It began subtly.
A missed train stop.An alley where the sky flickered.A stranger on the street whispering: "I remember when I used to be someone else."
Scene: Café Leblanc – Temporary HQ
Futaba hunched over her laptop, eyes darting between data spikes and footage captured on her phone.
"Okay, okay… so get this: Shujin Academy's rooftop is looping. Surveillance shows students going up and never coming down… until ten minutes later, when they're back downstairs without remembering anything."
Ren nodded slowly. "Another Mementos bleed?"
"Yeah. But it's not just that." She hesitated. "Something's watching from the other side. Like it knows we're looking now."
Makoto's brows furrowed. "Then we're not the only ones becoming aware of the merges."
Scene: The Glitched Location – The Reversed Hospital
Takemi stood frozen outside the hospital where she once worked. The same one that got shuttered after the experiments.
Except now, it stood wide open.
No staff. No patients.The signs read backwards, but only to the naked eye. In a photo? They read correctly.Inside: rooms looped. Hallways ended in mirrors. In one corner, a version of Takemi's old office stood… except everything was submerged in calm blue water.
"Why is my memory of this place wet?" she whispered.
Yusuke murmured, "Water symbolizes repression. Submersion in the self. This may be a fracture of your ego surfacing."
❖ New Clue Unlocked: The real-world location is now a "soft gate" to the Fifth Layer.
Fifth Descent Begins – Prelude and Warning
Velvet-blue butterflies flitted through the city that night.Ren saw one land on the back of his hand and vanish in a shimmer.
That night, he dreamed again.
Veluria, her voice distant but clear, whispered:
"The Fifth Descent is not a place. It is a state. You will enter when your hearts are aligned and unmasked.But beware—the deeper you descend, the more you become what you fear… or desire."
He woke up gasping.
And across Tokyo, the team felt it too.
Ann found a mirror that didn't reflect her.
Ryuji's voice cracked into two tones mid-sentence.
Makoto's planner had an entry from tomorrow she didn't write.
Yusuke painted something with no memory of painting it.
Takemi touched a patient's wrist and heard their thoughts.
Haru stood in her garden and the plants whispered her name.
Futaba's phone started replying to her before she typed.
They were all changing.
Final Scene: Team Briefing
The group reconvened in Leblanc's attic. Rain hit the windows, soft but constant.
"So we go in," Ryuji said, tone unsteady. "Even if this next descent isn't in the Metaverse?"
Makoto nodded. "It's still Mementos—it's just not bound to a single place anymore."
Ren looked at the group, each marked, changed, drawn deeper.
And he said quietly:
"The next mission is into ourselves."