Chapter 3 - Parallel Hope, Divergent Despair

**Parallel Hope, Divergent Despair** would have been the third chapter of Danganronpa Re:Birth by danganrebirth-voices.

## Summary

### Daily Life

#### Daily Life, Day 1

The chapter starts with Ayumu having a nightmare. In the nightmare, he finds himself in a corridor and finds the bodies of Akira and Kego. Kego and Akira are covered in stab wounds while Ayumu is holding a bloody knife and thinks how he must have murdered them. He then wakes up due to Monodora's morning announcement, and realizes he was having a dream like he had with Maiko and Nico previously.

After arriving at the cafeteria, Ayumu greets the remaining students, and asks how they feel given last night's events. The group is upset by last night's events, but are told by Mikoto to stop sulking and moping around. This creates a small argument within the group until Monodora appears, reminding the group that a new floor has been opened up and is ready to be explored. Monodora also reveals that all students must come to the gym at 8 p.m. that evening for a mandatory meeting. Seishi guesses that the meeting has to do with a new motive, slightly angering Monodora. After Monodora disappeared, the students decided to look at the map of the new floor on their e-Handbook. The new floor contains more classrooms, a library, a broadcast center, a music room, and a room called the Monomuseum. The students then go to the new floor to investigate it.

Along with Seishi, Ayumu examines the library on the new floor. Seishi notes that many crime novels are kept in the library and these probably serve as "inspirations" implanted by Monodora. As they continue to examine the library, Seishi asks about Ayumu's wellbeing since he had to reveal his true gender last night. Ayumu replies that he feels better than expected. He elaborates on the fact that he was bullied earlier in his childhood. His sister Emi liked to dress him up in girls' clothes at the time. Then one day, Ayumu had to go to school in girl's clothes and instead of being bullied for it, he became more popular and eventually started to feel more comfortable as a girl. Eventually, he grew more afraid that if the truth were to be revealed, everything would go back to the way it was before. Seishi assures Ayuma that he has nothing to worry about and that everyone will be okay with him. Seishi then replies that he still cares for Ayumu, and slips that his feelings about him haven't changed, to which he corrects himself, saying he doesn't think less about Ayumu.

The next room Ayumu and Seishi investigate is the music room, where they find Kazuomi and Aruma arguing about the musical instruments. After some time, Ayumu and Seishi make themselves known to the two. ***TBF***

Next, Ayumu and Seishi take a look at the broadcast center where Marin and Narumi went to investigate. There they encounter a sleeping Marin and Narumi, who manages to wake up Marin for their investigation. Ayumu asks the two if they have found anything yet. Marin replies that they haven't had much luck so far, but they were examining a radio station. Shortly thereafter, an unknown voice comes out of the radio station, and with the help of a manual, Marin manages to answer. The unknown voice introduces himself as Tsutomu Kanomi, the Ultimate Lucky Student. Ayumu then takes over for Marin, who has fallen asleep again, and questions Tsutomu about his situation as he is asking for urgent help. Tsutomu reveals that he is being held captive along with other Ultimate Students by Monodora, and they are being forced to participate in a killing game. Ayumu explains to him that Tsutomu's and his group are in the same situation, and that they'll try to keep in touch, so that they can help each other. Ayumu says goodbye to Tsutomu, and then leaves the transmission center along with Seishi, Narumi, and Marin. The four decide that they should split up to best handle the situation.

While Seishi goes back the way they came, and Marin goes down the stairs with Narumi, Ayumu takes a closer look at the Monomuseum. At the Monomuseum, Ayumu runs into Saiji and Misuzu, who are still busy investigating this place. He asks the two if they found out anything important about this place yet. Misuzu then explains to Ayumu that the Monomuseum has exhibits about previous killing games, and the killing game they are in is probably inspired by those previous ones. Ayumu, meanwhile, fills the two in about the information he gained from Tsutomu. Shortly thereafter, Monodora appears and forces the three to take part in his tour of the various exhibitions. The respective exhibitions deal with the past killing games of ***Trigger Happy Havoc***, ***Goodbye Despair*** and the ***Danganronpa 3 anime***. During the tour, Monodora makes various references to the related games and anime. At the end of the tour, he tries to give the students the key to the Monomuseum, as this is required for every lock in the museum. When none of the three want to take the key, Monodora decides to leave the key at the front desk at the entrance to the museum.

TBF

### Class Trial

#### The First Half of the Class Trial

The Class Trial starts out with Monodora giving a basic explanation of the procedure of the trial. The students are going to discuss which person murdered Aruma and have to vote the right person as the blackened. Ayumu asks Misuzu if she's feeling better, to which Misuzu assures him that with Aruma's medical treatment, she will soon regain her full strength. Shortly thereafter, Kasumi accuses Mitsunari of being the culprit and after failing to stab Misuzu, he killed Aruma in return. Marin vetoes this and says they should discuss beforehand whether Mitsunari is the perpetrator or not. Narumi agrees with her as she was in a similar situation in the last trial.

The group then begins to discuss the circumstances of the crime. Together with Seishi, Ayumu found Aruma trapped in a display case of the Monomuseum. While the two searched for help and the lost museum key, Mikoto guarded the museum's entrance. However, when they returned with the key they found in the cafeteria, Aruma was already dead and her body was gutted. Saiji adds that according to the Monodora File, the time of death was around 10pm last night and they need to talk about their alibis. Mitsunari points out that the fatal blow was probably dealt much earlier, and only the ones that were with eachother the entire day have an alibi. The only person within the group with a reasonably solid alibi is Misuzu, as she needed to rest from her stab wound and was occasionally supervised by Kasumi.

Kasumi then suggests that the culprit was probably still in the Monomuseum since it was locked right after Ayumu and Seishi left it. The culprit would then would have mixed with the others when they arrived at the Monomuseum after hearing the BDA. A Mass Panic Debate starts, and Ayumu is able to shut down Kasumi's idea of the killer hiding in the Monomuseum. Ayumu explains that the culprit was unable to hide in the first two exhibits, and had they been in the third exhibit, the group would have spotted them immediately, as the doors of each exhibit only open when someone is close to them. ***TBF***

TBF

Seishi then begins to put suspicion on Misuzu as the culprit. He explains that Arumu was tending to Misuzu's stab wound, and suggests that since Misuzu doesn't have a perfect alibi, there's a possibility that Arumu was alone with Misuzu just before she died. According to his theory, Misuzu strangled Aruma until she passed out and hid her unconscious body somewhere in order to later kill her. Later, she would have been able to use the wheelbarrow technique Akire used the previous murder and killed her. Ayumu agrees with Seishi's sentiments, as Misuzu may have been able to move again at the time, causing Misuzu to try to refute that train of thought as Ayumu faces her in a Rebuttal Showdown. During the discussion, Misuzu assures that she is still too weak from her wound to strangle Aruma. However, Ayumu counters that Aruma's new talent was related to medicine and that Misuzu might have been stronger than she cares to admit. In addition, Misuzu could have had a talent that could have made her stronger. However, Misuzu points they have no way of confirming the talents at all. In addition, there were no exact timeframe provided by Seishi's theory in which she would have had the opportunity to move Aruma's unconscious body. However, before she has a chance to finish defending herself, Misuzu starts vomiting blood and falls to the ground. In Misuzu's final moments, Kasumi screams for her dying friend.

##### Rebuttal Showdown: Misuzu Aisaka

*NOTE: This section includes the full script of the Rebuttal Showdown against Misuzu Aisaka. It was originally revealed on the DRRBV's Discord server.*

SEISHI: *"I think it's well established that friendship is worth very little in the courtroom, Ms Aisaka."*
MISUZU: *"Nonsense. This is absolute, unadulterated nonsense. Ayumu, you must not believe his lies."*
AYUMU: *"I'm really sorry Misuzu, but I actually agree with him… I think-"*
 **[Re: CROSS SWORD - Misuzu Aisaka]**
**REBUTTAL SHOWDOWN**
MISUZU: *"I am not Aruma’s murderer."*
MISUZU: *"Even after she tended to my wounds…"*
MISUZU: *"I still did not have the strength that would be needed to strangle her."*
MISUZU: *"And if we disregard my state of being…"*
 **Advance!**
AYUMU: *"Aruma’s new talent probably had something to do with treating wounds, because of the medical knowledge required to treat stabbings."*
AYUMU: *"If she were an Ultimate Doctor, for example, she could have treated your wound far better than the rest of us. That means you could've recovered way sooner than usual."*
 MISUZU: *"Speculating on Aruma’s talent is meaningless when she is not here to confirm it."*
MISUZU: *"Neither is speculating on mine when Mikoto named you as the prime suspect."*
MISUZU: *"Seishi never posed a timeframe that I could have moved her in, either."*
MISUZU: *"I was with Kasumi the entire day, so I...I-I...wh-"*
MISUZU: [Vomiting sound]
 **[OST quickly fades]**
**[Body Discovery 3-B plays]**
**[V3 - Wonderful Story]**
KASUMI: *"S-Suzu!?"*
KASUMI: *"SUZU!!"*
**CLASS TRIAL SUSPENDED**

#### Remaining Plot Points and Revelations

The following things would have happened/been revealed, but aren't included in the script of the Class Trial as it is unfinished:

* After regaining his senses back, Ayumu comes to the conclusion that Saiji must have been Aruma's killer.
	+ It turns out that Seishi used his newly acquired talent as the Ultimate Makeup Artist to disguise himself as Maiko, and using this to manipulate Saiji into killing Aruma. The plan was that Seishi would try and take the fall by making it look like he murdered Aruma, when in reality, Saiji was the one to strike the killing blow. Some time after stabbing Misuzu disguised as Mitsunari, Seishi with Saiji's help lured Aruma to a meeting and kidnapped her. Then, Seishi disguised Saiji as Aruma and was put into the display case. While Ayumu and Seishi had searched for help to free "Aruma", Saiji did get the real Aruma from the place he hid her (possibly the surfboard case), and brutally gutted her, putting her in the display case he acted like she had been before.
* There would have been boss versions of Rebuttal Showdowns against Seishi Yodogawa and Saiji Rokudou.
* Ayumu would have had an Argument Armament against both Seishi Yodogawa and Saiji Rokudou together.
* After being confirmed as the blackened, Saiji is pretty mentally broken due to Seishi's actions. It's implied that he has some awareness left and leaves a parting jab at Kasumi before getting executed, wondering if she realizes that this is how he felt when she refused to let him see Maiko.
* At the end of the Class Trial, Monodora publicly outs Mikoto as the Phoenix Foundation Member, and destroys her MP3 player, which was a communication device with the Phoenix Foundation. It's then revealed that Mikoto has hypersensitive hearing. She later finds a pair of earmuffs she starts wearing to deal with her sensitivity.
* After the Class Trial, the group tries to get in contact with Tsutomu again, but someone else answers the radio. A voice they don't recognize. It turns out that Tsutomu's group lost their Class Trial (equally to a Chapter 4 or 5 Class Trial) and all their participants except the blackened got executed.

## Truth Bullets

Apart from the titles, there isn't much information about the Truth Bullets. One can estimate the information of the Truth Bullets through contextual clues in the script. It is unknown whether this is the maximum number of Truth Bullets.

## Triva

* The name of the chapter was revealed on Discord after cancellation.
* The script for the Daily Life can be found *here*. The script for the unfinished Class Trial can be found *here*.
* There was an earlier draft of the chapter, where Saiji Rokudou was the first victim instead of Aruma and Aruma Todoroki was his killer instead. Also, Kasumi Izumo died in place of Misuzu Aisaka in that version. That draft of the chapter was scrapped for unknown reasons.
	+ Still, both Aruma Todoroki and Saiji Rokudou die that draft, while Seishi Yodogawa is the killer of the second victim.
* While there is no official animation of Saiji's execution, a fan-made intro for the execution was posted by @ShrugMoji on YouTube. It can be found *here*.

#### Leaked Soundtracks

* Re: CROSS SWORD - Misuzu Aisaka - Danganrebirth-Voices OST

## Quotes

> "*This is how this ends, is it? No more killing game, no more survival, just the cold embrace of death.You’re giving up because we don’t want to think that those close to us are capable of committing such a cruel crime. But, that’s the wrong way to go about it, isn’t it? If you truly loved them, then you would have to know all of their deepest, darkest secrets, and make peace with them. You would have to accept the fact that they did something unthinkable. And now you’re running away from them at the first sign of discomfort.... But, if you’re going to act like this, then I have to step in to fix your mistakes. This isn’t a fitting end. Not for you. Not for them. Not for this killing game. And definitely not for me.*"
> ― Mikoto Itsuki (CH:3 - Parallel Hope, Divergent Despair)
>
>

> "*The gods are with me!*"
> ― Misuzu Aisaka (CH:3 - Parallel Hope, Divergent Despair)
>
>

> "*Listen to me, Ayumu!*"
> ― Seishi Yodogawa (CH:3 - Parallel Hope, Divergent Despair)
>
>

> "*I'll bury your argument!*"
> ― Saiji Rokudou (CH:3 - Parallel Hope, Divergent Despair)
>
>

## See Also

* Script: Chapter 3 (Daily Life)
* Script: Chapter 3 (Class Trial Ver 3.0; Unfinished)
* Draft: Chapter 3 (Class Trial Ver 1.0; Scrapped)