Plot:Persona 5

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This is a complete summary of Persona 5’s plot and multiple endings. Be warned that spoilers are detailed below. For the plot of Persona 5 Royal, see Plot:Persona 5 Royal.

Prologue

In a casino heist, Joker draws the attention of pursuing agents to give his team a chance to escape safely. Exiting the casino, he is surrounded by an ambush of hundreds of police officers and informed that one of his teammates sold him out. Arrested, beaten, and drugged, he is forced to sign a confession of a litany of crimes, including manslaughter. However, his own memory of the alleged events is hazy.

At the same time, public prosecuting attorney Sae Niijima arrives to question Joker about facts involving her investigation. Despite a disagreement of jurisdiction with the police detectives and her own boss—the Special Investigation Unit Director—discouraging her intent, she argues her way into obtaining a brief interrogation. She recognizes Joker's civilian identity, to her surprise. She asks for honest answers to be able understand her case, even if it can't be used in court: what is the reason behind his actions, how did he find out about 'that world', and how is he able to steal someone's heart? She demands a full account of his actions from the beginning.

As Joker tries to remember, a glowing butterfly heralds a mysterious voice, telling him he is caught in an unjust game with almost no chance of winning. It begs him to overcome the game and save the world's future as well as his own.

Castle of Lust

After an incident where he allegedly assaulted a man, the protagonist is placed on probation and forced to attend school at Shujin Academy in Tokyo for a year, under the custody of Sojiro Sakura. On the trip to his new home at Café Leblanc, a mysterious app appears on his phone shortly before he sees a shadowy figure wreathed in blue flame. He also hears gossip about strange 'mental shutdown' and 'rampage' incidents. The night he arrives, he starts having strange dreams that tell him he is a prisoner of fate that must be rehabilitated to prevent future Ruin. A phone app from the prison master grants him access to the Metaverse, a cognitive world that creates loci around strong distorted thoughts, such as Shujin Academy's PE teacher who is a sadist and pervert thinking he rules the school as its king.

With new schoolmate acquaintances Ryuji and Ann, the protagonist awakens to his spirit of rebellion. They are joined by Morgana, a cat-shaped being who hopes to regain his memories and turn human again by investigating deeper into the Metaverse. While investigating Kamoshida for physical and sexual abuses of the school volleyball team in the real world, Ryuji and the protagonist are promised expulsion by Kamoshida for slander and Ann's best friend Shiho—a starter on the girl's volleyball team—tries to commit suicide and cannot testify to her abuse from her coma. Other team members are too afraid to testify and claim parents and school staff condone the abuse for the sake of success.

Under Morgana's guidance, the group infiltrates the Palace created by Kamoshida's cognition in hopes of stopping the expulsion and any further abuse. The team pick code names to use as thieves, with the protagonist being dubbed "Joker" by Morgana, and Joker also discovers that the Velvet Room is accessible outside of his dreams to empower his Personas. Exploring while fighting small Shadows influenced by Kamoshida's Shadow that rules the Palace, eventually the group finds the 'Treasure' that represents the heart of Kamoshida's distorted desires. They create a number of 'Calling Card' notices that declare their intention to steal his heart, posting them overnight around the school. After he reads the Calling Card in the real world, they are able to return to the Palace and steal the Treasure's cognitive form. In the process they are forced to fight Kamoshida's Shadow, but they don't destroy it as Morgana warned that killing the Shadow might kill the man in reality by removing all his desires.

A short time after the group steals the Treasure, Kamoshida publicly confesses to his history of abuse and apologizes at a school assembly, calling the police on himself to be arrested for his crimes. Ryuji and Joker are saved from expulsion, and Shiho wakes soon after from her coma. Joker, Ryuji, Ann, and Morgana celebrate their success at a fancy hotel buffet, where they encounter a number of other unpleasant adults that inspire them to look for other victims of unjust adults who cannot be touched by the law. The group officially become the Phantom Thieves of Hearts, with Joker as their leader, and resolve to look for another worthy target. In continuing dreams of the Velvet Room, Igor praises Joker's success, encouraging him to continue as a thief and to make bonds with those of similar mindset.

Missed Deadline Bad Ending

If Kamoshida's heart is unchanged by the school board meeting on May 2nd, after school Joker is visited by the police and arrested for violating his probation with multiple charges Kamoshida has leveled against him. The world warps slightly and Joker's head hurts, while Sojiro voices his disappointment in Joker's behavior as the police take Joker away.

Museum of Vanity

While waiting for a new target, Morgana takes the group to investigate Mementos, the 'heart' of the collective unconscious of humanity and home of all Shadows that are not powerful enough to break off into a Palace. Mementos's appearance reflects a subway station with tracks and trains that ferry humanoid Shadows downward toward an unknown goal, but with barriers that cannot be bypassed by the Phantom Thieves until they become better known by the general public. One of Kamoshida's volleyball team victims, Joker's classmate Yuuki Mishima, figures out the identity of the Phantom Thieves and creates a 'Phantom Aficionado Website' for people to support the Thieves and to make requests for someone's heart to be changed. One request is to stop a woman's stalker, and when the Phantom Thieves successfully confront his Shadow in Mementos, the Shadow asks them to also stop his past abuser, 'Madarame'.

At the same time, Ann catches the attention of Yusuke Kitagawa, an art student and live-in pupil of famous artist Ichiryusai Madarame. Yusuke asks Ann to model for his next painting. She agrees to allow the Phantom Thieves to investigate if this Madarame is the same man referred to by the Mementos Shadow. While they accidentally offend Yusuke with Ryuji's bluntness in asking about rumors of abuse, they determine Madarame has a Palace at the location of his 'humble art shack'. By investigating the Palace, the Thieves confirm that Madarame is plagiarizing his students' work, including Yusuke's, considering his numerous students to be his true art and blacklisting them in the art world when they inevitably stop producing or try to leave. Yusuke refuses to admit any wrongdoing of the man who raised him after his mother died—until he accidentally discovers Madarame committing forgery and is pulled into the Museum Palace and sees Madarame's love of money and fame rather than art. Yusuke awakes to his Persona after hearing Madarame's Shadow disdain his other pupils, Yusuke, and Yusuke's deceased mother, and Yusuke joins the Phantom Thieves to bring Madarame to justice.

When Madarame's forgeries are revealed to Yusuke, Madarame threatens to call the police on Ann, Ryuji, and Joker. He will wait until the exhibition ends to avoid bad press, but his heart must be stolen before the deadline. After a new Calling Card is plastered all around Madarame's current exhibition, the Thieves battle Madarame's Shadow and successfully steal his Treasure. Madarame holds a press conference to publicly confess his crimes on live television. The connection to the Calling Card and Madarame's sudden change of heart catches the attention of the public, the news, and the public prosecutor's office.

Missed Deadline Bad Ending

If Madarame's heart is unchanged by the end of the exhibit, the police arrest Joker for violating his probation based on Madarame's charges. The world warps slightly and Joker's head hurts, while Sojiro voices his disappointment in Joker's behavior as the police take Joker away.

Bank of Gluttony

After Kamoshida's confession, the Principal of Shujin Academy assigned the Student Council President, Makoto Niijima, to find the phantom thieves in the school. Over time his pressure has worsened, going so far as to threaten her letter of recommendation needed for most college applications. She securing Joker's association with two of Kamoshida's main victims to be suspicious, and starts following Joker after school in hopes of finding evidence. The Phantom Thieves hear rumors of a yakuza running scams in Shibuya with many victims their age, including from their school, tricked or blackmailed into insurmountable debt. A reporter they met while investigating Madarame agrees to trade information about the Phantom Thieves for the yakuza boss's name: Junya Kaneshiro.

Missed Deadline Bad Ending

If Kaneshiro's heart is unchanged by the picture-release deadline, the police arrest Joker based on the identifying testimony of a high school girl found drugged and performing illegal services, implied to be Makoto under Kaneshiro's blackmail. The world warps slightly and Joker's head hurts, while Sojiro asks what the hell Joker has done.

Pyramid of Wrath

Following Kaneshiro’s defeat, the Phantom Thieves are targeted by a mysterious hacker group named Medjed, who threaten to "deliver justice" to them, while a hacker known as "Alibaba" (revealed to be Futaba Sakura) blackmails Joker into changing her own heart. Futaba, a recluse and the adopted daughter of Sojiro Sakura, is crippled by guilt over her mother’s death, believing she caused it due to a distorted reality fed to her by malicious adults. Her Palace manifests as a vast tomb in the desert, representing her desire to stay shut away and her false perception that her mother, Wakaba Isshiki, despised her.

The thieves enter the pyramid, which is filled with treasures and guarded by ancient Egyptian-themed Shadows. As they explore, they uncover the truth about Futaba's past: she did not cause her mother's death, which was actually caused by a mental shutdown induced by shadowy figures studying the Metaverse. The "cognitive Wakaba" within the palace acts as a boss, fueled by the distorted memories of how adults treated Futaba, constantly accusing her of being a nuisance and the cause of her mother’s misery.

The turning point occurs when the Phantom Thieves confront Shadow Futaba inside the palace. Instead of fighting her, they help her remember the truth, allowing her to accept her past and reject the lies she has lived under. This acceptance causes her Shadow to transform into her Persona, Necronomicon, which helps the party destroy the cognitive sphinx version of her mother. In a unique twist, the "treasure" of this palace is not an object, but rather Futaba herself, as she was acting as the ruler and prisoner of her own distorted, lonely world.

Following the collapse of the Palace, Futaba collapses from exhaustion and sleeps for several days, prompting worry among the Thieves. Upon waking, her distorted perception is gone, and she fulfills her promise by easily hacking the true Medjed group, ending their threats and exposing them to the public. Having conquered her inner demons, she officially joins the Phantom Thieves as their new hacker and navigator, Oracle, using her talents to help them fight against the corruption of society.

Spaceport of Greed

Following a period of falling public approval and internal conflict, the Phantom Thieves target Kunikazu Okumura, the exploitative CEO of Okumura Foods and father of new member Haru Okumura. Okumura’s Palace manifests in the Metaverse as a massive spaceport where he views his employees as disposable, robotic workers destined for fuel. Haru, initially partnering with a runaway Morgana, joins the Thieves with her Persona, Milady, to escape an arranged marriage orchestrated by her father for political power.

The investigation reveals Okumura’s immense greed, as he seeks to dominate Japan’s fast-food industry and enter politics at the cost of his workers' lives. The Thieves navigate through the futuristic facility, overcoming worker-bots and confronting the cognitive, abusive fiancé that Okumura arranged for Haru. Through this, Haru officially awakens Milady's true powers and pledges to stop her father's tyrannical reign, changing her perspective from a timid girl to a determined ally.

Upon sending the calling card, the Thieves discover that Okumura has rigged the public's perception of them and plans to flee in a customized UFO, abandoning the spaceport to self-destruct. In a tense confrontation, the team fights through waves of loyal, suicidal robotic employees before finally overcoming the "Spaceman" Okumura himself, forcing a change of heart, and escaping the collapsing spaceport.

Following the successful heist, the Phantom Thieves assume their job is done, but a mysterious masked figure enters the Palace and kills Shadow Okumura. In the real world, this causes a mental shutdown, killing Kunikazu during a live press conference confession. This calculated murder frames the Phantom Thieves for the death, dropping their popularity.