Alice in Borderland

...I want out of Mira's wild ride

The most terrific ride, the best ride.

Someone called her the female Aizen but nah. Aizen wish he has as much sophistication and depth as Mira!

...I want out of Mira's wild ride

The ride never ends.

Can someone spoils me, what happens to Arisu's family in the end?

WELP! I knew I was right about the tea

...I want out of Mira's wild ride

No.. GIRL!! You just did not do what I think you did.... 

It might not be a complete stretch to think Usagi is the one the Queen is trying to manipulate. Despite Usagi's protesting, it feels like she's taken a backseat so far in this game while Arisu and Mira chat it out.

This. I am quite sure since I have "read" the raws. Although not all chapters, I have seen some pictures suggesting that this "might" be 100% correct. Is this a spoiler? I'm not sure tho. ;-)

Jesus, this comment section is more active and is in more debate than the entirety of the debates in the presidential election last year.

So many conspiracy theories.

I'll try to give my own vision on why this is probably true:

1- guys, do you really believe that the Queen of Hearts would use a low level trick like drugs? All the heart games were wicked because they put the players in agony just using despair. Using drugs would be lame for the high level queen, I'd be disappointed.

2- I agree with @Catloaf, we don't know what the treatment was because the author is showing us the reality of the main character.
This is the same reason why we have also the side stories that the main character can't actually know about. The point of view of the story is the author's view (as @OniBarubary said) and the author can show everything because it's another reality that exist within Arisu's mind.
The point is, if a mind is able to create another reality, that reality exist itself and I, the author/god, can show you everything. You may desagree with him but this is a manga so he was able to do that.

3- The queen firstly tried to trick the main character with some false explanations, right? Actually that it's not what really happened.
In that moment it was the author giving a message to the readers. He wanted to point out that if he wanted he would have been able to find many different explanations (aliens, virtual reality etc.), but this is not his objective. So at first he's saying "hey don't object the ending just because you don't like it, this is my story", and then with the right explanation he says "here that's it"

4- If you think about it the whole manga is really psychological also with the side characters, so it make sense that the ending is kind of mental haha

Now, if all above is true I believe we may have two different scenarios: Arisu comes back to reality with a good ending, or an Inception -like ending where we still can't figure out what is real and what is not.
Can't wait to see what is going to happen!

1) It's been a common trend in all games but the Kings of Diamonds and Clubs for Citizens to give themselves the "edge" for their games. Jack of Diamonds made Mahjong rules that favored him, King of Spades had a GPS tracker and flying armory, Jack of Hearts had his trick eye, ETC. All of them were still masters of their craft, yet felt the need to ensure their victory through some means or trickery.

2) I actually think it would be the most masterful reveal if all this actually was in Arisu's head. Even the chapters that follow the perspective of other characters. It would definitely lead to us the reader also rejecting the notion of this world being fake because we've seen things we feel have to be real. Much like what Arisu is going through from his own perspective.

3) My take on what happened the last few chapters was a setup for Arisu ultimately not getting an answer for what the Borderlands is. For the whole series that question has been in the back of your mind and occasionally it becomes a major plot point. Lasers from the sky, a mysterious overseer that can supply any number of items to create venues, people transported through time and space, the mystery of the fireworks. All that is unexplained. And ultimately not even the Citizens need to really know what is going on which is why I kind of think Arisu's character arc is going to end with him having to accept the things that happened in the borderland without really understanding why he got there and what it was.

I'll try to give my own vision on why this is probably true:

1- guys, do you really believe that the Queen of Hearts would use a low level trick like drugs? All the heart games were wicked because they put the players in agony just using despair. Using drugs would be lame for the high level queen, I'd be disappointed.

2- I agree with @Catloaf, we don't know what the treatment was because the author is showing us the reality of the main character.
This is the same reason why we have also the side stories that the main character can't actually know about. The point of view of the story is the author's view (as @OniBarubary said) and the author can show everything because it's another reality that exist within Arisu's mind.
The point is, if a mind is able to create another reality, that reality exist itself and I, the author/god, can show you everything. You may desagree with him but this is a manga so he was able to do that.

3- The queen firstly tried to trick the main character with some false explanations, right? Actually that it's not what really happened.
In that moment it was the author giving a message to the readers. He wanted to point out that if he wanted he would have been able to find many different explanations (aliens, virtual reality etc.), but this is not his objective. So at first he's saying "hey don't object the ending just because you don't like it, this is my story", and then with the right explanation he says "here that's it"

4- If you think about it the whole manga is really psychological also with the side characters, so it make sense that the ending is kind of mental haha

Now, if all above is true I believe we may have two different scenarios: Arisu comes back to reality with a good ending, or an Inception -like ending where we still can't figure out what is real and what is not.
Can't wait to see what is going to happen!

There's no way that's actually the truth.

The perspective of this manga has been 3rd person omniscient the entire time so we've been privy to the thoughts and actions of characters that weren't the MC, especially in Side Stories that didn't have him in them at all. It would be INCREDIBLY bad and weak writing to go "It was all a hallucination, even those things you weren't privy to and didn't even know about and the private thoughts of those characters you never heard" and switch to a different perspective.

Along with that, the behavior of the queen would make 0 sense if she was a mental health professional and working with someone who suffered from delusions/hallucinations and mental health issues when dealing with grief/trauma.

What I do believe, which I thought was bullshit until this moment, that the tea was drugged and she's using his weakened and open mental state to use suggestion to shape his hallucinations and implant these ideas into his head. He could be made easily suggestible and plied into a state she wants. Furthermore, I'd put dollars to donuts that she may actually be a psychiatrist/therapist that got transported to these Borderlands.

My money is still on "There will never be an explanation" because I can't think of a scenario that would be a fitting or satisfactory one. It's much better to have no answer.

He is not in therapy, no mental health professional would allow that kind of delusion to take place, not even the biggest of the biggest quackery, plus she if she is a neuroscientist she better than anyone should know how counterproductive such a thing is, is like giving hallucinogenics to a person with dementia in order to help them with spacial recognition, bullshit, this is not exposure therapy on the contrary they are allowing him to just run away from his problems, added to that the methods used by psychiatrist are far from the story Mira is telling, starting from the fact of how uninvolved his primary doctor has been on Arisu's world, to the point that he only introduces her on the island, i mean come on.

 

The sweet deal here is that Arisu is buying it for now, that said i do think he has been drugged, added to that he is fatigued and desperate, so i can see this kind of reaction actually happening.

While I want to agree with you, or at least your last paragraph, sadly, I can't help but find the flaws in your argument.  We have no fucking idea what his treatment was.  We only know what we've been told ourselves, which may or may not be simply what he thinks has happened. How many chapters did it take for those three to be killed off? With how many dying before them? Her being his primary psychiatrist yet not appearing until fairly far in means nothing. I mean, it'd be oddly appropriate for the island, a place run by (the mad)Hatter to be based on those he's actually seeing in the psych ward. I mean, if this is the actual reality then it actually kind of makes sense for it to not show up for a while, one doesn't just land in psych ward over night, it can take weeks or even months to get a full set of doctors/treatment set up--and that's before any real work even happens.  To directly refute your first point, of 'no one would let such a delusion happen', that's not how delusions work; they come in mostly to completely full from one's mind (and adapt as things go on), then they get broken with therapy. It's really impressive how much a single mind can come up with in a short span of time while completely ignoring the outside world.

I mean, for it to all be in one character's mind when there where parts that they weren't at all involved in is a letdown, but it's not an impossibility for those to just still be his fabrications.

The mind game is really amazing. 

I just realized that we're just a few chapters away from the end of the manga and we haven't seen what Yaba and Banda are doing while this game is happening. I really liked them, hope they do something crazy before the end.

By the way guys, check the last page of chapter 60. Now look at Mira's face in the last panel. That's honestly not the face of a doctor that just had her patient make such huge progress in recovering after a long time. If I was her, I would be chugging a beer or something you know? PLUS YOU CAN'T SEE HER EYES, I DON'T TRUST PEOPLE WHEN I CAN'T SEE THEIR EYES.

Can it be next week already pls thx

Holy sh*t! Completed unexpected twist for me, but really perfect!

Personally I don't think this is fake, it suits well the entire story and for the hypotesis of the drugged tea...that would be really toooo disappointing and a too easy solution for the <3 queen, it can't be for sure.

Plus the side stories made the whole thing more intriguing and mind blowing. Yes I totally love this ending!

There should be ACE of card right? and king of diamond mention joker too

...Ace cards are treated as 1s for the sake of the game.  The mentioning of a joker was more along the lines of matching the motif than an actual game I think.

why does he believe this

People would believe a talking bear that the sky is red if they were drunk enough, one could only imagine how suggestible you would be if you were drugged.

He is not in therapy, no mental health professional would allow that kind of delusion to take place, not even the biggest of the biggest quackery, plus she if she is a neuroscientist she better than anyone should know how counterproductive such a thing is, is like giving hallucinogenics to a person with dementia in order to help them with spacial recognition, bullshit, this is not exposure therapy on the contrary they are allowing him to just run away from his problems, added to that the methods used by psychiatrist are far from the story Mira is telling, starting from the fact of how uninvolved his primary doctor has been on Arisu's world, to the point that he only introduces her on the island, i mean come on.

The sweet deal here is that Arisu is buying it for now, that said i do think he has been drugged, added to that he is fatigued and desperate, so i can see this kind of reaction actually happening.

If this is the real answer, then its a pretty sad cop out, because we saw all those side stories of people like agni, etc, that Arisu couldnt possibly have known.

Even if the author's excuse was "oh, those other people are patients in the hospital and arisu worked them into his delusion", thats kind of a stretch.

Seeing as the table of contents shows two more entire chapters for this game and then 3 more chapters after...I feel like this isn't the case. 

How could I miss that from the beggining was in the fucking title Alice in Borderlands, that god damn girl is just a reference for hallucinations mixed with reality

There should be ACE of card right? and king of diamond mention joker too

mira is truly queen of hearts

I like this volume cover. I wonder why one eye is different from the other; maybe to suggest/reflect her mess-with-your-mind abilities?