The Two Sides of Monsieur Sheffield

However, if that's all I put on this page, this shrine wouldn't be very big. So let's go a little deeper, shall we?

The young Serph Sheffield was a graduate of Davenport College, one of the twelve residential colleges of Yale University. His primary field of study is listed as Psychology, though some would later suspect it was actually World Domination and Machiavellian Studies.

We aren't sure how Dr. Serph Sheffield secured a position in the Karma Society's God Project, but we can hypothesize that it was a combination of his sharp mental prowress and apparent ability to drop his pants at a moment's notice. Or maybe they just liked his smile.

Regardless of the reason, Dr. Sheffield was in charge of all matters pertaining to the mind as they related to the project. In particular, he was employed as one very important test subject's psychologist. This test subject was seven-year-old Seraphita, or as we better know her, "Sera". She is also occasionally referred to as the Cyber Shaman, or Number 19, though while I was playing Digital Devil Saga, I just called her "Kinda Useless".

Sera was one of many children who were involved with the project. Their job description is a little fuzzy, though it seems to involve talking to God and being submerged in green goo. Green goo, as you probably know, has come to be a standard in Japanese RPGs, and Digital Devil Saga 2 is no exception.

Now you might be thinking, hey, it's logical for a Kid Who Can Talk to God to have a psychologist. He's probably a dear, kind soul who occasionally showed her some ink blots and had her complete sentences like "I feel ____ when I chat with God". It pains me to tell you that you'd be sorely mistaken. The actual story is a little more twisted than a nice day with the Rorschach Test.

In actuality, the kind doctor was a scheming, manipulative little prat who longed for the power of God -- who in their world is equated with the sun, by the way. Serph didn't want to merely study God, but actually become God, divine powers and all. Science was simply a means to his end, and Sera and the aptly and uncreatively named God Project were his one-way tickets to unlimited potential. While most sane people would decide this is a bad idea and perhaps they should just shut up and suffer in their humanity, our Dr. Sheffield couldn't be dissuaded otherwise.

Serph had more on his side than a pretty boy face, though. He was clinical and detached, able to view others without the hindrance of such sticky, cumbersome obstacles like "empathy" and "compassion". Furthermore, he possessed a smooth, polished exterior that radiated the very kindness he lacked. It was his gentle smile and aura of confidence that fooled several members of the God Project, including Sera, into believing that Serph was a genuinely good person.

Gotcha, bitch!

Only one person wasn't fooled by the patented Sheffield Smile: Dr. Heat O'Brien, a gene therapy specialist also working on the God Project. Charged with monitoring Sera's physical state, as opposed to Serph's duty watching over her mental condition, Heat was unhappy with the way Serph secretly abused and pressured Sera with harsher and harsher tests. One day, after watching Sera undergo rigorous, painful experiments in pursuit of God's nature, Heat gallantly decided that he would have no more of this. My secret theory: he probably reasoned that the whole symbolism with their names/duties/the fact it's a video game meant that he had to take action, and quickly!

So here's what we know so far: Sera was a kid who could talk to God, her psychologist was an evil megalomaniac who had more in common with his delusional patients than anyone suspected, and Heat's about to get himself in a load of trouble going up against Serph. Where, oh where, can the story go from here? Well, that's what the rest of this shrine is for! Go read the other sections and delve into the dark mind of Dr. Serph Sheffield. Backwards | Main page | Windy-Days.net