Fragment 74 Insight

This one will be a bit longer because to be honest: Writing Brynhildr is very difficult. I’d honestly have an easier time writing about one of the maddened berserkers.

Tricky is the best way to describe this entire fragment. Brynhildr’s situation is extremely tricky, and it was very easy to accidentally “break” who she really is. She’s a yandere who constantly has to restrain herself, and even then, her compulsion would still shatter on certain occasions. Paracelsus’ potion, inspired as the counterpart to what she took in Fragments of Blue and Silver, served as a good starting point, but it was not a complete answer as you’ve read. It’s not as easy a getting rid of mad enhancement or mental pollution.

However, I would like to say that some personal thoughts on the matter. I wanted to keep Brynhildr true at her core, but that line kinda became blurry considering how much more “uncontrolled” she seemed to be in Fate/Grand Order. If you read Fragments of Blue & Silver over at Beast Lair (Thanks PhoenixRising!), she was noticeably calmer and in rather great control. Yes she had the mix ups, love-based thoughts, and comparisons to Sigurd, but it wasn’t 0 to 100 in a few seconds like Grand Order sometimes showed. I felt FGO took her character to a bit of an extreme, so I dialed it back a bit to resemble what was in her original debut series.

Essentially what it turned out as: Brynhildr not taking the potion acts as FGO Bryn, while under its influence she’s closer to Fragments of Blue and Silver.

This made it possible to address one of her key aspects: She restrains herself a lot. She’s worried about pushing her boundaries, which is understandable. It’s her very nature to kill who she’s fallen in love with. So I made it so her friends helped blur the line, and she’d slowly inched her way forward to grasp just a bit of satisfaction and happiness with every passing week. It was a slow process, masked by her trying to hide behind a content façade so others wouldn’t worry about her. Gentlemanly sincerity is another thing that tips her, after all.

But most of that was depicted in the background. I’ll admit, I may have to go back to previous fragments and do a bit of fine tuning on her interactions to better depict this.

On the other hand, more slice of life stuff with the lingering shadow of Solomon’s threat. Those who are most capable are still preparing the most, while the others are allowed to enjoy a calm atmosphere while waiting (aka, morale boost). We’re only one fragment away from the big shebang and I still have them going about rather ordinary lives and enjoying themselves. What can you say? It’s the Chaldea way… and maybe it actually plays into something in the supplement.

Though most of the interactions were based around her grail group, who are still the only “Grail War” in Chaldea to all get along so exceptionally, I included another that I was never mentioned: Jeanne Alter. It’s for obvious reasons why it was never brought up, but now it was all finally aired. Months of her not knowing, and suddenly poor Bryn is told her love can act very…strange when her summoning is ‘botched’ in some way.

Bonus points for contrast with how Janna acts with one of her teachers though.

Then there’s the other tricky situation I wanted to address: Arthur. It’s not so straightforward as I made it appear, and it’s also one of the more direct teases I’ve ever made since the servant outright says it. However, it’s a very tricky situation, with plenty of variables to go wrong. Who knows if it will only remain just a tragic and secret bond, or maybe I’ll actually pull the lever. We’ve got a lot of couples as is, though, so I try to keep a relative balance between confirmed, possible flirting, and close friendships.

Last Season 3 Fragment Teaser: They promised she’d be happy. She held onto that hope as long as she could before she dematerialized with a smile under that, Babylonian night. How long had really passed since she laid there in her final breaths… before she opened her eyes to a gift she always sought in her endless isolation?