Opening Speech
To the jury, it was a pleasure playing alongside each and every one of you, and getting to know some of you on a deeper personal level. I understand if there’s personal disdain towards me based on the strategic game I played, but I hope that with time you’ve come to understand my motives and that, for me, the decisions I made for my game never invalidated the personal relationships that were forged throughout the season. I was stubborn and assertive in my gameplay, and whilst I know that may have come across poorly, I hope that you can look back at the merge and see the influence I had vote after vote, and how and why I played the way that I did.

I’ve never typed an opening speech before, so I’ll try and give an overview of my game…

Going back to Deku, I firmly believe that if a swap never occurred, I would have been the last member standing. Whilst my strongest relationships were with the surviving members of Deku, I had alliances of almost every combination and had access to the most information of anyone on the tribe – for example, I not only knew of Sora’s idol but also knew that Nathan knew about it, despite him never telling me directly. This tribe was turbulent, and I could go into much more detail, but I think the main talking point moving into the next phase of the game was the work that I did with Kairi. Through Kairi, I tarnished Nathan’s image through leaking of information and falsely portraying our relationship, which resulted in her calling out of Nathan upon her elimination which greatly assisted me moving forward. All in all, I called the shots on Deku and as a result the other 3 surviving members were the players I personally had the best relationships with, regardless of the distrust I had sewn between them. We attended 4 straight tribal councils and I not only called the shots round after round but did so without receiving a single vote, and whilst receiving 2 masks that later assisted in the formation of my spiritual stone.

Gerudo was an intermission phase for my game. It was an opportunity for me to create new relationships, both strategic and personal, that later came to assist me at the merge. Furthermore, I capitalised on Nathan’s poor image and created the narrative of me being an honest truth teller, which was anything but the truth at this time as I had lied to and blindsided numerous people on my previous tribe. Whilst it may have faded with time, I think pushing this false perception of me as a player provided me with many opportunities in the future and was a low-key but strong move on my part.

The merge is where my aggressive plays re-emerged, and I am incredibly proud of how I played. I was able to create narratives, utilise both old and new relationships, and capitalise on push and pull relationships that I maintained to not only ensure my own safety, but to successfully target who I wanted time after time. A day into the merge, I had created such strong relationships across the board that I was able to obtain the Hylian Shield, the Scroll, and the Book of Mudora from the auction (with financial aid on Sora and Vivi’s parts) and after Lydia’s elimination, I had enough masks to create my spiritual stone. Aside from my own items, I was extremely perceptive and analytical all season long and knew the location of every single advantage, aside from the extra vote, and the location of all masks, with the exception of Rio's. The round of majority rules, I received an overwhelming number of positive superlatives, won the immunity challenge, orchestrated the blindside of Quilava (who in my eyes was by far and away the strongest player) and the flushing of Sindel’s spiritual stone – all whilst being able to maintain my relationship with Crash and Winona moving forward, two players who I think were equally pivotal in the events that unfolded all merge. I felt confident in my ability to get to final five from the start of merge as a result of my strong social and strategic game, and both my challenge ability and advantages I was holding – and yet I still played my heart out day after day and never rested, leading to me knowing who was going home at every single tribal council I attended regardless of where I placed my vote. I never played it safe and wasn’t afraid to make risky plays, such as the extreme lying and blindside I pulled on Sindel, that could’ve resulted in my elimination with a single misstep.

In the end, I chose to go to the end with Nathan and Sora – and this was in no way a group effort. Round after round, Nathan unnecessarily lied to everyone in the game and ended up flipping against me as a result of his frustration at our power dynamic – as every single round of merge I shot down his proposed ideas, as they would’ve resulted in his elimination 99% of the time. I didn’t work with Nathan at all after the Winona vote and utilised the honest/deceptive narratives I had created earlier in the game to ensure my own safety, the elimination of my targets, all whilst keeping him in the game as I think he played a highly flawed strategic game – to the point where nobody could trust anything he ever said. I assume you’ve come to understand that Sora was my closest ally all season (although players like Lydia, Winona, and Crash gave him a good running at times), and we were in lockstep all season long. That being said, I feel the majority of the decisions we made were more beneficial to me than to Sora, and that I was stronger socially and strategically than Sora in this aspect, and that he would’ve greatly benefitted from making a move to separate himself from me. He played in my shadow and whilst I think he played well, I feel he needed to cut me and emerge from my shadow - something that he admittedly considered, but that I was able to talk him out of.

All in all, I feel that I consistently performed highly in every single aspect of this game and I am incredibly proud of my achievements – and I hope that you have come to understand my motives and can respect my game. I apologise for the length of this speech already, and for not addressing every specific vote and relationship I forged in this game – if you have any questions about your specific elimination, or of any sort I will be more than happy to answer them in the jury questioning. Thank you for your time and I look forward to hearing more from you all.

Closing Statement
I guess we're doing these...?

I've explained my game to lengths greater than any piece of University coursework I've submitted, so I'll try to keep this brief. I hope that all of our answers to your questions have helped you develop a greater understanding of the upsides, and the downsides, of each of our games. None of us played flawlessly, but I hope that you can share in my opinion that I played the strongest overall game of the three. I was social, I was strategic, and I was physical. I attended 14 tribal councils, all of which I actively participated in, allowing for me to know who was going home at each, and managed to receive only 1 vote against me all season. I think you all saw many a side to me, and I feel I was a complex character both in terms of the player, and the person, and that I would be a great representation for this season. All in all, thank you for your questions and for playing this game alongside us and I look forward to talking more at the reunion.