Ultimate Storyteller Investigations

Isamu Koyama, the Ultimate Storyteller, had a large amount of pre-game information given to him as a benefit of his talent. He was given 20 plot threads to rank by how interested he was in them. Those threads were the following:

• A bear on a train
• A lost puppy protecting a kitten
• The best sushi in all of Japan
• A bloody mop
• A mugging
• The long-nosed child
• A trip to the convenience store for a new light bulb and a bento
• A gravestone bearing your own name
• The laughing fortune teller
• The ship which doesn’t exist in a harbor that was never built owned by no one
• The Wikipedia page for Sigore Langley’s album “Jump To Venus”
• A washed up corpse
• A grieving mother
• An American comic in a dumpster behind a convenience store in South Korea
• An abandoned bakery
• A killer’s last meal: A barrel of lemons
• The original tale of missing Ultimates
• A meeting between two assassins
• Cries from below a bridge
• A loud crash from outside your tent

Isamu's player, Avi, ranked them in this order:

• 1. The long-nosed child
• 2. A killer's last meal: A barrel of lemons
• 3. The original tale of missing Ultimates
• 4. A bear on the train
• 5. The ship which doesn’t exist in a harbor that was never built owned by no one
• 6. A meeting between two assassins
• 7. A gravestone bearing your own name
• 8. A washed up corpse
• 9. Cries from below a bridge
• 10. A loud crash from outside your tent
• 11. A mugging
• 12. A bloody mop
• 13. A lost puppy protecting a kitten
• 14. The best sushi in all of Japan
• 15. A trip to the convenience store for a new light bulb and a bento
• 16. A grieving mother
• 17. An American comic in a dumpster behind a convenience store in South Korea
• 18. An abandoned bakery
• 19. The laughing fortune teller
• 20. The Wikipedia page for Sigore Langley’s album “Jump To Venus”

The following are the results of these plot threads.

The Long-Nosed Child

You’d caught on to the fact that the child was trailing you after seeing him walk into the bar after you. It could have been coincidence before, when you’d seen him in both the park and the previous restaurant, but it was certainly clear enough now that you were being followed. Perhaps your method was a bit unsubtle though, as the kid chose to sit beside you at the counter, rather than observe from a distance.

You ordered him a cup of milk, and had a conversation with the boy. If you’d been forced to guess what had brought him, you would certainly have one idea, given recent events and all. And oh, how correct you were. The boy claimed to be a detective, currently engaged in investigating the recent disappearance of 16 Ultimates. As someone who had a habit of picking up useful information, not to mention an Ultimate yourself, the boy had chosen to tail you.

He had two reasons for doing this. The first was to confirm that nobody else was following you already, likely to take you away elsewhere. The second was to evaluate you from a distance to see if you did anything suspicious. After all, without knowing who was behind the abductions, there was no telling who could be trusted.

You told him everything you knew about the story, and anything you’d happened to stumble across by chance. One or two of the things you’d said seemed to catch his eye, and it was clear that he’d found something to follow up on. In return, all you asked was for an interview sometime after the Ultimates were found.

Sure, you could have asked for money, especially since it was clear from his family heritage (only one notable family is known for their prolonged noses) that he was probably beyond well off, but how often does the opportunity to interview a grade-school aged detective come up? Such an opportunity is priceless.

A Killer's Last Meal: A Barrel of Lemons

Seto Jikaru. The lucky convict.

You sat across from him at a table, watching him take a lemon from the barrel, cut it open, and begin sucking on it. His face puckered, and a tear rolled down his face at the sourness. Or perhaps it was something else?

Tomorrow, he would be executed on the charge of first degree murder. Today, he received his last meal. As soon as you'd heard about it, you used the connections granted from your talent to score an interview with the man. You desperately needed to hear his story.

"Why a barrel of lemons? That's what you're here to ask, right? Have you ever considered that maybe I just liked them?"

You tell him that his expression betrays that possibility.

"Yeah, fair enough... Maybe it's just spite then? I ask for a shit ton of lemons, and then give up after eating three of them. How ungrateful of me, right?"

You ask him why he killed the other man.

"...Same thing I told the judge. It was an accident. I guess I wanted him dead, and I've always been a little lucky, y'know? So maybe it is my fault on some level. Still, the jerk deserved it for the way he was treating my sister. That guy was bad news."

You ask about his sister, and how she was doing after the incident.

"Finally went and got herself some therapy I hear, so it's better... I wish she'd at least come and see me off, but I'm happier knowing that she's happy than seeing her sad face when they put me on the chair."

You ask about the lemons again.

"Can't a man drown his sorrows in a few lemons before he dies? I may be a killer, but I have every right to make my last true request be stupid and pointless, don't I?"

You ask him to continue the interview next week.

"You don't really get this execution thing, do you? I won't be around anymore by then."

You ask him again to provide a follow-up interview if he's still alive next week.

"No promises. Even if I am alive somehow, I don't think I'll have the time."

The guard walks over to your table, informing you that it's time to go. As you leave, you watch Seto peel open yet another lemon, and begin sucking on it.

Despite everything, you had a strong feeling that he would make it.

...

The bars to his cell were found melted the next morning. There was no sign of him anywhere.

You never did get that follow-up interview with Seto Jikaru, sadly. Interestingly enough however, a completely different individual named Shikiyo Checkmate, who had been dubbed the Ultimate Gambler, stopped by about a month afterwards for an interview of sorts. That isn't to imply a relationship of any sorts between these two men, let alone a casual case of faked identity, but simply a funny coincidence.

When he showed up at your tent, he offered you a lemon tree sapling as a gift.

The original tale of missing Ultimates

While the more recent news of missing Ultimates was troubling, it wasn’t what you were focused on. What had caught your attention was a comment you’d just happened to overhear in passing. Two men, both middle-aged and well-dressed, one carrying a bag of groceries and the other empty-handed, both seemed immersed in their conversation regarding the news. The research that followed was all spurred by one snippet you’d heard.

“What did they expect? This always happens.”

Hmm. It was somewhat common knowledge that in the 21st century, there had been a few dark spots on the history of the Ultimate Initiative. However, was it fair to say that it always happens? That warranted investigation.

While you normally prefer to hear your stories straight from the source, the closest you could get to that at the moment were old interviews and newspapers. Perhaps a few novels summarizing the events could help as well. A stop at the local library and a few online orders supplied you with all the relevant reading you would need.

You crack open the books, and try to get a clear picture of the events. Common knowledge is that the original Ultimate initiative was inspired by an American school that assigned similar titles, which is listed in almost every one of these books at some point. The American Ultimate program was short-lived due to issues with its management, whereas the Japanese program survived for much longer.

The first event that you can find clear accounts of is, interestingly enough, the incident that brought an end to the program. In the Spring of 2041, 4 Ultimates were uncovered in an abandoned warehouse, with the bodies of 12 others scattered about in various rooms. From records dug up in the building and testimony from the few living individuals, it was revealed that they’d been forced into a game of mutual killing. Of the four that lived, they had all been forced to kill to survive, and the one of them had been knocked into a 4 month long coma. This incident’s survivors were the Ultimate Carpenter, the Ultimate Speedrunner, the Ultimate Genealogist, and the comatose Ultimate Somnambulist (who was able to function normally despite his coma as a strange quirk of his talent).

This event, among others, got public opinion turned against the Ultimate Program, as many promising individuals seemed to be lost solely as a result of their being highlighted by the government as special. Interesting as it was however, it wasn’t the very first incident relating to Ultimates.

You glossed over a few more stories before finding a promising one from the 2010s. 5 Ultimates had gone missing within a week of one another, and were cryogenically frozen against their will as a gift to the future. Their bodies were uncovered in a bomb shelter in 2111, and they had to adjust to the modern world they’d stepped into. The real interesting part of this story is that Kazuo Keikan, the Ultimate Vigilante, apparently went on to take over Okasa for a full week before the military managed to arrest him.

You make a note to look into him more later. His life seems rather interesting.

Ah, but your search soon paid out. While it seemed at first that an event in 2004 involving 3 Ultimates found dead by the riverbank, with no explanation ever discovered, seemed to be the first ever event of Ultimates being kidnapped, one small footnote in history proved otherwise.

The Ultimate Morality and the Ultimate Discord disappeared on December 14th, 2000. The Ultimate Morality then reappeared on Christmas day at a police station near his home, where he confessed to the murder of the Ultimate Discord. He would later receive a verdict of Not Guilty, as it was ruled that the other man forced him into it against his will. The details of the trial were sparse however, and it received surprisingly little media attention out of respect for the man’s privacy.

2000? Wow, that was only 2 years into the program. And there were more than a few other incidents between then and now. In total, by your count, 123 Ultimates were involved in some sort of deadly incident as a direct result of their talent, and 91 of those involved died. This isn’t even including the 16 who have recently gone missing.

It looks like that conversation you overheard wasn’t baseless at all. It’s almost like Ultimates have been cursed to end up in these messes. Suddenly, you felt a lot less secure about your own fate…

A Bear on a Train

When faced with what is ludicrous, we may question the facts.

But what was truly curious, was seeing no others react.

Despite the sight, the figure’s might,

Despite their size, they stood so high,

Their composures remained firmly intact.

A bear on the train sitting quiet and still.

Had you gone insane, had your mind become ill?

You blink and check twice.

Rub your eyes and look thrice.

It remained, filling you with deep thrill.

The beast nudged the shoulder of a much older dame.

They rose, and it appeared it was their stop which came.

You jumped from your seat,

For you knew you must meet,

To learn their story was clearly your aim.

As you trailed from a distance, you were met with a sight.

You would quickly turn tail, abscond, take flight!

As the bear was soon mobbed.

Was tranqued and befogged.

With no opportunity to fight.

While you weren’t a coward, you were clearly outnumbered.

If seen by their captors, your days would be numbered.

So you ran for a while.

Escaped by a mile.

And with guilt, you were shortly encumbered.

The Ship...

The Ship Which Doesn't Exist in a Harbor that was Never Built Owned by no one

The rumor had been started by a small boy, and his even younger sister.

"Through the cave and out by the sea, a big ship stopped by!"

There were two problems with this rumor right off the bat. Firstly, there was never a harbor constructed in the area he'd claimed, so no ship would ever park there. Secondly, the child had already had a bad habit of telling tall tales, according to his neighbors. Stories of an alien Batman in the woods, living snowmen, and a great broccoli conspiracy have all been stories spread by him to other local children. It wasn't worth any consideration, as the story was obviously false.

You recounted all of this as you sat in the entryway of a cave, watching the rainwater pour down onto the sea. Despite all signs pointing to deceit, you had a strong hunch that all was not as it seemed. Your biggest issue was that while most of the boy's lies tended to be fantastical and imaginative, this was decidedly mundane. A peculiar thing to lie about indeed. Perhaps he was simply trying to make someone as gullible as you waste your time, or maybe this story bore an element of truth...

The cave exit faced a small beach, not to far away from a remote parking lot. It looked like it was connected to the back of a bowling alley or something of that sort.

The area was certainly unpopulated. If a secret stop were to be made, this location would beat many others in terms of pure lack of people.

For the past ten days, you'd sat and watched the sea, waiting for some sign of the fabled ship to show up. You'd brought a few of your notebooks for company, allowing you to recollect on past adventures. Still, boredom had begun to set in.

And then... a silhouette. From a distance, you could see it approaching, growing slowly at it approached from miles across the sea.

What followed was the slam of a car door, as you saw men pouring out of the parking lot in trucks, giant logs of wood being hauled across the sand. You hid yourself in the cave, but watched as experts worked at an almost bling speed. In minutes, what was once an empty beech contained a wooden harbor, just in time for a ship to dock.

You could barely believe your eyes. What appeared to be a luxury cruise liner had parked itself there, right in front of you. Seeing such a magnificent vessel stop at such a small beach was a peculiar sight to say the least.

The men worked quick, individuals pouring in and out, carrying large bags. Needless to say with all the secrecy, but the contents would certainly be some form of illegality. Drugs, weapons, contraband, bodies, etc. Given the sheer size of the bags, bodies was a guess that seemed to fit worryingly. Were they dead, and trying to hide evidence of a crime, or were they alive, and being trafficked. You couldn't say.

Ah, your curiosity got the better of you, as without thinking you'd made your way onto the ship. Once you'd figured out their pattern, you'd found a quick lull for you to slip inside. Thankfully, the room you entered into gave plenty of space to hide in, as it was a massive storage area.

As you stood behind a crate, furiously taking notes on what had been happening, you were compelled to go further. Deeper into the ship. All of your senses told you that there was one element to this story you still needed to see.

A rabbit.

"Hey hey hey! Who the heck is this!? The server room is supposed to be restricted to... huh?"

The rabbit moves into the middle of the frame, giving you a better look at it. It wore a bright red bowtie, had dark fur at the tips of its ears and paws, and the whites of his eyes were a shadowy black. White pupils stared into your own, looking you over.

"Hmmmmmm..." The rabbit materializes a filing cabinet behind itself, before fishing through it. It flips through a document, before letting out a dramatic "A-ha!"

The rabbit points at you. "You're Isamu Koyama, the Ultimate Storyteller! And according to my memory banks, you're not supposed to be here! So allow me to put this in a way you'd understand."

"A wannabe stoaway made his way in."

"But he's caught by a rabbit! Much to his chagrin."

"When faced with an intrude, only one thing to do-"

"It's time to sic on 'em Guard 1 and Guard 2!"

Well, time to leave.

You don't bother being sneaky this time around. You sprint at full speed back the way you came. A few of the men try to stop you, and you take a few good hits on the way out, but they were nothing you couldn't handle. You've always been good at dealing with pain.

You lose them in the cave, and make your way back into the city. Even as you get away though, the strangeness of everything you'd just witnessed sticks with you. A ship that for all intents and purposes felt like it wasn't meant to exist. A harbor built in minutes. And a rabbit that knew your name somehow.

With how odd it was, you were barely able to register how bad what you witnessed may have been. What was in those bags? Who owned that ship? How had they kept such a thing secret for so long?

You go back about a week later to see if it's still there...

And find nothing but an empty beach. No trace of a ship, harbor, or anything that took place a week prior.

Curiouser and curiouser...

A Meeting Between Two Assassins

A line of assassins, this one went by Iris Gervaise.

While normally the killer, today that wasn't the case.

A girl from a small group, a talent which carried disgrace.

Yoshie Remon killed her... You stayed in your hiding place.

A Gravestone Bearing Your Own Name

A graveyard. As you'd taken a stroll off the beaten path in the forest, pushing brambles and branches out of your way, you stumbled upon it. Your original plan was to looks over a few of the gravestones, and pay your respects to those who'd departed. Then, you saw it.

Isamu Koyama: 2205-XXXX

Staring at your own grave, waves of chill rolled down your spine. Why was this here, in such a remote location? Who put it here? When?

The question pulls on your mind even still, as you were unable to find the answer you'd been looking for. However, you *did* find a possible hint.

When you looked into who owned the land, you find out that the plot is apparently the future construction site for a tech factory. It could just be coincidence, but it could also *not* be. You hope they plan to move the graves and presumed buried corpses, else they may find themselves building haunted technology.

...It annoys you to leave a story thread hanging, but you have no leads to go on.

A Washed Up Corpse

At night, the full moon's reflection on the water at Sashimi Beach was the most beautiful sight you could see in Japan. The daughter of a small casino owner you'd been interviewing told you this, so you'd come to check it out yourself.

As you sat on the sand watching, you had to admit, this was a solid top 10. There was something enigmatic and wonderful about it.

You pull out your notebook, and sketch out the sight as best you can. The shimmering glow of the light on the waves, the calmness of the water, the-

Something washed up onto the sand, and you hadn't noticed until you added a small dark splotch to your notebook. Damn, and the sketch had been coming out so well. What was it? Driftwood, seaweed, a large fish?

You walk over to check it out. It was bigger than you'd thought, and you could see sea muck clinging to it even from a distance. As you get closer however...

A face. It stares back at you, a frozen expression of horror unchanging.

You freeze. You wish you hadn't, greatly wishing that you'd had more time to investigate. Maybe find out who it was? You didn't get that chance however.

From behind you, you see the yellow glow of flashlights coming over the hill, and you catch snippets of their words. "Find the-" "-washed up here." "-Donuts-"

That last one was probably unrelated, but the first two made it clear that you should get away. You sprint down the sand, and lie low in the darkness, as you see the men come down the hill. With how some of them wave their flashlights around, you're worried that they'll flash your location. Thankfully, they seem more focused on the body.

You don't hear much of what they say, as they're too far away. You have to crawl closer to catch anything of importance.

"-let this one get away. Bring it back to-"

"Hey! The hell is that!?" Suddenly, you're lit up with a light. You imagine you look like the biggest dumbest grain of sand on the entire beach.

"...You wouldn't be interested in answering a few questions, would you?" You ask, giving them a friendly smile.

As you sprint down the sand, gunshots ringing out behind you, you mentally beat yourself up over that terrible question. Also, if they were using basically anything other than guns, this could be pretty hot.

You lose them by diving under the water, and popping up two miles in the direction you'd been running from, about a full mile away from the corpse. You'd had to air out your notebook's pages that night to stop them from getting ruined.

Cries from Below a Bridge

A sob of tearful sadness, beneath the bridge below.

While walking right above it, all alone in Tokyo.

You make your way into the tunnel.

As you approach, the sound becomes funneled.

And through it you offer, "Hello."

A young man dressed in black suit and tie

Who'd hidden away in this tunnel to cry.

You allowed him to talk.

To learn why your walk,

Had been halted by tears amplified.

"I've been given a job, and I don't have the heart."

"But I need the pay offered, for my life to restart."

"The task is immoral."

"So I'm faced with a quarrel."

"And it's tearing my heart here apart."

You think for a moment, then two, and then three.

"That's a tough problem, I have to agree."

"Tell you what, I'll stay here."

"I'll sit still, lend my ear."

"Until you're sure of what your choice will be."

So you listen, as you do, as he retells all.

From highschooler dropout, to yet greater fall.

Now employed for crime.

Gather cash, then he'd climb,

Out of poverty, with just one windfall.

You wrapped up the evening, a tough call was made.

A criminal tomorrow, until he was paid.

He'd turn it around,

And rightly rebound.

And in death, his soul would be weighed.

A Loud Crash from Outside your Tent

CRASH!

You leap right out of your sleeping bag, rushing to unzip the tent's door as quickly as possible. As you do, you're greeted with the sight of bark.

A large tree blocked your way out of the tent, resting just inches away from the doorway. If it had been even a little bit closer, you would have been crushed. The thought was sobering.

On the other hand, the idea of that big heavy tree smashing into you, forcing you to the ground, unable to move and totally at the whims of anyone else around you...

"Careful! There was a tent over there, you could have killed whoever was in there." You hear, whispered in the darkness. Realizing that there were people nearby, you stay silent and keep your ears open.

"Shut up, we need to check around for any signs of it."

A few sets of footsteps pass by your tent, and you can see the glow of flashlights through your door. You're pretty sure three people are out there from the sounds of things. They seem to patrol the area for a while.

"It's not here." One of them whispers.

"I told you, I saw-"

"You saw a shadow! It was probably just a squirrel."

"Guys, this is stupid. If all the reports say it's in the city, then we should look around there instead of stumbling around the forest at night."

"The report said 'probably'. Just because it's been seen in the city, doesn't mean it's still there! If it was, then they probably would have found it already, don't you think?"

"Can't believe I let you drag me into this. I'm going home. Call me if you actually find evidence of which way it went."

You hear one set of footsteps walk away, as one man shouts, "Come on dude, it's gotta be around here somewhere."

"So, when we get another sighting in the city a week from now, you owe me 400 bucks, right?"

"Damnit... Where the hell is it?"

Eventually, all of them wander away, leaving you to ponder what you just witnessed. That, and find your way out of your tent, with this huge tree in the way.

A Bloody Mop

(Note: Bokkun skipped down the rankings and gave this thread as an extra, on account of it being the only one he wrote prior to giving out the characters.)

Shin-Sushi wasn’t popular, or even that well known.

The owner’s food was passable, but its competition owned.

So in you went to look around, to see why t’was a flop.

When there you saw by the register, a wet and bloody mop.

You rushed to check, then saw the rest, a murder scene was there.

And by the body stood a man, who into your eyes stare.

A janitor, with tools in hand, he looked ready to clean.

But if he killed the man or not, you simply could not glean.

“Turn around. Walk away. Don’t cause me any trouble.”

“Or else the bodies will increase, my work in here will double.”

Despite the warning, you could not help but simply be intrigued.

“I promise not to interfere. May I question you while you clean?”

Jo Utada, the Ultimate Janitor, employed by a local mob.

To erase their hits from existence, it was not an easy job.

He said no more, his annoyance clear, so you quickly left the store.

With knowledge of a mob man, whose talent was cleaning floors.

Unwritten

• A mugging
• A lost puppy protecting a kitten
• The best sushi in all of Japan
• A trip to the convenience store for a new light bulb and a bento
• A grieving mother
• An American comic in a dumpster behind a convenience store in South Korea
• An abandoned bakery
• The laughing fortune teller
• The Wikipedia page for Sigore Langley’s album “Jump To Venus”