It's finally time chaotic children. I'm gonna do a long post about Serika. DO NOT READ THIS THREAD if you have not played Chaos;Child to completion. This first part will only spoil up to the end of the common route, but beyond that will be spoilers for the rest of the game (primarily Nono route and True ending, will mark when this happens just in case someone scrolls and sees something they shouldn't.)
Why Serika? You might expect I'd talk about my namesake first, but to be honest I don't have THAT much to say about Nono that is thought provoking. I love everything about her-- her appearance, her values, her interactions with Takuru, there's pretty much nothing I'd change about her. Maybe someday I'll write a long letter in detail about why she's my beloved, but not today.
Serika, however, is a character that warrants discussion. She's an incredibly complicated and conflicting character in the story of Chaos;Child. Final warning to turn back, I'm about to spoil one of the best VNs ever made. For most of the story, Serika is the ditzy-yet-faithful sidekick of Takuru, constantly encouraging him to pursue the Return of the New Generation Madness, even after it becomes increasingly clear that things are far more dangerous than they initially seem. Forgive me, there will be some summarization in this piece.
Of course, as we find out, this was all by design. Serika was, in reality, the true mastermind behind NewGen2. Serika carried out these horrors as a result of the circumstances of her birth, those being that she was realbooted from a delusional imaginary friend into a real girl. When Takuru accidentally created her, it was with the following wish: "Give me something to do! Help me do it!"
Six years later, Serika put this wish of Takuru's into action. It ultimately resulted in the deaths of many innocent people, including Yui, Takuru's youngest sister, at the hands of his mind-controlled best friend, Shinji Itou. In fact, Itou was specifically mind controlled into believing he was avenging Senri Minamisawa, the girl that Takuru constantly has visions about early on in the game, who he was unable to save from AH Tokyo hospital when he ventured inside the basement before the earthquake. This part is important for later.
Part of the reason I decided to write this is not just because Serika is such an interesting villain and character in general, but it's also because of the way she seems to be perceived by some of the community. This is all based on my interpretation, my training, my experience (RIP Paul Harrell), so consider all of that if you're reading this, but I feel like Serika gets let off pretty easily by a lot of readers. I've even seen people who thought that Serika was somehow manipulated into doing what she did by people like (spoiler for Kazuki Route and True end)
Wakui.
I think that's absurd. Serika's power is MIND READING. Granted, it only works via eye contact (This is established concretely in Love Chu Chu), but she's not an idiot by any means even without the power. Generally, my thesis for this post is that Serika acted with total agency in regards to NewGenV2 and all of its particulars. Specifically, Serika was the person who interpreted Takuru's wish, and ultimately the person who decided how it should be carried out. There was not some unseen force that compelled her to horribly murder innocent people on Takuru's behalf, she decided to do all of this on her own, and should be culpable for that.
To add on to that, Serika is far more self-serving than she lets on. Minor spoiler for the start of the Nono route, but Nono says as much in her confrontation with Serika on the roof. Specifically, she says (paraphrasing) "At some point, it stopped being a game for Takuru, and started to be a game for you." She goes on to mention Yui's death at the hands of Itou. Nono route major spoiler:
At this point, Nono doesn't make light of her true identity as Senri, but the Senri angle of the murders lends further credence to the idea that the murders were more than just a game for Takuru.
In Chapter 9 while going over the evidence after Yui's death, Takuru makes note of the fact that Itou's obsession with Senri-- someone he obviously never met, and something Nono pointed out instantly, doesn't make any sense. This is the first time in the game that Takuru makes light of the case feeling like a game he's being challenged to, with this bit about Senri being evidence of that.
Unfortunately, we don't actually know the full details of Serika's ideal plans for NewGenV2. That makes talking about some of her motivations and choices during the murder somewhat challenging. We do know this much: Takuru was never intended to discover that she was the real perpetrator behind everything. Somehow, Sakuma was supposed to be implicated in all of this, so maybe there was a grand plan behind using Senri in NewGenV2 that would've led to this in some way.
But I think there's another, more apparent explanation, one that ties into all of the bizarre decisions Serika made in the latter act of NewGenV2. Decisions that really don't make any sense if her only goal is to create this grand game for Takuru, and never have herself be implicated. I think that Serika was terribly envious of everyone close to Takuru. At the start of Chaos;Child, the two people Takuru's closest to besides Serika are none other than Nono and Itou.
If we assume this point to be true, Serika's choices make much more sense. MAJOR NONO ROUTE spoilers imminent:
as we know, Nono is in reality Senri Minamisawa, with the real Nono dying in the Shibuya Earthquake. Senri's power allowed her to copy Nono's appearance and steal her identity, which she did originally to evade capture by Nozomi personnel. She then pretended that Senri was real victim in the earthquake, and buried the evidence of her old life under the Shibuya memorial.
Serika would've of course known all of this, having read her mind countless times during and even before Chaos;Child. She also knew that this was a secret Senri was terrified of anyone finding out, believing that it would destroy the life that she'd worked so hard to build, and turn all of her family and friends against her. Knowing this, it would make total sense for Serika to exploit Senri's secret as a means to torment her, at the expense of the security of her plan (Senri took note of important things about the case, such as being the first to suggest that the killer could read minds)
Then we have Itou, who was mind controlled by Sakuma into killing Yui. Again, if we're assuming my point, Serika directly involving Itou in the case as both a victim AND a killer makes sense. Itou is Takuru's best friend, and using Yui's tragic death was Serika's way of severing that connection forever. We don't know the exact moment that Itou became mind controlled, but it was in the very early stages of the case regardless, so his involvement like this was something Serika had always planned.
We know that Serika's plans for the murders didn't play out exactly like she wanted, as Uki was supposed to be the victim before Yui, and Nono was not supposed to be the final victim of NewGenV2 (more on this point later), so there's something to be said about whether or not Yui's death was always a part of the plan or not. But even if it wasn't, it serves as almost the ultimate conclusion of what I've been talking about. Yui's death not only took an important person away from Takuru, it also implicated Itou in the murders AND worked the Senri angle into it all by her being the motivation for mind-controlled Itou.
There's also another bit to mention that takes place before all of this. I wasn't able to find the screenshot at the time of posting but there is a moment in the midgame where Takuru is at home eating with his family (everyone, including Nono and Sakuma), and having a grand old time. He's talking about how much he enjoys it, when suddenly that red filter comes over the screen, and he suddenly starts thinking the complete opposite.
Since Sakuma is at the table, and the NOAH terminal is nowhere insight, it seems like the only explanation could be Serika using her connection with Takuru to beam that into his mind. Something similar to this happens in Chapter 10 when Shinjo busts into Serika's house while Takuru is searching it, but it's never confirmed if she actively did that or if it was just his imagination or something. Still, Serika trying to separate Takuru from his family makes complete sense if we assume what I said is true.
There's more I could talk about that happens in the Nono route that fuels my theory, but I don't want to include it due to the nature of Serika's character in the routes not necessarily being accurate to her in reality (this makes it frustrating to discuss parts of this game TBH). In case you don't know (true end spoiler):
ALL of the routes in C;C take place in a delusion synchro between Takuru and the girls, with Serika being the only one excluded. So her presence in the routes can't be taken as necessarily accurate since she's constructed out of others' memories of her.
All of that is to again say that I think Serika's motivations were more personal than she believes, and that NewGenV2 was a result of how SHE wanted to carry out Takuru's wish. His actions in both the common route end and true end assure the reader that Serika was wrong, and that she didn't know what Takuru truly wanted. If she did, NewGenV2 would've never happened in the first place. Certainly, Serika wouldn't have put the people Takuru cared about in harm's way as she did. I believe NewGenV2 was a personal project for her as much as it was for Takuru.
Of course, I can't blame Serika entirely. She's fundamentally broken in a way that greatly exceeds how broken normal people already are. To be brought into existence by a young child who suffered from parental neglect, and in the middle of a world-ending crisis, it's not a surprise that she turned out like this. Of course, it's not like this is a real murder trial and I'm trying to prove Serika is fit to stand trial, these are just thoughts that I've had in playing the game and seeing people's reactions to the True End and so on and so forth. I felt the need to give my two cents (more like ten at this point) on why Serika is more cognizant than she lets on. All of the choices she made that led to game's end were her own.
A couple of final notes: I of course totally understand why Takuru blames himself for what happened, and I know that his "rebuilding" of Serika into a normal girl is part of his own path to redemption. I do admit that part of me does prefer the Nono route ending in a lot of ways, simply because I find the conclusions for Takuru and Nono more satisfying (even if not everything is resolved re: Chaos;Child syndrome). I also think it's probably the most complete ending a route has ever had in the series, especially considering it's the "possible future" serika sees when she clashes with Nono in the true ending.
Everything I've written here is based off of game knowledge only, and nothing else-- with this one forthcoming exception. I did mention earlier about Serika's plans for the murders going awry, and us not knowing what her true ideal NewGenV2 was. There is one piece of lore we do know (if we assume what I'm about to say is canon or even true at all). I have read that there was a drama CD that came out after the disastrous C;C anime that says that Serika's original plan was for HERSELF to be the final victim of NewGenV2. If that's true, and that was her original design, you might ask how that fits into this giant mess of a post. I really don't know, but I find it interesting to think about regardless. Serika obviously does not view death as something scary, as we know from the true end. As long as he achieves her objective, her reason for existing, the rest is moot.
I might eventually post the screenshots I wanted for this, but I couldn't find them and decided to poast anyway. If you read all of this thanks for reading. This probably could be condensed but this is a forum, not a college paper. If I can't write long rambling strings of thought, what's the point?
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