Fanfic / A New Hope (Danganronpa)

Forty-Seven Students awaken in Hope's Peak Academy, to find themselves at the mercy of Monokuma and his many machinations. Their only means of escape? To commit the perfect murder, without being caught in the process. Can there be any hope amidst the overwhelming despair?

A New Hope by Crit Fail (formerly scorpio116) is a crossover between the three main games of the Danganronpa series. The casts of students from the three main games are all thrown together into a killing game orchestrated by Monokuma. The motives cause more chaos, the murders break more hearts, the class trials brew more distrust, and the executions bring more despair. But more than anything, the friendships, interactions, talent, and hope are all greater. As of June 20, 2018, it is complete at over 744,000 words.

Has several sequels, all featuring fan-submitted OCs (and the occasional canon character):

• Final Horizon, that follows a group of sixteen Ultimates, the would've been Class 80-A, as they deal with a Killing Game on a Space Station; as of August 26, 2018, it's complete at over 210,000 words;
• Sea of Tranquility, following the twenty-four members of would've-been Class 80-B on a Moon Base, picking up right during the end of Final Horizon; as of February 5, 2019, it's complete at just above 243,000 words;
• Kuma-Kuma Land, set after the previous stories, featuring twenty students^*it was meant to be sixteen, but four extra students managed to get in as well that were considered for Class 81-A trapped in an Amusement Park of Doom; as of May 20, 2019, it's complete at close to 288,000 words;
  • Fractured: A Tarotologist's Tale is a retelling of the Killing Game, from the perspective of Seikatsu Tabi, the Ultimate Tarotologist.
• House of Horrors, the Unofficial Class 80-C consisting of eighteen students, all previously talentless, in a gothic mansion on an island; As of June 12, 2019, it is complete at over 302,000 words;
• Railway of Despair, a small game with only 8 participants as a very unofficial Class 81-C trapped on a train in the Grim Up North of Siberia (and later Russia) for a week, ending on Christmas Day. It started as a spin-off roleplaying game that ran on the community discord server, and was completed on December 22, 2018. It was later posted properly (and slightly altered) onto fanfiction.net, completing on July 9, 2019 at over 126,000 words;
• Oasis of Hope, which follows 42 could've-been members of Class 81-B as they deal with a killing game in a desert shortly after Railway of Despair. The story is shelved, however.

At least two more sequels, tentatively titled Rapture and Legacy, were planned, but dropped. Rapture will feature the first class of the re-opened Hope's Peak stuck in a city under the sea. Legacy will follow the descendants of all the Killing Game survivors, as they themselves are thrust into one final Killing Game.

There are also several canonical spin-offs being written by the various fans of the series:

• Mists of Penjar, written by The Kobold Necromancer, following twenty-eight Hope's Peak graduates as they arrive at an abandoned town, hoping to discover the origins of Despair and The Tragedy for one reason or another. Apparently, it's meant to be the first in a series by its author.
• Central City of Despair, written by Mudkip of Despair, following sixteen students from a different school with a focus on talent as they try to survive a killing game in an abandoned model city. Initially not planned on being connected to the rest of this series, but Crit allowed it to be included;
• Isle of the Damned and Creatures of Despair, written by Celestial Sky Dragon and Wintersmith respectively, which serve as direct prequels to House of Horrors, covering, respectively, the first and second killing game on Hora Island;
• Tomb of Misery, written by Pettypunk, following 24 Ultimates stuck in an underground prison;
• A New Despair: HHPA's New Semester of Despair, following 20 students of Hope's Peak's American Branch stuck in a battle of Reality vs Delusion;
• Versailles Academy, written by Crit Fail, covering Ultimates from a 'upper-class' school getting pulled into a killing game;
• Château D'Death, occurring in a castle of the coast of Marseilles. Features talented students from multiple different schools;
• Sanguine Hearts, written by Alter Ego AV, another game following non-Hope's Peaks Ultimates (thirty-six this time), as they are trapped inside their school while a storm rages outside; (currently on hold)
• All Aboard the SS Lady Junko!, written by Birblord Almighty, following twenty-four Ultimates on a cruise ship with a killing game underway; (currently on hold)
• Misfits of Skyline, featuring the bottom ranked class of Skyline Academy put into a killing game; (cancelled)
• Black Gold and Black Hearts, following eighteen people on an oil rig in a killing game reminiscent of boot camp;
• Prisons of the Past, a killing game featuring survivors of previous games (mainly off-screen ones);
• Heartless New World, set between New Hope and Final Horizon, following former Ultimates in an elaborate base under Chernobyl;
• The Beast's Maze, written by Bellatrixshine, which tells of a non-killing game set in a maze. Some have described it as Danganronpa meets Saw.

There are also a couple of less-than-canonical spin-offs for the series:

• Legacy Mall, a non-despair AU covering the casts of all the stories hanging out at a giant mall.
• Tag, You're It! (...tag, I'm it...) based on the 2018 film Tag.

The series as a whole has been officially named by the author Legacy of Despair, with the reboot named Legacyof Hope. Sadly, as of February 21, 2023, the reboot has been shelved due to lack of interest.

The series can also be found here on AO3.

According to the Discord server, the original timeline is said to be adapted into a project in a bigger medium. A New Hope will be a Web Video series, while the rest will be fangames.

Not to be confused with the first film in the Star Wars franchise.

Spoilers from the actual game series will be unmarked.

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Tropes include:

Legacy of Despair as a whole

• Adaptation Expansion: The fanfics take the premise of Danganronpa and expand it a lot by giving the Killing Game participants Character Development and backstories, letting them act beyond the Killing Game and creating a universe that expands beyond the canon.
• Adaptational Villainy: Several characters have fallen into Despair, such as some of the Future Foundation, Hiyoko Saionji and the real Makoto Naegi.
• Alternate Universe: Takes place in a canon universe far distant than any of the main games.
• Anyone Can Die: Plot Armor no longer applies here and the characters are all vulnerable to being killed at any moment. Survived a canon killing game? Not safe. The Hero? Not safe.^note Though one managed to survive being executed. The Cutie? Not safe. Children? You guessed it, NOT SAFE.
• Author Avatar: Crit Fail has submitted OCs of his own to participate in the OC-based fanfics, with Laris Nevermind under his credit. As revealed in his Discord, Alice Bailey, Mallory Walsh and Akeno Shujinmo are also his OCs, but were submitted under fake names.
• Big Bad: Junko (before her Heel–Face Brainwashing) and the Despairs are the main antagonists as a whole (especially during A New Hope), but Ultimate Biologist Jibo Momota is the Greater-Scope Villain of the arc concerning Class 80.
• Cerebus Syndrome: The series gets noticeably darker as the stories progress (see Anyone Can Die).
• Crossover: In later fics, the SCP Foundation and the Slender Man are shown to exist in their universe, as well as Rapture.
• Gender-Equal Ensemble: As per Danganronpa tradition, the casts of each series starts out with equal amounts of characters for both genders.
  • A New Hope double subverts this in the initial story: there are 47 students all in all. Then Ryoko Ootonashi (technically Junko Enoshima) joins and evens out the cast..
• The Hero Dies: Quite a lot of cases. OC protagonists Hayate and Hikyou end up dying (with the former surviving) and let's not get started on the real Makoto Naegi. Played straighter with Laris and Daisuke.
• Horror Doesn't Settle for Simple Tuesday: In addition to the main story occurring during Christmas and New Years, the other stories also end up featuring Halloween (plus Christmas again in one of them).
• Hotter and Sexier: There are Lemon moments, so innocent minds be warned.
• Introdump: As per Danganronpa tradition, it begins with the cast introducing themselves to whoever the protagonist would be. However, there are some odd cases:
  • Sea of Tranquility, off the back, introduces the characters right away, without that much of a protagonist figure to latch onto.
  • Kuma Kuma Land starts up the introductions while the cast is trapped in a rollercoaster.
• Lone Wolf Boss: Several characters serve as antagonists and threats to the characters, even when they aren't with (and sometimes even against) Ultimate Despair:
  • Ringo Takagami. While not on the side of Despair (he even tries to go against them at a few points), he's still a ruthless sociopath who only cares about 'refining his skills'. He killed his old employers (the Kuzuryus) when the Tragedy hit basically just because, and even before the killing game started made it clear he hoped to hunt his fellow Ultimates on the station. By the 2/3rds point of the game, he tries to kill everyone via booby traps to escape as the sole survivor and keep 'refining' down on Earth.
  • Dylan Rufheiser becomes this as a ghost. While in life he was (more or less) loyal to Yukiko, she realized he was getting to hard to control and axed him off herself. Now, he hopes to be revived with the specific intent of hunting her down and killing her. Nevermind that the current mastermind is her pseudo-father.
  • Lars Weyer. A misogynist and Misanthrope Supreme, he does nothing but insult, harass, and occasionally threaten the people around him throughout the entire game. He stands as his own faction separate from his fellow participants, Ultimate Despair, Momota, or anyone else with only one specific goal in mind (one that definitely contradicts pretty much everyone else's plans); the complete and total extermination (by way of demonic forces) of every human on Earth.
• Our Ghosts Are Different: Ghosts exist in this universe, with several of the Ultimates such as Hikari, Remy and Hana having talents involving communicating with them. Sayaka, Himiko, Tenko and Angie appear as spirits in the mortal realm after being killed, but it's implied that many other victims of the Killing Games have become spirits as well.
• Population: X, and Counting: All the stories have a count at the bottom of each chapter detailing how many participants are still alive. This number changes accordingly.
• Wham Episode:
  • Chapter 24 of House of Horrors ends with a monster-creating formula being dumped into the water supply of London (a major tourist site). This leads to the possibility of monster-like beings appearing in future stories.
  • The finale of Railway of Despair, for the entire series. Junko and Makoto are somehow still alive, Jun has apparently been corrupted by his parents, and a bunch of Future Foundation's secrets (the successor of FF's leader being a clone of a Despair and Mukuro's past as a Despair in particular) have been exposed, causing people to lose faith in the Foundation and potentially cause a second Tragedy to start erupting.

A New Hope

• Actor Allusion: The reveal of the mastermind Makoto Naegi is one thing. But when you take into consideration the theme of sacrifice his character employs, it's a subtle nod to his seiyuu, Megumi Ogata's role as Tia Harribel, whose Aspect of Death involves sacrifice. Not to mention how Harribel also cares for her fellow Fraccion, much like how Makoto cares deeply for his friends.
• Adaptational Backstory Change: Due to the story not having V3's canon "Truman Show" Plot, all of the students in class 79 have their fake Ultimate titles and personalities as their real ones.
• Adaptational Heroism:
  • Canonical killers Hifumi, Celeste, Mikan, Gundam, Chiaki, Kirumi, Gonta, and Kaito do not murder anyone.
  • Mukuro is shown to be a lot more conflicted about following Junko then she was in the original game and even makes a Heel–Face Turn after Makoto saves her from the spike trap.
• Affectionate Nickname: Several, as friendships blossom into romances.
  • "Maki Roll", from Kaito to Maki, naturally.
  • "Fujibear" and (briefly) "Tater tot", from Miu to Chihiro.
  • "Mimi" or "Miki", from Hajime and Chiaki to Mikan.
  • "Aki", from Hajime and Mikan to Chiaki.
  • "Pompadour", from Akane to Mondo.
  • "Naegels" and "Donuts", from Mukuro to Makoto and Asahina, respectively.
  • "Sai" from Kaede to Shuichi
  • Hiko from Peko to Fuyuhiko right before her death.
  • The members of Makoto's group get the nicknames Koto, Hina, Kuro, and Saya.
• Anti-Climax:
  • The final fight in Towa City. Chisa shows up in a battle mech, ready to fight . . . and abruptly jettisons away in an escape pod, abandoning the city entirely. It's even lampshaded.
  • The Forbidden Action Motive. It gets skipped entirely thanks to a clever trick on Ryoko's part.
• Ascended Extra: To an extent. The v3 cast (here all part of 'Class 79') were only hinted at in the author's original fic and were apparently members of Ultimate Despair. Here, they make up a whole third of the cast.
  • The hostages only showed up once in the original story. Here they're recurring characters in their own right.
• Asshole Victim: Shuichi punching out Byakuya in chapter 103 after one unfeeling comment too many. Togami being dead wrong in the following trial just adds to it.
• Babies Ever After: Unsurprisingly happens with several couples during the epilogue.
• Badass Crew: Fuyuhiko's group. Every team member is either A) physically stronger than most of the other students, B) a trained fighter, C) adamant about maintaining cooperation and a moral code, or some combination of all three.
• Bait-and-Switch: When Sayaka tells Mukuro that she knows her secret, both Mukuro and the readers believe that she somehow learned that Mukuro wasn't actually Junko. Actually, however, she only realized Mukuro was wearing a wig.
• Balanced Harem:
  • Makoto's group (Sayaka, Aoi, and Mukuro) are a case of this. The three have an equal presentation and overall meaningfulness to the plot as well as their own character arcs. Even when Sayaka's dead in the latter half, her ghost still appears, and even when said ghost disappears, she still has a say in the final trial. Aoi has her arc with Makoto in terms of her pregnancy. Mukuro has the more prominent character arc, being directly linked to the first Mastermind and is now seeking to redeem herself.
  • Hajime's group (Mikan and Chiaki) count as this as well, with Mikan having prominent character development.
• Breaking Old Trends:
  • Due to the longer Killing Game and larger cast, much of the standard Danganronpa chapter formulas do not apply. Supposed double murder at the third case? It happens at the first. The Big Guy dying in fourth? The first one dies at the second. The chapter where two victims and one culprit might be expected? It's a single murder with a single culprit, and even then, it's debatable. However, there are some downplayed exceptions:
    • Rantaro's nature in canon might suspect that he has a bigger role here, but the fact that he dies early may come as a shock. Given that his talent is revealed from the start, this is downplayed.
    • Himiko's death comes off as something that can occur in the first trial (the shock kill).
    • Korekiyo maintains the bizarre and unredeemable motive befitting of his role as his game's Chapter 3 killer. Though the chapter that follows is anything but a Chapter 3-esque trial, let alone a trial at all. It's also a shift in that fellow Chapter 3 killers Celestia and Mikan do not kill anyone at all and both survive the Killing Game.
    • Keebo closely fits something akin to a death in Chapter 5.
  • There's more than one traitor within the Killing Game. Mukuro is initially this, but it's subverted and joins the students' side. Tsumugi is a straighter example, serving as The Dragon to the Mastermind. Celestia becomes the new mole of the game (instead of Sakura, who was coerced earlier much like in canon). Ryoko (who is technically Junko under self-inflicted Heel–Face Brainwashing) subverts this as well since despite being the initial mastermind, she aids the cast instead of sabotaging them.
  • The Mastermind switches after a good chunk of the Killing Game, despite Junko being revealed as the first mastermind.
  • Unlike canon entries that end on a bleaker note, it's the first to earn the closest thing to a Happy Ending, despite the deaths of the cast.
• Call-Back / Call-Forward: In the last chapter of New Hope, Togami mentions the Mona Lisa had been stolen by an unknown source. In the first chapter of Final Horizon (released prior to the epilogue but chronologically taking place after it), the Mona Lisa is found ... in Hayate's room. On the Space Station orbiting earth.
• Cannot Tell a Lie: The second motive and one so strong, Kokichi inflicts body horror to avoid it. Averted by Mukuro, which didn't go unnoticed by Celeste or Kokichi.
• Cast Herd: After Monokuma's welcoming ceremony, the students spend time splitting into groups of seven or eight, hoping to decrease suspicions among one another and increase camaraderie. Each group has a designated Captain, though each captain's level interaction with rest of the team members varies from group to group. After the second trial, the captains start gathering together on a periodic basis to discuss how to move forward. Said groups become less of a thing as time goes on and numbers drop, however.
• Cerebus Syndrome: As the Killing Game continues, the deaths and executions become more brutal, the students don't partake in leisures much and sex scenes appear later throughout the story. Then, there's Sonia and Sayaka's deaths, Kaede temporarily becoming an Ultimate Despair and Nagito's Heroic Sacrifice to save her, and The Reveal of who the Mastermind is.
• Commonality Connection: Several friendships between students from different games are formed in the beginning over their common talents and interests.
  • Leon wants to be the Ultimate Musician, which is what Ibuki already is. They quickly get together romantically.
  • Tsumugi and Hifumi admire each other's talents pertaining to manga and anime. That's (apparently) a lie on Tsumugi's part.
  • Peko and Maki agree to meet in secret at 5:30am on a regular basis to spar. Mukuro takes up Peko's spot later on.
  • Kyoko and Shuichi end up interacting a lot in-and-outside of investigations given their respective detective skills. Kyoko admits under truth serum at one point to being jealous of Kaede.
    • Kyoko also bonds a bit with Ryoma given their stoic personalities. It's left unclear if there were any non-platonic feelings there, but Kyoko is still visibly affected by Ryoma's death.
• Convenient Photograph: Mahiru, who was merely wandering around the school taking pictures, accidently takes several depicting the location of a later story and Killing Game. Namely, House of Horrors. In a rare use of this trope, not only is this quickly found out by the villains, the photos are also destroyed by Mahiru's killer.
• Darkest Hour: The disease motive is easily where things are the most dire for the students. Ten students are infected with a disease that will kill them if someone doesn't commit a murder within three days (and Hifumi and Tenko do fall victim to it) and even Hajime nearly commits murder to save Mikan.
• Death by Adaptation: Canon survivors Toko, Hiro, Sonia, Himiko and Maki all die.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Meta example: Originally was a fic named 'A New Despair' (now taken down completely) featuring characters from the first two games only. Was rebooted to include V3 characters after its release. Its final chapter retcons the fic as being a severely altered retelling of A New Hope's events by Kokichi to Komaru, with an unidentified boy proceeding to tell her the actual story. Chapter 101 finally reaches this point; the conversation was over a computer, Shuichi was the unidentified boy, and he doesn't have time to share the correct story before Monokuma shows up.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: After all the hardships and deaths they had to endure, the Hope's Peak survivors manage to escape death and live out happy lives in a recovering world.
• Ensemble Cast: 47 students and a bear, with the cast growing with more action taking place outside of Hope's Peak. The author somehow finds time to give everyone arcs and enjoyable moments of interaction.
• First Kiss: Many examples, with both canon and non-canon examples:
  • Makoto and Mukuro technically have one while he's hospitalized and losing consciousness in chapter 20.
  • Angie and Hiro in the storage room in chapter 24, during the second investigation period. It escalates from there.
  • Makoto and Hina after the stressful Third Trial at the end of chapter 37.
  • Shuichi and Kaede in chapter 40.
  • Sonia and Gundham get one in chapter 49.
  • Makoto and Sayaka have theirs in chapter 58. It's also their Last Kiss.
  • Chiaki and Mikan in chapter 67.
  • Peko and Fuyuhiko in chapter 71. Also doubles as a Last Kiss.
  • Byakuya and Kirumi in chapter 73.
  • Nagito steals one from Kaede in the flashback in chapter 103. Kaede gives him his Last Kiss as he's dying a few minutes later.
• Foreshadowing:
  • Following Ibuki's death, Leon snaps at Kaede that she should have died instead. It's later revealed that the trap was created by Leon and was actually meant to kill Kaede.
  • There are several points leading to the reveal of "Hiyoko" being Kotoko Utsugi.
    • During the Christmas giveaway, Hiyoko remarks how the shoes don't fit her. They would've for an adult, but a child?
    • The earliest indication is when Hiyoko discovers that she had been wearing orange contact lenses, and her real eye color is pink.
  • If one were to discern Hiro's Tarot Card reading:
    • The upright Death Card usually indicates change. It could possibly indicate the phase in which the cast undergoes their character development.
    • The second is an upright Seven of Swords. It indicates deception and betrayal. It could foreshadow Celestia becoming The Mole, or how Tsumugi is closely deceiving the Ultimates and working with the Mastermind. Regarding the former, the minor arcana status indicates how she doesn't pursue being the mole anymore and turns down Monokuma's offer. Since Hiro was with Angie at the time, it also discerns Angie's future deed: killing the Impostor, Kiyotaka, and Gundham due to their differences when managing the Committee.
    • The next card is the Wheel of Fortune. It indicates that there are things that people cannot control. Case in point? Nagito's true self coming out. He states that in order for the Killing Game to end, more trials have to be conducted and more people have to be killed, and only then will hope triumph.
    • The next card is the Ace of Cups. It indicates the time to let go of certain things. Often, it indicates the new relationships the students undergo.
    • The next card is the Lovers. It usually signifies perfection in a relationship, or how the core pairings (Makoto/Aoi/Mukuro/Sayaka, Hajime/Chiaki/Mikan, Kaede/Shuichi, Chihiro/Miu) fully come together during the killing game.
    • The next card is the Sun. It indicates how the cast ultimately triumphs after the Killing Game.
  • During one of Makoto's conversations while he's incapacitated, Aoi tells him stories about various serial killers. She mentions investigating the Genocider Syo murders, though it's coincidental that they're in the same room as her. However, she also mentions a new serial killer who murders girls, with him having a body count of twenty. Said serial killer is also with them.
• Giallo: Think about it...bloodier executions and death scenes, explicit sex turned up to eleven, and complicit murder mysteries...this is essentially a modernized version of this Italian genre mixed with the Danganronpa franchise.
• Hotter and Sexier: More romance (and subsequently love-making between characters) compared to canon. The author warns readers at the beginning of chapters that contained detailed sex scenes.
  • In Chapter 88, Miu and Chihiro.
  • In Chapter 89, Makoto, Hina, and Mukuro.
  • In Chapter 95, Hajime, Chiaki, and Mikan.
  • In Chapter 110, Kaede and Shuichi.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Happens a lot, perhaps unsurprisingly. Not always ending in a death though.
• Imperiled in Pregnancy: Aoi suffers a lot for her and her two twins.
• Instant Illness: The sixth motive sees ten people ill, with death by suffocation in three days if someone doesn't kill. Yamada and Tenko end up dying to it.
• In Spite of a Nail: In spite of all the changes that come from having the three casts in the same killing game, some things do not change.
  • Canon survivors Makoto, Kyoko, Aoi, Byakuya, Hajime, Fuyuhiko, Akane, Kazuichi, and Shuichi all still make it to the end.
  • Makoto is still punched out by Mondo.
  • Sakura still commits suicide in order to help everyone move forward.
  • Munakata still goes insane about hope and ends up Walking the Earth.
• Intimate Hair Brushing: Following the end of the stressful first trial, Mukuro brushes Sayaka's hair for her. It's at this point that Sayaka reveals that she knows Mukuro is wearing a wig and, once she sees what Mukuro looks like without it, claims that she likes Mukuro's normal hair even better and offers to brush hers as thanks. Mukuro accepts and thinks about double crossing Junko for the first time in the story.
• Irony:
  • Angie expresses the opinion that the only reason students would kill each other is to escape the school (and that they can end the killing game if they all accept living in the school for the rest of their lives). Only one person in the entire run of the game killed with/for the express intention of leaving^*Teruteru, and they died before the investigation had even begun. Also, shortly after she expressed this idea for the first time 'onscreen', someone^*Leon set up a murder where, even if it had been successful, they wouldn't have had the option of leaving at all (not that they had been thinking of that at the time). Sadly, no one ever points that out to her.
  • Normally in the games the third trial is always a double murder, here it's the first trial to only have a single victim.
  • During the first game, Byakuya was the last to come around to the idea that Sakura's death was a suicide. Here, he is one of the first students to realize it and is on the side of the scrum debate that believes she killed herself.
• I Work Alone: In the beginning, Maki, Ryoma, and Byakuya refuse to join any group and operate independently. They eventually join (and in Byakuya's case, eventually lead) Kaede's, Hajime's, and Sonia's groups, respectively.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: In the third trial, Mukuro knows that Naegi's world will be shattered if Asahina is found guilty and executed. This is the biggest driving factor behind her giving a false confession to being the blackened in order to buy time.
• Love Confession:
  • Sayaka gives one to Makoto in Chapter 56. Complete with in-universe musical accompaniment.
  • Chihiro gives one to Miu in Chapter 76 (no music this time, but still sweet).
• Love Hurts: Three relationships have already been broken up (mainly by death of all involved parties), Ibuki and Leon^note who set up the trap that killed her, no less, Hiro and Angie and Gundham and Sonia, in that order. The last one in particular lasted two chapters before Gundham was found dead.
  • And with Sayaka's death, the number's up to four. And then five with Peko's death. Mondo's death makes six. Maki's death brings the number up to seven. And Ryoko’s death in the epilogue brings it up to eight. Ryoko's case is particularly cruel because it was Zig-Zagged. Kazuichi first thought he lost Ryoko due to her acting as though she fell in despair, and then Played Straight when Munakata kills Ryoko.
  • Averted for once with Kaede and Shuichi in chapters 102 and 103. Ultimately Averted with Kirumi and Togami; Mikan, Chiaki, and Hajime; Mukuro, Asahina, and Makoto; Fuyuhiko and Celeste; Kaito and Akane; and Chihiro and Miu.
• Making Love in All the Wrong Places: Miu and Chihiro do this a couple of times in the later chapters^*At least one of those times got Miu pregnant before the final trial.
• Misplaced Retribution: While the real Makoto's desire for revenge against Class 77 B and 78 are understandable, Class 79 hadn't even starting attending Hope's Peak Academy when he went there, meaning he had no reason to include them in the killing game.
• The Mole: Subverted for Sakura, played straight for Mukuro initially, Tsumugi, Celestia, and an unknowing K1-B0.
• Mouth Stitched Shut: Self-inflicted by Kokichi to avoid the second motive. He gets it removed afterward.
• Must Not Die a Virgin: Denoted by anyone who has sex in the lemons. After all, surviving a string of death and many more events must have made a reason for it.
• Mythology Gag: Makes references to canon, as well as some other fanamde Danganronpa works (often unintentionally) as well:
  • Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc
    • The first motive is the canonical video motive. Both Makoto and Sayaka have identical videos used here much like in canon.
    • The second case also involved a female character leaving a cryptic message in her own blood for them to identify the killer, but it's subverted in that it is cleaned up before it was present. Her killer, however, was killed by someone else.
    • Leon accidentally kills another blue-haired musician here. Though this time, he had been intending to kill someone from the start.
    • Chapter 41 brings up Chihiro and Mondo's death flags again: Chihiro admitting that he wants to improve himself as a man, while Mondo reflects on his own shortcomings. Fortunately, Mondo doesn't pull through with it here.
    • Sakura once again commits suicide, but it's for a for a different reason.
  • Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair
    • Teruteru's death is seemingly food-related as in canon, to say the least. Canon has him fried, while the fic has him at the end of a shish-kebab.
  • Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope's Peak High School
    • The Forbidden Action Motive is once again played, but it's subverted when Mukuro and Ryoko disable it.
  • Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony
    • This isn't the first time Himiko Yumeno dwelled with piranhas before. However, whereas her magic show involved piranhas, here, they become the death of her.
    • Kaede is once again involved with a Rube Goldberg Device, but here, she's not the one who either builds it, gets killed by it, or modifies it.
  • Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc IF
    • Makoto takes the hit for Mukuro when she is about to be impaled by the Gungnir spears. However, unlike the novel, where the Killing Game comes to a close and the students live through, the Killing Game continues to its conclusion.
    • Also unlike IF, Genocider Syo doesn't activate on Toko, instead falling unconscious.
    • Mukuro reveals her identity, much to the shock of the cast, in both works. In IF, it happens during the time she gets saved by Makoto. Here, it takes place much later in the story. While no one believed her in IF at first, what's left of the cast in A New Hope fully believe her.
• Never Bring a Knife to a Gun Fight: Or more accurately, Never Bring a Sword to a Bot Fight. Maki gets killed because of this.
• No Pregger Sex: Averted with Makoto and Hina.
• Not His Sled: While the Spears of Gungnir are used, they fail to claim a victim as Makoto shoves Mukuro out of the way.
• Obvious Rule Patch: In order to make sure that the students can't create a cure for the disease he creates, Monokuma ensures that one of the students infected with it is Mikan.
• One Degree of Separation: Mikan, Kaito and Kokichi are half-siblings.
• Pair the Spares:
  • Happens a bit near the end. Akane/Kaito being a particularly late in the game example.
  • Particularly odd/interesting examples in the epilogue include Natsumi/Sato and Kenshiro/Hiroko.
• Pet the Dog: Monokuma gets into the Christmas spirit, decorates Hope's Peak Academy in lights, sets up an extravagant Christmas tree, and delivers presents to every student, with each gift having something to do with an Ultimate talent.
  • Razor Apples: However, there's a dark side to all of Monokuma's actions. Mukuro's gift is the severed head of the real Hiyoko Saionji. Celeste's gift is a revolver. She receives this less than a day after being given a motive to kill Asahina specifically.
    • Subverted in both a good and bad way with Nagito's present, which turns out to be a completely empty box.
• Population: X, and Counting: There's a record of people alive at the end of each chapter (for the most part). When one or more students die, the living population number goes down. Occasionally, it goes back up if anyone new gets added to the population.
• Powers That Be: Sonia's group. Everyone is a believer in a greater power, spirituality, or the supernatural. (Though Kazuichi may have his own reasons for doing so.) Subverted with Leon and Ibuki.
• Pre-Climax Climax: Kaede and Shuichi have sex before the final trial of the Killing Game. They make it out alive.
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: Twogami's group. With the sole exception of Kirumi, each team member did not make many friends among their classmates in the actual games, and in some cases did not try to.
• Red Herring: In the appropriately titled "Bait and Switch", the video motive plays out like in Trigger Happy Havoc, and Sayaka elicits a very similar reaction as in canon, leading to believe that she will commit murder only to die by someone's hand. While Sayaka gets more of a reaction here, the real murder is Teruteru (who was also affected by the video motive) murdering Himiko, with Sayaka in the way.
• Related in the Adaptation: Mikan, Kaito and Kokichi turn out to be half siblings.
• Rousing Speech: Kaede, Hajime, and Makoto give a collective one to the surviving members of their respective classes in the final trial, encouraging them to not vote.
• Sadistic Choice: During the sixth trial, Korekiyo reveals his plot: he kidnapped five girls (well, more like four girls and one crossdressing boy) and hid them somewhere in the school. Until midnight, one girl will die every hour, on the hour. So the students have a choice. They can either kill Korekiyo, but risk not being able to find the girls or sacrifice another student and find the girls, but remain stuck with a serial killer. Thanks to Celestia and Miu, they are able to kill him and still find the girls.
• Secret Test of Character: Kyoko admits to taking a backseat to Shuichi in the second trial. She wants to be reassured that he is someone who can solve a case without her, because she knows there is a possibility that the two of them may not survive the killing game together.
• Second Love: Kaito and Akane are both this to each other. They hookup late in the game after both of their initial love interests, Maki and Mondo, are both dead.
• Sequel Hook:
  • It's established near the end of the story that at least four more killing games are being plotted out by Junko's followers, with hints toward them being dropped in the chapters beforehand. The spin-offs follow these up (Space Station, Moon Base, Amusement Park of Doom, and at least one other). The epilogue ends with the survivors (whose means of reaching space is still months away from functioning) watching the beginning of the Horizon Station broadcast.
  • A more straight-forward example comes at the end of the story proper: on one hand, the survivors escape the school. On the other hand, the increasingly zealous Munakata is still on the loose determined to ‘destroy Despair’, the rest of Ultimate Despair is still running around, and a brainwashed Nagito clone is still at large.
• Sex Signals Death: The first people ever noted to have sex in the fic are Leon and Ibuki. They're also the first couple to bite the dust.
• Shout-Out: Aside from numerous pop-culture references, there are also references to other Fanganronpas, intentional or not.
  • Danganronpa Another
    • This isn't the first time a character succumbs to a motive involving hostages. In Another's case, the culprit is outed as a killer. Here, the character attempts to kill, only to end up as a victim of another character. Fortunately, the hostages in ANH that said character is trying to protect all make it to the end.
    • The situation with the second mastermind is almost similar here (a protagonist figure being the mastermind). In DRA, the mastermind is the protagonist's true identity. Here, the mastermind is a clone of the protagonist figure.
    • Peko's case is oddly similar to Ayame's in that they both landed the finishing blow on a character that was someone else's victim. The difference is that Kizuna attempted to murder someone purposefully, only for Ayame to take the last hit, while Peko was under the influence of the Fear Gas motive and lands the last hit on Gonta, attacked by Hiyoko/Kotoko who also was falling under the motive. Even their execution is similar.
    • The killer with the highest body count in the fic, Angie Yonaga, slightly brings to mind Kinji Uehara. Both are religious people who killed for somewhat sympathetic reasons (keeping the peace for Angie, saving the orphanage children for Kinji). Both even have some degree of remorse after their trials.
    • Miu gaining an AI of herself (Doppelganger) brings to mind Yamato Kisaragi, who coincidentally shares Miu's talent (Ultimate Inventor), In fact, one could say that Yamato has been split into Chihiro and Miu, with Miu inheriting his primary talent and Chihiro inheriting his knack for computers.
  • Super Danganronpa Another 2
    • Ryoko Otonashi is somehow an Expy to Sora. Both were punished by some form of drowning (happens near the end for Sora, whereas it happens when Ryoko is introduced. Both have character arcs relating to finding their memories, and both are somehow affiliated to certain Ultimate Despairs (Akane Taira for Sora, Junko Enoshima for Ryoko). Not to mention they have a close relationship with different Lucky Students: Makoto for the former and Yuki for the latter.
    • A murder occurs in the backdrop of a music concert; the difference is that the murder happens during the concert, rather than in the background.
    • Himiko's death slightly brings to mind Setsuka's death. Both are killed in rather mundane ways, but what happen to their bodies after their deaths bring to mind cruel manners.
  • In Chapter 38, Hajime and Mikan go to the Arcade's pizzeria and see animatronic Monokumas on stage and make a blatant Five Nights at Freddy's reference.
  Mikan: Y-yes t-they're are rather troubling. I-It reminds me of a certain game s-series.
  Hajime: Hey don't worry, I'm pretty sure we don't have to worry about these rejects trying to stuff us into suits.
• Spared By Adaptation:
  • Canonical deaths Mukuro, Chihiro, Celestia, Chiaki (the real one), Kaede, Kirumi, Miu, Kokichi and Kaito and surprisingly Taichi, Yuta, Juzo, Kizakura, Gozu, Chisa, Seiko (probably), Natsumi and Sato all survive to the end of the game.
  • Downplayed with Mikan who technically didn't die, but was just comatose, but here, she reaches the end of the killing game.
• Surprisingly Happy Ending: For a franchise that usually ends on a bittersweet note, it's odd that the students make it out to a recovering world.
• Their First Time: Happens a lot between love interests (usually featuring lemons).
• Title Drop: In a move that mimic's the end of the original game, Kyoko gives Makoto a new title: their 'New Hope'. By comparison, the Mastermind (like the chapter he's revealed in) could be called the 'New Despair', though this is never stated in the story.
• Unwanted Harem: Naegi's group. Sayaka, Aoi, and Mukuro all have feelings for Makoto and all fret over how he may feel towards each of them. The 'unwanted' part is dropped when all three get together with him. Subverted with Hajime's group even though—unlike Makoto—all of his team members are women (except Chihiro, but nobody is aware of his secret at first). There is far less focus on his relationships with everyone else. He still gets with Mikan and Chiaki by the third floor.
• Unreliable Narrator: The entirety of A New Despair turned out to Kokichi telling Komaru about the events of the killing game, only he made up a majority of his story in order to mess with her.
• Villainous Breakdown: Korekiyo has a major one after Chihiro's gender is revealed, due to his philosophy of only killing girls. This allows everyone to find and save him and the other kidnapped girls, although it's too late for Sayaka and Sonia.
• Wham Episode:
  • For readers of A New Despair, Chapter 8: Mahiru, who had survived up to the reboot in the original story, is the first to die, showing that none of the survivors in the original story are safe.
  • A smilar moment occurs in Chapter 23: Himiko, a survivor of her canonical game, dies.
  • Chapters 48 & 49: Everyone starts realizing they've lost more time than they'd realized, Hina discovers she's pregnant, and Mukuro (who admits to Hina (and Sakura) that she knows more than she's letting on to tell Hina that Makoto's the father) realizes she has no idea who's controlling the Killing Game.
  • Chapter 72: Some students realize Monokuma's controller's switched out, several people (including Mikan) have been infected by a disease motive barely twelve hours after the last trial ended, and Makoto gets an unexpected (but actually real) visitor: Sayaka Maizono's ghost!
  • Chapter 78 hints at members of the Danganronpa 3 cast being members of Despair, with Yasuhiro's mom knocking out one of them (Ruruka Ando) and escaping.
  • Chapter 83: It takes place entirely outside of Hope's Peak (besides one point in the Mastermind's room) and shows most of the 'unnecessary' hostages being murdered. Also, Future Foundation has found Ryota, and learned that Despair agents have infiltrated their ranks.
  • Chapter 85: Several student's secrets get revealed, Tsumugi is finally killed off, and, as a final surprise, Monokuma reveals exactly which of the secrets from the earlier motive belong to who (meaning everyone knows Maki's an assassin, Sakura nearly became a mole, Makoto wet the bed, etc.).
  • Chapter 100: K1-B0 was an unknowing spy-bot for the Mastermind, Monokuma already knew about Usami, The Mastermind used K1-B0 to murder Maki, and said Mastermind is seen plotting something with Monaca, Chisa, and two unknown people (implied to be the ones controlling the killing game on Horizon Station and possibly the moon base).
  • Chapter 101: Komaru briefly contacts the students at Hope's Peak, the story officially completely surpasses where New Despair reached, hints are dropped about the Mastermind of the spin-off, Sayaka's ghost disappears (see the wham section for Final Horizon for why that might be), and at the very end an unseen student gets turned into an agent of Despair.
  • Chapter 108: Junko's back.
  • Chapter 110: Except not. It was a ruse by Ryoko, allowing the students to skip the last motive and move on to the final act.
  • Chapter 111: The Mastermind is revealed: The ORIGINAL Makoto Naegi!
• Wham Line:
  • A message Mukuro gets Along with the head of Hiyoko, who she thought was controlling the game:
    Guess Who?
  • From Chapter 103, after Byakuya and Shuichi's fight:
    Ryoko found herself starring at the situation in silence, what no one saw was the faintest of twitches along the corner of her lips.
  • Chapter 111:
    You targeted Hina, Kuro, and me because you were angry. Because you felt betrayed and abandoned. You developed the twist on sacrificing people in your game, because you felt like you'd sacrificed yourself for the rest of us. You watched from the shadows as I unknowingly took over your life. All that hope you carried became slowly twisted, before it turned into something ugly. There is only one explanation for why I heal so fast, one explanation for why you and I were the only ones who could see Sayaka's spirit. One reason why you were able to enter the simulation without any trouble. It's because you and I are one in the same. Isn't that right, Makoto Naegi!
• "What Do They Fear?" Episode: The fifth motive sees hallucinogenic gas released into the school, causing the students to experience their worst fears. Results very from person to person.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are: Hajime and Chiaki often give these types of speeches to Mikan.

Final Horizon

• Affectionate Nickname: Pop up, continuing the previous story's trend:
  • 'Beautiful' or 'Buns' for Alice from Hayate.
• A Birthday, Not a Break: Despair strikes during Shiori's birthday when Shiori is poisoned by cyanide in her birthday candles, Wei loses his leg, Giselly and Shuhei are almost thrown out of a broken window, and to make matters worse... the number one prick on the station, Ringo Takagami, is found dead, meaning (since he actually wasn't The Mole) that they have to go through a trial, which means they have to vote for one of their number to die. Though the last one manages to be averted via Loophole Abuse. Subverted in a sense when Monokuma declares that the cast is a couple of days off of Shiori's actual birthday.
• Accidental Murder: Well, suicide, but this is how the first murder occurs.
• Air-Vent Passageway: Thy run throughout the station. Hayate and Alice use them during the final day of the killing game.
• Ambiguous Gender: Galexialyn Chijimatsu and Raef Hyzaki are this. It gets sorted out during the first investigation.
• Anyone Can Die: Enforced Trope, in the third case, due to a reader poll. And Hiyoko, after the fourth. The reader poll thing had another twist to it though.
• Audience Participation: The readers got to vote for who would be the victims of the third case.
• Big Damn Kiss: Alice gives one to Hayate when he reveals he's still alive.
• Continuity Nod: Ringo brings up the entire argument brought up by Nagito back in A New Hope during its third trial: if one hands someone a gun and that someone fires it, the killer is ambiguous depending on the situation.
• Cosmic Deadline: The final trial of the Killing Game is slightly faster in pace than most of the others, particularly due to the comet approaching that will destroy the space station.
• Dark and Troubled Past: All of them. Except Ringo.
• Did They or Didn't They?: Alice notions to Akiko that she and Hayate were "rolling around" prior to his "death".
• Dying Declaration of Love: Giselly tries this on Shuhei when it looks like one or both of them will be sucked into space. It fails, both in her not getting to say it and neither of them managing to die. Except she was actually going to reveal she was the unwilling mole. She gives and actually declaration before being dragged off to her execution, however.
• First Kiss: Also continuing the trend of the previous story:
  • Hikaru and Rei in chapter 11. They even admit it was a first kiss for both of them.
  • Akiho and Wei Yun in chapter 17.
• First Law of Resurrection: Hayate, the supposed protagonist, "dies" in the third case, but later comes back, having revealed his true nature as the Ultimate Anti-Hero. The reception was more mixed, however.
• Gender-Equal Ensemble: Zigzagged Trope. It seems the case, minus the two with Unknown Gender anyways. It's however revealed in the first investigation, that Raef is male and Galexialyn is female. Then Sayaka enters the cast.
• Hopeless Suitor: Raef hints at a crush on Hayate in Chapter 12. Unfortunately they (Raef) die and Hayate becomes smitten with Alice, who reciprocates, so they never had a chance of getting their feelings returned.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Akiko has feelings for Alice, but is willing to step aside when seeing she clearly likes Hayate. She even keeps Hayate from pulling this trope himself.
• Love Hurts: Carries over from the previous story:
  • Charles is devastated when finding Nico dead.
  • Hikaru is similarly devastated when Rei is found to be the culprit.
  • Alice after Hayate dies. Fortunately, he gets better.
  • Akiko during that time Alice is suspected of being the traitor.
• Men Are the Expendable Gender: By the time of the fourth trial, only two men are still alive (one missing part of a leg), and only two women (both in the second case) have died. This changes post-fourth trial, when no less than three of the surviving girls get blown up within a few chapters of each other. And one guy survived.
• The Mole: It's confirmed there is one on the station. It's Giselly.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair:
    • The first trial of both DR2 and this present the true nature of both of its antagonist characters. The former presents Nagito as one who's planning to kill should the game come to a standstill, whereas the latter shows how Ringo is planning to kill everyone and become the last man standing, winning the game.
• Never Bring a Knife to a Gun Fight: Or as Ringo learns, Never Bring a Gun to a Spirit Fight.
• Off on a Technicality: What ultimately spares Galexialyn: she didn't directly kill Ringo, so she doesn't get executed.
• Population: X, and Counting: Much like the previous story (albeit now actually being present from the beginning), the number of people alive is kept track of. When someone dies or gets added in, the number changes.
• Recurring Element: Per Danganronpa tradition, several characters are based on existing archetypes:
  • Several characters have crime-oriented talents: Giselly, Ringo, and Hayate.
  • Two of the students have talents related to the supernatural: Shiori and Galexialyn.
  • Ichiro is set up to be the Big Guy of the group, but dies before the fourth case.
  • Rei is the musically-oriented girl of the group.
  • Rei fits the archetype of the second-case killer: her past is brought up and this factors into her motivations to kill.
  • Hayate fits the third-case killer archetype of killing two people and revealing a darker side behind it.
  • Giselly is the technologically-oriented character but mixes it with the above criminal theme.
    • She also fits with the Ambiguously Brown archetype.
  • Shiori is the group's Token Mini-Moe.
  • Ringo fits the antagonistic Jerkass archetype, but unlike those who came before him, he lacks decent redeeming qualities.
• Sequel Hook: At the end, fittingly. There's a Despair-inducing computer virus hidden somewhere, waiting to be released, Jun has disappeared to 'discover Despair' on his own, and in a more direct hook, the surviving students are sent down to the moon, where their other classmates are. That last one leads into the concurrently-written story, Sea of Tranquility.^*With the chapter of that story simultaneously being posted showing the two classes meeting.
• Shout-Out: Nico Bessho, with her Ultimate Guesser talent to, well NicoB.
• Surprisingly Sudden Death: Sayaka's.
• Time Skip: Word of Writer confirms in the comments (prior to it being revealed in-story) that the story takes place two years after New Hope.
• Title Drop: For the series as a whole in Chapter 22: The Mastermind calls Jun their 'Legacy of Despair.'
• Wham Episode:
  • Chapter 9: Some of the characters find a room full of cryo pods, one of which contains the still alive (and original, if the scars are any indication) Sayaka Maizono!
  • Chapter 17: Hayate, the by all appearances main protagonist of the story, dies after a reader poll votes for his death. Also, turns out he was Mr. Psycho all along (that part, at least, was already planned)!
  • Chapter 22: Ringo sets up traps that nearly kill Wei, Akiho, and (at the end of the previous chapter) Shuhei & Giselly, the actual mole poisons Shiori, and then Ringo is found - murdered.
  • Chapter 24: Galexialyn was Ringo's killer, however since the killing was done via a summoned monster, she gets Off on a Technicality. However, Monokuma reveals that (contrary to what he'd said earlier) the meteor that will destroy the station is only a week away.
  • Chapter 27 & 28: The survivors discover that all members of Class 80-A had some form of mental illness and were confined on the station sanitarium, Hayate was Shuhei's brother, Jibo Momota was experimenting on them by giving them extra talents, Hiyoko Saionji is confirmed as the Horizon Station mastermind, everyone has bombs in their necks that will go off in a few days, and she proves this by killing Sayaka!
  • Chapter 30: Hayate survived thanks to Mr. Psycho's Healing Factor, and rescued Alice from the sanitarium (and a murderous Akiho) before midnight. Also, Shuhei knew about this and made sure Alice was in the room Hayate could spring her from. Alice also realizes the true purpose of the Killing Game is to break Jun and drive him into Despair.
  • Chapter 31, the final chapter: Giselly was the mole, Hiyoko dies, the station blows up, and the survivors are forced into the Moon Base Killing Game.
• You Have to Believe Me!: Alice ends up getting suspected of being the mole, in part because she was heard talking with Monokuma the previous night. She's not the mole, but can't explain what she was talking about because Monokuma threatened to kill her if she did.

Sea of Tranquility

• Abandoned Laboratory: Tranquility Base is revealed to be this. Its creators apparently gave up on it for some reason (leaving several colonies unfinished) and left, hence why the starving livestock and easily killable greenhouse plants were in such a bad state.
• Alliterative Name: Alex Alvarez.
• Crossover: Apparently, SCP is (to some extent) a thing in Legacy of Despair's setting. And Mirielle's mask is an object from there.
• Dramatic Unmask:
  • In chapter 11, Fukuya revealed his true identity as Jason Carter, Ultimate Strategist.
  • In 21, the Ultimate Diplomat reveals he's actually the Ultimate Psychopath.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: the sixteen survivors of Class 80 manage to stop the brodcast and escape the moon without losing anyone else. Happy endings abound for the cast.
• "Freaky Friday" Flip: happens in chapter 24.
• Love Hurts: Carries over once again:
  • Evan's Ship Tease with Hikari ends when she becomes one of the victims of the second trial.
  • Lee loses Mallory in the third trial. In a platonic(?) example, Shiori loses her best friend Xia to a misvote.
  • Jason lost any chance he had with Evan, and didn't discover it until a trial later.
  • Right before Zalicka can finally get with Anh, his head is bashed in.
  • Sierra loses Mirielle at the same time, but inherits Lupin and the Phantom Thief title from her.
• Moon Base: Where the story takes place.
• Population: X, and Counting: Continuing the trend in the series, a counter is present that keeps track of the student population, going down when someone dies and up when people are added in.
• Red Herring:
  • Everything suggesting Kakeru was the Token Evil Teammate.
  • The Tribunal is never utilized.
• Sequel Escalation: Final Horizon had sixteen students participating in the killing game, this one has twenty-four. Apparently, eight of them aren't actually students. Or even natural Ultimates. Or even natural humans.
• Shout-Out: Arsène Lupin's mask is known as SCP 11037.
• Time Skip: Sort of. It's being written concurrently with the other stories, but is clearly set after Final Horizon, as the wrecked Horizon Station in the sky clearly shows. Later confirmed to begin during the final chapter of Final Horizon.
• Wham Episode:
  • Chapter 15: Class 80-B finds some unexpected new additions to the Killing Game: the survivors of Class 80-A.
  • Chapter 21: The students outright vote incorrectly and know it. Galexialyn gets executed for a murder she didn't commit (proving even the previous story characters can die), and the real killer is revealed to be Dylan; Ultimate Psychopath!
  • Chapter 23: In ascending order, Sierra and Mirielle get together, the Extra Eight students are confirmed to be Artificial Ultimates with false memories, and A new motive begins that starts with the pressure dropping enough to knock people out. There's then a Time Skip to three days later.
  • Chapter 24: "Freaky Friday" Flip occurs, and everyone has amnesia from the last three days. Also, Lupin isn't actually a split personality, but a sentient magical object that Mirielle stole.
  • Chapter 26: Dylan is (apparently) dead, Evan's stuck in another body, Class 80-A airs its dirty laundry (most of it already known, but Shiori's was a bit surprising), and it turns out the Extra Eight aren't artificial Ultimates; they're full-blown Artificial Humans who were (presumably) created on the moon and have no actual lives outside to Moon Base.
  • Chapter 31: Dylan was impersonating Evan, and a realization is reached concerning Yukiko.
  • Chapter 32: Essentially a Flashback Episode revealing how Yukiko and Dylan successfully orchestrated of carried out every single death in the Killing Game. At the end, Yukiko uses a perk to have the executed person be decided by roulette wheel, with the readers getting to vote how it ends!
  • Chapter 33: The roulette wheel lands on Yukiko anyway, only or her to pull out a remote and turn Monokuma off, revealing that there was never a mastermind. Monokuma was run by an AI (that may or may not become Kuuma in House of Horrors), while Yukiko and Dylan (the first artificial humans created) served as caretakers. Also, Yukiko Momota was created with Jibo Momota's DNA, and she has access to the Despair computer virus brought up at the end of the Horizon game. The survivors are forced to let Yukiko escape while they go to stop the virus from being broadcast to Earth and kickstarting a second Tragedy.
  • The final chapter, Chapter 34: Sure, the survivors got their happy ending (and some of them have even joined the new Future Foundation), but Mastermind!Makoto shows himself to Yukiko and he's taken his son Jun under his wing. Then, he invites Yukiko to join his next plan for Despair...
• "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: In the final chapter, every survivor is successfully rescued from the moon and start new lives upon returning to Earth. As told by Misuzu and Kakeru, Natalie and Shuhei are living together in the United States, Zalicka is staying with Wei in Tokyo until she is able to return to Egypt, Hayate is working as a security consultant for the Future Foundation while Alice is starting a program for orphans, Lee is going with Lia to visit her parents in Portugal, Choko and Tae Min have joined the law firm, Alex is continuing his DJ career, Jason is working with the foundation and has found a new relationship with Juzo and Shiori plans to be the godmother for Alice and Hayate's new child.

Kuma-Kuma Land

• Accidental Murder: The situation in the second case, Maddie was running from Yushikuma and blindly firing paintballs behind her. One just happened to hit Kanade, and the acid secretly implanted in the paint by the Intruder ate away at her.
• Ascended Meme: The name Annabelle Protection Squad has been used by readers since her character bio was revealed.
• Asshole Victim: A rare showing for a Danganronpa work: The asshole character who does nothing but antagonize the rest of the cast while refusing to cooperate? Becomes the first victim, with practically everyone as a suspect due to him being so unlikable.
• Alliterative Name: Kanade Kanaka.
• Amusement Park of Doom: the setting.
• Fate Worse than Death: Everyone who died in the game is turned into a Kuma and forced to work in the park, experiencing pain if they don't follow their programming.
• Foreshadowing: In Chapter 13 Laris and Kaizoku both mention having blood on their hands. Two chapters later in 15 they are the only two to kill during the death game.
• Never Bring a Knife to a Gun Fight: Laris tries threatening Kurokuma with a sword. Kurokuma has a pistol. Fortunately, it just damages Laris' helmet a little.
• No OSHA Compliance: Probably intentional, but still. The game opens with one hundred captured individuals strapped to a roller coaster, with the twenty who become participants being the only ones that survive the ensuing ride and random seat-ejections.
• One Degree of Separation: Laris is not only from Sonia's home country, she's also the bastard half-sister of Sonia and Kirumi.
• Shout-Out: The Knight that raised Laris is named Gregory Loghain.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: After The Intruder's death, Haruto gives a scathing one to Tomoko, pointing out her It's All About Me attitude and open disregard for anyone else is exactly why the majority of people voted for her in the second trial. Tomoko seems more affected by the fact that Haruto outright slapped her beforehand.
• Trash Talk: In Chapter 15: Tomoko and Kaizoku use this to goad Yushikuma into making mistakes and get sloppy in the Chessmatch Deathgame.
• Wham Episode:
  • Chapter 10: the Despaired Nagito clone has made it into the park.
  • Chapter 15: The killing was a complete accident and run of bad luck, the series has it's first instance (outside of Sea of Tranquility, which doesn't count in this context) of a (in this case accidental) blackened getting away with it and being allowed to leave, and the rest of the cast manage to get through the subsequent death game with no casualties (except, possibly, Yushikuma and maybe even Masaru).
  • Chapter 16: Madison leaves the park to get help, and discovers where the park is located: on a massive Floating Island at least a mile above the ocean, held aloft by massive machines ... machines that won't hold it forever, and with a second Tragedy certain to come if the island falls.
  • Chapter 18: The Nagito Clone is found dead with his heart removed.
  • Chapter 24: Shiho, the blind runner, is a (very unwilling) mole.
  • Chapter 26: Shiho's exposed as a mole, everyone gets lost and separated in the sewers, and at the end of the chapter, the character count nonchalantly reveals that someone has died off-screen. Also, the narrative checks back in on Madison, now at Future Foundation headquarters, where Makoto informs her (and the audience by extension) that if the island drops, it won't just cause a second Tragedy ... it will be a global extinction event. And they currently have no way to stop it on there own.
  • Chapter 33: Laris Nevermind, the author-submitted character everyone had pegged as being a survivor in this game, was actually a mole the entire time. And then she dies in a duel with Shirokuma and Kurokuma (destroying them both in the process). And then the final bear reveals themself: Meijikuma is Meijikuma.
  • Chapter 36: The island's starting to fall. Good news: it won't actually be an extinction event. Bad news: It will still level Tokyo at a minimum.
• What the Hell, Hero?: After The Intruder's death, Haruto gives one of these to Laris for going along with the plan of using Anna as bait.

House of Horrors

• Affectionate Nickname: A few examples:
  • 'Hikky' from Ariana to Hikyou shortly before he dies.
  • 'Minnow' from Ariana to Kitai.
• Aggressive Categorism: Invoked by the Mastermind in regards to the 'Man vs Monsters' effect present. So far, not actually very present in the students themselves, though some have been weary of the more monstrous participants.
• Bittersweet Ending: The surviving ten students get rescued, Akeno a.k.a. Junko Enoshima escapes with a fully Despaired Shiro, and the island and its monstrous inhabitants remains intact.
• Death of a Child: The seven-year-old is one of the first to die.
• First-Episode Twist: The fact that the students are Artificial Ultimates.
• First Kiss: Carries over once again.
  • Hikyou and Ariana in chapter 4, just before the former’s death. Cue Fade to Black.
  • Alexander and Jana, also in chapter 4. It escalates from there.
  • Alexander and Akeno in chapter 7. The second, longer one is also to sustain her.
• Halloween Episode: The story has a more 'horror' theme to it, with at least half the cast being turned into monsters. In universe, Halloween will occur roughly around the nineteenth day in.
• Hotter and Sexier: Lemons return: In Chapter 4, Alexander and Jana.
• Kill the Cutie: Kitai, at the end of chapter 4.
• One Degree of Separation: The roster includes a member of the Kirigiri family, and an animal bred by Gundham Tanaka.
• Older Than They Look: Syd is listed as being 19, but apparently is actually older than he looks^*which makes sense, otherwise there's no way he could have even gotten into Hope's Peak, much less graduated, before the Tragedy struck.
• Retcon: A small one appears in the prologue: Mahiru, before dying, found what appeared to be pictures of the Artificial Ultimates project. Specifically, Jizoku.
• Team Pet: Henry the Dragon and Teleios the Gyrfalcon (though he'd probably take offense to that).
• Wham Episode: Every chapter from three to eight:
  • Chapter 3: Jibo himself (allegedly) is the first victim of the game.
  • Chapter 4: The Decoy Protagonist and little boy both die horrifically.
  • Chapter 5 has something of note: while Samuel is aware of Junko Enoshima's role in the Tragedy, other members on the group somehow aren't, with Jizoku having never even heard of The Tragedy. Or cellphones for that matter, which paints a picture of how long he's been getting experimented on (or was dead for). Also, the current killing game isn't the first one that's occurred on the island.
  • Chapter 6: The Decoy Protagonist was killed by a mind-controlled Kiyomi Kirigiri.
  • Chapter 7: Some of the Staff are participants of offscreen killing games, and a new participant is added to the game; Ultimate Angel Sonia Nevermind.
  • Chapter 8: Another new participant has been found, Daisuke del Rio (a character from one contributor's fic series), and Kiyomi can still talk through her mirror.
  • Chapter 10: Kuuma, the de facto mastermind after Jibo's 'death', and the only one who knew who was behind that, is abruptly killed by something with a tentacle in the middle of the night.
  • Chapter 16: Kiyomi gets revived.
  • Chapter 24: Saino managed to escape the island, and infected London (at least!) with her monster-creating virus.

Railway of Despair

• All for Nothing: Near the end, Hoshikuma points out that there was no rule against sharing tickets; if all eight players had just shared their tickets with each other than they could've left by the first day. The whole killing game didn't need to happen.
• Bittersweet Ending: Very. Good news: half the cast got out alive, including the girl who was actually pregnant. Bad news: One(two?) of them will be stuck in the Oasis game, Junko and Makoto are still alive and have (apparently) successfully corrupted their son, and a second Tragedy seems to be underway thanks to the discovery of a few of Future Foundation's secrets.
• Men Are the Expendable Gender: Inverted, three females died before a male died. And he was the last death of the killing game.
• Real Life Writes the Plot: Why Eline was the first to die: the character's actor/writer wasn't available for most of the roleplaying sessions, so Eline ws offered up as the first victim.
• Role-Playing Game: The story was told over one, though the author will actually write it all down later.
• Your Days Are Numbered: The train has a week at the start before it reaches its destination. When it does, it will crash and kill everyone onboard.

Oasis of Hope

• Crossing the Desert: What the cast has to do just to get to the oasis in question. Not everyone will actually make it.

Mists of Penjar

• I Can't Hear You: It's been discovered that sound can't travel if you don't properly see the person you're calling out to.
• Mysterious Mist: As stated on the title, mist can often be seen and it does have supernatural qualities that can't be explained.

Central City of Despair

• Ghost City: The students are the only people occupying it.

Isle of the Damned

• Atlantis: Turns out, it's a thing. And Lars kills its eldest princess.
• Author Appeal: The author is a huge fan of The Titanic, and it shows in the arc set in a simulation of the ship's voyage.
• Prequel: Serves as this to House of Horrors following Hora Island's first Killing Game.
• Shout-Out: The mermaid princesses are named Mera and Madison.

Creatures of Despair

• Foregone Conclusion: Only Sabishī, Brooke, the Staff, and an insane scarecrow survive to House of Horrors.
• Hope Spot: After the first trial, the participants are actually allowed out of the mansion ... only to learn that they are on an island miles away from civilization.
• Literally Shattered Lives: How the first killer and victim meet their end.
• Prequel: Serves as this to House of Horrors following Hora Island's second Killing Game.

Tomb of Misery

• Late-Arrival Spoiler: The fic's very existence spoils that 24 Ultimates, like the Ultimate Golfer, don't get out of the prison at the beginning of Oasis, but manage to not die right away either.

Versailles Academy

• A Tragedy of Impulsiveness / Poor Communication Kills: A combination of this is what causes the first murder.
• Lights Out Somebody Dies: The second murder occurs after a black out.
• Seven Deadly Sins: Serves as a theme in the story.

Chateau D'Death

• Shout-Out:
  • Two with Castlevania:
    • When exploring the Gear Tower, it gets compared to a Clock Tower level.
    • Klara mentions to Naomi that Kasuka often asks 'What is a man?'. Naomi has to resist the urge to say 'a miserable pile of secrets'.

Legacy Mall

• Lighter and Softer: Than canon, by a long shot.
• Making Love in All the Wrong Places: Axel and Emizel, to Hikyou's annoyance and Dylan's humor.

Afterlife

• Due to the Dead: The whole point of the story, it seems.

Tag You're It!

• Crossover: The whole story is one with Tag.
• Faking the Dead: Raef seems to be doing this as the time of the story.
• Lighter and Softer: Than the actual stories, obviously.