Romantic World Miu
Miu in this parallel world has the same problems as the Miu from World 1, but gets a much happier resolution.
Miu wants friends, but does not know how to make them. However one day she suddenly gains a power that causes everyone to want to be her friend...to the point they start fighting over her. Note that this is the same power as the Chariot tarot card.
"Hey! I talked to Miu first! Go away!”
Through Tomoko, Miu is introduced to the AF researchers, Chisa, Kazusa and Shuugo. They plan to make a machine that can control Miu’s power: a wheelchair that can absorb the energy to power its own movement. However they cannot get it to work. That’s why Chisa summons Takuya and Yuki to help them.
While Takuya prepares the scooter, Chisa is left alone with Miyu. Not really knowing what else to do, awkwardly, she offers her a caramel.
Fighting Miu reveals that there is a gap between the amount of energy she is releasing and the amount of energy she is attacking Yuki and Takuya with. That is, the wheelchair is working as it should, but Miu is not releasing her full potential.
Kazusa suggests taking her to a milk bar to calm her down. Her, Chisa and Shuugo would frequent the place often in the past. However Miu is concerned at the amount of people there.
We figure out that Miyu is actually suppressing her own power, because she does not want people to fight over her.
Once Chisa realises this, she uses the Starry Sky Notebook (sorry I can’t think of a cool-sounding translation), an AF that can revive events from the past.
In a previous ranking event, the military tried to blackmail Chisa to use it to bring about the Shoumetsu once more. But this time Chisa uses it to show Miu her own past. Because she thinks they are kind of similar.
Kazusa and Shuugo once fought over Chisa the same way people are fighting over Miu now. Chisa felt it was her fault that the two of them could not get along. However, once they saw how much they had upset their friend, Kazusa and Shuugo immediately apologised.
This memory resonates with Miu. “Are you...like Miu?”
Chisa asks Miu to trust them, and to stop suppressing her power. Miu knows the wheelchair is absorbing her power: whenever the wheelchair moves, she can feel her power disappearing. But she is scared. That things will return to how they were before. That she will have no friends, and be alone again.
“People won’t fight anymore. That’s a good thing. But being alone...is scary…”
Chisa also relates to this. If she wasn’t able to do this research, would she have any value at all? Would she still be together with Kazusa and Shuugo? The lack of confidence and fear of abandonment she felt back then are now clearly being reflected in Miu. But Chisa knows now. That her, Kazusa and Shuugo will always be together, and she won’t let Miu be alone either.
Miu releases her power. The wheelchair absorbs it. Miu’s power disappears, and to her great delight, Chisa is still her friend.
The wheelchair starts moving a little too much and we have to stop her in the final fight. But it’s a happy ending where we finally see Miu smiling, and having fun. In the end, she even calls Chisa “big sister”.
“I want to play with big sister Chisa!”
Hearing this, Chisa gets emotional.
Kazusa and Shuugo also realise how much Chisa has matured.
Shuugo: "Chisa's different now"
Kazusa: "Yeah, seems like she's stronger than before"
Some other things:
Tomoko was the one who brought Miyu to the researchers. Tomoko knew Miyu’s parents, but more than that, Miu reminded her of one of her own acquaintances: Yomi. Just like Miu, Yomi has very strong powers that are different to the normal powers of tamashii. However Yomi was at least able to control her powers.
Tomoko then comes up with a scenario: what if, say, somebody were to get their hands on Miu, and send her off to a foreign country? Her powers would wreak havoc there. She would send that country into complete turmoil. Wouldn’t it be easy to capture such a country in that situation? Yuki asks if Tomoko was trying to prevent such as scenario by bringing Miu to Chisa and co., but Tomoko will say no more on the subject.
This exchange also made me realise that Miu and Yomi share the pattern of being parallel world versions of tamashii that possess the same (possibly weaker?) tarot card powers as their other selves, even without being physically given a card. I have no idea if this is only limited to Romantic World, or if it will be a trend across all parallel worlds.
Both World 1 Miu and Romantic Miu also share a similarity in that we have to fight two versions of them that are slightly different in appearance in the final quest stage. In World 1, an evil alter ego Miu reverts to the more timid original Miu in the sixth fight. In contrast, here, timid Miu becomes joyful Miu. This references the structural similarities in the two quests. Interesting then, that the endings are completely different. What a difference a real friend makes.
