Iris School of Wizardry - Route Review

Hi Everyone!

On this page you can find the reviews about the game "Iris School of Wizardry - Vinculum Hearts". The reviews are written one character after the other. I tried to not include too much spoilers, which turned out to be harder for certain characters than for others. 

In any case, the reviews are in following order:

• Keith Knight
• Clyde King
• Matias Archibald
• Cyril Grundy
• A-Jay Blackford
• Leonore

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Keith Knight

Summary:

Keith is one of the first characters you'll meet in this game, but at that time he's a mere customer of MC's bookstore. As it turns out, this meeting will be a turning point in MC's life.

Once you enter Iris School of Wizardry and get accepted, you find out that Keith is actually this:

... and he's also going to be one of your teachers. This goes for all routes you can play in this game. 

Despite being in such a high position, Keith still is a very grounded person and he gives his best to be a good teacher. He encourages MC when she's down and after some time, starts to care for her, especially since he knows MC's sad background.

Which in return gets MC to think more about Keith's life and why he would ask such a question, since he's supposed to only be a professor.

At that point Keith already started to have feelings for MC, but I think it's right that moment when he notices that MC can see deep inside him and has a deeper understanding of who he is and what he feels, that he really falls in love with her. She's someone he can be himself around and doesn't have to act as the smart, helpful professor or the strong and strict commander.

Of course MC is still a student and Keith still a teacher, so they can't officially be a couple. Good thing that soon MC graduates from school.

Well, things are still not going how MC wants, but then she finds out even more about the professor and how much his kindnes affected her life in a good way, without her even knowing. 

Then MC opens up to Keith on her last night at the School, which leads to Keith opening up to MC as well - yet he still struggles to let MC love him. Well, in the end they find a way to make it work, otherwise there wouldn't be a happy ending, would there (and a quite funny one as well ^^).

Story conclusion:

He seems kind of cold and frightening at first, so it's surprising to see many different sides of him during his route (some of them make you laugh so much, hehe). I played his route first, to get a better understanding of who Keith is and once you're through his route, everything he does and how he behaves in the other routes, makes more sense. So, if you want to like him in the other routes and understand why he is how he is, then I recommend to read him first. But if you want to unveil that mystery at the end and see him as the cool and a bit frightening professor that he seems to be, than read him after all the other guys.

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Clyde King

Coming soon!

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Matias Archibald

Summary:

In the Prologue MC meets Matias while he's caring for a cat (which MC takes home afterwards). My first thought was "What a nice guy!"... Oh, how foolish that was XD

Turns out that Matias is one of those tsundere characters that like to tease MC until steam comes out of her ears. At the same time he pushes MC to give her best and to learn for school, since MC and Matias partnered up for an exam. This leads them to have meeting - which give Matias even more opportunities to tease MC.

Slowly you can see that behind Matias teasing are budding feelings for MC and on a masquerade ball he disguises himself and sizes his chance to... get really close to MC, which leads MC to realize her feelings for Matias.

However, since we're still only halfway through the story, this would be waaay to early for them to be in a happy relationship, right? That's why Ashley, MC's roommate goes to reveil something shocking to her:

 

Of course there's a reason for everthing, but right now MC learns more about the bond between Clyde and Matias and that Matias isn't the bad-guy he seems to be from outside. On the contrary, he hides something really sad about himself and his past.

In the meantime MC meets Matias in town, while everyone else went home for Christmas. They enjoy some shopping and Matias is actually quite... nice-ish to MC -_- and  even gives her clothes.

In return MC brings Matias to her bookstore where he learns that MC is living on her own since she was about 10 years old, but that she never felt lonely because the warmth of her parents love remained all those years with her. Matias in return tells MC how cruel his childhood was and how he met Clyde.

 

At the same time MC realizes that their love just can't be.

 This and way more serious reasons lead Matias to have a breakdown...

... but thanks to MC finding Matias just in time, they finally work things out and Matias realizes that... 

But we still haven't reached the ending here. There's still the final exams that MC and Matias have to go through, and that exam is an unusal one, I can tell you that. All I want to say, is that MC has to kill Matias...

 

After going through such a rough exam, MC gets rewarded with a steamy night with Matias, which results in Matias finally "seeing" a future with MC and a way to make his dream come true together with MC's help.

Story conclusion:

Matias' story shows that there is more to a person, than meets the eye. Meaning, that even if he seemed to be a jerk at the beginning, he turns out the be rather sweet at the end. Also, his past will surely surprise you, as well as the future he has to face. 

For me the ending was a bit surprising. I thought they would write it in a different way, where magic would solve Matias issue. It kind of did, but differently how I thought and in a way that shows off the power of MC's ability, despite her being an Ultio (half-human/half-witch). Another element that's explained in Matias story, is his friendship and loyalty towards Clyde. So, if you like Clyde and want to see their friendship from Matias point of view, this route is what you want to read.

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Cyril Grundy

Coming soon!

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A-Jay Blackford

Summary:

A-Jays story starts with MC being bullies, which is something that also happens in the other routes. The Iris School of Wizardry normally accepts only members of the high society or through having connections. However, MC being a common girl makes a lot of the other girls envious, which results to them speaking bad about MC.

Soon after that, MC finds A-Jay playing beautiful, but sad music  on the piano, which on the hindsight kind of shows perfectly A-Jays emotions. On the outside he seems that funny guy that makes you laugh, but in reality he's so sad and lonely inside. But more about that later.

For now MC suddenly encounters someone else that seemes to also listen to A-Jays music.

 

After that MC teams up with A-Jay for the midterm exams, which results in them not getting the best scores, since both of them are quite the airheads. 

Time passes and soon the summer vacations come up, during which all other students go home to their families. But since MC's an orphan, there's no one waiting for her at home. Hearing this, A-Jay decides to ask MC...

 

... and so MC ends up spending some time with A-Jay at his families villa... together with his family.

 

And here things get strange. In a sad way. But you only find out about this afterwards, so for now it only seems like MC spends some time with A-Jay and his family, having dinner with them and watching fireworks together. Seeing A-Jays happy family together, MC starts to think about how her life would have turned out, if her parents hadn't passed away all those years ago.

The next day A-Jays family is gone and they take a stroll on the beach where MC tells him about what happend to her parents. Being asked how she could still be so positive after all this, MC explains A-Jay that her family is always with her - inside her heart.

 

After that the vacation time soon is over and MC and A-Jay return back to school, where on a full moon night you find a red door. 

Now here's the thing: Save here, because this is where you can find the secret character in the game. Once you decide to not open the creepy red door, you find something else out about A-Jay which is quite shocking.

A bit later to that incident, MC gets invited to the headmasters tea-party where she reflects on what magic is about. Following that, A-Jay approaches MC to ask her why she's avoiding him.

 

That being said, MC remains in a state of confusion, since she still hasn't realized that the feelings she's having towards A-Jay, is called love. So, why not just ask someone else what that feeling might be? Thankfully we have the wise Clyde that knows the aswer to this.

Finally realizing that she might be in love with A-Jay, MC immediately runs to him and finds him in the library, where he wants to use one of the forbidden books about dark magic to unveil the mysteries that surround the school. A-Jay found out about two secret doors and thinks that the headmaster is hiding something that has to do with it. During their Christmas holidays, both of them decide to enter the secret door and they end up in a strange Alice-like place.

They meet the strange boy again, which MC saw while A-Jay was playing the piano some time ago. However, that guy is just as creepy as the place they are in, but somehow MC and A-Jay find a way out and find themselves in the garden. They start to talk about why A-Jay had to repeat the class and about what MC discovered about him before. They also speak about their plans for the future:

Both of them then end up with a fever, during which the other guys come to visit MC. It's then, that Cyril explains something shocking about A-Jay and his family and it's hard for MC to cope with that. It is now, that you finally understand certain things that happened while you were visiting his family during summer vacations.

To avoid any more spoilers we skip to the final exam, during which MC and A-Jay end up in that strange Wonderland-place again. Of course they find a way back out again with one mystery about the school unveiled. And to solve some more mystery, this time again about A-Jays family, MC and him have a very moving moment together after the graduation party.

And since we haven't had enough of creepy red doors, A-Jay leads MC to yet another one. But this time, it shows a couple in love the future they could possibly have together.

Now having seen what future might be ahead of them, they both decide on what they want to do now with having graduated from school and we get a nice happy ending with another romantic scene on the beach.

Story conclusion:

Like Matias story this route shows that there is more behind a person than you can see. A-Jay's story was partly really sad and lonely, so if I had to decide, I would want to MC end up with A-Jay since he deserves her love the most. It also made me realize to not take my family always being there for granted.

A big plus-point of his route was the hidden character you can find in his route. I didn't expect this to happen and was a bit stunned to suddenly find myself in another route (yes, I went through that creepy red door...). So, if you want to play the hidden character and thus also find out about the mystery of the school, then you have to start with A-Jays route (and don't forget to save before you go through the door!).

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Leonore

Summary:

Leonore is the hidden character you can read, if you decide to go through the creepy red door in A-Jay's route. Once you do that, you find yourself in a kind of creepy version of Alice's Wonderland (did I say that it's really creepy here?).

Finding herself stranded in that world, MC can do nothing aside from exploring her surrounding. And so she meets that strange guy again, that she saw before while A-Jay was playing the piano.

 

Turns out that the guys name is Leonore. Since he's oh so lonely in that place (and she has no clue how to escape), MC get's to held hostage by Leonore.

Somehow MC still finds a way she could escape... there's just something to Leonore that makes her hesitate to leave (*cough*Stockholm-syndrom*cough*).

Time and time again MC hears a strange voice in her head, that begs her to help Leonore. Accidentaly MC finds out that she has the same necklace as Leonore, which comes in handy when Leonore get's totally crazy and wants to kill MC. Deciding that it's finally time to do something to help Leonore or the other person trapped inside Leonore, MC casts a spell that makes her see a different Leonore. There she sees an even more vicious version of Leonore bully a kind version of Leonore until the kind version decided to fight back... which results in a horrible outcome in which one of them dies. The price of using dark magic and for killing someone results on the surviving guy being locked up in the underground of the school.

Since MC went to the depths of Leonore's heart with her magic, he finally is able to remember his real name and what happened to him. Temporarly free from his madness, Leonore tells MC that the only way to leave the underground would be to kill him - and he wants MC to do just that, because otherwise he would sooner or later kill her. Of course at that point MC is already in lover with Leonore, so it's clear that this is no option for MC... or maybe it is?

In the end everything turns out well and MC and the saved version of Leonore leave the underground and go to the headmasters office to learn the whole truth about Leonore/Iris and why they were locked inside the underground (which includes a quite moving scene with the headmaster).
As a happy ending both of them end up attending the same class with MC watching out for the good version of Leonore, since he's quite a powerful wizard.

Story conclusion:

Leonore's route was nice as some kind of goodie since he's a character I wasn't expecting to meet and to be a dateable character no less.
However, his route was at times really, REALLY creepy and Leonore totally nuts, so I had my doubts how MC would even fall in love with him (I mean real love, not the Stockholm-syndrom version). Once you find out the truth, most of Leonores madness made sense and I was quite moved by the sadness he faced before and while being locked up in the underground. The good version of Leonore is really kind and adorable and I can see why MC fell in love with him. The scene where MC had to fight with herself on whether she would kill Leonore to free him from his madness and to set herself free, was very moving, as well as when he finally had his reunion with his father.
All in all, this is a route for those who like creepy things, as well as for those who finally want to unveil the mystery surrounding the Iris School of Wizardry.