ooc ⚜ profile

[entreats]

Name: Jelle
DW username: devilism
E-Mail: queeningsquare[at]gmail[dot]com
IM: LINE: queeningsquare
Plurk: queeningsquare

Other Characters: N/A

Character Name: Ange Ushiromiya
Series: Umineko no Naku Koro ni
Timeline: The end of EP4, post-death.
Canon Resource Link: character | general series

Character History:

(Trigger warning for mentions of suicide/suicidal thoughts and gore!)

There are two stories one could tell about Ushiromiya Ange. But they all start out the same, both of them are part of the "bad ending" future Ange is part of.

Ange was born in 1980 and lived together with her father (Ushiromiya Rudolf) and her mother (Ushiromiya Kyrie). She also has an older half-brother, Ushiromiya Battler, but he left the house to go live with his grandparents on his mother's side after his mother (Ushiromiya Asumu) died since he was enraged at his father for taking Kyrie as his new wife so quickly after Asumu died. Because of that Ange didn't see her older brother a lot, but she still looked up to him and liked him a lot. She states herself that the times when both her parents and brother were with her were the most fun.

But all of this soon changed. On October 4, 1986 her parents and older brother left for the annual family conference on their family island of Rokkenjima, which Ange unfortunately could not attend that year since she was sick. But it was exactly that year that nobody returned from Rokkenjima. Nobody but Ange's aunt Eva, that is. The mass media started pinning these mass murders on Eva and later on even on the island's rumoured witch of legend, but nobody was able to prove anything about what really happened that day. Ange was left in care of her now only living family member, Ushiromiya Eva. But Eva had slowly become embittered by the loss of her man and her son, the fact that all the blame was pinned on her and that everyone was after her because she had inherited the entire Ushiromiya family's fortune as the only survivor. She took this out on little Ange, being physically and verbally abusive with her and causing Ange to grow into less and less of a happy and bright girl.

Eventually Eva sent her away to an all-girls boarding school, St. Lucia's, if not just to be rid of her. Due to her wealth and the rumors about her guardian Ange didn't make any friends there and was in fact even bullied. The bullying only increased when the girls started to notice that Ange snuck out often during lunch time to find a quiet spot where she could talk to the ghost of her cousin Maria who died in 1986 on Rokkenjima, which she "summoned" through Maria's diary she had managed to get hold of. In order for Ange to become happy she became Maria's apprentice as a witch. Maria taught her how to summon the seven sisters of Purgatory, magical 'furniture' (servants) who originally belonged to the witch Beatrice but ended up becoming Ange's friends. But since Ange was the only one who could see them, her classmates started thinking she just had imaginary friends.

This all escalated until one day Ange hadn't been able to study because of the sisters' prescence and got a low mark on her test. All her classmates bullied her ferociously into writing up an apology letter for her bad mark which had lowered the class average. Ange ordered the sisters to kill all of the bullies in a fit of anger, but they said they couldn't do that, causing Ange to rage even more. Since they couldn't even help her when she needed it the most, Ange started to deny the sisters' existence one by one, causing them to disappear and even Maria to leave her. In the end she convinced herself that it had been imaginary friends and that she had actually been alone all along - leading her to read the apology letter she was bullied into writing out loud to her classmates and asking for someone to kill her already, revealing she had grown suicidal due to her depressing life.

Later on in 1998, when Ange was 18 and just out of that boarding school, Eva died. By that time Ange had already grown into a cold girl, having learned through her experiences at the school that it was better to just hide all of her feelings underneath a thick layer of deadpan and acting like she didn't care about anything. On her dying bed Eva pushed some last curses on Ange; first she refused to tell what really had happened on Rokkenjima so Ange would never know who or what had killed her parents, and then she made Ange inherit all of her money - which had been a curse to Eva, it was what had caused everyone to speak badly of her and be after her life - the title of family head of the Ushiromiya family and the title of the Endless Witch, Beatrice. Ange just replied flatly to the things Eva said as if she didn't care, but in all actuality Ange's despair at not being with her parents and brother nearly drove her to suicide right after that, but right as she tried to jump off the rooftop of a skyscraper to end it all, her story seperated into two directions.

From that point on there is an Ange in the "real" world in 1998 and an Ange who goes back in time to try and save their family. The two are shown sharing the same memories, so it's technically the same Ange, and so Ange will have memories of both timelines in-game too - Umineko just plays a lot with the idea of parallel timelines and sharing memories between them.

The Ange in 1998 jumped off the building and managed to miraculously survive the fall by landing on a net below. Even though she was still deeply depressed because of everything that had happened with her family, she figured she should at least find out what exactly happened to them before she'd die - covering up her depression with a front of deadpan cynicism once more. After that she went on to investigate what happened on Rokkenjima to the best of her abilities, visiting relatives of the servants who had been on Rokkenjima that day and researching various other things. She was chased by her aunt from her mother's side who wanted to make Ange 'drink tea with her' (hint: it's not actually drinking tea when said aunt was part of the yakuza) in order to gain the Ushiromiya family's fortune. But Ange managed to escape the Sumadera family's goons who went after her again and again, partly thanks to her personal bodyguard Amakusa.

At the end of her research she managed to convince a captain to bring her to Rokkenjima, where she wanted to lay down flowers as a last tribute to her family. But her aunt had followed her even to the island and cornered Ange when she was alone, since she had left Amakusa back at the port in order to carry out this symbolic moment by herself. She was knocked to the ground by her aunt's bodyguards and even humiliated when her aunt got hold of Maria's diary she had been carrying with her and started mocking it and tearing out pages. Eventually Ange was able to summon the magical sisters she had denied before at school and they quickly took care of all the bodyguards and even Ange's aunt, killing them. There was only one enemy left; the personification of the one who had caused Ange so much pain, the witch form of her aunt Eva. The witch form changed into her aunt Eva's form with a gun, but in the struggle Ange was able to get the gun instead and shot her 'aunt' (although it couldn't really have been Eva since she had died before), symbolizing Ange finally breaking through the circle of hate in the Ushiromiya family.

There is, however, another side to this story. Instead of jumping off that skyscraper and surviving, there's a timeline in which Ange instead met the witch Bernkastel on top of that skyscraper. She promised that if Ange would fight together with her brother against the witch Beatrice who 'imprisoned' her family in a game she and Battler were having back in 1986 over whether magic exists or not, her family would be returned to her. The only condition was that she couldn't tell anyone who she actually was, so she was forced to use the alias of 'Gretel'. And so Ange went into the past with Bernkastel, back to 1986. She supported Battler in his battle against Beatrice, although she was careful to hide her identity by putting up her sarcastic deadpan front even in front of her older brother - for example by telling him to keep the jokes to his haircut. Eventually Ange realised that her family would never be returned to her since she already was from a future where it had been decided that her family never came home from Rokkenjima - if they would return, they'd return to a six year old Ange from a timeline different than her own. But she still continued participating in the game for her brother's and family's sake, so at least some Ange out there could live a happy life together with her family.

When her brother lost his identity and will to fight, Ange told him who she really was - that she was his little sister and still out there waiting for him to win and come back - making him regain that will. But the price she had to pay for that was high - it was practically a moment of self-sacrifice. Since she had broken the rule of not telling him who she was, Ange was torn apart piece by piece by hot-glowing irons until she was nothing more than a pile of scrap meat.

Between the two timelines this is technically the last moment, and it's the final moment that Ange will remember before showing up in-game.

Abilities/Special Powers: Ange is a witch, since she was Maria's apprentice and inherited the title of Beatrice, the Endless Witch, from her aunt Eva. Therefore her witch name is ANGE-Beatrice. She isn't able to use the endlessly killing and reviving power that comes with the title of Beatrice in canon though, and the power she does use involves summoning canon characters (the seven sisters of Purgatory), so she won't be able to use that power in-game. Which means that other than having the title of being a witch and having the potential for magic if taught any, she'll practically be powerless within the game.

Third-Person Sample: To say Ange was used to strange things would probably still be an understatement. Even before her life started to be consumed by witches' games, time-travelling and alternative worlds she already had gotten plenty of experience with both the idea of magic and imaginary friends. Even the way she grew up, while not entirely supernatural, was pretty off compared to the way most normal people would have grown up.

In that sense this place wasn't much different. It had been a surprise to learn that she was still alive (or just existing) even after vividly remembering dying, sure, but this place wasn't so weird once she got over that part. After having participated in Beatrice's game in an attempt to save both her family and herself, this place almost felt more normal in comparison. It was a setting she was less personally involved in, for one, making it easier to just view it like some cartoon from TV come to life. A weird other world filled with weird other people. It made it a lot easier to actually feel detached from this place and everyone in it rather than just act like she was detached to hide the fact that she cared like Ange did back home.

After all.. she was sort of alive here, but she had nowhere to return to. She died back home, that's for sure. And even if she wouldn't have died, she never would have reached her goal anyway. One of those witches had told her that no matter what she did, her family would never return to her. All of her struggles would be in vain.

So in that case nothing mattered. Who cares that she was stuck in some really weird world that was different from her own? If she wasn't ever going to see her family again, then did it really matter that she was here rather than back home?

It was as if every road she could take would just lead back to the same point. She followed the witch off the rooftop, participated in the game, tried her best but only died without making anything better for herself. But if she had never followed the witch, she would just have continued to live the same life as before. A painful life where she never would know what happened to her family and live every day while being hated by the world. And even in this place she was stuck without being able to change a thing. No matter what she did, there just was no happy possible outcome for Ange Ushiromiya.

It was a realisation that she knew she already had years ago. But somehow being here felt different from standing in that classroom and proclaiming that she wanted to die. It even felt different from that day she stood on the rooftop, about to jump off. Although she still was stuck in a position where it didn't seem like anything would change for her in the future, she wasn't crying. She wasn't even really feeling all that bad or trying to find an end to all of it.

Maybe it was since there wasn't really anyone trying particularly hard to hurt her in this place. No one trying to hurt her specifically, anyway. At least in this place she could blend into the crowd without the burden of her name, without anyone knowing who she was. She could just live as a normal person, more or less.

And maybe there was still a part of her that wanted that. A small part of her that Ange wished she could let go of, but knew she could never truly abandon. A small bit of curiosity, a small bit of determination. The feeling she tried to bury deep inside of her that made her accept the witch's offer to join the game in the first place. The feeling that as long as there was still something she could do, maybe she could live.

Sure, she was dead back home, but she still existed here now. Sure, she was told that she couldn't change her own fate anymore, but maybe she could at least still find a way to change her family's fates for the better, or at least find out what happened on Rokkenjima that day. Maybe there was even something she could find out about this place - find a way to somehow turn the tables on the witches from outside of her world, somehow return home alive and fight once more.

Ange couldn't help but think of her brother and his dumb determination even in the face of the most terrible or impossible odds. The same brother who had always made her so happy when she was young, the same brother she sacrificed her own life for once already. If he saw her in this situation, he would for sure be telling her that she couldn't give up just yet.

This place was a new chance - Ange just had to figure out for what exactly.

After lying aimlessly on her bed for the biggest part of what felt like days now, Ange got up. Without even really bothering to make her hair look slightly more presentable or her clothes a little less wrinkled - she sure didn't care about that anymore at this point - she stepped out.

The first step was just to do anything at all, after all. Look around. Find clues. Find anything.

First-Person Sample: So I noticed that hedge maze outside. [ Because exploring was just what she took to when she wasn't sure what else to do with herself after suddenly turning up in this place after dying. ]

It seems ideal for this place, huh? Some weird place with some mysterious big hedge maze. It sounds like it could have come straight up from a horror movie. [ Not that she sounds very impressed by the idea. Judging from how flat her tone is, Ange isn't one to actually get scared by horror movies. ] I don't know yet since I'm new, but there's probably spooky stories about it too. Am I right?

[ She tilts her head sideways a little with a bored look on her face, like she's trying to think. ]

Something like.. "Tons of people go in there, but no one has ever returned. Sometimes you can hear their screams at night." [ Her deadpan delivery sure kills any hopes of that actually sounding like a scary story. It's like she's describing a visit to the grocery store or something. ] Or "A terrible creature lives in there and one day it'll escape its prison of a maze and devour us all." Those don't sound totally unbelievable in a place like this.

[ A small pause, and then-- ]

Or just "I once went in there, couldn't find the way out until hours later, and I had to go to the toilet so badly I peed my pants midway through." The scariest story of all, if you'd ask me.

Anyway, if anyone has any stories about it, feel free to tell me.

[ This might just be her way of asking people for information about it. But in the dumbest way, of course, because who asks questions like a normal person and leaves themselves vulnerable to being made fun of for asking a dumb question? Not Ange, nope siree. ]