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The story of PSO2 has many chapters & is very long.
This isn't meant to be a substitute for the game, or as a transcript of the entire script/plot, but rather a way to understand, read-up-on, speculate, analyze & get a really good idea of what's going on in the game.
This section is for Chapters 4 and 5 ONLY. For all the plot before this, see the Story Hub. Because the game is divided up over these sections, the plot will be as well.
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Green Text: Speculation or opinions
What You Do/The official "Party Line" appears in RED TEXT
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This whole page is pretty much worthless.
Secret Information Gathering: With Xiera
Preface: All the shallowness and stupidity of this episode seems to condense itself into this one extra scene at the end. If you hate really banal dumb things you need to skip this ENTIRE PAGE and go on to the section of the website where it’s episode 5 or something cause this gonna get stoooooooopid. Oh and then it gets stupider in the boy's room.

Do you like porn?
Hope you do cause it's gonna try to go there as much as possible with high schoolers.  
How do we get something this vapid and worthless in here? I mean, you'll see how reaching it goes in just text
, but you have to imagine the pervy-est &  hentai camera you possibly can and then push it all around the room. What's super sad is how much of a waste it is, instead of learning more about characters or attempting to make them interesting in their final shot so that you might actually miss them/care a little bit, it chooses to fail utterly and have them fight over their own boobs!

*Can you imagine? Writing a bunch of dialogue about high school fools fighting over their own boobies in a stupid tub & then like.......congratulating yourself on great writing? How does that work? How cringey is it? Let’s find out. Who would even? Anyway get ready for the next level of cringe.

And some tangents because irl history is interesting and also terrible.

Xiera is at her screens when you come in, and she'll say perfect timing. She's finally done it, she's bridged a mechanism that allows us to see the progress of Earth. With it, we can catch up on Hitsugi and everyone's progress with live video info. She had a hard time getting it done but...

Peeping Is Bad
Sounds Interesting

Who said it's for peeping? She just said we can video call them now that we're away from that dimension. Staying in touch with conference video calls isn’t bad. If you say Sounds Interesting she's happy, and asks if you're also concerned with how things are going over there. Even though the major threat is eliminated, Ether is still spreading, so Phantoms will reoccur. Instead of giving out sortie orders upon info that's brought to us, it is essential to observe the situation as much as we can and monitor it to help with suppression control. Now THAT's the reason, it'll never be used for peeping, not ever. So let's test it, to see what type of info we can receive. She types along on her screens.

It goes to static, then shows you...they're in the darn bath again!
Annnnnnd instead of turning it off and waiting 45 minutes for them to soak, of course, because it went so well last time that Casra investigated the lot of everyone and even considered killing people over ‘breach of info’ because no one could fess up that they were on creeper-cam spying on naked high schoolers. Lesson status: NOT LEARNED.

Kohri says nothing like a piping hot soak, the good thing of the school is the size of the bath. They're camped out in their towels again, in the steamy area, sitting on the floor of the not-deep 'pool'. Hitsugi agrees, but glares at Och and Phul. They're seated across the way on the edge of the tile wall soaking their feet. Och scowls back that no matter where we go or which bath they take it won't make a difference, they'll 100% to complain anyway.

*No, no one would complain about you if you weren't there to start arguments every 10 seconds. Also, if they are really to be counted as teachers they ought to be in the faculty steam room bath whatever you call this place because mixing children/adults faculty/students in a place like that is a school no-no. But maybe it's age-divided so let’s benefit the doubt here.

Phul throws in her two cents, you can probably expect more of this treatment Ms Dorm Manager. Hitsugi claims she didn't want the title, they needed one, foisted it onto her and it's a coincidence. Och says speaking of which, you're being rude to your teacher/elder, so show some respect you little miss student council president. She sasses back that there's no chance because she's not her homeroom teacher. *Homeroom teachers in Japan have different significance/a greater role than they do in other schools around the world, so this makes sense for her to say. Och says she'll make the test 200% more difficult just for her. Hitsugi baits her, by claiming how she'll just ace it anyway. They both stand up in  the middle of the pool to glare each other down from inches apart. (one false step in a tile tub...and that's the end you know--but neither falls nor lashes out)

But someone calls out that the pool is not a battlefield, so leave all conflicts at the door.

Phaleg has appeared!
They yes m'am her, and sit down to plot against her. She has somehow gotten into the pool as well, in her towel, without anyone noticing. (So, it seems like teleportation ability, or when she turns into the star/sparkle thing you saw on occasion, she can be that and then make it invisible. It is also silent, apparently.) Och wisely asks why she's there, she's an outsider to the school, so student president...do something about her. Hitsugi says as if she would...but Och it's your role as teacher so you do something, you're the faculty staff! Kohri thinks they're adorable because they're so alike and don't give up.

Notice how we never find out why Phaleg is there. At all. Ever.

She has ZERO REASON to be there, she doesn't even like any of the girls / be their friend...or foe, really. If you're some immortal demigod you're not going to want to warpspace into a high school BATHROOM and hang out in DIRTY KIDS WATER that smells like feet and mildew and listen to stupid conversations that have taken place 10 billion times before. Anyone who has lived longer than perhaps 30 years can look back on their own era, then see movies or younger kids/their own kids/whatever repeating the exact same scenarios in high school. As a kid or a teen everything is novel, but over 100 years? Nothing is. You likely can't imagine up over 200 or so, but she's got to be up over 1k, how much would she have seen? (over, and over, and over again)

TANGENT ALERT
(And here's another funny thing why didn't she kill Hitler & Leopold 2?)
Wild tangent: Killing Hitler (or failing to) is also a huge issue because obviously wizards in Harry Potter could have done him in, alongside old Leopold 2, but chose not to--and Rowling couldn't write well enough at the time to excuse that away--so of course these guys aren't going to either because there's totally 0 thought into it. And we KNOW Hitler existed here, because WW2 happened & Japan built the Yamato.
You may ask what did Leopold 2 do?
They purposely don't cover the guy in schools in lots of places so: Probably off’ed more people than Hitler, but you don't hear about it because he got them all while Hitler did not/was stopped before he could. He did (accidentally/on purpose) change the currency of a whole huge area in Africa off of gold/coins to "the chopped off hands of human children"--if that gives an idea of what people had to be 'ok with' at the time if they were capable of murdering him but did not--a'la Phaleg. (Seriously, put his name into Google & read about him--he's worse than you think...And when you're through there, try other genocides of the world, Pol-Pot perhaps....all modern enough that she'd of been able to do something--or fail to.)
You can't put her anywhere on Earth and have her not hear about WW2 realistically. If you set her as Japanese, she's worse (ethnic cleansing the Chinese out, Unit 731, attempt on native Hawaiians, however many other atrocious things that went on including convincing their own guys to do suicide things which is very wrong), if you put her in South America...she'd still know there was 'a very bad man' running up against people who didn't deserve it over in Europe and then proceed to do nothing about it even though she could fly over there. The logistics of all of it are just BONKERS and you have to basically switch off your entire brain which is aggravating--but expected.

Phul '....' at this, so Kohri asks what's wrong. (Phul is staring down Kohri from her seat on the edge of the tile pool. Phul glares at Kohri further, telling her that her chest and her breasts are so big......(of course this is what she goes after) Kohri never paid attention to such things & tries to wave her off. (Remember, poor Kohri is likely either gay or more-likely shes bisexual attracting to feminine looking males and also to regular females so harassing her like that is a little worse than going vs a hetero person.) Phul starts grilling her at it, while crawling forth through the water in a creepy way. What did she eat? How are her exercises? What does she think about, and what should she do? Tell me!

If they don't know "It is genetics" by this point in the future, and being supposed 'geniuses' well there's not much hope for the lot. To deflect creepy crawling Phul away, Kohri demands she ask Phaleg because hers are bigger. To which Phaleg tells her that it's daily training.  Och rages 100%, outraged to think we'd agree with her? It doesn't work!

We then get so many camera zooms on the boobies that we are in a porno.
Phul tells everyone she knows Och's been trying everything she can think of (to generate breast enlargement) but she can't see any difference. Och sour-grapes on this saying it's 100% useless fat anyway. So, Hitsugi! You say something.   Hitsugi won't help, because she's 'not on her side' because a teacher DID say there's a definitive difference between zero and one. What this does, is makes you sort the poor saps here in order of booby size.

Trope-a-Dope - The here we go again edition:
We’ve encountered this before but the basic trope is that large breasts are superior, small is inferior and girls who have small breasts are angry and jealous at all times of others because they feel bad about themselves. Ones with large freely dump on smalls (and are justified in this) because picking on people is cool & reminding them that ‘no man will ever like them’ is great because ‘a man liking you’ is the only thing you have to live for.  How trite is that? Just watch every SINGLE STEP COME TRUE. You think they’re not that pathetic but they are.

Och is upset because girls with small boobs are forever inferior to all others, and are thus always angry and salty that they cannot be regarded as beautiful by anyone. She wants to increase hers so picks on good-target Kohri.

The pecking order is always that girls with largest boobs freely dump on those with smaller because small = inferior, so everyone is able to dump on her here.

Hitsugi has larger ones than Och, so she takes it upon herself to crap on Och here, because girls are all very salty all the time. Also, when hanging around in tubs, all girls want to do is talk about the tiddy & get jealous of each other. It doesn't even require an antagonist to make it happen, as we saw in the first bath peeping scene where Hitsugi gets jealous and we've got to have tiddy-chatty-hour there too. So no, it's not hyperobla if every single time you see these clowns they're always banging on about the same damn thing. As if somehow, their recent near death experiences and all that madness wouldn’t still somehow be fresh on their minds? Being on the MOON? And literal ALIENS? Nnnnaaa--we gotta get us a man.

Everything in the above trope-a-dope is patently "100% untrue" which is why it's like......so rage-worthy? Cringe worthy? What's even funnier is that if you look at Olympian level female athletes none of them look like Phaleg. Phaleg is def. up to something.

Och demands that if you're comparing (Kohri & Phaleg) to her, the rest of all of us are errors.  Phul says it's too many errors, because we asked about Enga a while ago. Och stammers her response, demanding why she brought him up, or how he's related to the conversation at all. (He isn't) Phul is defending herself here against "Being an error" by bringing up a guy that Och likes/has a minor crush on so she can be disparaged in front of others for liking him. And these jerks wonder why they don't have any friends and are so 'emo and lonely'.

Hitsugi claims to be 'sorry to disappoint' but her brother "likes them bigger". Och didn't want her opinion! Hitsugi  asks if all men are like that, right Kohri? Annnnd there we went with the "no man wants a small boob girl they are so ugly and worthless" and then the girl getting upset because "no man will like her". Kohri agitates, and says to not ask her because she doesn't like men at all, she prefers Hitsugi any day. Phul considers that information worth gathering. This is the 2nd time Kohri has claimed to be gay, but she also thinks Aru is ok, so she's likely to be bisexual, but to prefer a feminine feature-set on either type of person. And, that's fine and all but....why do we have to hear about it? It super literally doesn't matter.

Och demands Kohri to give her off 50 percent, as she can spare some & moves forward toward Kohri again. Then she tries to....claw off Kohris' boobs? What? They get to swatting at each other. Phul reminds her that teachers sexually harassing students is a crime, Och argues that it's not, its "Skinship" so 'come on gimme'. Phaleg tells her to stop it, so she'll growl at that.

Phaleg says true love transcends shape and form, meager problems concerning the appearance of your bodies is trivial, and should mean nothing to you. (That's supposed to be "real rich coming from a vain witch like Phaleg who uses her magic to cultivate her appearance"--it's supposed to be ironic statement.) She tells them that "What's important is what you think and what's in your heart, you should have learned that by now." You're young but caring and nurturing is how you experience love, it's an integral part of human nature.

Wise words maybe but the camera is squarely fixed on her boobs the entire time. Phul calls it charismatic persuasion, but knowing you, you have the experience to back up the knowledge. Hitsugi asks what kind? Och doesn't know either. (The answer is clearly that Phaleg likely fell in love with someone at some point in her 1000s of years and lived with them their whole life, tragically losing them at the end of it because she's immortal and they aren't. Teens have not experienced ANY lifetime with another person, a real true love over 20 or more years to learn what nurturing love really means.) Kohri asks how old Phaleg is. Hitsugi thinks this is rude! Och thinks it's a good question.

She says there's no point, she's nothing more or less than her heart wishes her to be. She then glares at the ceiling menacingly for no reason...but....

Xiera shouts! And says let's keep it confidential! Everything's a secret from everybody just now! She switches the system off as quickly as she can and you nod at her a lot, both fretting that Phaleg has figured out someone has seen the conversation.

Had Phaleg truly been better written as immortal, she'd of confessed her age because it doesn't matter. It's like why Jean Luc Picard Star Trek has no hair, it's because it no longer matters who has and has not hair, in his era. Phaleg probably could not tell anyone was watching unless she has unknown extra powers. But, because she's turned into such a do-anything MacGuffin here, of cooooourse she can see through to different dimensions! They needed an excuse to end the scene.

So in all, all this does is give you a worse impression of everybody.
A sad note to go out on.
But hahahaaha you didn't think it could get any worse but it's gonna!

Unflinching Information Gathering

Xiera welcomes you in to her info gathering attempt (again) but this time it's strictly info, nothing more! She feels it's too difficult to get a full grasp of events if we only use the girls. Now, we'll see how Enga and Aru are doing. (So, she can choose to focus on a person, and then you see what's around them) She cheerfully presses her floating buttons to see how things are on earth. You can watch her screens with her and they show...static...

And...Aru's practicing his flipper kick in the pool bath while loving how big it is. This ruins Enga's sense of relaxation. Ah. So, we were inappropriately watching the girls, now it is time to inappropriately watch the boys. I guess no one could expect it to be better at this point so here we go regardless.

But, Aratron's in the bath too, with a wash cloth on his hair-free head saying Enga has a scary face. Now HOW is this old man in the tub with the kids? He's faculty at the school now (Because they'll just let anybody in there apparently: Och and Phul are even less qualified than he is. Remember, he's an ex-astronaut so he's no slouch in several fields of study, but being good at something doesn't mean you're fit to teach children or know how to create lesson plans etc.) Communal same-sex baths are common at hotsprings and things in Japan where you can go free from clothing and have a soak. It isn’t a big deal over there, like how saunas are in other places. However, mixing teachers and students in a ‘recreational area’ like that is the part that’s probably a problem.

But now, someone else chimes in to the conversation.
It's Hagith! He's perched on the edge of the tile tub. However, unlike everybody else, he's totally naked. Keep this in mind even when you don’t want to.  He winks, saying how he's the benefactor, practical owner of the whole place because he's such a fabulous donor, so of course this is where he can be if he wants. No.....it isn't....but we have to shoe-horn him in somehow because who even knows. Are we going to figure out how he summoned the green man out of his tablet? Learn more about the Yamato? Figure out how his mind reading apps work? Say why he joined MC? Clear up all the loose ends he created? SPOILER: No.

Enga tells him he sounds so annoying that no one should have to put up with his arrogance. He should ask him instead why he wants to sit in dirty people water that probably smells like armpit and athletes' foot because it's in the boys sector. (remember, the girls one probably smells like mildew and feet--we are equal-opportunity offenders) Hagith defends it that he expresses his apologies in the form of generous donations so it's corporate philanthropy. He wants to spend a night in the dorms for old times’ sake. Aratron apologizes that MC didn't take the immaturity out of him. Enga says no need...geez.

What this is, is a legitimate pining for the 'glory days'.
Lots of people actually have this and it can be called "Peaked in High School". Even though he's turbo-wealthy and clearly successful at whatever he's doing that they leave unclear other than 'app maker' he feels connected to his days as a high-schooler even though it seems likely less-pleasant / doesn't make exact sense. With how they characterize him, he DIDNT have a good time, and probably DIDNT peak in HS, but they're giving him this legit complex anyway as an excuse to shoe-horn him into the scene to antagonize everyone. It would be an interesting ploy if they bothered to do better characterization with him & write him right. (Ex. had tons of friends/thinks he did, was really popular and fun, was actually the kool-kid/with everything...and now as an adult he doesn't have that and wants it back. Or make it that he thinks he was top dog in HS but people were really fawning over him for his money because he was a rich brat and now it's all adults who don't fawn so he misses HS. At least those would be both easy to write and logical to have.)

Aru thinks its the more the merrier, that all are together and lively. (Is anyone going to ask him why/how he created the green man) Aru wishes Big Sis could join us also. Enga calls him a dummy, that's a recipe for disaster in a steaming hot pot. Enga is correct because everyone here has the maturity level of a horny 14 year old boy that doesn't know that girls are people.

Prediction fun time:
Will this end up talking about the size of everyone's junk & parading around in playgirl magazine fashion? (Old man tiddy! Greasy rich guy butt! Enga has bum-fluff? Let's go see.....and BARF)

OR

Will it end up being a misogynistic pile of utter swill that's repulsive to watch and listen to?

Take your bets folks, let's see if we can get even more inappropriate and creepy than you EVEN THOUGHT POSSIBLE. 

Aru says we went in together last time. This raises the interest of Hagith and Enga, who both stand to question him about it. Hagith feels healthy young men should be curious about such things, so in the men's room we shouldn't hold back with our talk. Hagith is deeeeeeef in his 20s somewhere, and he's 'so interest' in 15 year olds? Grooooossss. Plus, curious? If he not knows what a girl looks like with no clothes he's in his damm 20s he can see a photo online. Big whoop.

Aratron thinks back and asks Enga that he was teasing Och earlier?
(Remember, she badgers him about school work along with Phul, as they nettled him out of his hiding-box to take a test earlier. He would have to tease back at them probably to be feisty/that would be very in-character to do--however, picking on someone's appearance they can't change is mean and bad/unfitting for a get-back after test-pestering.)

Enga is only mildly annoyed he remembers. Hagith accuses him that he is a prefer-er of tiny tit! (Wow seriously?) Enga gets mad, and Aru demands to know what is a tiny tit, and is very excited about it, hopping around on his little water ledge. Enga flops around about it a little bit, saying like how Hitsugi has on her. But, Aru disagrees, saying Hitsugi goes boing but Kohri is better going bo bo boing! Aratron then decides to lust after her, saying that her growth of boob is more fascinating and extraordinarily eye catching...(he is wistful) Enga angrily chastises him saying ya ol pervert shouldn't talk about that stuff.

Annnnnnd Enga's technically Aru's dad now (Remember?)
So instead of telling him something even SLIGHTLY responsible like "we live in a society where hetero's judge women based on their breast size which we equate with their beauty level and how much we want to have sex with them, and that determines their worth in life". But hey, he's what 16 or 17 or something and that would be OOC.
So maybe Aratron, being in his 80s would have something moral or positive as the literal adult in the room to say but nah, he's hot under the non-existent collar for some 15 year old booty and admitting* it.
So, poor Aru gets a bad education. There is no "Well how would YOU feel if you had ONE trait that everyone focused on and repeatedly told you that your entire appeal was inside ONE TRAIT? You would feel bad then, wouldn't you?
You are more than your looks. Everyone is." One must wonder how he'll turn out as a teen or an adult, will he stay nice, as he is now, or, having no good parent figure to say things like "its ok to be attracted to people's looks, but here's how not to be a shallow turd about it", let him become a rampant neckbeard incel whinging eternally about the friend zone?

*Admitting it- If you're attracted to someone or something you shouldn't be...maybe it can't be helped? Some attractions are genetic (like feet-attract is usually genetically based about the wiring in the brain generally so isn’t that interesting—it’s another thing to look up about why it happens, and is generally harmless to look up unlike old Leopold 2.)  It has to be ok to think thoughts, however talking about them should be skipped if you know they aren't appropriate? Acting on them to be never? The problem with inappropriateness is when it leaves the mind and turns into actions like ogling, making others uncomfortable for your own gain, or peeping/spying/invading or otherwise troubling people for gain. (And that's the passive-portion only---active would be groping/etc which is completely left out because it doesn't arise here.) So it's like yeah, he's inappropriate here cause he's up in his 80s wistfully lusting after the breast-growth of a 15 year old, monitoring her booby size as it goes up since her recruitment/age goes up/as she is with MC, so maybe the message is that as long as she doesn't know (remember you can almost never see his eyes) it's ok for him to do because he won't act on it. It's not set up to look moral nor amoral here it just is a dialogue.

Hagith approves of a real man's conversation, because it's the type of thing he always wanted to have in school while he was there. Enga tells him "he was so lonely bastard no wonder he became the student council president." He claims haughtily that he was the best for the job...which reminds Enga of why he hates him. To diffuse Enga, Hagith will ask

“So, what's his type really, big or small boobs! Personally he accepts all types in all glory!” He gestures grandly but would choose...Kohri..to which Enga says he has guts. Remember, Enga is probably either 16 or 17 or so if Hitsugi is 15, so he's not going to mind a 25+ year old man saying "would prefer to bang" a 15 year old girl. At that age you don't know or care what "Statutory" means. Hagith uses this as confirmation that 'Enga likes tiny tits' so let's use his latest app to be sure he gets along with her...(What does this mean? Is he going to put Enga on Tinder or dating app?)

So, Enga tells him he's got a real death wish now. (Just trip him on the slick tile, he'll die)
They square off with a stare down.
To get rid of the stare-down, Hagith asks Aru which is better boobs, Kohri or Histugi?

Aru doesn't know, but he likes hugging them. Kohri makes his heart to skip, but they're really warm...but really he loves both. Hagith agrees, but Enga commands him to stop perverting Aru's young mind like that. They then continue to gesture and argue about it.

"Energetic youth, but events like these arguments embody peace, right Mother?" asks Aratron.
They all argue as Aratron sits contentedly in his side of the tub.
Ah how true it must be a time of peace when we can concentrate on objectifying others rather than battle planning.

Xiera stares too closely, and very obviously, saying she was lost in her observation, but no more, all footage STRICTLY confidential. We're all done here, no more info needed everyone's AOK. She then sneers a long time, clearly remembering all that she saw. (Remember, Hagith was naked the whole time and the screen you were viewing may not have been the only angle.) This is clearly meant to portray her as dizzy and lustful, the expression meant to be a dirty pervert's leer.

Just because a girl does it, doesn't mean its ok.

This is the same thing as those awful micro-cams secretly installed in girls locker rooms and toilets in Korea that everyone's so riled about. It's rude and super wrong no-matter who is observing for sex purposes without the consent of the people. The leering she's doing up there illustrates that IT IS FOR SEX-purposes of Xiera that she did it. The stereotype of the "dirty peeping perv" is always male, but a female doing it is just as bad / though because it's counter-stereotype it's generally played for laughs, as it is here, which is sad.

It's surprising they would want to characterize a robot this way.
If you remember Headmaster NAV from Universe, they had him programmed as a dirty old man who would regularly commit battery by pinching/slapping butts. (Yes if you do a sexual touch in a public place that hurts another person without their permission...what's that called? The answer isn't 'jaywalking'......) He was characterized as a bit of a fossil though/kept around because of his godly skill at knuckle weapons and general un-kill-ability, so his bad behavior was warned about but tolerated because he was a bit of a juggernaut---could he even be stopped by the law if someone wanted to press battery charges? Etc. did get raised in the game and he wasn't portrayed as a great moral hero/or in a position like Xiera's. He was shown as not engineered to run a ship, but a flawed old pervert who's creators are long dead. That's an important distinction, as well as that everyone didn't approve of him and he wasn't a tool to make your character or other story characters complicit in his nasty acts either.

You'd think Xiera would be upset/mad/jealous
She already whines about her own 'tiny tit' in her own words, so you'd think she'd be angry at the conversation praising Kohri and lusting after "the superior to Xiera girl Kohri", but she's not. Maybe she's too distracted by naked Hagith.
The clear thing though is that the pot always needs the kettle to be black too: shoplifters think everyone else shoplifts, pervs think everyone is just like them too/they just don't admit it/etc....so...whoever is writing for Xiera here needs her to be as confidently pervy as 'the guys are' to even the playing field of "rotten folks/ ALL girls would love hidden cams in the boys bathrooms too-- they love under-age guys as much as we love under-age girls without their consent". Accuse your accuser of the very thing that you are accused of so you can feel better becuse "well, everyone is that way". That's why they have her behaving that way, she's the justification that girls as just as bad. What's also interesting is that you're complicit. You could walk out at any time but....hmm.

Useless Tangent:
To vastly improve the story characters which would never happen:
None of this stuff would even require a massive re-write. If like 1/2 of the worthless swill was deleted (Do pets hate Pietro???) any of it would be easy to do which is what's so frustrating.

Create Phul & Och to actually be unattractive and fill in their back story as to why their families and everyone else doesn't like them. Give them legitimate reasons to be suicidal & make Mother their real savior. Have them improve their behavior over the course of the Episode, and learn slowly that their meanness/petty ways/always bickering/dumping on others is wrong, and have them get 'on the fence' about Mother's objective because of their new knowledge. Mother WAS an all-right sort in ways, and she DID use good morals in some cases to get people to do whatever. Have Phul & Och learn their own worth, as they improve their friendship and learn to interact with others through Mother's teachings.
Make people want to root for the cool nerds & see writing & math as something that can be awesome too.

Create Phaleg as an actual immortal & explain her and Ardem - they had no idea what these 2 were supposed to be and never figured it out. Neither one was convincing, and they had tons of ill defined powers and MacGuffins. Immortals are damn hard to write for but it CAN be done and since they were sorta-intregal to the plot it would have vastly improved it if they'd had actual planning.

Fix Enga: He's basically a mean rat-bag the entire time. Start him off that way, then have him learn that abusing Hitsugi constantly isn't the road to success. End it with them being the coolest team ready to take on their greatest challenge which will be raising Aru. No, you're NOT ready to be a good/proper parent to an 8 year old when you are 15.

Fix Mother: They had no idea what they wanted Mother to be either. The Photoner angle built her up to be 'worse than pd', but then she's just a sad sack misguided creature that comes across as a teenager in personality and intelligence. "Whoopsie, I didn't know I could have more than 1 goal in my life!" She'd be the hardest to fix because it would either have to be revealed that the Photoners just dumped her because she wouldn't obey and was leaning toward going rogue, or making her as bad as they said...she couldn't ever really reform as she did. A tricky angle as a plot.

So, it just seems like it was riddled with fluff and missed opportunities to have better, or even good, characters.
The Earth angle turned out to be "fake" because it VERY quickly developed away from 'earth' into full-on "magic fantasy earth" where impossible zany things are happening all the time and every belief must be permenently suspended. If you take away 90% of the traits of a thing, is it still the thing? (no.) (Tokyo, the empty city! No sattellite/military sees the Yamato! No one ever looks out a window in Las Vegas! Girl falls 10 stories out of building and has not a scratch on her! Mind reading phone apps! Children star-trek teleporting inside of video games! It's SO REALISTIC)
It's super clear with all the magical fantasy they had to put in, that the entire purpose of the episode was to involve High School Sexiness, and have a "Very Japanese Setting", which you couldn't have unless you put it on Earth. Magical girl flower transformations, military might boat, katanas galore, school girl skirts n panties, titty-talk, thigh highs for everyone, uniforms everywhere, every trope we can put)

Epilogue:

But wait...there's more! No apparently this can't be over yet.

The creator Phantom
One day/night all over the world, the ether towers all set off with a pillar of blue light. In the middle of the pacific ocean, a new huge island appears. On the island, there grows a tree that's....maybe up into the stratosphere? It tops out well past any clouds, but it's somewhat unclear just how high and large it is. Higher than Everest for certain.

This entire thing is a cinematic and that's all there is to it. This is a nice intro for the online 12/12 MPA type quest where you have to fight Phantom God after ascending some of the way up the big tree. At the bottom is more 'temple like' stone ruins area/although ruins of nothing because you just literally watched the island spawn. Then, you have to fight the 'wooden guy' form of the PG, and chase it up the tree. The tree is a massive slow spiral path, so you use zoom pads and various stops for fighting more of the usual enemies like Es Opsis and the Es Santorus along the way.

At about the mid point, you'll get form 2 of 'wooden guy' who is a little more elaborate and the 'blue banner' that hangs vertically in it is even more confusing as to whether or not it is a tongue. On the way up towards it with zoom pads, it'll raise thorns walls, those thorn spikes up out of the ground and more, trying to prevent the party from reaching the top-ish of the tree.

Getting to...wherever it is at the (well it couldn't be the top unless the tree brought air up there with it because it's shown here as miles above the clouds so...no breathing available--also nobody just ran however many miles into the stratosphere either as the trip was too short) top-ish, you can see down into a blue pit of glow-water. The PG manifests as a human...sorta torso with the wood/blue glows theme still going on, and an orb sticking out of the abdomen. It has a twisted vines nest instead of legs as it is part of the tree. It has 4 large snake-type dragon heads per front/back of itself. These attack independently with energy orbs, physical snake-strikes and blasting.

Easter Egg:
The "Halo" behind this thing is a series of golden lines and a ring. It is THE GAME'S OWN LOGO
. No, really...go look at it, it's the logo lines behind the text and this dude's got it as his wing/halo apparatus. Very odd easter egg.

The torso will do lightening, homing 'meteors', smash with fists and do a huge energy ball. It can pull a sword out of itself as well. Breaking all the heads off the dragon snakes causes them to fall in such a way you can run up them and stab at the torso ball. Once it gets damaged enough this way, the torso will pull out a big branch based sword and shoot a huge energy beam at the moon. This actually shatters the moon, with the intent of raining it down on the earth to destroy it. (Simply breaking the moon would also likely destroy most earth life too, it keeps the tilt of the axis ok, and the tides are actually pretty important) Now, this starts a timer in which you have to kill it before it expires or you auto-lose the quest. This requires beating the snake dragons 1 more time. After that, the torso will attack with sword sweeps, homing 'comets', cascading floor thorns, and sweeping back and forth with flames. However, it has to lean close to the tree edge to do these things and that's when the orb gets hit and it dies.

Upon defeat, it'll shatter and the island will disappear along with the tree and its island.

Where does that leave everyone? On Easter Island, home of the Moai stone head statue guys.
Never answered: What about the moon?
WHAT ABOUT THE MOON?
WHAT ABOUT IT?

The moon is still shattered! It's still going to obliterate all life on Earth! Beating this moron didn't stop it and the kicker is they literally never resolve this plot point! AAAAAAAAA

Epi-Epilogue Single Item
Phaleg in:  Return of the Demon
As had been mentioned a few times earlier, you can accept the challenge of Phaleg to a fight. (Everyone would have riled up with disappointment had she not actually been fight-able after all of her posturing earlier)
However:
There’s a stipulation to doing it, which is that you have to beat “Solo Training Heaven & Hell” which has the ability to be suuuuper obnoxious and is a fixed difficulty. Beating this quest (which has nothing to do with this) one time will unlock the ability to fight her.

The scene of the battle is on a glass (odd) looking floor, with many white metal poles around. It is the top of an ether tower. She’ll talk and yell the entire time, but you can’t understand her. She does DBZ style ‘hand up’ summons of energy to shoot a beam at you. She also really loves her fast move/teleport deal, which she will use almost constantly. However, it seems to have a bit of a cooldown where she has to stand still to recover it, so you can hit her then.

If you beat her HP down enough, she’ll unleash a super move. She uses the dust/fast to go way up into the sky above the ether tower, and then pulls her power around her. She uses so much, it becomes like flames which arrange into a ‘phoenix type’ wings/fire around her. She then uses that to bomb down onto the tower top (and your guy) creating a huge shockwave. Now the poles are all bent and the ground/glass floor is broken up. Countering her/blocking her is really important for blades classes because you can reverse on her a lot due to her quick attacks.

If you beat her, she’s of course, surprised she lost. She falls down and laughs, now finally opening her eyes. She says it’s wonderful, here, she’s always thought she was the peak of perfection but maybe she’s only halfway there. She actually acknowledges her arrogance, saying it was immature and that things like this happening is why life is interesting.
She then does that red dust fast-vanish from where she was laying on the ground and appears at a distance on the edge of the wall behind your character. After dusting herself off a bit, she says thank you for helping her learn of her immaturity. She is happy because she knows she can become much stronger, and also because people are still far from the heights of their limits. She says the fight isn’t one she’ll forget in her long lifetime…as the frustration of losing a fight is part of being human, so next time…she won’t lose.
At this last bit, she’ll open her eye, then close it again to try and look ‘cutie’ like she always does, before turning into the red dust, zooming up into the sky and then turning into that ‘sparkle’ thing to go blasting off horizontally. You then flop forward and shake your head at the situation.

The scene ends.

The flop-forward is meant to force your character to illustrate that the fight against her was difficult, whether or not you thought it was. (If you’re real big on blocking it may not necessarily be so) Naturally, one couldn’t expect to learn anything plot-wise from the fight, other than what an ether tower looks like up close. She’s still poorly planned it seems and will remain that way.

This SHOULD conclude all of Episode 4: Earth