Hello. This might be pretty long, apologies in advance ^^''... And quite a late comment too, but better late than never!
I read this VN around April 2025 while looking through various Menhera Jam entries. I think that of the several I read, this one was my favourite. Perhaps it is for the reasons that a previous commenter describes, that it manages to capture certain mindsets and experiences in such a raw way that feels quite refreshing.
Lucia is both a charming and compelling character. Something about her daily life seen through the narrator, the ethical questions she challenges you with that betray some of her deeply held principles despite her eccentricity, and that reality of illness and dependency upon others without it being treated as a degrading way to live in any way, was really touching to me.
I remember that when I got to a certain climactic scene where that really cool CG appears, it actually made me cry. I can only offer my own interpretation as a single reader ofc, but the way it seemed like she was seeking so desperately to be Engaged with, as if she was had written this world (much like another famous VN witch) for that purpose, but as a character trapped on the other side of the screen, just never could feel the truest confirmation that that acknowledgement was happening.
Of course this was all a game written in advance, but I happened to come across it at a point in my life where I was being faced with those questions; I was learning from the first time from people very dear to me that I could actually be quite an emotionally avoidant person, and how that could hurt them. That just listening without opening up your heart in return is not actually the virtue that it seems... So when, after trying to connect to another in many ways, even sharing her WIP VN writing lol, she turns directly to the player and says that actually, I think the caged bird is You, you're the one who won't sing for me, it was frighteningly Relevant. o_o
And then the ending, just gosh... The epilogue switching more to her own PoV was quite interesting too.
After I finished reading I wanted to make sure that this VN was on Vndb as well. added it myself though probably others have helped to improve upon my entry since then since my own understanding of the systems there are a bit limited..
And furthermore... By the time I had finished playing it, there were several points in the text and Imagery that stuck out to me and made me wonder based on vague osmosis, "Hm, is this a Dies Irae thing?" I had vaguely heard of that VN before but never was inclined to read it as the obviously fraught subject matters made me a bit wary, but ultimately I decided I might as well try it, simply hoping that I could glean a little more of what Purple Prose, this VN that had unexpectedly touched me so, wanted to communicate.
So entered it with mostly low expectations, though taking meticulous notes, and by late August I came out of it with one of my favourite works of fiction. o_o I still don't entirely know how much I was intended to read back into PPfPP through this, but it resonated all the same. The surprisingly head-on exploration of irrational passions and fixations, the overattachment to pretence and "delusion" and narratives, and what it even is to be Chuunibyou, and how so so many characters and themes came back to that notion of seeking connection from others, wanting to make yourself understood, no matter how destructively, or whether to flee from that engagement entirely. Mercury is the planet of thieves and travellers...
There are also things I was dissatisfied by in DI, maybe if the writers were more leftist than just Liberals they could be less utterly unserious about a few things ? lol but I would want to take up the remaining space here with neither that nor my countless further thoughts...
Regardless, a lot of what I had found in both of these novels resonated surprisingly deeply and has led me to both do a lot of personal reflection and make some interesting discoveries.
I suppose what I hope to emphasise here, with this overly long comment from a total stranger, is that I think the domino effects from finding and reading this fascinating work of yours genuinely have changed my life a lot and I wanted to express my gratitude for that.🙏 I believe that the witch was a true witch and her display of magic quite excellent.