The Inkopolis Chaos trilogy is a collection of three Splatoon fanfictions made by CrystallicWolf108.
- Inkopolis Chaos: A group of Inkling friends — Samuel, Luke, Sylvia and Melody — are going about their normal lives while preparing for an upcoming Turf War tournament, when they encounter a lost Octoling, Natalie, who is on the run for a crime she didn't commit.
- Inkopolis Chaos 2: A year after the events of the first story, Samuel, Natalie and the others find themselves up against The Octobusters, a group of Inklings who want to force Octolings out of the city and back into the underground where they belong.
- Inkopolis Chaos 3: Picking up after the events of 2, the gang joins forces with the Squidbeak Splatoon to help protect Inkopolis and the rest of the surface world when a corrupt Octoling known as Lieutenant Obsidian threatens to destroy all life on the planet.
The trilogy can be read here
on Wattpad; several one-shots can be found here.
Inkopolis Chaos contains examples of:
Tropes applying to the series as a whole
- Arc Villain: Each installment has a different main villain: Scarlet in 1, the Octobusters' leader in 2, and Lieutenant Obsidian in 3.
- Bittersweet Ending: The villains are defeated, the good octolings that were trapped and brainwashed underground are now free from the tyrannical octo valley, meaning that the tension between inklings and octolings is finally over (except the bad octolings and octarians, who all remain underground). The heroes and innocents are living happily, but their victory came at a cost. Ruby Diorite died in a heroic sacrifice, and now Jade will have to live with the weight of knowing that someone died for her to live. Sylvia also gets PTSD from her experiences in the camps, even if she managed to recover from her emotionally broken state. Finally, it’s hard not to mention the thousands of octolings that Lieutenant Obsidian executed, which is a brutal loss for the octoling race. While overall the trilogy ends happy, there were some consequences.
- Cerebus Syndrome: Inkopolis Chaos 3 takes a sudden dark turn, while the first two stories could get dark at times, they still mostly remained positive and upbeat, the third story is really dark almost all the way through. This is due to Lieutenant Obsidian, and the threat she poses being world ending. Not only that, but her setting up concentration camps and mass executions is an extremely dark turn for the series. Unsurprisingly, once she’s dead, the ending goes back to being positive and upbeat, with her threat no longer being present, and any of her surviving prisoners being released.
- Colourful Theme Naming: Many characters' names correlate with their respective ink colors:
- Samuel Turfblu has blue ink.
- Samuel's cousin, Sylvia Turfora, has orange ink.
- Luke Virigree's surname is a portmanteau of "viridian" and "green" (though his ink is lime).
- Melody Rose's ink is hot pink.
- Ruby Diorite and Scarlet Spiker have red ink.
- Jess Rubrum's ink is also red, and her last name is a term for the short summary of a document, which was often written in red early on.
- Jade Grady's ink is the same green as Luke's.
- Summer's ink is yellow, a color stereotypically associated with summer and the sun.
- The aqua-inked Cyalux Clover's name is a portmanteau of "cyan" and "lux", the latter being Latin for "light".
- The purplish-inked Magentark Clover's name is a portmanteau of "magenta" and "dark".
- Lieutenant Obsidian's ink is black, just like the namesake volcanic glass.
- Darker and Edgier: This saga's topics are somewhat more mature than those of Splatoon, with depictions of PTSD, frame-ups, and regular endangerment of Inkopolis otherwise unheard of outside the Octo Expansion and Splatoon 3.
- The Dictatorship: Lieutenant Obsidian is the dictator of the octarians, ruling over them with an iron fist.
- Fantastic Slurs: “Pit Dweller” is a slur used against octolings, poking fun at how they lived underground.
- Foil: Behind their shared red ink, Ruby Diorite has numerous differences from Scarlet Spiker:
- Ruby was once a tragic Anti-Villain who thought her actions were good prior to her redemption; Scarlet is a Card-Carrying Villain.
- Ruby was quite stoic during her misguided deeds; Scarlet shows overt delight at her misdeeds.
- Ruby is willing to protect her allies at all costs; Scarlet has no qualms with abusing and endangering her gang.
- Ruby is an Octoling; Scarlet is an Inkling.
- Ruby gives up her life to save Jade; Scarlet is unwillingly killed by Jade to save the protagonists.
- Foreshadowing: Foreshadowing is absolutely everywhere. In the first story, it’s frequently foreshadowed that Samuel and Natalie will end up together, and even outright confirmed in some of the stories tags. The first story even foreshadows some of the third story when James and Jess argue with Scarlet, and only going with her plan either out of fear or boredom, which foreshadows them abandoning her in the future. More foreshadowing in the first story to the third story is when Ruby says she doesn’t deserve to live, which foreshadows her sacrifice in the third story. The second story foreshadows Cyalux’s secret villainy multiple times. The first time is when he sneakily puts a golden egg in his bag during a salmon run shift. The second time is when he says he will speak to Melissa, but when Melissa talks to Sylvia, she doesn’t mention him speaking to her. There’s also some foreshadowing of his brother, as he asks if he was the only one who got on with his brother. The third story also has some foreshadowing, with Adelyte joking about Luke, Summer and Melissa being in a threesome, foreshadowing that Luke and Summer would end up together. There is also more foreshadowing of Ruby’s death, when Marie asks the agents to come back in one piece, and Ruby promises she would, even though Ruby sacrifices herself moments later.
- Interspecies Romance: There are three inkling/octoling romances in the fic: Samuel/Natalie, Melissa/Dylan, and Jade/Katelin.
- Intrepid Reporter: Off the Hook flies to the heroes' fight against the Octobusters to reveal the latter's leader to the public.
- Masculine–Feminine Gay Couple: Jade is a tomboy and Katelin is not. Both are secret agents and they're also both dating. In the third story, there usually seen together, and feel upset when apart from each over if the other is in danger.
- Never Trust a Title: Inkopolis Chaos 3 hardly even takes place in Inkopolis, mostly focusing on Cuttlefish Cabin or Octo Valley. Inkopolis is only visited twice, in parts 6 and 14.
- O.C. Stand-in: Many major characters' appearances are inspired by nigh-nameless characters:
- Samuel, Sylvia, Luke, and Melody are based on the default Inklings found in Splatoon and Splatoon 2's promotional material.
- Natalie and her brother Dylan are based on the default player Octolings.
- Ruby and Obsidian are based on enemy Octolings, with the latter having black hair like the elite variant.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: Almost the villains in the story are racist towards their opposing race, with only Ruby Diorite and James Axowe turning away from their racism, and Jess Rubrum never being racist in the first place.
- Series Fic: The series is a trilogy of three separate fics.
- Shout-Out: Blakeson's speech during the mass execution bears a striking resemblance to Lieutenant Groves' speech talking about Cutler Beckett's decrees from Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End.
- Villain Team-Up: In the third story, Lieutenant Obsidian and Scarlet Spiker team up, though it is a shaky alliance: Scarlet plans to betray Obsidian, and Obsidian plans to throw Scarlet in a camp once she is done with her.
- World of Technicolor Hair: Carried over from the Splatoon setting, the cast has a wide variety of hair colors. Samuel and Bethany have blue, Luke and Jade have green, Sylvia and Georgina have orange, Natalie and Dylan have pink, Melody has pink/purple, Katelin has blue/purple, Ruby and Scarlet's gang have red, Summer and Melissa have yellow, Obsidian and Blakeson have black, Cyalux has light blue and Adelyte has turquoise.
Tropes exclusive to tie-in one-shots
- An Aesop: In "The Life of an Inktoling", Atubah's father delivers one to the school faculty complicit in Scarlet's bullying of his daughter: if you don't hold people accountable for doing bad things, they'll grow up to see nothing wrong with being outright evil.
- Take That, Audience!: “A Burden To Bear” takes a jab at the people who gave Draco in Leather Pants to Cyalux, and Ron the Death Eater to Ruby, with Melissa even looking at the camera while shouting at Ruby’s inner demons, explaining why Cyalux’s descent into villainy was not Ruby’s fault, and also explaining why Cyalux was throughly in the wrong, no matter how sympathetic or enjoyable he may be.
