers of the queen bee, seen as disposable by the queen (Ayin Queen Bee art is next on my to do list), sacrificing everything for the greater workings yet never being remembered, not being rewarded, only discarded when they have outlived their usefulness.

"No one remembers those who gave their effort to raise the kingdom. It’s a truth that repeats on and on."

After everything that she had done, she was abandoned by Ayin, forgotten, left to the wayside to rot, to be forgotten, like the Apple and the Bear which appear before us.

"Be honest, back then it wasn’t that hard to turn around and look back at me."

Where the story of these two abnormalities diverge follows the point where they were abandoned. While the bear seeks the fulfillment of a new, loving owner, the Apple seeks its own path in life, growing to find its own path, its own fulfillment. While Elijah, now Malkuth, was abandoned by Ayin, in the past, rather than seeking the same fulfillment that she sought from Ayin, she looks to the future, with hope of improvement, the Will to stand up Straight.

Angela:

Like Malkuth looks back at Elijah to gain hope, to know that her past does not define her, Angela must realize the same, as we can see from her quotes in the realization:

"Attain the will to stand up straight by looking back? You know nothing about my past."

In the same way that Ayin refused to look back on Elijah, refused to create a place on the stage for Angela, the sufferings of both were ignored.

Angela refuses to look back at her past, to realise what she has become. Angela cannot gain hope for the future without accepting her past, she cannot gain the Will to Stand up Straight as long as she is defined by her suffering, by her past.

"Looking back on myself… It wasn’t even so difficult to do."

Angela says, mirroring Malkuth's own words towards Ayin.

Angela, following the realisation, like Malkuth, looks towards the future, to seek her own path, undefined by her trauma, free from the script that bound her.

. Thank you for reading this Essay, the Ayin Queen Bee thing is not a joke, there is an actual list and it was next down.

If you liked this essay consider following and/or suggesting something for me to write about.

and for a final note, a quote from Angela's realisation:

"I can’t fly with ragged and tattered wings."

~~~

The story of “Today’s Shy Look” is one of a person being forced to express themselves to the community despite being shy, they wanted them to express emotions to show that they are happy - Shy Look took to flaying their skin and carving 5 faces on different patches, so that they would be able to wear these masks and express their emotions, pleasing the people of their community; 

ostensibly Today’s Shy Look’s story is one of neurodivergence, more specifically developmental disorders such as ADHD, or in this story’s case, Autism, fitting the thematic of an inability to express oneself, and a societal expectation to do so.

The flaying of the child’s skin is analogous to the harm that this societal pressure can create among children who diverge from the norm, having to change themselves in order to please others, to fit the permanent square peg into the permanent round hole; to climb up the slope of the bell curve; to become Normal.

The story may also be read in a more literal sense, the harm which society places on divergent children being not only that of an inordinate social pressure, but the actions which may follow, actions which bare a much more direct parallel to the child’s flaying of their skin.

There is a correlation between self harming and Alexithymia (Norman et al., 2020), a common symptom in ASD (Kinnaird et al., 2019); Additionally there is proposedly a correlation with ASD and developing psychiatric disorders, specifically depression and anxiety (Lugnegård et al., 2011);

Due to a harder time understanding emotions and an inability to properly express them, individuals with ASD are more likely to self harm (Vandewalle & Melia, 2021)

; those who lack healthy support, are more prone to viewing themselves as being “incorrect”, leading to attempted “Self correction” or “punishment” when one does not act to their expectations, this concept of heightened standards is called perfectionism (Frost et al., 1990;) (Gyori & Balazs, 2021).

Often  i have noticed a correlation between emotion repression and low self esteem alongside a sense of perfectionism (conjecture, 2024), additionally comes a link between self harming and shame, using it as a form of motivation (Schoenleber et al., 2014).

We can elaborate on this concept through the lines present in Library of Ruina and Lobotomy Corporation:

“Goodness, why are you making such a face? You're making others feel gloomy too. Please be more considerate, you don't live in this world alone after all.” 

The concept of deviation from societal norms being something that should be eliminated, the shame that the child may have felt for abstracting from the norm ; The posing of the child as “Selfish” or “inconsiderate” when they are the ones expected to change their ways for the others, leading to the belief that they are the ones required to change, that they are the ones who have done something wrong;

"Do I look a bit better now? I hope I do…"

The pressure and desire to conform to the ways of the society, the disregard for their own suffering in lieu of the community’s values;

"What the fuck do you want from me? To keep smiling like an idiot?!"