*Hyun-ae's Help Desk (IC Inbox)

[terminalemulation]

<sub>[Integrated into the interface of the COMP is *Hyun-ae's contact button: simply pressing it immediately deploys the COMP glasses and causes her to appear before you, image initially fluttering in and out of existence for a bit before she can properly display. The whole process is soundless: a somewhat generic greeting automatically appears in a text box beside her.

If you choose to actually converse with *Hyun-ae rather than just ask her to pass a message to someone else, this is the place to post!]</sub>

Comments

sorry for the wait!

[terminalemulation]

Oh, that one's a doozy. The causes of it remain unknown, but we definitely know its effects.

The 13th Hour began to appear after the Calamity that wiped out most of the world, save current whereabouts, of course. That was ten years ago; when Hinoto-ri first began to mark the era as AC, "After Calamity."

It is a time when the barriers between Hinoto-ri and other worlds are at their weakest - the demon world in particular. Something about it resists all forms of timekeeping, and all clocks jump immediately from 12:00 to 12:01 after it passes.

As I'm sure you know, the 13th Hour is highly dangerous... but we do have ways of monitoring how dangerous. There is a positive correlation between demon activity and the phases of the moon - research on exactly how is still ongoing, as each sort of demon sports a unique temperament. The field of demon behaviorism is a very promising one, especially since creatures from the homeworlds of Visitors have begun to appear!

Lastly... one of the Visistors known as the Wise Men, Takeharu Kirijo, has compared the 13th Hour to something from his own home, known as the Dark Hour. It's worth noting that his native world also has Persona users... I think there's definitely something to that, but there's also some major differences between the 13th Hour and what Kirijo reported. They're not the same thing. I could tell you more about the Dark Hour just to illustrate those differences, but that could be getting off on a tangent.

No problem!

[strangerfromthedesert]

[Persona... he remembers hearing that term before, when he first arrived. A lot happened during his transition that muddled what he could remember though. Gotta love a defective memory chip.]

Is that why they're called the Wise Men? Because they experienced similar things in their own world before?

The word "Persona" also sticks out in my head like a sore thumb. I take it I wasn't the only one for that to happen with.

[terminalemulation]

Exactly!

All three of them came from worlds that were already familiar with the concept of Persona, even in slightly different forms. There's more people from worlds such as theirs in Hinoto-ri nowadays, but they're held in regard as they appeared far before the main masses of Visitors. They and the Seven are responsible for much of the accommodations that exist for extraterrestrials now.

Anyway, everyone who comes in from different worlds... um, excuse me, almost everyone, came here because of the mysterious figure known as Philemon granting them a Persona and making a request for aid. People report varying amounts of cognizance of the encounter... it's said to be 'like a dream.'

[strangerfromthedesert]

[Philemon... the name sort of rings a bell, but there was someone talking to him, that much he could remember. They wore some sort of mask, plain with some purple on it, but nothing else came to mind. He could scarcely remember another "dream" that happened as well. Lots of red.]

And who all are the Seven? Residents or Visitors that were here before us?

[He'll get to Philemon and Persona more after this, one thing at a time. Or at least, he thinks he will.]

[terminalemulation]

They're Visitors. They're busy quite a bit of the time tending to this or that, but that's another reason why I'm here - to help serve as a filter to reduce that workload, and to call them in when a situation requires their intervention.

The Seven consist of Brainstorm, Ideo Hazama, Minerva McGonagall, Reiko Akanezawa, Dr. Byron Orpheus, Ciel, and a man known only as "Q."

Ciel in particular I owe a lot to... she's the reason I was integrated into this network in the first place.

[strangerfromthedesert]

[His eyes scan the words written on the visor screen as he has since the start; he was picking out the most important parts he could to get an idea of his situation and who he was meant to protect. Back when he first "met" the Resistance, he didn't immediately agree to help them. Even after getting used to being reactivated and being sure of his own abilities, it took some time for him to observe the Reploids there and see their plight for himself. He could verify everything this AI was writing to him after the fact for himself,

just like when... Ciel explained things to him at first. Wait.]

Wait. This "Ciel". Blonde hair in a ponytail, pink clothes, blue eyes?

[terminalemulation]

_{[*Hyun-ae mimics his surprise - people with previous experience with members of the Seven are few and far between, after all.]}

...You're familiar with her?

_{[...Let this be good news.]}

[strangerfromthedesert]

[Zero's eyes closed. His thoughts reached back, back to when he was locked up in that old laboratory for many years. When he awoke to a plea for help. When he met her.]

... She's the one who activated me. "Zero, the legendary Reploid", she calls me. She asked me to help her Resistance fight against Neo Arcadia back in our world. I haven't seen them in a year since I succeeded in terminating their leader, an imitation of another legendary Reploid, X, and distracted their forces to hunt me down. I meant to return in time.

[He opens them again. He had to make sure.] She is here, then?