This is a letter from Strassman to Carmine. It is filled with many scientific terms specific to this lore. Strassman gives his approbation for the opening of 2 new LBR centers in Heian-kyô & Naniwa-kyô (Kyoto & Osaka irl), where the subjects would reach the dimension Y-93 (supposedly Youtopia). He mentions the destruction of Arc/hive, linked to Dallus Lauren and the experiments done with/on him. There’s also a mention of 4 runes they’re trying to find, as they can help understand the state of consciousness needed to reach Y-93.
CORPORATION
To: Victor Carmine, [redacted] From: Dr. Karl Strassman, [redacted] Date: [redacted] Subject: Update on LBR Centers and Mitigation of Energy Overload Risks
Confirmation of New Sites and Adjustments Post-ARC/HIVE Incident:
As per the directives from [redacted] and EVE, the construction of two new Lesser Banishing Ritual Centers (LBR Centers) has been confirmed at locations strategically positioned above ancient Eldritch Conduits in the regions Heian-kyna and Naniwa-kyna. These sites are crucial due to their positioning over exceptionally potent metaphysical energy sources, specifically designated as Arcane Verterations.
Identification of ARC/HIVE Incident Causes and Mitigation Measures:
Following the catastrophic event during the final days of ARC/HIVE, identified as the result of an unfiltered surge of Aetheric Hyperflux, we now understand that bidirectional energy exchanges with Dallus’s consciousness led to unforeseen distorses. Given the uncharted nature of these phenomena, the catastrophic failure of ARC/HIVE was an unprecedented outcome that no predictive models could have anticipated. However, with our current understanding, we’ve implemented a series of critical recalibrations to our systems. These adjustments include advanced filtration protocols and energy modulation techniques, designed to stabilize the Astral Matrix and prevent future disruptions. While we proceed cautiously, I am cautiously optimistic that we have effectively mitigated the risk of further incidents.
To prevent a recurrence, we have implemented several critical adjustments:
Dual Ethereal Distillation Arrays (EDA): These arrays function with an enhanced Oscillatory Harmonic Filter, effectively purifying and stabilizing incoming Metaphysical Phase Energy (MPE) waves. The system neutralizes Harmonic Discrepancies and Unstable Arcane Particles (UAPs), ensuring the stability of the Astral Matrix.
Controlled Extraction of QRFs: By tapping into the Nodal Arcane Crossings at these locations, we can now safely and efficiently extract Quantum Resonance Frequencies (QRFs) from the Etheric Veins. This process is carefully managed to avoid the accumulation of Casual Entropic Residue (CER), which previously contributed to system failures.
Ritual Practices and Security Measures:
These LBR Centers serve as hubs for conducting advanced rituals designed to prepare and cleanse individuals for accessing Dimension Y-93. These rituals have now been integrated with scientific methodologies to ensure safety and efficiency. Furthermore, we have initiated the search for four enigmatic runes hidden within each laboratory. These runes are believed to hold the key to unlocking deeper layers of knowledge and access within these uncharted territories.
I Understand your keen to inspect the new facilities. Please inform me of your availability, and I will arrange an AURORA and ensure that all necessary preparations, including metaphysical acclimatization procedures and security protocols, are in place prior to your arrival.
Dr. Karl Strassman [Redacted]
[K. Strassman handwritten signature]
RESEARCH DEPARTMENT
| Fact | Source |
|---|---|
| LBR stands for Lesser Banishing Ritual and is used to reach Youtopia in a “natural” manner | ‣ |
| ARC/HIVE was destroyed because of Dallus Lauren | “the catastrophic event during the final days of ARC/HIVE”, see In the dark |
| Theory | Source |
|---|---|
| LBR Centers already exist at that point | “new sites” |
| “Eldritch Conduits” might refer to some tunnel to reach another world, like a safe passage between the world of the living and the spirit world | It’s a common japanese belief, is depicted in Spirited Away (Ghibli) & can also be a reference to Elden Ring |
| Arc/hive was trying to mess with magic and Nex Gen is picking up the pieces to do the same | “Aetheric Hyperflux” is a reference to Final Fantasy, and “Arcane” is a common name for magic |
| Dimension Y-93 is the scientific name of Youtopia, and they’re already trying to reach it in these labs | Y is like “Youtopia”, and 93 is a recurrent number in this lore. We also know Youtopia is reachable with a LBR. |
| The runes are the 4 symbols of the insights | See The Four Insights, they’re very tied to the LBR. |
Note : most of these explanations are only theories.
LBR : Lesser Banishing Ritual. Basically what we hear/see in [ost] (spi) ritual.
Energy Overload : Sudden surge of energy, too much to be handled by the devices used.
Eldritch Conduit : (1) A passage between two worlds. (2) an announcement of the coming of a new god.
Arcane Verterations : (1) Telluric (magic) knots hidden underground. (2) Telluric (magic, electric & magnetic) current hidden underground.
Aetheric Hyperflux : A very strong flow of magic or energy.
Astral Matrix : A grid or table used to mesure the Astral plane (emotions and feelings plane).
Dual Ethereal Distillation Arrays : Two devices (E.D.A.) created to separate the substances coming from and going into the Astral plane.
Enhanced Oscillatory Harmonic Filter : A device that mesures and reduces the risk of a waste of energy, overheat or failure.
Metaphysical Phase Energy waves : Here, a wave of Aetheric Hyperflux from the Astral plane that may come in phases (not all at once, not all the time).
Harmonic Discrepancies : The different harmonic currents (interferences in the electric/energic/magic current) registered.
Unstable Arcane Particles : Magic particles acting like interferences.
Nodal Arcane Crossings : Center of the crossing of the magic current. A reference to the Arcane Verterations.
Quantum Resonance Frequencies : The exact frequency in which a quantum system (atom or molecule) can absorb or emit energy (think : radiations, nuclear energy etc).
Etheric Veins : The hypothetical veins through which the Aetheric Hyperflux flows. Can be a reference to Skyveins.
Casual Entropic Residue : A thermodynamic concept. Some energy waste left after the manipulation of Aetheric Hyperflux.
Dimension Y-93 : Youtopia’s scientific name.
AURORA : (1) A limousine. (2) Artist featured on Limousine.
Victor Carmine is theorized to be Skys’s alias. He works at Nex Gen now as it’s a file from Nex Gen, but he was also working for Arc/hive before that as we’ve seen in ISSUE-51-fromhelltoshell.pdf 1 (Rebecca works with him, and we know Rebecca was still a lab worker at Arc/hive at that time)
Strassman is part of Trinity, and was a lab worker at Arc/hive following Mantra. We know he worked on PUSSE at Nex Gen way after that, so we know he works for Nex Gen at that time.
Although the date is unknown, we can confidently say it’s set after 2028 as it mentions Arc/hive being “destroyed”. The ISSUE-51-fromhelltoshell.pdf 1 is from 2028 and Arc/hive was still a thing.
LBR stands for Lesser Banishing Ritual, a ritual we now know is used to reach Youtopia. “Centers” refer to some facilities where LBR are done at a larger scale, certainly on multiple test subjects. Mitigation means to prevent a big problem by possibly making the ritual smoother. “Energy Overload” is explained further, so we won’t linger on that term.
“Confirmation” means that Strassman is 1) not in the same team as Victor and/or 2) in a place to give orders. “New Sites” means that some LBR Centers already existed before. We don’t know yet what happened to them, if they were destroyed with Arc/hive or if the new sites are just additions.
“Post-ARC/HIVE incident implies that something very bad happened to Arc/hive, that may be linked to these former/other centers, and that may be because of the LBR executed without enough precaution concerning the Energy Overload Risks.
We don’t know who is under the redacted part, but it’s someone that has at least as much power as EVE over Nex Gen. As per what we know so far, it may be Alfred ingram winter †, Emily or some other new character.
EVE being mentionned here confirms it’s from Nex Gen. It also may mean that it’s from at least 2037, as EVE was only created at that time by Ikaro Lauren. But if she was already a thing before that as we also theorized, her presence doesn’t tell us much about the date.
“Eldritch” refers to something strange and otherwordly, and is often used to describe Lovecraftian horror. “Eldritch Conduits” might refer to some tunnel to reach another world, like a safe passage. It may also be a reference to Elden Ring : the Eldritch Conduits in that case are the Oracle Envoys. There’s 4 of them, appearing as a band to announce the coming of a new God. Even if in that case it seems to be something inanimated, like a place or an object, we can theorize that these Conduits may refer later to the band and the coming of EVE.
Heian and Naniwa are both former names of japanese capital cities in the medieval Japan. Heian (Kyoto) was the capital city from Heian era to Meiji era, while Naniwa (Osaka) was only the capital city for one year within the Nara era.
“kyna” is a suffix that doesn’t mean anything in japanese. It may be a reference to Neon Genesis Evangelion where the cities often have a prefix or suffix to signify that they’re different to the cities in our world. In that case, “Japan” in this ARG may have another name.
It’s interesting that they seem to place these “ancient Eldritch Conduits” in some japanese cities, as Ghibli, a famous japanese company, often uses this kind of explanation in their work. The most famous coming on the mind is “Spirited Away”, where a tunnel leads to the spirit world. In Shinto, one of the main religion in Japan, tunnels and bridges are often depicted as a passage to another world.
NOTE : On the recent (09/08/2024) instagram post, BMTH corrected “kyna” as “kyô”, which makes way more sense (kyô 京 is a common suffix for imperial capitals in Japan).
Basically some scientific gibberish to say that this source is very strong in a spiritual sense. Arcane may be a reference to magic. In that case, it may be also referencing the telluric lines or ley lines (a famous source of magic), or even the telluric currents (the electricity that’s flows underground). These conduits, in that case, may be some telluric knots : it is when a few lines cross each others’ path, resulting in a stronger power. (For more information on the telluric current, see this wikipedia page. For ley lines in the real world, see this wikipedia page. For my analysis here I used my knowledge of magic in World of Warcraft, although I know a lot of fantasy games/movies/animes refer to this kind of magic source.)
It just means what it says…
“The final days of arc/hive” confirms that the organisation no longer exists at the time of this document. Furthermore, we can theorize that the reason why it doesn’t exist is specifically because of this event.
“Aetheric Hyperflux” may be a reference to Final Fantasy. The Aether is the source of magic and life in the world of FFXIV. To know more about this, see this wiki page. As a fun addition, “Aetherflux Reservoir” is a card in Magic that can either give life when magic is used, or deal magical damages in exchange for life. It’s a bit complicated, but it basically links magic to life as well. Read more about this on that page. In our world, that Hyperflux is a very strong power that, as it was unfiltered, dealt a lot of damage (hence why we say it may be how Arc/hive was destroyed).
“bidirectional energy exchanges” means that this energy goes both ways : it comes from and to the subject. In that case, it’s a surge of power that came from Dallus’s mind and may have destroyed the devices used to test on him. There’s a strong chance that this is what we see in In the dark towards the end, where Dallus ends up blowing the lab after a serie of test on him.
This line only tells us that this incident wasn’t anticipated and was totally new, so maybe Nex Gen used that as a warning and a precedent to enforce more security but still pursue this kind of experiments. This is what “Mitigation of Energy Overload Risks” refers to.
This is the confirmation of our theory from earlier. Also, it may imply that Arc/hive’s systems were totally destroyed by the incident.
filtration protocols and energy modulation techniques is just a way to say they will certainly stop the experiment before it goes too far as they now know where the breaking point is.
the “Astral Matrix”, more than a callback to the famous Matrix movies, is certainly some kind of “grid” or table used to mesure what we can call the “astral plane”. Think of what you see in Matrix, but for another plane of existence not (yet) plugged into a super computer, that can give you powers if it leaks into our plane.
I think Strassman is cautious.
Let’s breakdown the names : “Dual” means two. “Ethereal” is something that has no physical form (like a ghost, or in that case, a substance/power from another plane of existence). “Distillation” is separating different substances in a solution, usually by heating up the solution so the “lighter” substance evaporates then is cooled down in a system. “Array” only means that there’s a bunch of different techniques to do that. So “Dual Ethereal Distillation Arrays” might mean that they try to separate different substances from that other plane, as they realized that the powers used by Dallus was a mix of different things. In that case, they want to treat these things separately, hoping to prevent a future incident. They created two of these EDA, because we’ve learned above that the energy was a two way street : it came from and to Dallus. So, they want to treat both energies as they may not know which resulted in the destruction of Arc/hive.
“Enhanced” means that the object used already existed and was upgraded. “Oscillatory” is a device commonly used in physics to mesure an electric current, which kind of supports the former theory of the telluric current and the source of magic. “[Harmonic Filer](https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/harmonic-filter#:~:text=1 Harmonic Filters-,Harmonic filters are series or parallel resonant circuits designed to,voltage distortion in the system.)” is commonly used in the daily life to prevent the harmonic current to basically destroy all the devices. So, an “Oscillatory Harmonic Filter” is both a device to mesure and reduce the risk of a waste of energy, overheat or failure.
“Metaphysical” refers to something that goes beyond the physical world. “Phase” here might indicate a particular stage or aspect of the energy or waves being described. “Energy” here would be the Aetheric Hyperflux we talked about earlier. “Metaphysical Phase Energy waves” in that case would mean a wave of AH from that other plane, that may come in phases so not all at once and not all the time. [Thank you chatGPT for the breakdown of the last term!]
This further explains what we said before. “Harmonic Discrepancies” refers to the harmonic current, and “Unstable Arcane Particles” is what they call these specific harmonics, as it’s not exactly speaking about an electric current but rather a “magic” current from that other plane.
Extracting Quantum Resonance Frequency will ultimately add excess waste energy in the form of Casual Entropic Residue - you cannot reduce Entropy as per the laws of Thermodynamics so Nex Gen/ARC/HIVE would have to upgrade their Skyveins to displace this energy elsewhere to be able to extract the QRFs to stabilise the Astral Matrix. Think of it as them having a form of waste similar to nuclear waste, and potentially the build up of said waste would have caused the disortes within Dallus' consciousness. In order to extract this energy, you would need a lot of energy to do so, so it's the poor management of both energy streams and the waste residue building that caused the potential disaster with Dallus and other subjects. [Thank you Stu and Ash for this analyse!]
It’s safe to assume that Dimension Y-93 is the scientific name of Youtopia, before it was marketed for the general public. We already know that a LBR is necessary to reach that dimension (before Nex Gen invented P.U.S.S.-E). This further confirms that they intent to use these rituals at a larger scale. It may link to [ost] (spi) ritual where we hear the ritual being performed ; in that case, the scene we hear in (spi)ritual takes place at one of these centers.
It’s just a conclusion of what we’ve seen earlier.
This is where it gets interesting : these runes can refer to the relics we’ve encountered in The Four Insights, so Pan’s flute, Guardian tears, Abramelin’s candle of etemal light & Golden Raspberry. But as we’re talking specifically about “runes”, it may just be a painting of the insights’ symbols, maybe on the walls. This implies that the laboratories mentionned are set in some old buildings, or that these runes were retrieved and brought to the laboratories for study. These laboratories may be some old Arc/hive buildings, but it’s unknown why Strassman and Carmine, who were supposedly working for Arc/hive, don’t already know about these runes. It’s possible that these runes are, in that case, hidden on the new sites they’re about to build, maybe 2 in Heian-kyô & 2 in Naniwa-kyô.
This may be a confirmation that these runes are in fact already on the sites. “These uncharted territories” may refer to the other plane of existence hidden on the other side of the “Eldritch Conduits” we’ve talked about earlier.
Strassman implies here that Carmine might be very interested in some spiritual and esoteric discoveries. As we theorized that Victor Carmine is maybe Skys’s new alias and we know Skys is deeply versed on the spiritual side, as he was Mantra’s guru and kickstarted the research on another dimension and the awakening of powers (see Jan15_2031_declassified__PROJECT D.U.S.T. 2 for more information) this can be another argument for the Carmine=Skys theory. It can also just mean that Carmine wants to be sure the facilities are up to the task they’re supposed to do.
AURORA, styled like that, is the name of the featured artist on liMOusIne. This may just be an easter egg, or maybe means that it’s a means of transport. “metaphysical acclimatization procedures” may just be a convoluted way to say that they’ll make sure he’s going to be in the right mindset, or that the devices don’t risk to explode if he goes near them. It might also mean that Carmine has powers too (which makes sense if he really is Skys), and can trigger the devices because of the energy he emits, like Dallus did.