The Manila Folder

## Basic Info

The crusty manila folder that contains the gang's lore from the past, present, and future.

### Effects

Foresight

The Manila Folder is one of several cursed artifacts, and it contains prophecies for the life of James and Jacob throughout high school. The contents are incredibly schizophrenic and difficult to decipher without a rotten brain, but it was terrifyingly accurate for predicting the school year from sophmore to senior year.

## Origin

The exact origin of the manila folder is unknown, as James and Jacob give cryptic answers when questioned about it. Nobody is quite sure how it was written or what thought process went into it, but it was crafted in 2014. Several pages were filled out, along with a key, that included some major characters in the lore and their interactions with each other. Red lines represented conflict, blue lines represented friendship, and pink lines represented love interests.

Essentially, the papers were giant food webs of social interactions between all the relevant lore characters, and each page represented a different stage of time, which was organized as parts from Jojo's Bizarre Adventure. The scribes started from the past and created a page dedicated to what was, then scribbled out a page of what is, and then began making predictions all the way until the end of senior year.

## Interpretation

The pages of the manila folder only represent changes in relationships between characters and the relative mental state of each character (depicted with frowns or smiles), but no exact reason for the change in relationship is given. This is likely because the prophetic revelations of the future did not include exact details, but only the bigger picture effects. For example, the folder could predict a car accident, but it could not predict what would cause it. With that in mind, James and Jacob used the Manila Folder as a guide to navigate high school, as it gave them adequate time to prepare for upcoming conflicts.

Somehow, despite the best efforts of James and Jacob to change the future, the Manila Folder was 100% accurate. Some refer to it as a self-fulfilling prophecy, however many of its predictions relied on people unaware of their own fates to fulfil them. In many cases, James and Jacob actually attempted to intervene and prevent the prophecies from coming true, however their intervention ended up playing a role in bringing about the result predicted by the folder.

> What I do, I do only to secure a better tomorrow.
>
> James

The Manila Folder would ultimately become a source of hope, as it predicted a horrifying shitshow extending several pages, but it ended on a high note with all of the villains defeated and the heroes living in peace and harmony. As the keepers of the folder realized the coming suffering was inevitable, they used their knowledge of the future to secure a "better tomorrow" for themselves. Many dirty deeds were undertaken by the keepers of the folder in order to secure the good ending, and eventually the prophecy would be fulfilled and senior year would end on the highest note possible, making all of the prior suffering worth it.

## Copies

One of the most kept secrets of the Manila Folder (besides its origin) is the fact that a copy exists. One fateful night the folder was to be shown off at Skyway, and fearing for its safety the scribes made a secret copy. Each page of the folder was photocopied and placed into an identical manila folder, and this was the copy taken to Skyway.

To this day, this copy is used whenever the folder is presented to strangers, and this is to keep the original safe. The original Manila Folder is kept stored in a backpack in an undisclosed location.