Silver Palace Story Cast: Who's Who in the Beta

The Silver Palace story recap walks the Dichotomy Beta campaign in order, from the airship prologue to the factory floor. This companion piece cuts the same story a different way: by character. If you have ever asked who Ashley really is, why Superintendent Rex keeps blocking your investigation, or how the maid Alf ties into a murder, this is the who's who.

Everything below comes from a hands-on Dichotomy Beta playthrough, so treat names, roles, and spellings as pre-release. This guide is heavy on spoilers.

The Playable Cast in the Story

These are the roster characters you can meet inside the beta campaign, and what each one actually does in the plot.

The Detective (and Munin)

The Detective is the protagonist, returning to Silvernia three years after the Evermore airship disaster that killed Queen Agoria and the Detective's sibling, who was also their partner. The public brands them the "queen slayer" for a crime they did not commit. They come back to chase the one clue left behind, a bullet bearing a strange mark, and Chief Inspector Lorin pulls them into the constabulary's Nameless Ashes case, where the same mark turns up on the victims.

The Detective solves cases inside a "mind palace" that reconstructs crime scenes. As the story deepens, their nightmares curdle into other people's memories and the stabilizer keeping them functional stops working. The female build, Munin, shares this same story.

Ashley, the Cinderella

The beta confirms what the character bio only hinted: Ashley is the civilian behind "Cinderella". She talks her way into the Detective's employ by posing as a Royal Academy graduate who wants no wages, offering only a riddle she calls the "mystery of the stolen silver."

In truth she is one of the Cinderellas herself, a survivor of the Silverium extraction at the United Vermentum Works factory. She engineered her hiring so the Detective would uncover the truth she could not chase alone, and she has been quietly paying the assassin Red Rose to protect him the whole time. When suspicion falls on her, she slips away, calls the Detective her prince, and leaves to take her revenge alone. For a closer read on the tells she drops along the way, from her calloused hands to the riddle she offers instead of a wage, see Ashley: Who Is She, Really?

Argos, the Bartender

Argos tends the Memoir Bar, the warm, oak-scented haunt where the returning Detective's journey begins. He greets the Detective like a legend, pours a strong, sweet house drink called the "city wanderer" on the house, and mentions that plenty of people have been waiting for this return.

True to his support role, he offers to secure testimonies "even from the deceased," casting himself as a dash of mixer to complement a strong liquor.

Alf, the Maid

Alf, Maid No. 49 of MISS, is the first assistant candidate Lorin brings in, and she fails every test: she cannot spell, cannot brew tea, and her uncalloused hands give her away. Undeterred, she simply refuses to leave and appoints herself guardian of the reopened office.

That stubbornness matters. When the journalist Grimm sneaks in, Alf thrashes him and throws him out, unknowingly protecting the notebook he came to hide, the evidence that later cracks the Cinderellas case wide open. Her showcase is otherwise pure comedy: salty tea, baking timed by waiting for the "boom," and a staring contest won against a crow.

Lorin, the Chief Inspector

Lorin is the one who calls the Detective back to Silvernia. He waves off his own title, calls himself a figurehead of a force the military cobbled together in the knights' absence, and enforces the rule that every case needs a team of two, which is why the assistant interviews happen at all.

His side thread hides a secret: Lorin was once the street legend Silver Fist. Rather than fight the teenage gang that worships his old tag, he poses as the still-living Silver Fist to steer them back to school. For the four clues that give him away and what the reveal says about him, see Lorin and the Silver Fist.

Firtho, the Coroner

Firtho is the Detective's blunt childhood friend, the coroner behind a corner clinic in a forgotten district, nicknamed "Miss Mortis." She brews the stabilizer that holds the Detective's nightmares at bay, and secretly inoculates terrified gangsters against a contagious rash rather than experimenting on them as they fear.

Her quest is a locked-room "vampire" case at Williams Manor. To prove a death was faked, she injects a tetrodotoxin nerve agent into her own arm and wears a mask through the night, counterfeiting death to expose the trick. The culprit, Baron Edgar, was a colleague of her late father Irwin. For the surgical tools and anatomical heart hidden in her design, see the Firtho design breakdown, and for her confirmed kit, see her character title page.

Cynthia II, the Scion of House Luna

Cynthia II is the queen's sheltered young cousin, first in line to the throne, and also the Detective's landlady. Her case starts as a hunt for three missing cats and turns into a framed werewolf family and the collapsing guild of Baron Barton.

Over one night she learns that her governess Moira's distrust of commoners and a werewolf girl's hatred of nobles are both wrong, and she chooses kindness. She owns all of Morgue Street through a trustee, and she waives the Detective's rent forever on one condition: that he always makes time to play with her.

Rex, the Superintendent

Rex is the superintendent the Navy sends to oversee the River Constabulary, and his order-first zeal keeps putting him at odds with the Detective. He seizes Grimm's body and bars the Detective as a civilian, then later names the Detective the prime suspect in the Williams grave-robbing.

His Ultimate's Doberman police dogs, Radar and Chalky, are at his side in the story too. He is no villain: once the Detective exposes the investor Daniel Boulden's smuggling scheme, Rex makes the arrest and finally offers the Detective his respect. Read his dialogue closely and he never needed a redemption arc at all, which is the case Rex: Who Is He, Really? makes in full.

Red Rose, the Assassin

The Red Rose is a flirtatious assassin, likely an agent of House Flora, whose members carry flower titles. She first appears disguised as a clerk applying for the assistant job, having bribed the real clerk to swap places just to size the Detective up.

From then on she shadows the case, cutting alarms and finishing off assassins to keep the Detective safe. The reason is a contract: Ashley has been paying her. When drawn out at a noble ballroom, she keeps her promise and tells Ashley's whole story.

Bentham, the UMI Secretary

Bentham introduces herself outside the United Vermentum Works factory as secretary to the general manager of UMI. She has watched the Detective circle the plant's security, guesses the trade at once, and warns that the factory is so autonomous even its own headquarters cannot see inside it.

Plainly hunting the factory's secrets herself, she proposes a deal: hand over the findings, and be paid handsomely along with her friendship. It is a short but pointed appearance that frames her as a power broker circling the same conspiracy.

Grimm, the Journalist

Grimm is a brash photojournalist who once trailed the Detective's cases and ghost-wrote some of the reports that made them famous. Chasing a story he swears will make his name, he is soon found seemingly burned to death in an alley.

The death is staged. Grimm coats a substitute corpse in a fireproofing agent, fakes the burning to escape whoever wants him silenced, and hides his notebook in the safest place he can think of: the office of the Detective the city believed was his enemy. That notebook renames the Nameless Ashes the "Cinderellas." For a closer read on the symbol stitched to his coat and who he really is, see Grimm: Who Actually Is He?, and for the literary roots of his name, see the character name origins breakdown.

Gratia, the Bunny Knight

Gratia is the "bunny knight," an Argent Knight of the Order of the Tide handpicked by the queen and adored by a trio of street children who hire the Detective to find her. She has trained for the Royal Equestrian Tournament for years without ever winning.

After losing the queen's prototype Silverium steed, she reconciles with it and names it Top Hat, after the Detective's headwear. At the tournament a harpy attacks, Top Hat reveals he can fly, and Gratia takes to the air to protect the crowd, only to be disqualified. The Queen's Herald reveals the attack was staged to show the public a knight fighting for her people.

The Supporting Cast: Who's Who

These characters are not on the playable roster (yet), but they carry real weight in the beta story.

• Pixy: a street kid who read the Detective's old newspaper cases, marvels at the reactor on their shoulder, and spreads the word that the "queen slayer" is really a hero.
• Moira: Cynthia II's governess, forever warning her charge away from commoners. In a fight she lets slip she was something far more dangerous "in another life."
• Knight Galant: a good-natured knight faint with low blood sugar inside his heavy armor, who sparks a running debate about what belongs in a proper sandwich and later misreads the Detective and Gratia as a couple.
• The Queen's Herald: the voice of Queen Feliana, who reveals the staged harpy attack and asks the Detective to guide Gratia from the shadows.
• Baron Edgar and Madeline: a strangely youthful Royal Academy administrator and his assistant, the masterminds of the Williams "vampire" murder. Madeline turns out to be a werewolf.
• Jekyll: the Williams estate butler and unpaid research assistant, drawn into the murder by his feelings for Lady Maria.
• Emily: a factory forewoman hiding a burned arm, one of the Cinderellas Ashley grew up beside, whom the Detective pulls out alive.
• Daniel Boulden: a Royal Bank investor running an invitation-only bubble scheme, who tries to loot the vault and pin it on a master thief called the Rogue.
• Vorsch: owner of the United Vermentum Works factory, who parades a spotless assembly line while draining laborers to produce banned high-purity Silverium.
• Romme and Evan King: a doctor beloved by the poor and a rising young detective, both silenced for what they knew about the factory.
• Baron Barton: guild master of the collapsing Crescent Guild, who framed a werewolf family to bury his own losses in Cynthia II's case.
• Top Hat: Gratia's prototype Silverium steed, a metal horse that senses its rider's feelings and, it turns out, can fly.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is Ashley in Silver Palace?

Ashley is the Detective's assistant and the civilian behind the playable "Cinderella." She is a survivor of the factory's Silverium extraction who manipulated her way into the Detective's employ, secretly paid the Red Rose to protect him, and ultimately left to pursue her own revenge.

Is Lorin the Silver Fist?

Yes. Chief Inspector Lorin was once a street legend called Silver Fist. In his side quest he poses as the still-living Silver Fist to steer a gang of teenagers back toward school rather than fight them.

Did Grimm really die in Silver Palace?

No. Grimm staged his own death, coating a substitute corpse in a fireproofing agent and faking the burning to escape whoever wanted him silenced. He hid his case notebook in the Detective's office before disappearing.

Who are Radar and Chalky?

Radar and Chalky are Superintendent Rex's two Doberman police dogs. They appear at his side in the story and are summoned by his Ultimate, Thunderous Judgement.

Why does Rex keep blocking the Detective?

Rex is a Navy superintendent with an order-first, by-the-book view of the law. He bars the Detective from crime scenes and even names them a suspect, but he comes around after the Detective helps him arrest the smuggler Daniel Boulden.

Is this the full story?

This covers the characters revealed in the Dichotomy Beta. For the plot in order, read the Silver Palace story recap. Details are pre-release and may change before launch.