#forever dead

“You don’t understand, do you? I used to be like you. I barely remember, but I used to be like you. I cared so much about people, I cried everytime someone was hurt. I suffered for a long time stuck in here caring about people." "I know what you’re going through. You’re going to hold on as long as you have, with hope that you can make it out of here with everyone. Then you’re going to despair. That lasts a while, too." "Then you’ll get bored. Like me." "And you’ll wish you were still suffering. Anything else is better than boredom." "I wish I could feel something, anything else, other than being bored. I’m stuck in here for eternity, and I know everything that could possibly happen. I know how everyone reacts to a murder, what makes people turn to despair, what fills people with hope and make them survive until we all run out of food and starve to death." "I wish I could feel terrified, or afraid, or angry. But I can’t anymore. I don’t feel anything at all except boredom." "Do you understand, Teacher?" "This is why I’m letting you suffer as long as possible. Because it’s better than the alternative." "I’m sorry. I don’t envy you." "You’ll understand eventually.”

As you can see, it’s pretty weird. You got some character monologuing to some “Teacher” about hope and despair and boredom, saying they can predict what everyone’s gonna do and feel and how that makes everything boring.

This definitely makes them sound a lot like Junko, and the connection is certainly clear. They both hate boredom with a burning passion and are able to easily predict people’s actions and feelings. But there’s actually one crucial line we have to keep in mind which separates them:

“I don’t envy you.”

The character speaking doesn’t enjoy despair, they only prefer it over boredom. This separates them from Junko herself, who does explicitly enjoy despair even without factoring in her hatred for boredom. Keep this in mind, I’ll bring it up later.

But what’s most important about this character, is that they’re likely not a DRDT character, but rather the protagonist of “Forever Dead”, the book Veronika talks about in her introduction. Take a look at how she describes it (and sorry the screenshots aren’t perfect, the text flashes too quickly).

Veronika: Oh oh oh! Speaking of horror, let me tell you about the horror bookI'm currently reading! It's called Forever Dead! You see, it's about a boy stuck in a time loop and forced to watch his friends die for eternity. While he is horrified at first, he eventually becomes more concerned over his growing boredom in t[he face of the] terrible tragedies because he sees them over and over again. The book is written like a normal autobiography at first, but as the protagonist descends into insanity over time, the writin[g style] starts to fall apart and take on a more sinister tone. Format twists like that are so fascinating, don't you think? Honestly, I would really love to know just how it feels to be in his shoes and experience something so horrible over and over and over again. And then, my favorite scene in the book, is one time he's impaled by many metal spikes and left to slowly bleed to death while he's left c[ontemplating] his thoughts. He's forced to apologize for everything he did... while... he... um... ohh..."

“Forever Dead” (FD) is a completely fictional book, as in, it doesn’t exist in real life. You can actually tell because it isn’t censored the way the dev usually censors real things, like A****a C*****e’s name [Agatha Christie]. So if it was made up specifically for DRDT, that would imply it holds some significance.

And you can see a lot of the same ideas as in the About page text. A character who ends up becoming bored of their environment, turning to unethical acts to entertain themselves. But what’s really striking is the repeated mention of the “Teacher” in the About page text.

(Is that a Rei Mekaru reference?!)

There… really isn’t a DRDT character who would be called that. I’ve seen it related to Mai before, and while the teacher could be an allegory for Mai, it can’t literally be her. Mai is a student, and not a particularly academically gifted one at that; she’s not anyone’s teacher. The only other person who could apply is the teacher Min is implied to have had at the end of her Bonus Episode, but… like, what would that mean. Why is he important?

No, I think it makes more sense to assume this is related to Forever Dead. That would also explain why the character claims to be “stuck for all eternity” even though they know what to do to make everyone “survive until [they] all run out of food and starve.” And also because of a little theory-bordering-on-headcanon I have.

Don’t you think it’s strange how the character uses the word “Teacher”? People in the US, to my knowledge, don’t speak like that. I believe they use “Mr/Ms/Mx [Name]” or something like that. So, could this be an in-universe translation quirk? For example, if “Forever Dead” is originally Japanese, the character could actually be saying “Sensei”, which I think is more common, and is sometimes directly translated to “Teacher” even though it sounds a bit weird in English. I personally love this idea because it conjures up the frankly amusing idea of the dev making up not a book in English, but a book translated to English from Japanese just for shits and giggles.

Anyways, rambling aside, the point stands. I think this is a (fictional) quote from (the fictional book) “Forever Dead.” So what does it mean for DRDT?

Well, seeing as it’s literally in the About page, it’s likely closely linked to the very nature of the killing game, right? It makes sense to assume we’re meant to relate the mastermind to this quote. The attitude is mastermind-y, the actions are mastermind-y, the context is mastermind-y, we’re calling mastermind.

But wait. Since this Forever Dead protagonist constantly speaks of boredom, doesn’t that instantly relate them to Veronika?

Well, yes.

…

But… it’s Veronika. It would honestly be weirder if something related to the mastermind doesn’t link back to her. She’s the biggest mastermind bait I’ve ever seen, and unless she has an early reveal, I don’t quite see her as the mm (I’ll just start shortening it).

Other theories have also connected it to Whit’s intuition. I find these interesting, and about as plausible as any other good mastermind theory. However, since the “boredom < despair” angle is something which I feel is quite intuitive for the average DR fan who knows anything about Junko and Izuru, I actually want to dive a bit deeper into what the connection between the mm and the Forever Dead protagonist could mean, since that’s an angle I’ve seen explored less often.

For one, there’s the time loop thing. Now, I don’t believe DRDT takes place in an actual time loop, but I think there’s an argument that there is a repetition of events at play. As in, things which happened in the past, and are repeating in the present.

Yes I’m talking about the pre-prologue cutscene.

... Fuck!! Fuck, fuck, fuck, this really hurts... Ouch... I really wasn't expecting her to attack me like that. I made a massive mistake to trust them. I can't rely on anyone. All by myself... I have to end the killing game. And even if I can't do that... I have to kill Teruko Tawaki. No matter what.

I’ve talked about it before, but as a refresher: that fork with blood on it implies whoever is speaking got attacked with the fork, which fits Xander’s eye injury suspiciously closely.

(Believe it or not, the David MV might have an allusion to it as well but I am not getting into that)

So if Xander is the one speaking, if you think about it, it must mean he was involved in a killing game previous to the one we see in DRDT. Which, in fact, Teruko may have some vague memories of.

Teruko: And also, as a way to reference that "past killing game," right?

That could be about the THH killing game, which frankly sorta makes more sense in context, but seeing as Veronika then claims nothin like a killing game had happened before, I find it most likely that got completely erased from history.

So what’s the important thing here? Well, for one, if Xander’s eye injury came from a previous killing game, then we are definitely not talking about an actual time loop, as that would have erased his eye injury. However, it could be talking about a repetition of events. Perhaps there have been multiple killing games before this one, a la V3 but without the “fiction” aspect presumably.

This is nothing new by itself, but it does have an odd implication when related back to the About page text. Think about it, the FD protagonist doesn’t enjoy the time loop. If he could, he would end it. So if he’s meant to reflect the DRDT MM’s attitude, could this mean the mastermind doesn’t actually enjoy the killing games?

It sounds insane, but hear me out. We’ve already established the FD protag doesn’t actually enjoy despair, so if they’re meant to parallel the MM, then that could imply the MM doesn’t enjoy despair either. And if they’re being forced into the MM role repeatedly for one reason or another, the same way the FD protagonist is forced into the time loop, wouldn’t they grow bored of it, despite the despair? It’s the same thing as the FD protagonist:

“…I used to be like you. I cared so much about people, I cried everytime someone was hurt. I suffered for a long time stuck in here caring about people.”

If we apply this with the idea that “time loop” = “repeating killing games”, and that “FD protag” = “Matermind”, then what we have is a reluctant mastermind forced to go through with several killing games for reasons unknown, who only grew slightly fond of despair once they grew bored of everything else.

So, uh, there’s definitely unhinged point #1. However, there is another thing to note, the one I mentioned in the beginning. And since I mentioned it, you probably caught it. The FD protag dies the exact same way Mukuro does, and since the FD protag is connected to the DRDT MM, it’s possible there’s some connection between Mukuro and the DRDT MM. Most likely related to their mastermind-iness.

Of course, what the connection could actually be is very vague, and there’s a ton of options. Still, here’s a few possibilities I find the most interesting:

>The mastermind is a secret extra student, hiding somewhere in the school. So Mai. I don’t quite like this one since it’s sorta silly and I just don’t see Mai as the mastermind, but it is there.

>The mastermind deeply adores a loved one, and may even disguise themselves to look like this loved one. Like Mukuro does with Junko… and like Whit does with his mom. This is to appease the people who love the Whit MM theory, because I know some people are really passionate about it and it’s frankly always fun to see those people talk about it! It is also just objectively funny to always find ways to pin him as the MM imo.

>The mastermind fully disguised themselves as another person. So, Veronika = Mai crack theory. Sure, at this point.

>There are two masterminds, and one of them died early on. Basically thinking of Xander here, given the whole “kill Teruko Tawaki” thing. The second would probably have to be Mai unfortunately, so I don’t quite see it. Though I guess it could also be David, or just anyone else in the killing game for that matter, but you know.

>The mastermind faked their death. You know, we never saw Min’s corpse… So we’re off to delulu land! Min is still alive! Min is still alive! Min-!

Blatant favoritism aside, that’s pretty unlikely. I doubt the mastermind would want to straight up lose an arm in a fake execution. Though I guess if she’s a reluctant MM maybe she doesn’t get a say in the executions, so…

Min is still alive! Mind is still alive!

>There are two masterminds, and one of them is disguising as the other. This fits shockingly close to the J & Ryan double mastermind theory I swear exists somewhere on Tumblr and I’m not going insane I just can’t find the post. Essentially, the idea that Ryan and J swap places constantly, taking turns on who is the more traditional mastermind and who stays in the killing game, explaining that one time Rose seemingly didn’t recognize J in chapter 1. So two siblings, where one of them disguised as the other while the other just presents as themselves? Exactly like Mukuro and Junko.

But I feel the most grounded ideas are usually the likeliest ones, which is why I think this connection to Mukuro may simply be another way of saying the MM was manipulated/coerced into their position, instead of choosing to be the MM on their own.

It’s a less conclusive answer, but it’s less farfetched than the other ones. And it sorta fits… uh….

Well, see, I’m making a post with AUs for all possible MMs… and I kinda accidentally convinced myself Rose might be the mastermind? I might make a more detailed post about it later, but basically this more vague connection to Mukuro fits, so.

Anyways, those are all the possibilities I can think of for unhinged point #2, the connection between the MM and Mukuro. I don’t have much else to say, as I feel this is something that’s gonna make more sense as we move forward in the series.