#and if we're working with canon Lilith and Lucifer could find out and that's why Alastor disappears for 7 years

[emmys-grimoire]

Lesson 57 analysis + 58 predictions

It's less exciting than anticipated, probably.

tl;dr Summary

We start asleep, but overhearing Satan + Belphegor plotting to prank us. You can choose how to surprise and foil them. They're just here to tell you breakfast is ready. Belphegor finally rewards you with the star of diligence: MC is one star away from completing the exam and earning their sorcerer's license.

Lucifer is eager to make MC a full-fledged sorcerer because he could use them to ward off Solomon's advances, which apparently he's still making. Asmo tells us that Solomon is very picky, and driven, when he's choosing who to pact with.

And he's apparently very adamant about getting Lucifer.

The others note that Mammon and Leviathan are acting unusual, and they clearly are very distracted. We decide to ignore the strangeness for now and answer Barbatos's summons to Hotel Corvo.

And guess who is also being summoned!

We arrive, and Diavolo informs us that there's an evil phantom now haunting the hotel. Not just any ol' phantom, though: a bogeyman.

Apparently they're pretty tough and might have the upperhand against demons. They take the form of what their victims' fear most. They put several hotel guests in the hospital.

We find out that the reason why Mammon and Leviathan are being so weird is because they know they're responsible for the bogeyman being in Hotel Corvo: they went wild with Crowe upgrades and summoned it accidentally, then ordered Crowe to teleport it to Hotel Corvo after it transformed into Lucifer and scared them out of their wits.

Obviously, Lucifer's not happy! Barbatos assigns him to "fix" the problem. The brothers want to leave Mammon and Leviathan to do it on their own, but of course we can't have that.

Diavolo also seems keen on joining, but Barbatos turns on the scary fake smile and Diavolo relents.

Then the others show up! It sounds like it wasn't a planned get-together, but Solomon is eager to make the best of it. He wants to make our quest to banish the bogeyman MC's final trial.

Simeon is initially reluctant, but MC convinces him to join.

And then we're off down a creepy hallway in the hotel. The lesson ends on a cliffhanger as the creature at the end of the hallway suddenly attacks us.

Don't worry, Lucy will save us, probably.

This is the start of the trial of humility.

Analysis

Barbatos's Plan

Probably the most noteworthy thing about this lesson is how clearly Barbatos is setting all this up, even though he has no visibly obvious motivation to do so. He's summoned everyone to the same location under different auspices and he's making sure Diavolo isn't around. We still didn't get any insight on what he and Lucifer talked about, but I think Lucifer's being deliberately steered by him in this direction, too.

Since this doesn't seem to be something he's coordinating with Solomon, it leads me to believe he's either doing something to foil Michael's plan or he's setting up some kind of trap for the guy. For whatever reason, he doesn't want anyone else to catch on just yet.

Simeon's reluctance to stick around and help us is also noteworthy: he probably has Michael plans on the brain, and his intuition is probably trying to warn him. Alas, he can't say no to you.

Also, the BG being a bunch of doors and keys probably means something. Barbatos's room has multiple doors which lead to multiple places, I think: can't remember if they're just portals to different parts of the three realms or different points in time, but if I was a betting gal, I'd put my money on the latter. It doesn't look like his room (it looks like an old hotel), but I wouldn't be surprised if these doors lead to "flashbacks" similar to the ones we ran into back in the fake House of Lamentation.

The Bogeyman and Lucy's fears

It's implied that the bogeyman has powers that may make it difficult for demons in particular to cull. It sounds something an angel might be effective against, though, because Solomon insists Simeon accompany the group just in case "things go south". Though Simeon seems unsure if he can actually be effective against it.

Who do you think is stronger than Simeon, who is an archangel who was once a seraphim? He could just be downplaying his power, too: he's less threatening that way.

The bogeyman also has the ability to take the form of whoever or whatever his victim fears the most: we discover that Mammon and Leviathan fear Lucifer the most when they initially summon it.

This trial is 100% going to involve Lucifer facing what he fears the most. My guesses: it'll be either Father or Michael. They can do the former if MC doesn't necessarily see the same form Lucifer sees (they likely fear something different)... but if whatever form the bogeyman takes is noticeable to everyone observing it, then it's going to be Michael because I don't think the devs are going to give God a tangible form for reasons.

Why Lucifer could fear Michael? Simple: not only was Michael the one capable of bringing him low during the Great Celestial War, but he may know Lucifer better than anyone. All his strengths, but more importantly, all his weaknesses. Lucifer fears being exposed as flawed and imperfect, particularly by those he considers his lessers. It's also not the first time he's expressed something akin to fear re: Michael.

Another possibility is Lilith. He could fear facing her after failed to protect her. That'd be difficult to manage on-screen, though, for obvious reasons. They haven't given Lilith a canon appearance yet and it's in their best interest not to because they've been using MC as the Lilith expy in the Celestial Realm flashbacks.

Whoever or whatever it is, it'll be fun.

Solomon and his pacts

Another thing this lesson did was remind us that Solomon really, really wants a pact with Lucifer. We found out a couple lessons ago that his whole motivation behind forging a pact with Asmo was his interest in Lucifer.

Up until this point, Solomon has been pretty upfront with his desires and usually backs down when they deny his request to make a pact. He asked Belphegor back in Season 1, and he hasn't brought it up again after he was rejected.

This doesn't seem to be the case with Lucifer, though. His rejections have been ignored.

He's being unusually cavalier about this whole situation so maybe he would try to manipulate the current situation to wring a pact out of Lucifer, since he hasn't been deterred yet and something needs to change in order for him to get what he wants.

I don't know. Lucifer might be his blind spot, and something he wants badly enough to step over the line, so to speak. Why he wants Lucifer so bad is another head scratcher, but it could very well be because just because the guy is incredibly powerful.

Or this is just another red herring meant to make us suspicious of Solomon again. I guess we'll see.

Predictions

We have only three lessons left, and they set this lesson up as the lead into the climax, which is going to be later than where it was in season 2. But it can't afford to happen much later. 58 will give us the first half of the climax at least, and I won't be surprised if it wraps it up entirely in one lesson so we can have both 59 and 60 to say our goodbyes. It'll feel pretty rushed otherwise.

Michael's showing up in some capacity. I'm much more willing to bet on a face reveal now than I was at the beginning of the season: we haven't heard anything from him directly since the first flashback -- not even another chat -- and he hasn't even officially introduced himself yet. But we've been hearing all about him this season, and they've made it a point to let us know he's working on something behind the scenes. It feels like most of this season was softening the ground for his arrival, and he'll drop in to get us hyped for the next season.

I think we're headed back to the Celestial Realm, baby!

Luke's not with us at the haunted hotel, so he'll likely remain oblivious about what happened during the Great Celestial War until next season. Simeon's not gonna fall because he'll probably need to be our tour guide, and we have a bunch to explore about his background, too.

I was hoping we'd get some kind of conflict with the Sorcerer's Society as a part of the completion of the exam but I'm not sure if they can fit all that in now. Kind of disappointing: trying to smooth things over with them sounds much more interesting than Mammon + Levi just letting out a literal boogeyman. I don't think they're using their story themes as effectively as they could be. It's just Levi's tech going awry again, like it always does.

How I'll rate this season will depend entirely on what the climax actually turns out to be, but so far I'd rank it higher than season 2 but lower than season 1 because of the re-used tropes. Stop teasing us and just give us meaty conflict already.

[rsmrymnt-tea]

I just played through the new HDD lessons and I... What????

The 3rd lesson specifically has me pulling at my hair. The cast is reduced to idiots once again!! We've got Dia, Barb, Luci, Sol, and Satan here at the party and yet the curse is still an issues?

Lucifer canonically is very good at breaking curses and what does he do? We're to believe Solomon and Satan have never heard of the curse and are therefore unaware of how to break it, and they also have no methods to work out the solution on their own??? And Dia has the power to reincarnate Lilith as a human (and keep the Celestial Realm from noticing) and Barbatos has unspecified time powers and they're both useless too?

Why are they asking the demons in the Little D's for help? It's so stupid. And also they are trying these solutions that the demons are suggesting! Does that mean that these are feasible ways to break a curse? Why is the cast doing the stuff but not the MC?

Not to mention the stakes are pretty pathetic? If you think about it I guess having your personality altered indefinitely sucks. But in the event MC only makes remarks that are barely meaner than their usual dialogue. They don't do anything to particularly risk their relationships or hurt anyone so???? And even though the cast is like oh no we have to hurry it's not as if there was an actual deadline imposed I'm just sjdsks what is happening?

Also pretty lame to just say that the demons we're returned to wherever once the curse was broken. That doesn't make sense, and it happened off screen. What was the point of having them here really??

- 🐝

I’m gonna yell this here, but for all the hype that the devs built up for this event—

IT IS SOoooOOOoOOO SHIT GRRRRRRRRRRR

Four fucking pages to one event and this is the best they can come up with? I’m as disappointed and upset as I was during the Art event where the most competent characters were also completely useless just to pad out the fucking thing when writing a decent story for it wouldn’t take such any strenuous stretch of the imagination.

Like… This is soooooooo stupid. If MC’s supposed to be sadistic now, why tf didn’t they just grab Valago and shake him like a maraca until he told them how to undo the curse?

Hell, why didn’t anyone else do that?

Why didn’t Solomon and Satan go off somewhere to begin researching the curse? Why tf couldn’t Dia do anything??? Don’t tell me some demon in the body of a Little D outdid the prince of the Devildom with a curse? And if MC was holding the protective stone and the bouquet the whole time why didn’t anyone think to use those instead right away??????????? My Disbelief Could Not Be Suspended At All And That Is Bad

And god, yeah. Why why why were they just going with the Little D’s suggestions when I cannot fucking imagine anything that they suggested as being ways to counter the curse? Especially if it’s not MC who’s doing any of it lmao???

Would’ve been fun if they did it like reverse Halloween where MC’s the unhinged one but nooo… Gotta go lukewarm! Which I guess they have to since not everyone wants to be mean to the boys but then why go with a personality change as a curse in the first place if they’ll give the option to be nice?

And yeah, I thought we’d like, have those little buggers stick around for a little bit now that they’ve had their fun? But no, I guess not? We don’t find out anything about them at all????

Then the side boys all go home if you don’t take the story key route??????????

The nicest part I guess was the end with the photo album but I wish that part stretched a couple more chapters. Like wouldn’t it be nice for them to talk more about how much they love and appreciate MC? Without the influence of gems? Would’ve nice if some of the Gem event dialogue went here instead…

Are we just not the crowd for the events or something? Because half the time they just grind my gears with how stupid they make everyone for the sake of forcing it to go longer. The entirety of Part 3 just shouldn’t exist.

The whole thing certainly didn’t feel like the pleasant surprise that I was hopping for :/