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Fajita Queen
Jun 21, 2012

Which like... seems pretty good? Live your mortal life in what's pretty much a utopia as long as you let your corpse be used after you die.

The ruler being an extremely intelligent immortal pseudo-god kind of solves every single problem with real world "benevolent" dictatorships.

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shades of blue
Sep 27, 2012
I dunno, there's something to be said for having freedom. In terms of meeting your basic needs, I'm sure Keter is great. There's just much more to life than just having food and shelter.

mossyfisk
Nov 8, 2010

FF0000

The Shortest Path posted:

Which like... seems pretty good? Live your mortal life in what's pretty much a utopia as long as you let your corpse be used after you die.

I doubt he wants old zombies, so "after you die" is probably around 30.

Fajita Queen
Jun 21, 2012

30 years of near-utopian living is likely still substantially better quality of life than any person that's below nobility in any of the other cultures we've seen in the setting so far.

Of course, this is mostly just speculation because we haven't seen the details yet and it's probably gonna be pretty fuckin skeevy either way.

Omi no Kami
Feb 19, 2014


I'm re-reading mother of learning for fun, and here's some conspiracy fodder that's probably innocent but might be damning evidence of an overly complicated villain plot: in Zorian's first iteration of the time loop, the one that ends when he and Zach get soul-punched by the lich and all their bits become commingled, Zach expresses surprise that Zorian isn't in the dance hall and quickly outlines the long series of increasingly frustrating attempts he made to a) get Zorian out of his soon-to-be-fireballed dorm, and b) keep him at the dance.

The thing is, why on earth did Zach try so hard to save him? I think he's been in the loop for... five years at this point? Fifteen? However many it's been, he should be well past the point where he's randomly saving everyone just in case this time it sticks, the two of them don't know each other well (or at all, really?), and Zach has been pretty consistently depicted as being disorganized, undisciplined, and led by his mood to the extent that I have trouble believing he'd do something that he found annoying unless he had a good reason for it.

I think the explanation is probably as simple as "He's an okay guy and didn't want to watch any of his classmates get hurt," but if he or his clone is red robe, maybe Zorian's been part of an intentional plot from the getgo, and it was just set up to look like an accident?

sunken fleet
Apr 25, 2010

dreams of an unchanging future,
a today like yesterday,
a tomorrow like today.
Fallen Rib
I think it's because at that point Zach had been mind-whammied by red robe into thinking that his ultimate goal is to defeat the invasion singlehandedly and stop the primordial release and then when he eventually accomplishes that goal the loop will magically resolve itself. So in the first parts of the story Zach is working towards trying to create a "perfect loop" where he saves everyone and defeats the invasion. It's not until Zorian mucks with things enough that red robe shows himself and directly attacks Zach to steal his memories (and then attacks him again in the next few subsequent loops) that Zach cottons on to the fact something is amiss and stops trying to singlehandedly save the city.

Omi no Kami
Feb 19, 2014


Hmm, that would somewhat-kinda explain why red robe stopped bothering with the invasion after zorian appeared (assuming its only purpose was to keep zach occupied). I dunno though- there's just a whole lot of sketchiness in both the invasion and the initial plan that makes me really hope that at some point Zorian fixes Zach's mind whammy and figures out exactly what was going on before he got involved.

jsoh
Mar 24, 2007

O Muhammad, I seek your intercession with my Lord for the return of my eyesight
hey im really dumb and have a bad memory and am an atrocious reader of serials but can someone remind me of what the resolution of cat promising the winter prince guy 7 crowns of mortal men or something like that to get his help against summer was?

e: prac guide if it was unclear

jsoh fucked around with this message at 06:21 on Jul 23, 2018

Goatse James Bond
Mar 28, 2010

If you see me posting please remind me that I have Charlie Work in the reports forum to do instead

violent sex idiot posted:

hey im really dumb and have a bad memory and am an atrocious reader of serials but can someone remind me of what the resolution of cat promising the winter prince guy 7 crowns of mortal men or something like that to get his help against summer was?

e: prac guide if it was unclear

I don't think it's happened yet.

navyjack
Jul 15, 2006



violent sex idiot posted:

hey im really dumb and have a bad memory and am an atrocious reader of serials but can someone remind me of what the resolution of cat promising the winter prince guy 7 crowns of mortal men or something like that to get his help against summer was?

e: prac guide if it was unclear

Are there 7 little principalities that make up Procer?

sunken fleet
Apr 25, 2010

dreams of an unchanging future,
a today like yesterday,
a tomorrow like today.
Fallen Rib

Omi no Kami posted:

Hmm, that would somewhat-kinda explain why red robe stopped bothering with the invasion after zorian appeared (assuming its only purpose was to keep zach occupied). I dunno though- there's just a whole lot of sketchiness in both the invasion and the initial plan that makes me really hope that at some point Zorian fixes Zach's mind whammy and figures out exactly what was going on before he got involved.

Yeah the fact that Zach won't let Zorian into his head is what keeps most of the ambiguity in the story though, so I understand why the author doesn't let it happen. As things stand we only really have Zach's word for how things went down on his end - and it leaves the story open for a double-cross or other similar shenanigans.

ZypherIM
Nov 8, 2010

"I want to see what she's in love with."

violent sex idiot posted:

hey im really dumb and have a bad memory and am an atrocious reader of serials but can someone remind me of what the resolution of cat promising the winter prince guy 7 crowns of mortal men or something like that to get his help against summer was?

e: prac guide if it was unclear

No resolution and its sort of a giant chekov's gun that got covered up by the whole crusade thing. We also don't know the implications of it, but that princess of summer or whomever Cat was talking to was shaken by that info. My guess is that having claims to 7 thrones will give him some sort of 'allowed into reality' thing or something like that. I figure that'll tie up something on the procer front, or the undead front after they start in, or tie up the winter mantle things if they don't use Akua to clean that all up.

I'm sort of hoping that all the stuff with the winter mantle gets resolved sooner than later, since I'm fairly sure there isn't going to be any Name progression until something gets resolved there, and a lot of hte uniqueness of the story is driven from all of that.

Affi
Dec 18, 2005

Break bread wit the enemy

X GON GIVE IT TO YA
On the same page I totally understand why Zach is leery about anyone messing with his head.

Omi no Kami
Feb 19, 2014


sunken fleet posted:

Yeah the fact that Zach won't let Zorian into his head is what keeps most of the ambiguity in the story though, so I understand why the author doesn't let it happen. As things stand we only really have Zach's word for how things went down on his end - and it leaves the story open for a double-cross or other similar shenanigans.

Yeah, and I can't decide whether that's a structural flaw or not. Zach's reticence is perfectly understandable, but if it turns out that he/his clone was the big bad all along and it's played for a shocking reveal, I'm going to be miffed; it is such an obvious twist by this point, and it largely relies on Zorian being okay not investigating the mind magic stuff even though it's currently the one big clue they have about what's going on that hasn't been investigated.

KOGAHAZAN!!
Apr 29, 2013

a miserable failure as a person

an incredible success as a magical murder spider

navyjack posted:

Are there 7 little principalities that make up Procer?

Considerably more

Velius
Feb 27, 2001
I’m a bit annoyed with the cliffhangers in Practical Guide, especially when we get these super short chapters of tension leading to - wait two days to find out more!

Anyway, this is obvious, but I’m writing it anyway. So we see Keter and the Dead King’s rose, where he willingly sacrificed his whole kingdom for his advancement. He’s clearly intended to be the Villainous inversion of Cat, who at least declares her motivation to be protecting her Kingdom even at cost to herself. Somehow he’s beaten the various narratives/stories that would have caused his fall, so he must be similarly savvy to this setting and it’s ideas. So what does this mean via a vis Akua, the former rival/mirror who we’ve seen become much more actively engaged with the Woe and who’s declared intent is to hitch to a winning horse? I don’t see redemption in Akua’s future (although that might be interesting, given Pilgrim’s still hanging around), but I’m not sure where she goes from here otherwise. It does seem as though something bad is happening shortly for certain, though.

NinjaDebugger
Apr 22, 2008


Velius posted:

So we see Keter and the Dead King’s rose, where he willingly sacrificed his whole kingdom for his advancement. He’s clearly intended to be the Villainous inversion of Cat, who at least declares her motivation to be protecting her Kingdom even at cost to herself. Somehow he’s beaten the various narratives/stories that would have caused his fall, so he must be similarly savvy to this setting and it’s ideas.

You uh... haven't read the latest couple chapters, have you?

Omi no Kami
Feb 19, 2014


Did mother of learning ever establish what happened with Zorian getting assassinated the first time he asked for help translating the lich's recitation? He showed the linguistics professor his transcription, explained it away by saying that he overheard invasion stuff and got attacked, then a few hours later he gets assassinated by a short person wearing black robes and a white mask. I suppose the simplest explanation would be that he/she was a random agent of the invaders and completely unrelated to the overarching mystery, but I can't remember that incident ever coming up again.

Oo Koo
Nov 19, 2012

Omi no Kami posted:

Did mother of learning ever establish what happened with Zorian getting assassinated the first time he asked for help translating the lich's recitation? He showed the linguistics professor his transcription, explained it away by saying that he overheard invasion stuff and got attacked, then a few hours later he gets assassinated by a short person wearing black robes and a white mask. I suppose the simplest explanation would be that he/she was a random agent of the invaders and completely unrelated to the overarching mystery, but I can't remember that incident ever coming up again.

There was a chapter where he visited the language prof again to get help for learning to speak whatever the language was in the jungle country where Damien's fiancee's family live, and realized that the walls were full of cranium rats because they were spying on the nearby principal's office. So wrong place, wrong time, he got mind-read by rats and murdered.

Omi no Kami
Feb 19, 2014


Ohh right I completely forgot about the rats... darn, that completely spoils my favorite conspiracy theory of the month. I don't think there's enough in the text to support this, but I noticed that one of the few background characters who Zorian repeatedly observes but never names in the first part of the story is the second girl Zach was giving test tips to; he recognizes Neolu (I think that's her name?), but not their friend, and every time he interacts with Neolu in later iterations when she doesn't know Zach, the third girl is nowhere to be found.

This made me wonder if red robe wasn't a clone but the third girl, who was simply an opportunistic student that Zach spilled everything to in order to get a date, and who subsequently teamed up (or was already in league with) the rebels and lich to hijack his loop. I think it requires too many moving parts to work, especially since whoever's responsible had mind magic and Zorian pretty explicitly confirmed that the only other telepath at the school was the house slytherine girl who he tutored.

sunken fleet
Apr 25, 2010

dreams of an unchanging future,
a today like yesterday,
a tomorrow like today.
Fallen Rib
That's pretty much the current canon explanation though. They assume its someone Zach leaked information about the timeloop to who somehow managed to figure out how to loop along with Zach, somehow took advantage of Zach's trust to ambush and gently caress his brain, and then just ran rampant powering up after that point. The problem is that there is no way to know who that person is without examining Zach's mind. It could have been the third girl (and actually now that I think about it that's not a bad guess because she was close to Zach while he was crusading against the lich so she would be ideally positioned to stop him from noticing something was up) but it could also be literally anyone. Slytherine girl is the only mind mage pre-loop but after - potentially decades - of training, it could also be any character in the story really. Its impossible to take guesses at who is the culprit based on their apparent "power-levels" or abilities because the time loop mechanic makes it true that any character could be a secret super-mage.

Also if we assume the loop was actually set up for Zach's benefit it would follow that initially he would have known how it worked - and also known about the imperial treasures and their powers - so our double-crosser could theoretically have had six months to work out their double-cross if Zach placed a temporary marker on them of his own will - which lets the whole theory hang together a bit better. How someone could get enough expertise in soul magic to modify their own marker in six months is a bit of a head-scratcher though. Maybe Zach did it himself because he was lonely?

e: In my mind there is two ways the story can go at this point - either Zach is a trusting moron who let someone else in on the secret to ultimate power and got double-crossed or he's actually really smart and manipulative and - for some as yet unexplained reason - he needs Zorian to escape the loop and is abusing him to that end.

sunken fleet fucked around with this message at 14:47 on Jul 24, 2018

Kalas
Jul 27, 2007
Wandering Inn patreon advance update, reading best character Toren chapters leaves me with a dumb grin the entire time. How could a murderous pile of bones be so adorable.

Silynt
Sep 21, 2009

Kalas posted:

Wandering Inn patreon advance update, reading best character Toren chapters leaves me with a dumb grin the entire time. How could a murderous pile of bones be so adorable.

I was really hoping that male Toren would take over at the very end and kill the arrogant Silver-rank team taking credit for her strength. Also, poor Halrac :(

Omi no Kami
Feb 19, 2014


sunken fleet posted:

That's pretty much the current canon explanation though. They assume its someone Zach leaked information about the timeloop to who somehow managed to figure out how to loop along with Zach, somehow took advantage of Zach's trust to ambush and gently caress his brain, and then just ran rampant powering up after that point. The problem is that there is no way to know who that person is without examining Zach's mind. It could have been the third girl (and actually now that I think about it that's not a bad guess because she was close to Zach while he was crusading against the lich so she would be ideally positioned to stop him from noticing something was up) but it could also be literally anyone. Slytherine girl is the only mind mage pre-loop but after - potentially decades - of training, it could also be any character in the story really. Its impossible to take guesses at who is the culprit based on their apparent "power-levels" or abilities because the time loop mechanic makes it true that any character could be a secret super-mage.

Also if we assume the loop was actually set up for Zach's benefit it would follow that initially he would have known how it worked - and also known about the imperial treasures and their powers - so our double-crosser could theoretically have had six months to work out their double-cross if Zach placed a temporary marker on them of his own will - which lets the whole theory hang together a bit better. How someone could get enough expertise in soul magic to modify their own marker in six months is a bit of a head-scratcher though. Maybe Zach did it himself because he was lonely?

e: In my mind there is two ways the story can go at this point - either Zach is a trusting moron who let someone else in on the secret to ultimate power and got double-crossed or he's actually really smart and manipulative and - for some as yet unexplained reason - he needs Zorian to escape the loop and is abusing him to that end.

Yeah, I'm really hoping for the trusting moron route, but considering how little we actually know about him, and how much just plain doesn't add up, I'm leaning pretty heavily towards either he being the manipulator, or the clone theory (although clones can't survive resets as far as we know).

On the telepath angle, this is reading an awful lot into it but my assumption about Zorian being the only telepath was mainly based on the bit where he first discovered his ability and became best friends with spiders. I'm fairly sure I remember his doing a topical scan on all the students and teachers, and the matriarch was definitely poking around on her own, so I can't see both of them not noticing if another human in the academy had extremely high-level skills and defenses.

I don't think this is a useful guess, because we plain don't have enough information about most of the cast, but my assumption had always been that whoever started busting things up either knew the lich or the cultists already (I can't remember if they were red robe's connect to the lich or vice-versa?). Either way, it's a little dicey because I can't see him helping someone else to the loop and not jumping in, but I'd assumed that the lich was the one who had done the initial hack, then got screwed by whoever he helped. It really comes down to who was in a position to act on Zach's story within 30 days (or 6 months if he'd already gotten whichever artifact lets them do that), and I can't think of anyone besides maybe Xvim (who is way, waaaaay too obvious) who would've pulled that off.

What really bugs me is that even though all evidence points to Zach being the original looper, I really can't see how he got involved; he wasn't really competent enough to con his way into someone else's spot like they do in the compression chambers every loop, and he had literally no resources or high-level connections before the story began.

Edit: Huh... I just got to the bit where Z & Z were buddies for the first time, when Zach reappears 8 loops later. I'd completely missed this, but Zach is claiming that his memory loss came from the same loop where they got comingled; it's a little tough to parse, but he at least seems to believe that the soul magic which screwed them both up was the same incident that punched holes in his memory. Maybe he was actively chasing his own clone for months/years before he actually got edited?

Omi no Kami fucked around with this message at 19:25 on Jul 24, 2018

Ytlaya
Nov 13, 2005

I'm catching up with Ward, and Victoria is actually pretty hypocritical in the scene where Chris is getting pissed at her. She reacts in pretty much the same way to Amy being mentioned as he does to her infringing on her situation, but doesn't seem to make the connection. This isn't to say Chris is right to be so angry (though I would say he has more of an excuse, since he's a kid), but Victoria isn't really in a position to be condemning him for flipping out when she entered territory he didn't want her to.

Speaking of Ward, the whole Damsel arc was really great. I like her character a lot, and it was really depressing how everything got ruined for her just as she was finally starting to make progress towards a decent future (since she was already allowing herself to actively think about interacting with Edict in a non-hostile way).

Are we supposed to assume J was just the victim of Damsel's paranoia, or that he was actually working for Accord (the logic that Accord wouldn't let an unpredictable element like her stay around if he didn't think he could control her was pretty solid, especially given how easy it would be to kill her)?


edit: I kind of agree with Kenzie's own evaluation that she's basically a hopeless case. I can't really think of any way to possibly solve her problem. Even Yamada apparently couldn't do anything about it.

Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 06:02 on Jul 25, 2018

PetraCore
Jul 20, 2017

👁️🔥👁️👁️👁️BE NOT👄AFRAID👁️👁️👁️🔥👁️

It's ambiguous but the leaps she makes to assuming J is a mole are pretty big leaps. I actually suspect the guy that needled her constantly but showed up again once she fell from glory was a plant, but not J. J was just a teenaged dude with a crush.

I mean, we've seen a situation where Accord picks out someone with violent, impulsive behavior patterns and offers them a job if she shapes up, but he was open and honest about that. If he was interested in 'taming' Ashley I'm pretty sure he'd have just done that. And while it's not that much of a leap to think that Accord might have had someone watching her, I really don't think that person would have been J! But because Ashley's emotionally primed to expect betrayal from everyone she cares about, once she thought that Accord had a plant her gut reaction was that it was J and all the leaps of reasoning after that are imo retroactive and working backwards.

Omi no Kami
Feb 19, 2014


Ytlaya posted:

Are we supposed to assume J was just the victim of Damsel's paranoia, or that he was actually working for Accord (the logic that Accord wouldn't let an unpredictable element like her stay around if he didn't think he could control her was pretty solid, especially given how easy it would be to kill her)?

I felt that the text supported damsel being a paranoid jerkface, it was a bit weird how calm he was about being murdered but I still felt he was just a victim of her paranoia. I don't know if it counts as WoG, but if you look at the weaverdice character sheet that WB made for her, under the boston games tab it says "Survived and made her mark during the Boston Games arcs, killing the Woad Giant and the Gem, earning some attention in the villain community." I'm fairly certain he's the only person she killed besides the plant giant, and in 4.1 Prancer also mentions her murdering the "Jewel of Boston".

PetraCore
Jul 20, 2017

👁️🔥👁️👁️👁️BE NOT👄AFRAID👁️👁️👁️🔥👁️

Omi no Kami posted:

I felt that the text supported damsel being a paranoid jerkface, it was a bit weird how calm he was about being murdered but I still felt he was just a victim of her paranoia. I don't know if it counts as WoG, but if you look at the weaverdice character sheet that WB made for her, under the boston games tab it says "Survived and made her mark during the Boston Games arcs, killing the Woad Giant and the Gem, earning some attention in the villain community." I'm fairly certain he's the only person she killed besides the plant giant, and in 4.1 Prancer also mentions her murdering the "Jewel of Boston".
He wasn't calm at all, though, he was so deep in shock he could barely talk.

Omi no Kami
Feb 19, 2014


PetraCore posted:

He wasn't calm at all, though, he was so deep in shock he could barely talk.

I can see that... I suppose it's not realistic, but at the time I'd expected his reaction to be more along the lines of "Holy freaking crap wtf you crazy murderer *death rattle*".

Ytlaya
Nov 13, 2005

PetraCore posted:

He wasn't calm at all, though, he was so deep in shock he could barely talk.

Yeah, I read it as obvious shock. The only potentially suspicious thing about his reaction was that he responded with instant fear at her bringing up the topic of Accord having someone to watch her, though that could also just be interpreted as a reasonable "I really don't want the person who can easily kill people with a gesture to think I'm an enemy." There's some reason to doubt the latter in the fact that he had previously shown little fear around her, despite her being pretty obviously volatile a lot of the time.

edit: As an addition to my comments earlier, I feel like the closest thing to normal social interactions Kenzie has is with Chris. Like they're the only social interactions she has that don't send a chill up my spine.

Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 06:28 on Jul 25, 2018

Oo Koo
Nov 19, 2012
Practical guide: So the Dead King just welcomed Catherine into the club of small g gods.

Gitro
May 29, 2013
OK so one thing that's been bothering me about prac guide: did they ever refer to the dead king as the Hidden Horror before ten or so chapters ago? Because I'm pretty sure they didn't, and now it's almost all they call him.

SerSpook
Feb 13, 2012




I think I remember it, but it was an interlude. Maybe a Black one?

builds character
Jan 16, 2008

Keep at it.

Ytlaya posted:

I'm catching up with Ward, and Victoria is actually pretty hypocritical in the scene where Chris is getting pissed at her. She reacts in pretty much the same way to Amy being mentioned as he does to her infringing on her situation, but doesn't seem to make the connection. This isn't to say Chris is right to be so angry (though I would say he has more of an excuse, since he's a kid), but Victoria isn't really in a position to be condemning him for flipping out when she entered territory he didn't want her to.

Speaking of Ward, the whole Damsel arc was really great. I like her character a lot, and it was really depressing how everything got ruined for her just as she was finally starting to make progress towards a decent future (since she was already allowing herself to actively think about interacting with Edict in a non-hostile way).

Are we supposed to assume J was just the victim of Damsel's paranoia, or that he was actually working for Accord (the logic that Accord wouldn't let an unpredictable element like her stay around if he didn't think he could control her was pretty solid, especially given how easy it would be to kill her)?


edit: I kind of agree with Kenzie's own evaluation that she's basically a hopeless case. I can't really think of any way to possibly solve her problem. Even Yamada apparently couldn't do anything about it.

It’s not entirely fair to compare getting remade into a horrible, slavishly adoring flesh monster and someone showing up at your house. Even if your house sucks. And you have to change into a horrible monster from time to time.


Also, yeah J got murdered.

Kenzie’s just a broken kid who needs an iron giant dad and a tentacle monster mom.

Affi
Dec 18, 2005

Break bread wit the enemy

X GON GIVE IT TO YA
Mother of learning chat:


How did the loop start? Did the looper (Zach or unknown) press start and then get teleported a month back to relive it or did the looper start the loop and then lived a month and then reset it?

If it’s option one then somehow Zach lived a “normal” month where he somehow ended up in a top secret research facility in the middle of an invasion only to luck out and start the loop the second the primordial broke loose. Which should be repeatable unless someone got erased from the timeline.

If it’s option 2 it’s just weird that Zach would wake up in his bed right? He should start his loop in the facility? Is it confirmed he actually wakes up there or what?

Ytlaya
Nov 13, 2005

builds character posted:

It’s not entirely fair to compare getting remade into a horrible, slavishly adoring flesh monster and someone showing up at your house. Even if your house sucks. And you have to change into a horrible monster from time to time.

That's not what's being compared though; it's a comparison between "people bringing up the topic of her sister, without knowing what the specifics of that situation are" and "visiting Chris without warning." Both of these things are things the people in question requested others not to do for reasons they don't feel comfortable elaborating about. We don't know Chris's specific reasons for being so upset about having someone show up without warning, but there's reason to assume they're less valid than Victoria's reasons for not wanting Amy to be mentioned.

Also, Victoria was totally lying with her excuse for visiting him (that it was only because he wasn't picking up his phone), and he was totally correct in his assumption that she just wanted an excuse to visit. Not that he's necessarily right to be so upset about her visiting in the first place, but she should have just been honest about that.

builds character posted:

Kenzie’s just a broken kid who needs an iron giant dad and a tentacle monster mom.

The whole thing that makes it difficult for me to imagine a resolution to Kenzie's situation is that she doesn't just need a loving family. She already got that before (at least once, and it could probably be considered at least twice if you consider the Wards after she triggered), and (as she's fully aware herself) she can't help but gently caress things up through behaving in ways that are extremely inappropriate. I certainly don't blame her for it, but I also can't think of how to fix it.

edit: The most optimistic outcome I can imagine is that growing older manages to somehow fix things.

Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 14:51 on Jul 25, 2018

PetraCore
Jul 20, 2017

👁️🔥👁️👁️👁️BE NOT👄AFRAID👁️👁️👁️🔥👁️

Well... Yamada couldn't 'fix' things, but Kenzie has apparently been steadily improving. Some of that is definitely her learning how to better mask her feelings, but I don't think it's fair to disregard all her progress in that light. Her emotional issues are deep and are not going to go away magically as she ages, but her better learning what is and isn't appropriate is a huuuge deal given that, as you said, she's accidentally blown up previous healthy support systems via inappropriate behavior.

That's why I'm pretty hopeful about her whole deal. I think Ashley's right that it wouldn't take much to tip Kenzie over into doing something pretty bad, but recovery is a long and difficult process, and I think Ashley is speaking from the experience of someone who is also constantly on the edge. Just the fact that Kenzie still has two people who care about her fully and who know that when she smiles it's not a happy thing is a big deal.

I suppose I'm rambling a bit, but what I'm trying to say is that you're right that what Kenzie needs isn't just a loving support system. But I think Kenzie is doing surprisingly well on the other aspect of what she needs, which is an understanding of boundaries and the ability to self-reflect on her emotions and behavior and think through what she's feeling and why. Even in the best case scenario, she's not 'stable' yet, but I think that there's hope that she'll get there.

sunken fleet
Apr 25, 2010

dreams of an unchanging future,
a today like yesterday,
a tomorrow like today.
Fallen Rib

Affi posted:

Mother of learning chat:


How did the loop start? Did the looper (Zach or unknown) press start and then get teleported a month back to relive it or did the looper start the loop and then lived a month and then reset it?

If it’s option one then somehow Zach lived a “normal” month where he somehow ended up in a top secret research facility in the middle of an invasion only to luck out and start the loop the second the primordial broke loose. Which should be repeatable unless someone got erased from the timeline.

If it’s option 2 it’s just weird that Zach would wake up in his bed right? He should start his loop in the facility? Is it confirmed he actually wakes up there or what?


The mechanics of the loop (as have been explained to us the readers) make the second option more likely. Because what's happening isn't "time travel" but rather a constantly resetting "snap-shot" of reality that is stored in it's own super powerfully temporally accelerated pocket dimension that is somehow contained and powered by an imprisoned primordial. So in essence whoever started the time loop started it up at the start of the month and the events that we see playing out in the story aren't "real" but just the result of some sort of hyper-advanced spell that "snap-shots" the whole world and then predicts - for lack of a better word - the actions of all the people / things trapped inside.

As for how Zach factors in, well in the story Zach has claimed that he always wakes up in his bed in his mansion and that is the reason he thinks it's unlikely that he is the "original looper".


At the end of the day I don't think we really have enough information to know how the loop started or who started it - it's one of the big mysteries they're working on unraveling.

navyjack
Jul 15, 2006



Oo Koo posted:

Practical guide: So the Dead King just welcomed Catherine into the club of small g gods.

That was a great chapter. And the darkest and bleakest one in awhile. That bit with Akua at the end? Brr!

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Fajita Queen
Jun 21, 2012

Akua continues to be the best non-Heirarch character in the story, goddamn.

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