and suddenly i have a vision of chuuya getting ready for a date, dressing up, getting flowers or wtv, then verlaine sprinting into his apartment waving his hands and yelling “chuuya, hurry up! you’ll be late for your first date!” then shoving him off the balcony cuz “it’s a faster way of getting to ground level than taking the stairs”
Asagiri confirmed that Agatha is on her way to the story so I've been re-reading the novels. I have a theory regarding Verlaine, Port Mafia, and Clock Tower (Spoilers for Novels)
Before I continue on, please note I will be posting snippets from Dark Era and Storm Bringer with little bits of information from 55 minutes. Spoilers ahead!
I will avoid going into too many details for Storm Bringer however this part in the final chapter gave me a realization.
For a brief TL;DR, Verlaine went to Yokohama to seek out Chuuya, was wanted in Europe for assassinating many important figures in power and nearly ruining the reputation of Order of the Clock Tower. Verlaine supposedly was killed in a final conflict against Port Mafia but we know even with events in the manga this isn't the case.
Three days after the engineering advisers and Dr. Wollstonecraft arrived in Japan, the main unit—the European joint inquiry committee—met up with them to conduct a more elaborate investigation. (...) The Port Mafia was cooperative from start to finish. They provided lodging, vehicles, and even chauffeurs whenever necessary. Any equipment the investigation required, they had it delivered. All Mafia members were ordered to cooperate with the hearing investigations.
The joint inquiry committee reached their conclusion after a month of investigating. Verlaine was dead.
Right after Ougai Mori saw them off at port, he let out a sigh of relief. “This was utterly exhausting.” Mori rubbed his shoulders while watching the government ship fade into the distance. (...) A woman in a crimson kimono stood by Mori’s side. It was Kouyou. "Give me an update on the underground shelter.”
“No one has entered or exited,” she replied, narrowing her eyes. “It appears the esteemed members of the inquiry did not even suspect a thing.” (...) “They have absolutely no idea that Verlaine is still alive inside.”
So you might be wondering "Okay? Why does this mean?"
I have a suspicion that Mori found Verlaine while recovering from Death's Doorstep and Verlaine offered intel in exchange for sanctuary within Port Mafia and that this information kicked off events that lead to the Mimic Incident.
I had always found it odd that Verlaine was given executive status and kept safe in Port Mafia's basement. He is the reason hundreds of mafioso died and made an attempt on Mori's life and he doesn't seem to care much about most humans in general.
So perhaps an exchange was made. Verlaine likely knew going back to Europe would be far worse for him than becoming a dog of the mafia. If you've read the novel then you know what he had gone through and there's a good chance he would have been weaponized or punished in worse ways. It's noted he is hiding from Europe's reach in the epilogue of SB. It's also noted in Dark Era how strict Europe is with their monitoring of ability users.
Europe was home to top-class skill users employed by both the government and various criminal organizations, and as a result, those skill users built an extremely elaborate and complex power structure throughout the continent. That was why such a strict surveillance system had been put in place to prevent such individuals from escaping to other countries.
Verlaine may have informed Mori of just how great of a threat Order of the Clock Tower is, or perhaps plans she had, maybe reasons for the people he assassinated. In 55 minutes there's this line from a character named Wells about the sort of experiments they were conducting for weaponization (and makes me wonder if One Order is a product of this experimentation)
“I worked as an engineer for England in skill-weapon development,” Wells calmly continued. “We were conducting experiments in England during that time that intentionally awakened skill singularities to integrate them into weapons…"
And this kicked off his plan to have Ango contact Mimic and bring them to Yokohama. The timing seems to fit. Here's a passage from Dark Era with Dazai explaining the details of Mori's plan.
“Boss, you started putting this scheme into motion years ago to get that license,” Dazai continued, standing in front of the boss’s desk. “I’m guessing this plan first took shape two years back when Ango went to Europe for business. You did some searching and found that Mimic would be the most promising enemy for your plan, so you had Ango contact them. I was wondering how Mimic escaped Europe and sneaked into Japan so easily, but the answer was rather simple. The Port Mafia helped them illegally enter the country. To send the Special Division for Unusual Powers into a panic and make them get off their butts, you purposely invited the enemy organization to Yokohama.”
This is already getting pretty long so I'll wrap this up with a quick overview and my theory for the future;
Mori made a deal with Verlaine to keep him out of the clutches of the European Government in exchange for intel. Once Mori gained the intel he started the plot to get Mimic into Yokohama to have them taken care of in exchange for a very difficult to obtain Skilled Business Permit, a certification that permits activities as a skill-user organization. This strengthened his power the Port Mafia and in turn making them more capable in protecting Yokohama.
However, there's a possibility that Agatha might be onto his plans which could be part of the reason why she was so eager to nuke Yokohama in Dead Apple, to take out a force that could be troublesome in the future.
And guess who recently appeared out in the open during a major conflict...
“Portrait de Verlaine" par Georges Rouault (circa 1937) dans les collections permanentes du Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, Bourgogne, France, juin 2026.
artists really don't be leading artistic lives anymore the way they used to 😞
(being arrested for travelling to paris without a ticket, having an affair with an older married man, being shot by your lover, not writing anything else after the age of 20, dying horribly with your leg amputated)
