Rule of Rose Mysteries

It’s finally up on YouTube, the link is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9V4pBHy06d0

Please rate it.

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Some of my blog-posts that relate are:

See-all Walkthrough: “The Little Princess” Chapter (Part 7a): Rear Gate
See-all Walkthrough: “The Little Princess” Chapter (Part 7b): Rear Gate
See-all Walkthrough, With Commentary: “The Little Princess” Chapter (Part 9): Chalk Drawing

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There is an infamous unused Rule of Rose scene that has long been a topic of argument and speculation among Rule of Rose fans. This scene has no soundtrack.

Some Rule of Rose fans, however, have written dialogue for the scene, and dubbed the scene for sound.

You can watch this dubbed, fan-fiction scene on YouTube at this link: Fan-fiction dub of unused Rule of Rose scene.
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As I mentioned in Part 1, I don’t think that the scene in the “Stray Dog and the Lying Princess” chapter of Rule of Rose, in which we see Gregory’s scars, is an accurate representation of of Jennifer’s forgotten past. In fact I think that most of that entire chapter is a falsehood that Jennifer has told herself. See my “Stray Dog Boss-Battle Mystery” blog-posts, linked to at the end of this blog-post, for more on that topic.

So, could it be that the scars that we see on Gregory were also a falsehood that Jennifer told herself about the massacre? And, if so, what sort of inner motivations might have led Jennifer to make up the falsehood that Gregory was scarred like that?

I propose that Jennifer loved Gregory (as a sort of father-substitute).

Jennifer surely must have kept it a secret that she had been kept in Gregory’s cellar all of those months, or he would have gotten in trouble for it. Jennifer wanted to protect Gregory.

Jennifer even declined Wendy’s offer to help her escape from the cellar, at first, because (as Jennifer explained to Wendy, in a letter):

…the man is so lonely, so sad. I can’t just leave him alone.

And in the “Once Upon A Time” chapter, Gregory is one of the only three that Jennifer cares enough about to want to see, in the flesh, before she leaves.

I think Jennifer loved Gregory, and I think that she may have believed that he loved her in return. So, I think, Jennifer was absolutely devastated by the idea (whether it was, in fact true, or not) that Gregory came to the orphanage to kill her. How could he possibly be willing to do that? The idea that two people that she had loved, Wendy and Gregory, had come for her to in order to kill her was an idea that Jennifer feared was true, and yet it was also an idea that Jennifer found to be too awful to bear.

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When Wendy brings Stray Dog through the front door of the orphanage, in the “Stray Dog and the Lying Princess” chapter, what are we supposed to think of the scars on his body?

I have argued, in my blog-post The Stray Dog Boss-battle Mystery (Part 5), that I don’t think that this scene truly occurred during Jennifer’s forgotten past. But even if so, I think it is important to understand the story that Jennifer told herself about what happened. So let’s ask ourselves what the scars on Gregory’s body would likely mean if we took the scene at face value (that is, as if the scene happened in Jennifer’s forgotten past exactly the way we see it in the game).

I can think of two possibilities:

(1) Wendy scarred Gregory as part of his being trained like a dog.

(2) Gregory self-inflicted the scars.

Can you think of other possibilities, assuming that we are taking the scene at face value?

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Stray Dog can be seen in the drawing of the “Mermaid Princess” storybook associated with the text:

Before long, she was old and decrepit.

See the time 9:28 in the YouTube video linked to here, Mermaid Princess video, to view that page of the storybook.

In terms of the surface level story of the storybook, the story of a mermaid princess, Stray Dog seems very out of place among the mermaids at the bottom of the sea. Why is he there?

The reasons that have been coming to my mind as possible answers relate more to the pattern of the inclusion of Stray Dog in the Rule of Rose storybooks in general—he can be found in most of them—than to any specific involvement in the story of Clara. So I think I’ll write up most of those ideas in a separate blog-post focusing on that pattern, as those ideas will relate to more than just this particular storybook.

On this specific page of the “Mermaid Princess” storybook, Stray Dog’s presence might serve to help us associate the underwater scene with the orphanage world, thereby encouraging us to identify the mermaids swimming in the background as the girls of the Rose Garden Orphanage.

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Is there any viable alternative to the hypothesis (described in Part 9b) that the scene of Jennifer watching Gregory through the cellar window is based on a memory that occurred before Jennifer entered the cellar room on her first day there?

During the time shortly before I started my Rule of Rose Mysteries blog-site, I had developed an alternative hypothesis that grew out of an “evil-Wendy” theory. I wrote about this on the GameSpot/GameFAQs forum, but that thread has long since disappeared. I think that I can reconstruct the jist of the theory, however.

Jennifer wrote in a letter to Wendy (the letter can be found in the “Once Upon a Time” chapter, in the Sickroom, by the lamp):

16 November

Dear Wendy, my visitor in the window,

Thank you so much for writing to me. The man calls me Joshua, but my name is Jennifer. I’ve been in this room ever since he saved me. He’s a nice person… but he won’t let me leave.

Jennifer’s statement that she has been in the room “ever since he saved me” is dated 16 November, so this opens up the possibility that Jennifer was let out of the room at times between 16 November and the date of her escape the following January.

Why would Gregory change his behavior after 16 November from what it had been before?

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Now we will re-enter through the front gate, and this time turn to the left.

Travel to the shed, but don’t enter. We will do that later. Turn right at the shed and proceed along side of the house until Jennifer is beside the cellar window. We will discuss other features, such as the grey shapes on the ground and a hole (that we passed by) in the side of the house, later. Notice that Gregory’s voice can be heard before Jennifer reaches the cellar window.

Move Jennifer right next to the cellar window and press “x”. Jennifer kneels down and looks through the cellar window into the cellar below.

Gregory can be seen sitting on a stool next to a bed. He is pointing a revolver at his own head, the opening of the revolver’s barrel pressed against his temple. He is facing a bed, which we cannot see except for its bedposts.

We will see, later in the chapter, that Joshua’s clothes are arranged under the bed cover… or is it actually Joshua’s body that is under the bed cover? See my blog-post The Mystery of Joshua’s Clothing Under the Blanket (Part 1)

Gregory is telling a macabre story about Stray Dog and “peas”:

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In Jennifer’s forgotten past, the orphans were killed by Gregory Wilson, a. k. a. Stray Dog, at the Rose Garden Orphanage, with Jennifer being the sole survivor.

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And in the “Orphanage World” of Jennifer’s dream, the orphans are again killed by Gregory Wilson, a. k. a. Stray Dog at the Rose Garden Orphanage, with Jennifer being the sole survivor.

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In the “Airship World” of Jennifer’s dream, however, Jennifer relives the last days of the orphans through the distortion of the fantasy that the orphans had used at the Rose Garden Orphanage during their last days: pretending to be on an airship flying to India.

Jennifer’s dream recreation of this fantasy-play of the orphans is colored by her own experience, during her forgotten past, of having actually been on an airship flying to India that crashed (with Jennifer being the sole survivor).

As Jennifer dreams the “Airship World” she remembers (partially) that the orphans are doomed and are inevitably going to die… so the dream reflects this by having the airship of the “Airship World” moving toward a destiny of coming apart (hence the need for rope everywhere to try to hold the airship together and secure the things within the airship) and inevitably crashing (which we will not be shown, but which is implied to be coming). When the orphans die in the real world, their fantasy of an airship voyage to India will die as well.  So Jennifer’s dream of the “Airship World” recreates that approaching doom in airship-terms: an approaching crash.

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There is a drawing on the mirror nearest the door.  The drawing is of some sort of creature, but what creature?

It seems to me that, of all the creatures that we see in this game, the creature of the drawing most closely resembles Stray Dog as seen in the storybooks.  In the storybooks, Stray Dog is always drawn facing the reader.  This differs from the drawings of Stray Dog elsewhere.  In the chalk drawings on the outside of the orphanage mansion, Stray Dog’s head is always depicted in side view, showing a dog-like snout.  Similarly, Thomas’s drawing of Stray Dog, on Hoffman’s portrait in the Reception Room, depicts Stray Dog in side view, showing a dog-like snout.

Jennifer’s comment at this Closet Room mirror, however, in the “Once Upon A Time” chapter, doesn’t deal with Stray Dog or Gregory.  It deals with Amanda. 

Jennifer tells us:

“Amanda was always more sensitive about her looks than anyone else. One day she was given a severe scolding by Miss Martha. That’s because Miss Martha’s lipstick had gone missing. The lipstick was never found, but I know Amanda took it. I’ve seen her applying it late at night.”

This statement made me wonder if the drawing might be of something other than Stray Dog.

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Leave the Headmaster’s Room by the door leading to the small hallway (that is, the door next to the door connecting the Headmaster’s Room to the Reception Room).

Just outside of the door, at Jennifer’s feet, there are some drawings on the floor. These drawings extend down the hallway to Jennifer’s right, almost to the very end of the hallway.

In the “Once Upon A Time” chapter of Rule of Rose, Jennifer makes three comments about these drawings:

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At the drawing on the floor of a big donut-shaped one-eyed person (near cabinet):

“This sloppy drawing must be Thomas’s. See what happens when you give him chalk? The walls, the floors… To him, it’s one big canvas.”

At the drawing on floor of spooky things nearest the Headmaster’s Room:

“The spooky things… They swept away everything that’s dirty, including disobedient children. It was a scary story that started as a rumor and spread like wildfire.”

At the drawing of spooky things nearest the Closet Room:

“The spooky things love to clean. That’s why they always carry mops and brooms. They’ll kidnap you if you don’t clean. At least, that’s what everyone says.”

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We learn from these comments that Thomas was the child who drew these floor drawings.

Thomas was also the child who drew on Hoffman’s portrait in the Reception Room. That drawing showed Hoffman being devoured by Stray Dog, and Hoffman with tongue protruding (strangled?). For more on this topic, see my previous blog-post: See-all Walkthrough, With Commentary: “The Little Princess” Chapter (Part 14): Reception Room: Stray Dog Gobbles Hoffman In Hoffman’s Portrait

Thomas’s drawing on Hoffman’s portrait, in the Reception Room, was a possible clue to Hoffman’s fate. Do these drawings also contain clues that tell us something about occurrences at the orphanage?

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