Our Home

The orphans overlooking the ramparts

## Trophies

*This castle is a ruin... That's exactly what you need. Whoever built this place really didn't want to be fucked with. Be good and you'll be fine.*
Mélie

"**Our Home**" is the eighth chapter of *A Plague Tale: Innocence*. It is a short level and the first to have no combat, violence, or dangerous elements whatsoever.

## Plot

### Synopsis

> Hugo, Amicia, and Mélie tracked down Lucas, threw the Inquisition off their trail, and reached Château d'Ombrage, an isolated ancestral fortress, overrun with rats. After a tough battle to eliminate the swarm, the orphans got their first night of peaceful rest.
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### Summary

The bright new day dawns after Amicia, Hugo, Lucas, and Mélie have made a home in the crumbling Château d'Ombrage castle. Hugo wakes his sister in good spirits, ready to explore the castle. Rooms of the castle are overgrown with ivy, have holes in their walls, and doors and furniture have fallen apart, but the atmosphere is pleasant, safe, and even hopeful for once. In a room downstairs, Lucas has set up shop in a dilapidated alchemist's laboratory with equipment already there. Having been unable to sleep, the young trainee has instead started to try and work on a treatment for Hugo's symptoms and the siblings help him do so. Unfortunately, the mixture simply explodes in green smoke, and the siblings leave Lucas to his work to go explore.

Both are disappointed to see that Mélie seems to have left without saying goodbye and they proceed out to the ramparts, where they enjoy a moment throwing echoes around the empty courtyard. Mélie is found standing behind them and pulls Amicia aside to talk. She plans to go and rescue her brother, Arthur, from the town Bastion, and implores Amicia to be good to her brother, telling her that, as with her and Arthur, he will save her one day in return. Hugo calls to his sister and shows her a repeating symbol that is seen in the great hall as well as the courtyard, being possibly the coat of arms of whatever order built the castle, and finally leads her to a small courtyard with a tree, where he gleefully chases butterflies. Amicia experiences a moment of sadness as she touches her pendant, mourning her lost family, and hangs her pendant on the tree. Lifting up her brother, he does the same with his pendant. He apologizes for being sick, as his condition has advanced to the point where a web of blackened veins is appearing on his neck reaching towards his cheeks.

As Hugo continues to chase the butterflies, Lucas quietly shares some grave news with Amicia: the Prima Macula, a curse in Hugo's blood, progresses through stages called "thresholds". At each threshold, the carrier has a chance of dying and Hugo is now approaching the first one. Although Lucas does not have the means to create the elixir his master Laurentius and the de Rune siblings' mother Béatrice were working on to slow the Macula's progression, he recalls that their work was based on a forbidden book called the Sanguinis Itinera. However, given its dangerous contents, the book is locked away in the University basement. Amicia reasons that, given the chaos of the plague outbreak, it may be easier to sneak in unnoticed, and as the University is near the Bastion, Mélie offers to help her get in. After getting some directions from Lucas, the girls set out for the town as the scene fades to black.

Navigation

* I – The de Rune Legacy
* II – The Strangers
* III – Retribution
* IV – The Apprentice
* V – The Ravens' Spoils
* VI – Damaged Goods
* VII – The Path Before Us
* VIII – **Our Home**
* IX – In the Shadow of Ramparts
* X – The Way of Roses
* XI – Alive
* XII – All That Remains
* XIII – Penance
* XIV – Blood Ties
* XV – Remembrance
* XVI – Coronation
* XVII – For Each Other