HoratioVonBecker
Imperfectly Aligned
[X] Strife Without End
[X] Full Throttle
I want to see the Armament Advancements. Let's do this.
[X] Full Throttle
I want to see the Armament Advancements. Let's do this.
A Simple Transaction I
- Thread starter Rihaku
- Start date
- Original
- Location
- Peterborough, NH, USA
I would appreciate it as well. The 'More omnipotent than you, even if that's logically impossible.' gist I've gotten is tripping me up whenever I try and make a character comparable to a High Cursebearer, probably because of the 'Able to accomplish things beyond human comprehension.' thing. You know, for obvious reasons.
- Location
- Europe
I think of it as Dies Irae Taikyoku, where taikyoku is analogous to an ISH value. Where a high cursebearer is basically Hajun, and the Accursed is to a Cursebearer what Hajun is to an ant without even a single mote of Taikyoku. It's not perfect, because the settings don't quite sync up, but the principle is similar. There is no true omnipotence, just ever higher heights.
Zampano
🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈
- Location
- Simping for DSB
In my mind, there's no narrative around High Cursebearers. They can appear in narratives, but the entire conceit of the Accursed is that some conflicts occur outside the realm of human understanding. Like, not lovecfaftian "things man wasn't meant to know" but rather conflicts where the partisans and means of violence occur in ways that humans wouldn't recognize or perceive.
Horatio's "comeuppance quest" comes the closest to putting a narrative on the High CB tier, but it would necessarily have involved flattening \ translating the perceptions of a decidedly non physical and atemporal protagonist.
Writing a story about a high CB is like writing a story where the protagonist is gravity. Or a solar flare. A High CB is more like a plot device, or a natural disaster: set dressing, instead of character
Horatio's "comeuppance quest" comes the closest to putting a narrative on the High CB tier, but it would necessarily have involved flattening \ translating the perceptions of a decidedly non physical and atemporal protagonist.
Writing a story about a high CB is like writing a story where the protagonist is gravity. Or a solar flare. A High CB is more like a plot device, or a natural disaster: set dressing, instead of character
OctarineShrike
Avatar of Mandos
[x]Barricade of Myth
[x]Full Throttle
Edit: Looks like buffing Aobaru didn't get the necessary momentum.
[x]Full Throttle
Edit: Looks like buffing Aobaru didn't get the necessary momentum.
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- Location
- Europe
Of course it will, they have a similar ISH value! That's how it works by definition!
Zampano
🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈
- Location
- Simping for DSB
Right now Mythology Halo seems to be measuring at an ISH value that is strictly higher than HtQ, going by the vote tally. Dk is pointing out that the thread's ability to detect & respond to ISH levels is pretty whack.
November Sky was an objectively higher ISH than Seal of Ruin, imo. (Still not totally sure how that's the option that won the vote.) 🧂
((I missed being salty about votes! The haze of apathy has been pretty heavy for me this last month.))
- Location
- a place
It was quite literally off the back of Rihaku showing us a blurb about Hunger's soul evocation, that had been hinted at since the Temple arc, and I assume the hype off that just carried it without a thought to what would be best in the situation.
Also, in fairness, I don't think people realized exactly what the shape of our conflcit would look like and probably underestimated Dien's reach or overestimated our ability to find + kill him at that point.
Still.
I really wish we got November Sky.
Though, had their been a advancement in there I felt could provide any help for getting to Dien, I probably would have been lamenting that pick instead.
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Man if we had NS we would just take SitS+HtQ right now. Rip in pepperoni.
Anyway, current winning options are Praxis, Gisena and Nova.
Gisena + Praxis: We could get a lot of value out of CtF here. Combine Gisena and Adorie(for Rank 10) or Letrizia(for Sharpbright) in order to accelerate her research. Combine Gisena and Hunger so we can marry Hunger's sheer power and Gisena's Graces. We could also do something like combining Gisena and Arcanist.
Praxis + Nova: This is pretty much Regalia of Strife vote. Outside of Regalia, since we are getting CtF, maybe we could get some Nova specific Advancement and then fuse with Nova.
Nova + Gisena: Try to find a way to have Gisena super upgrade Nova I guess. Or have Gisena go full greed while we and Nova fight of Dien
We were offered Broken Kaleidoscope.Though, had their been a advancement in there I felt could provide any help for getting to Dien, I probably would have been lamenting that pick instead.
Anyway, current winning options are Praxis, Gisena and Nova.
Gisena + Praxis: We could get a lot of value out of CtF here. Combine Gisena and Adorie(for Rank 10) or Letrizia(for Sharpbright) in order to accelerate her research. Combine Gisena and Hunger so we can marry Hunger's sheer power and Gisena's Graces. We could also do something like combining Gisena and Arcanist.
Praxis + Nova: This is pretty much Regalia of Strife vote. Outside of Regalia, since we are getting CtF, maybe we could get some Nova specific Advancement and then fuse with Nova.
Nova + Gisena: Try to find a way to have Gisena super upgrade Nova I guess. Or have Gisena go full greed while we and Nova fight of Dien
Fanwork##6606 Words
Reaction: "Twilight of the Gods"
Well, the title also has the color scheme of the Evening Sky, so maybe it's about something that might happen in the Realm of Evening during the upcoming proc? I'm not saying some sort of disaster is waiting for us in our private Realm, as it would take some very strange circumstances for someone to overpower Hunger there, but the Realm of Evening clearly isn't newly created, more akin to something we've inherited thanks to our Cloak.
Given the malleability of the Realm and its production of ambrosia, it wouldn't surprise me in the least if it was ruled by gods once upon a time. Perhaps they were killed off by the Foremost and the Realm was left unattended afterwards, or maybe it's the other way around and they were allies of the Foremost, killed off by a third party that had eliminated the Foremost.
Of course the title doesn't have to be taken literally. The Twilight of the Gods in the general sense was about the end of an age, and I would say what happens right now qualifies. Till now the Armaments reigned supreme on the theater of war, but as Letrizia mentions later, that's no longer the case. They haven't been rendered irrelevant, naturally, as they can supposedly grow beyond their original parameters in certain circumstances, but they're not the sole deciding factor of victory anymore. Heh, and one of major actors presiding over the new Age is even the bearer of a Ring-
Oh. Oh damn. I'd nearly forgotten it with everything that happened lately, but isn't there at least one other Ringbearer present in the Human Sphere? Asterios or some such? Huh, didn't think I would remember his name so clearly, but apparently he made an impression.
Anyway, back then it said that he would need a lot of help from Apocrypha to make a breakthrough, so we thought we were temporarily safe without Apocryphal's direct intervention, but what if a Foremost Shard got involved? Our Ring is neither Ascended nor Ruling, so in theory we're vulnerable to another Ringbearer contesting our primacy. It wouldn't be so bad in normal circumstances, but I'm not sure we can afford the distraction in these times of conflict.
I can see Apocrypha gathering her power while we're off training in the Realm of Evening and springing something like this on us soon afterwards. She doesn't like repeating herself, but putting a new twist on old ideas is right up her alley. Damn it, as if we needed more complications...
The voterbase is probably going to drown in salt if something as silly as forgetting to complete the Ring trips us up despite giving our other Artifacts a boatload of EFBs.
Does Dien seriously think we can recognize a trap if it isn't shoved in our faces? Maybe the vague possibility was brought up once or twice, but never taken seriously by the vast majority of the voters. I'm pretty sure Once United won for reasons that are completely unrelated to us recognizing that Dien was planning to bait us.
Though I'm curious if he was just wasting our time or if there was something greater in the works. From what happened in this chapter, it doesn't seem like he had something that could truly threaten Hunger, but I suppose simply drawing things out while he Progressed was a good enough plan of action.
He even seems secure enough in his victory to tempt fate! What can they accomplish together indeed. Just because Apocryphal is on his side doesn't mean he can taunt Murphy like that, right? Just wait till we learn Closing the Fist, then he'll see!
Hmm, actually, what can the Surgeon do aside from outgrowing Hunger through stats and Rank? It's still difficult to gauge the limits and intentions of the Foremost Shard, but now that we've had a number of Dien interludes maybe we can try to anticipate some of his advancement paths?
He's a Hero, but he's also a scientist. And trying the same methodology repeatedly when it has shown itself to be less than effective isn't the sign of an intelligent man. Whether Dien likes it or not, direct combat is Hunger's specialty and something our bad boy excels at. So would Dien try to outdo Hunger where the Cursebearer is superior, or would he attempt to strike at a weakness?
Our Companions present an obvious one, but they're fairly well-protected. He can annoy us by targeting the Republic populace, but that doesn't go to the root of the problem. Besides, Dien doesn't seem like someone who would enjoy defeating Hunger in such a way. To turn the earlier thought around, he's a scientist, but at his base he's a Hero, enjoying a challenge to an extent that would be past the point of insanity in most humans. He's not a Steward and might disdain subtle methods that completely rely on breaking Hunger's will to fight. He's not above using the psychological weakness, but it won't be his focus.
I think right now the best way to defeat Hunger is fighting him in a sufficiently different metaphysical context. We have a number of abilities that function everywhere, like the Praxis and the Blade-derived powers, but the rest of our abilities are still dependent on Rank to a large extent. Augustine has shown the effectiveness of such a tactic, after all. And while Apocrypha might not like repeating herself, that's not a hard and fast rule.
So my idea of how the final fight could go: he would establish a field where most of our Artifacts don't function, cut us off from our allies somehow, and besiege us with an army that would drain our Praxis endurance. There are still too many points of failure in this plan, like Hunger learning Refinement of Place or Cold Light of Vengeance, but perhaps he'll have a solution for that too.
Or maybe the context will be even more unsuited for our usual methods of fighting, like a mental battle? Well, not a mental battle, because against a Cursebearer that sounds like an elaborate form of suicide, but it could be something like the Realm of Forms or another place where he would have an experience advantage over Hunger.
Also, wow, he pretty much hit the nail on its head with his prediction. I guess Closing the Fist isn't that much of a surprise for a Foremost Shard like him? Maybe from his point of view using allies to empower yourself is completely natural... or perhaps he's even familiar with the Exalted Battle Array technique and its derivatives? I thought 'ancient when the dust of stars was still young' was referring to the Exalted verse where the Accursed came from, but it's possible the Foremost knew some variant of the Charm too.
Hmm, Dien talks about it being a dark mirror to his own ascent, whereby he could simply be talking about his growth through feeding on the findross of his subordinates, but he could also mean literal plans to merge together with all his minions into a giant biorobot. Probably a non-continuous existence to avoid being instantly ganked by Hunger's Artful Thorn, but he has already shown an ability to work around that. I'll admit that the idea of fighting a galaxy-sized Surgeon sounds really cool, even if the requirements would be fairly horrifying.
I was gathering steam and preparing objections to the idea that Hunger is always cutting through... but then I considered the course of our adventures and the choices Hunger made. Not in terms of tactics, but the broad strokes, the overall strategy.
And I was kind of surprised to find out that this is a not entirely inaccurate assessment on Dien's part. From an outside point of view it might truly appear like Hunger has some sort of preternatural intuition for striking at the enemies' weak points, advancing when he is strong and retreating when he is weak.
The Temple and the Rotbeast proc showcased it best, examples of an almost optimal speedrun that in the course of less than a month propelled us to heights which should have taken us years, but during the Nilfel arc he almost immediately made a beeline for the Tower and the Princess, the keys to the whole scenario. He made some mistakes here and there, and Augustine/Procyon would have made him pay dearly for it if it wasn't for his Companions, but on the whole he appears to make optimal decisions more often than not.
Now we know that we're nowhere near as good as his successes might make us seem and that a boatload of Arete and Patreon support played a heavy role, but to an in-universe observer Hunger would have looked extremely competent even before getting 50 +s to Wis. Also extremely reckless, but for him risk and success go hand in hand.
So yeah, the other Foremost Shards might be getting a similar impression of Hunger, in which case future negotiations with them could prove quite amusing...
It would have been more impressive if this was some planned move on our part, but I'll take what victories I can get! Trying to play Xanatos Speed Chess against the Surgeon and other intelligent enemies might be a lost cause, but with enough Arete and Advancements even the most stupid decisions can look like a stroke of genius! Truly pay-to-win is the most superior strategy of them all.
Dien makes it really hard to dislike him, and I have to constantly remind myself that has caused humanity and Hunger no small amount of grief. He's like... anti-Summer. Where the Fate was an asshole of epic proportions and a sore loser, Dien is almost graceful in his defeat. He reminds me a bit of Zang Kong, truth to be told, especially as he was during his last confrontation with Nameless. They're even both fans of exponential scaling!
He's probably an extremely dangerous person for Hunger to Imprison in his soul, as Hunger might come to empathize with Dien and thus become more easily affected by Dien's ideas. And we've seen just where these ideas lead, hundreds of star systems subsumed and sacrificed on the pyre of Dien's ascension. I would like to say that this would make them irreconcilable enemies, but it takes just one misstep to start the downslide on a slippery slope.
He had mentioned encountering and extinguishing other Foremost Shards in Dueling Wits, but did we ever ask ourselves what he did with the remains? However weak they were, their potential was still immense, and in that context a phrase like 'all caste was flesh' sounds quite worrying. Let's hope he hasn't decided to create some insane Foremost chimera to counter Hunger.
You know, it seems like the power disparity with Hunger, Gisena and Adorie hit the kids even harder than I thought. We've seen Aeira's musings on this topic last chapter, where she expounded on how her own empowerment was more a matter of circumstance than her own efforts, Aobaru's inferiority complex couldn't be more obvious if he stamped it across his forehead, and now even Letrizia complains that she has become a team mascot!
Which, to be fair, is not an entirely inaccurate assessment, but at least she has her own Armament! Aobaru has to content himself with borrowing Hunger's and Aeira doesn't even have that much. But I guess going from top of the food chain to second stringer can be more upsetting than not having had that power in the first place. Aobaru and Aeira were some of the best Elementalists, but they still knew that there were realms of power above their own, whereas Letrizia grew up convinced that piloting Armaments were the upper ceiling of what was achievable by humanity.
Only to have Hunger come and shatter that delusion within a few months.
I wonder how the other pilots feel about the Anomaly and the Foremost Shards. Do they feels as confused about it as Letrizia does, or do they futilely try to deny the reality before their eyes? People can be quite good at refusing to admit the truth even in the face of overwhelming evidence, especially when their all their prior experience contradicts it.
Well, the Republican Armaments are probably too busy trying to save their country to worry about such things, so it's more about the Armaments from the Imperium and the Association. They're far enough removed from the situation that they could deny the validity of any such news.
Heh, I can just imagine some of the more image-conscious pilots making a ME-type announcement. 'Ah, yes, the Praehihr. A middle-aged swordsman allegedly even more powerful than the Armaments. We have dismissed that claim'. Though more likely it will be some high-ranking politician spouting a line like that.
Pfft, the Duchess Distraction and her subsequent reaction to Hunger revealing the pilot's crush is still one of the funniest moments in this story, up there with the Baking Bid when we met Adorie and the Piscine Peril when we were first introduced to the wonders of Fishing. And the SOUP incident, of course, but we don't talk about that.
I'm pretty curious just how the different Armament pilots handle their fame. Are most of them like Letrizia, treating it as an occupational hazard and an unimportant consequence of their position, or do they enjoy the glory that comes with such a unique status? Are there many Armament pilots that use their Implements for base gain? It's obvious how things stand in the Empire - they're nobles there - but do they fit into the Republic and the Association?
I suppose it matters little right now and will matter even less should the Surgeon win and drown the world in a green tide, but Hunger will have to decide the treatment of Armament pilots and their position in society once he takes over.
Good food? The King Fish was a good example of what Hunger considers acceptable fare, and things only got better from there - as long as Gisena was kept away from the kitchen, of course.
Astral research? Hunger is an example of a whole new field of magic that manipulates Pressure in novel and unusual ways, plus he gave her the Sharpbright Element, which is basically 'Pressure control on steroids'.
Ancient Terran media? Hunger is a living and breathing human from a dimensional alternate of old Terra. Even if he suffers from major memory loss and has some holes in his knowledge, he is still one of the most authentic examples of someone from that age she is likely to ever meet.
You know, in light of that I once again have to wonder just how 'random' our arrival in this world was and how much influence the Accursed had over it. I don't think he would directly alter our destination, since that runs counter to the idea of Mitigating the Curses by offloading them onto Cursebearers, but immediately meeting Letrizia and Verschlengorge at their weakest is a bit too much of a serendipitous encounter.
And Seram back in AST0 landed near the village where the Alvysh sisters were waiting to be saved... and who we abandoned soon after, to my everlasting regret. More than that, all the power systems relied heavily on findross, which the Metaphysical domain of Amplitude could easily manipulate... and which we also abandoned in favor of telekinesis and pyromancy. God, we really screwed up with that one.
Anyway, there might be something to that one theory about the first Geas world being a sort of 'tutorial' after all? Seram might have screwed some things up, but we can't say we weren't given some major advantages. Hunger is in the same boat, including his arrival near a plot-relevant character and his knowledge of Accretion, which might be the equivalent of modern-age technology when compared to the stone-age tools most locals use.
We can't truly be sure this is the case unless we start a third Cursebearer quest, but maybe the courtesy extends to the second Geas world as well, so we'll have to thoroughly check where we land once we leave this world.
But is that actually the case, or is it her bias showing? I reckon that the longer lifespan thing wouldn't matter as much for younger artists. Maybe it's a matter of her not doing that much research and mostly being exposed to certain types of media due to her position?
I suppose this is something else about Hunger that would have captured her attention. I'm not talking about having taken a hit to his longevity, though he had lost the vigor of his youth prematurely too. He's functionally immortal, but due to Apocryphal he lives his every day as if it were his last. He can never rest, never stop, never give even an inch, lest the Curse takes advantage of his lapse and strikes him where it hurts the most.
Anyway, I didn't really think that having her lifespan extended and being relieved of responsibility would have affected Letrizia so significantly, though it should have been obvious in retrospect. I thought she would be happy about getting to live longer, of course, but it seems her feelings on the matter are quite ambivalent, since her the prior purpose of her existence (being a pilot) has been rendered irrelevant.
She has lived her whole life knowing that it won't be all that long and that she will spend it fighting threats to the Empire. Suddenly going from that to being free to do anything she wants must have been jarring.
It seems we have been slacking in our pupil's training. Prepare yourself, Aobaru. The time has come to prove you have what it takes to become the Hero of the Voyaging Realm!
Personally I feel like the kids are overreacting to the power disparity. Yes, they're lagging behind somewhat, but they're still Hunger's Companions and can contribute in their own ways. Aeira is a stealth specialist that fills an important hole in our build (much as I would have liked to get Shadowlord instead), Aobaru is a Hero that is bound to get that neat Legendary Template sooner or later, and while it seems Verschlengorge is lagging behind too much, I distinctly remember being told by Rihaku that Praehihr-bound Armaments can grow to match them without much issue.
Gisena's promise to resurrect Letrizia's father reminds me how much of a headache the ability was in AST0. A very useful headache, but annoying nonetheless. Resurrection in almost always a limited resource, so we'll have to decide who gets a second chance and who doesn't. Probably not individually, but just arguing about our overall approach to such Graces is going to be exhausting. Thankfully neither Hunger nor Gisena are the self-sacrificing types unless suicidal charges are an option, so I think they'll handle such abilities responsibly.
This reminds me a bit of our problems with Seram and Nameless. Truly Hunger has spoiled us with his nigh-endless stores of Willpower and his willingness to train so hard the universe gives way. It's a bit strange that Letrizia feels so relaxed about completely entrusting her safety to Hunger and Gisena, since she has seen them both strain against their limits during Apocryphal procs and her involvement was critical in the battle against Procyon not long ago. She can't truly believe they will be successful each time without fail, can she?
The part about augmented Astrals is worrying. Like, we already knew that Dien's biological manipulation isn't just limited to the physical realm, but this means that his resource base isn't constrained to the Republic and that he can shape monstrosities from the Astrals too. I also remember Rihaku saying something about Accretion being a relatively easy path to producing findross, so the Surgeon might have ways of generating it other than the Feeder Suns... and we would have no idea about because we have no way to keep tabs on the Astral Realm.
I don't think Letrizia is being fair to herself. While her greatest contribution to date has been as a cute thrown weapon, I believe that she'll come into her own as long as she continues to follow Hunger. Verschlengorge can improve, as can her control over Sharpbright, and it probably won't cost us that much Arete in comparison to the benefits we could gain. Her first relationship EFB SJUC also offers substantial benefits, so I don't doubt we'll try to see what is gated behind her second relationship stage sooner or later.
Still, that's all in the future, so I can see how she could be upset at her relative weakness and 'uselessness'. Not much we can do there other than show support and help her find her own niche. As I mentioned previously, she doesn't have to show her worth on the battlefield, research capabilities can be equally important, as shown by our latest enemy. Since her Element is so well-suited to manipulating Pressure and she likes researching the Astral Realm so much, maybe she could look into better ways for Hunger to improve his Astral Rank? It's getting increasingly harder to do so as our Rank climbs ever higher, but perhaps she could provide new insights into the matter.
Man, how much worse will things get for them once we acquire the Regalia of Strife? Right now they're still somewhat protected by their Rank, but Letrizia is already showing signs of being affected. I don't want our kids to become fanatics or develop suicidal tendencies because of getting addicted to watching Hunger fight!
It's a bit funny how she takes Hunger's ridiculous Progression for granted by now. Why, of course he has grown immeasurably stronger while they were away! Hmm, what were the Advancements he got since they parted ways? The (improved) Exalted Battle Array, the Refinement of Purpose and the Imperial Praxis, the Seal of Ruin (though it has been somewhat useless till now), the Orb Feat and the Breaker of Suns, which was later upgraded by Supreme Commander, the Attainment of Quickness, the Refinement of War...
The Patrons truly spoil us, since most of those are the results of Wishes. But from an in-universe PoV he is advancing even faster than he did in the Voyaging Realm. I wonder what the Watsonian explanation will be once we can't sustain that sort of pace anymore. Burnout? An increased difficulty of Progression past a certain point? A lack of external pressure to spur Hunger onward? I'm tipping on burnout as the most realistic explanation, because getting that many Praxis techniques in so short a time just feels unreal.
In such a scenario Letrizia becoming our enemy would have been almost inevitable, either because a detachment of Armaments would have been dispatched to deal with the upstart king, or because we would have emerged from the Voyaging Realm to subjugate the Human Sphere.
I considered the chances of encountering friendly Republican forces first, but I don't think Hunger would have gotten along well with their Kill-Teams, so a situation where they would have hired us to chase down Letrizia sounds highly unlikely unless Apocryphal got involved. Which she might have just for kicks...
But not every Cursebearer is as talented as Hunger! While he's nowhere near the top, like those crazy guys that take the Doom of the Culling for fun or the Combat-types that reach High Cursebearer, he's still incredibly gifted by the standards of the 'average' Cursebearers, if there's such a thing. And I don't think this is the standard the Foremost held the Praehihr to when they coined their terms.
By the way, Letrizia uses terminology related to her Element in the last sentence, and I doubt it's unintentional. I remember that the Element's description said that it can be applied to anything described as 'sharp' and 'bright', metaphorical descriptions included? Perhaps Letrizia isn't quite as unmotivated at training as she pretends to be and is trying to broaden her magics' range of effects in what ways she can, by expressing as many things as possible in its terms?
I'll admit this paragraph was one of the reasons why I chose to vote for getting in the robot later on. If this is how strong Hunger is on his own, how much better would he be at the helm of an Armament? There might be some incompatibility issues due to the Armament specializing in long-range combat, but I don't think those are difficult to overcome for a Progression-type. At the end of the day Novakhron is Hunger's Armament, made by his own magics and meant for him above all others.
I refuse to believe that we'll complete the whole Geas task without getting in the robot even once!
He hasn't let up since then and has demanded the uttermost effort from himself, which had admittedly culminated in stuff like charging at an Armament with very small chances of victory. Still, if there is anything I would like Letrizia to learn from Hunger, it's that it's never over till she says so. The Accursed believes that one can always find a way, and that the Praxis and the Cursebearer system exist is proof that he also wants other to try as well, even if things look hopeless.
Another lesson in how much more important the appearance of invincibility can sometimes be than having an actual advantage? Hunger is a big fan of Age & Treachery, so plans such as these are common for him.
It's a bit weird that he only sent Astral entities against Hunger's team and no Heroes. One would think that Dien would want to show off his Caste's power given the chance, rather than send random monster tides at us. Are there none strong enough to challenge the Cursebearer yet?
And yeah, it's not like we had some grand and elaborate scheme beyond 'reunite with our friends and grind in the RoE'. You know, I'm getting the feeling that Dien has some strange misunderstandings about us...
And it's curious that he continues to refer to Hunger as a Tyrant. The first time it might have been a metaphor, but I'm starting to suspect that there's more to it than that. I don't think the Tyrant's Doom is all that special in the larger context of the Rihakuverse, but we know that the Foremost are likely to have possessed some connection to the Accursed and his Cursebearers in order to get access to the Royal Praxis and Curses en masse.
So... perhaps they were conquered by a specific Cursebearer bearing the Tyrant's Doom, who taught them the Royal Praxis and how to build Armaments afterwards? And to Dien Hunger is just another Tyrannic Cursebearer.
One would think that someone important like that would have left traces behind in this world's history. It's almost as if someone had... erased them, like they did the Foremost and findross.
I'm not certain whether Etrynome will be buffed enough to pose a serious challenge to Hunger, but even if she won't, Catherine can also be a problem in other ways.
1. Psychological warfare.
You can bet that Apocryphal will reveal her identity in such a way that Hunger will feel conflicted about just killing her. I don't know whether there will be mechanical maluses for dismissing her importance or if there will just be a sympathetic interlude, but she has been an important plot point since the very start of the quest, so I doubt she will go down quietly.
2. Time and action constraints.
We shouldn't forget that unlike everyone else, our Curses aren't sleeping while we're off training. They're gathering power to strike with even greater force once we're back. Decimator won't proc for a while,but I bet Apocrypha is ready to present new challenges, possibly ones that are power-agnostic. I don't know if it will be a Ring war, the other Foremost Shards, or something completely out of the left field, but it's entirely possible that we'll be hit by a distraction and won't be able to completely focus on the fight.
...a bit sad that we might have to kill Catherine, but one ought to look for the silver linings.
I reckon she will be dangerous enough for a 3-pick if not more, one way or another, and I also distinctly remember that when Hunger learned the Exalted Battle Array, the in-universe reason for getting an enhanced version was killing an Armament. It also said that we won't get similar benefits for destroying conventional Armaments again, but if anything counts as an unconventional Armament, it's a Dien-improved Etrynome! So we can look forward to another such boost, though it may cost us some Arete this time.
Reaction: "Twilight of the Gods"
Hmm, I'm a bit confused. The title most likely refers to Ragnarök, and I suppose both Hunger and Dien are godlike enough that applying such terms to them isn't really inappropriate... but it still seems like a somewhat exaggerated description for our current circumstances. It's just one confrontation where Dien fruitlessly throws his creatures at Hunger, so why call it the Twilight of the Gods?
Well, the title also has the color scheme of the Evening Sky, so maybe it's about something that might happen in the Realm of Evening during the upcoming proc? I'm not saying some sort of disaster is waiting for us in our private Realm, as it would take some very strange circumstances for someone to overpower Hunger there, but the Realm of Evening clearly isn't newly created, more akin to something we've inherited thanks to our Cloak.
Given the malleability of the Realm and its production of ambrosia, it wouldn't surprise me in the least if it was ruled by gods once upon a time. Perhaps they were killed off by the Foremost and the Realm was left unattended afterwards, or maybe it's the other way around and they were allies of the Foremost, killed off by a third party that had eliminated the Foremost.
Of course the title doesn't have to be taken literally. The Twilight of the Gods in the general sense was about the end of an age, and I would say what happens right now qualifies. Till now the Armaments reigned supreme on the theater of war, but as Letrizia mentions later, that's no longer the case. They haven't been rendered irrelevant, naturally, as they can supposedly grow beyond their original parameters in certain circumstances, but they're not the sole deciding factor of victory anymore. Heh, and one of major actors presiding over the new Age is even the bearer of a Ring-
Oh. Oh damn. I'd nearly forgotten it with everything that happened lately, but isn't there at least one other Ringbearer present in the Human Sphere? Asterios or some such? Huh, didn't think I would remember his name so clearly, but apparently he made an impression.
Anyway, back then it said that he would need a lot of help from Apocrypha to make a breakthrough, so we thought we were temporarily safe without Apocryphal's direct intervention, but what if a Foremost Shard got involved? Our Ring is neither Ascended nor Ruling, so in theory we're vulnerable to another Ringbearer contesting our primacy. It wouldn't be so bad in normal circumstances, but I'm not sure we can afford the distraction in these times of conflict.
I can see Apocrypha gathering her power while we're off training in the Realm of Evening and springing something like this on us soon afterwards. She doesn't like repeating herself, but putting a new twist on old ideas is right up her alley. Damn it, as if we needed more complications...
The voterbase is probably going to drown in salt if something as silly as forgetting to complete the Ring trips us up despite giving our other Artifacts a boatload of EFBs.
Every time I read these passages, they never fail to amuse me. Especially using the word 'strategy' in relation to Hunger, as if we have some overarching plan we follow rather than vague guidelines that can shift at the most unexpected times.
Does Dien seriously think we can recognize a trap if it isn't shoved in our faces? Maybe the vague possibility was brought up once or twice, but never taken seriously by the vast majority of the voters. I'm pretty sure Once United won for reasons that are completely unrelated to us recognizing that Dien was planning to bait us.
Though I'm curious if he was just wasting our time or if there was something greater in the works. From what happened in this chapter, it doesn't seem like he had something that could truly threaten Hunger, but I suppose simply drawing things out while he Progressed was a good enough plan of action.
He even seems secure enough in his victory to tempt fate! What can they accomplish together indeed. Just because Apocryphal is on his side doesn't mean he can taunt Murphy like that, right? Just wait till we learn Closing the Fist, then he'll see!
Hmm, actually, what can the Surgeon do aside from outgrowing Hunger through stats and Rank? It's still difficult to gauge the limits and intentions of the Foremost Shard, but now that we've had a number of Dien interludes maybe we can try to anticipate some of his advancement paths?
He's a Hero, but he's also a scientist. And trying the same methodology repeatedly when it has shown itself to be less than effective isn't the sign of an intelligent man. Whether Dien likes it or not, direct combat is Hunger's specialty and something our bad boy excels at. So would Dien try to outdo Hunger where the Cursebearer is superior, or would he attempt to strike at a weakness?
Our Companions present an obvious one, but they're fairly well-protected. He can annoy us by targeting the Republic populace, but that doesn't go to the root of the problem. Besides, Dien doesn't seem like someone who would enjoy defeating Hunger in such a way. To turn the earlier thought around, he's a scientist, but at his base he's a Hero, enjoying a challenge to an extent that would be past the point of insanity in most humans. He's not a Steward and might disdain subtle methods that completely rely on breaking Hunger's will to fight. He's not above using the psychological weakness, but it won't be his focus.
I think right now the best way to defeat Hunger is fighting him in a sufficiently different metaphysical context. We have a number of abilities that function everywhere, like the Praxis and the Blade-derived powers, but the rest of our abilities are still dependent on Rank to a large extent. Augustine has shown the effectiveness of such a tactic, after all. And while Apocrypha might not like repeating herself, that's not a hard and fast rule.
So my idea of how the final fight could go: he would establish a field where most of our Artifacts don't function, cut us off from our allies somehow, and besiege us with an army that would drain our Praxis endurance. There are still too many points of failure in this plan, like Hunger learning Refinement of Place or Cold Light of Vengeance, but perhaps he'll have a solution for that too.
Or maybe the context will be even more unsuited for our usual methods of fighting, like a mental battle? Well, not a mental battle, because against a Cursebearer that sounds like an elaborate form of suicide, but it could be something like the Realm of Forms or another place where he would have an experience advantage over Hunger.
Sometimes I wish we could, but the Geas won't let us skip this challenge so easily. Hmm, but that he doesn't realize it is interesting - Gisena had seen the shape of our Tyrant's Doom on first meeting, and she was immeasurably weaker than Dien is right now. Is it the case of the Geas being much more subtle and difficult to detect than the Doom, or that the Hero's abilities don't lend themselves well to it?
Also, wow, he pretty much hit the nail on its head with his prediction. I guess Closing the Fist isn't that much of a surprise for a Foremost Shard like him? Maybe from his point of view using allies to empower yourself is completely natural... or perhaps he's even familiar with the Exalted Battle Array technique and its derivatives? I thought 'ancient when the dust of stars was still young' was referring to the Exalted verse where the Accursed came from, but it's possible the Foremost knew some variant of the Charm too.
Hmm, Dien talks about it being a dark mirror to his own ascent, whereby he could simply be talking about his growth through feeding on the findross of his subordinates, but he could also mean literal plans to merge together with all his minions into a giant biorobot. Probably a non-continuous existence to avoid being instantly ganked by Hunger's Artful Thorn, but he has already shown an ability to work around that. I'll admit that the idea of fighting a galaxy-sized Surgeon sounds really cool, even if the requirements would be fairly horrifying.
Hah, Dien makes it so hard to hate him despite all the war crimes! He has a truly likable personality, never letting a loss get him down and respecting his opponents for besting him where others would resent them. We're also getting Dien interludes more often than any others, so maybe Rihaku relishes writing this character as much as we enjoy reading his inner monologue?
I was gathering steam and preparing objections to the idea that Hunger is always cutting through... but then I considered the course of our adventures and the choices Hunger made. Not in terms of tactics, but the broad strokes, the overall strategy.
And I was kind of surprised to find out that this is a not entirely inaccurate assessment on Dien's part. From an outside point of view it might truly appear like Hunger has some sort of preternatural intuition for striking at the enemies' weak points, advancing when he is strong and retreating when he is weak.
The Temple and the Rotbeast proc showcased it best, examples of an almost optimal speedrun that in the course of less than a month propelled us to heights which should have taken us years, but during the Nilfel arc he almost immediately made a beeline for the Tower and the Princess, the keys to the whole scenario. He made some mistakes here and there, and Augustine/Procyon would have made him pay dearly for it if it wasn't for his Companions, but on the whole he appears to make optimal decisions more often than not.
Now we know that we're nowhere near as good as his successes might make us seem and that a boatload of Arete and Patreon support played a heavy role, but to an in-universe observer Hunger would have looked extremely competent even before getting 50 +s to Wis. Also extremely reckless, but for him risk and success go hand in hand.
So yeah, the other Foremost Shards might be getting a similar impression of Hunger, in which case future negotiations with them could prove quite amusing...
Funnily enough, this is the opposite of Hunger's current strategy. Where Dien prefers to advance in the face of the unknown, Hunger has decided to retreat and regroup. The Surgeon likes to grasp the initiative in his own hands, so perhaps we should have expected an attack after Hunger chose to fall back instead of pushing forward?
It would have been more impressive if this was some planned move on our part, but I'll take what victories I can get! Trying to play Xanatos Speed Chess against the Surgeon and other intelligent enemies might be a lost cause, but with enough Arete and Advancements even the most stupid decisions can look like a stroke of genius! Truly pay-to-win is the most superior strategy of them all.
Yeah, I bet the Makers and the Stewards had their own pithy sayings about the simpleton Heroes. No surprise there that the Surgeon takes some pride in his caste. He's a strong believer in the selection of the fittest, and the orcs exemplify that principle.
Dien makes it really hard to dislike him, and I have to constantly remind myself that has caused humanity and Hunger no small amount of grief. He's like... anti-Summer. Where the Fate was an asshole of epic proportions and a sore loser, Dien is almost graceful in his defeat. He reminds me a bit of Zang Kong, truth to be told, especially as he was during his last confrontation with Nameless. They're even both fans of exponential scaling!
He's probably an extremely dangerous person for Hunger to Imprison in his soul, as Hunger might come to empathize with Dien and thus become more easily affected by Dien's ideas. And we've seen just where these ideas lead, hundreds of star systems subsumed and sacrificed on the pyre of Dien's ascension. I would like to say that this would make them irreconcilable enemies, but it takes just one misstep to start the downslide on a slippery slope.
Huh, I get the feeling that the last sentence was an allusion to something much deeper, not just another boast. Maybe the Surgeon's guiding principle, maybe a reference to his past crimes... but another possibility is that it refers to his future plans.
He had mentioned encountering and extinguishing other Foremost Shards in Dueling Wits, but did we ever ask ourselves what he did with the remains? However weak they were, their potential was still immense, and in that context a phrase like 'all caste was flesh' sounds quite worrying. Let's hope he hasn't decided to create some insane Foremost chimera to counter Hunger.
It has been a while since we've had a Letrizia PoV. Was it the SOUP interlude? Ah, no, we also had a short look into her mind after Hunger's first Praxis training attempt. But it feels like we've had her voice her thoughts more often, possibly because she's quite outspoken and doubles as exposition-girl.
You know, it seems like the power disparity with Hunger, Gisena and Adorie hit the kids even harder than I thought. We've seen Aeira's musings on this topic last chapter, where she expounded on how her own empowerment was more a matter of circumstance than her own efforts, Aobaru's inferiority complex couldn't be more obvious if he stamped it across his forehead, and now even Letrizia complains that she has become a team mascot!
Which, to be fair, is not an entirely inaccurate assessment, but at least she has her own Armament! Aobaru has to content himself with borrowing Hunger's and Aeira doesn't even have that much. But I guess going from top of the food chain to second stringer can be more upsetting than not having had that power in the first place. Aobaru and Aeira were some of the best Elementalists, but they still knew that there were realms of power above their own, whereas Letrizia grew up convinced that piloting Armaments were the upper ceiling of what was achievable by humanity.
Only to have Hunger come and shatter that delusion within a few months.
I wonder how the other pilots feel about the Anomaly and the Foremost Shards. Do they feels as confused about it as Letrizia does, or do they futilely try to deny the reality before their eyes? People can be quite good at refusing to admit the truth even in the face of overwhelming evidence, especially when their all their prior experience contradicts it.
Well, the Republican Armaments are probably too busy trying to save their country to worry about such things, so it's more about the Armaments from the Imperium and the Association. They're far enough removed from the situation that they could deny the validity of any such news.
Heh, I can just imagine some of the more image-conscious pilots making a ME-type announcement. 'Ah, yes, the Praehihr. A middle-aged swordsman allegedly even more powerful than the Armaments. We have dismissed that claim'. Though more likely it will be some high-ranking politician spouting a line like that.
Missing that guy's crush is nothing to be ashamed of, Letrizia! He was only the pilot of an Armament that made all his intentions and weaknesses blindingly obvious, so not noticing a subtle nuance like his romantic feelings for you isn't a mark against you! Really, it could have happened to anyone...
Pfft, the Duchess Distraction and her subsequent reaction to Hunger revealing the pilot's crush is still one of the funniest moments in this story, up there with the Baking Bid when we met Adorie and the Piscine Peril when we were first introduced to the wonders of Fishing. And the SOUP incident, of course, but we don't talk about that.
I'm pretty curious just how the different Armament pilots handle their fame. Are most of them like Letrizia, treating it as an occupational hazard and an unimportant consequence of their position, or do they enjoy the glory that comes with such a unique status? Are there many Armament pilots that use their Implements for base gain? It's obvious how things stand in the Empire - they're nobles there - but do they fit into the Republic and the Association?
I suppose it matters little right now and will matter even less should the Surgeon win and drown the world in a green tide, but Hunger will have to decide the treatment of Armament pilots and their position in society once he takes over.
No wonder she accepted her adoption into Hunger's little family so easily!
Good food? The King Fish was a good example of what Hunger considers acceptable fare, and things only got better from there - as long as Gisena was kept away from the kitchen, of course.
Astral research? Hunger is an example of a whole new field of magic that manipulates Pressure in novel and unusual ways, plus he gave her the Sharpbright Element, which is basically 'Pressure control on steroids'.
Ancient Terran media? Hunger is a living and breathing human from a dimensional alternate of old Terra. Even if he suffers from major memory loss and has some holes in his knowledge, he is still one of the most authentic examples of someone from that age she is likely to ever meet.
You know, in light of that I once again have to wonder just how 'random' our arrival in this world was and how much influence the Accursed had over it. I don't think he would directly alter our destination, since that runs counter to the idea of Mitigating the Curses by offloading them onto Cursebearers, but immediately meeting Letrizia and Verschlengorge at their weakest is a bit too much of a serendipitous encounter.
And Seram back in AST0 landed near the village where the Alvysh sisters were waiting to be saved... and who we abandoned soon after, to my everlasting regret. More than that, all the power systems relied heavily on findross, which the Metaphysical domain of Amplitude could easily manipulate... and which we also abandoned in favor of telekinesis and pyromancy. God, we really screwed up with that one.
Anyway, there might be something to that one theory about the first Geas world being a sort of 'tutorial' after all? Seram might have screwed some things up, but we can't say we weren't given some major advantages. Hunger is in the same boat, including his arrival near a plot-relevant character and his knowledge of Accretion, which might be the equivalent of modern-age technology when compared to the stone-age tools most locals use.
We can't truly be sure this is the case unless we start a third Cursebearer quest, but maybe the courtesy extends to the second Geas world as well, so we'll have to thoroughly check where we land once we leave this world.
This opinion feels almost foreign to me. I can imagine that longer lifespans could lead to doused passions in artists, so people with shorter ones who nonetheless live more fully would naturally resonate with Letrizia due to her circumstances...
But is that actually the case, or is it her bias showing? I reckon that the longer lifespan thing wouldn't matter as much for younger artists. Maybe it's a matter of her not doing that much research and mostly being exposed to certain types of media due to her position?
At least Letrizia is self-aware enough to recognize that she might not have found some deep truth here.
I suppose this is something else about Hunger that would have captured her attention. I'm not talking about having taken a hit to his longevity, though he had lost the vigor of his youth prematurely too. He's functionally immortal, but due to Apocryphal he lives his every day as if it were his last. He can never rest, never stop, never give even an inch, lest the Curse takes advantage of his lapse and strikes him where it hurts the most.
Heh, yes, three-four months is an eternity and a half in Hunger-time. Enough for him to go from 'ten times stronger than the average human' to 'kicks around robot-gods for fun'. Whatever else one may say about Apocrypha, overcoming her challenges successfully makes other tasks look pretty trivial. We barely even notice we have a Geas nowadays, Decimator is something we finish on the side, and the less said about the Tyrant's Doom the better. I almost feel bad for the Doom, truth to be told. Such an inconsiderate Cursebearer we are, that we don't even care about not being able to Mitigate her...
Anyway, I didn't really think that having her lifespan extended and being relieved of responsibility would have affected Letrizia so significantly, though it should have been obvious in retrospect. I thought she would be happy about getting to live longer, of course, but it seems her feelings on the matter are quite ambivalent, since her the prior purpose of her existence (being a pilot) has been rendered irrelevant.
She has lived her whole life knowing that it won't be all that long and that she will spend it fighting threats to the Empire. Suddenly going from that to being free to do anything she wants must have been jarring.
Uh oh, Letrizia calling Aobaru stupid and being jealous of his mad piloting skillz? My tsundere alarms are tingling! No way, our daughter can't start showing an interest in boys, she's too young for that! Even though we had made sure to leave the Shinji expy behind, a betrayal has come from the most unexpected corner.
It seems we have been slacking in our pupil's training. Prepare yourself, Aobaru. The time has come to prove you have what it takes to become the Hero of the Voyaging Realm!
It sounds like Letrizia is growing up. Things were simple before she met Hunger, her role and the trajectory of her destiny clear and easily discernible. Now she has to find other things to occupy her time with. Maybe she'll focus on Astral research? Assuming Apocryphal doesn't accidentally the Astral Realm, of course. Perhaps she could concentrate on improving her cooking skills instead, those will always stay relevant! And I still remember that delicious soup...
Personally I feel like the kids are overreacting to the power disparity. Yes, they're lagging behind somewhat, but they're still Hunger's Companions and can contribute in their own ways. Aeira is a stealth specialist that fills an important hole in our build (much as I would have liked to get Shadowlord instead), Aobaru is a Hero that is bound to get that neat Legendary Template sooner or later, and while it seems Verschlengorge is lagging behind too much, I distinctly remember being told by Rihaku that Praehihr-bound Armaments can grow to match them without much issue.
Yeah, I wouldn't wish that sort of punishment on my worst enemies. It's almost the worst fate imaginable for me, being parasited by some foreign entity and losing my freedom to it, either due to mind-control or direct body puppeteering. I get the feeling that even if we free the Republicans, the consequences of this disaster are going to reverberate into the far future. Will the Foremost become a taboo research topic? Will they create stringent restrictions on bioengineering, perhaps? Well, if Hunger consents to it, that is, and I don't see the bearer of the Ring of Blood agreeing to such limits.
Gisena's promise to resurrect Letrizia's father reminds me how much of a headache the ability was in AST0. A very useful headache, but annoying nonetheless. Resurrection in almost always a limited resource, so we'll have to decide who gets a second chance and who doesn't. Probably not individually, but just arguing about our overall approach to such Graces is going to be exhausting. Thankfully neither Hunger nor Gisena are the self-sacrificing types unless suicidal charges are an option, so I think they'll handle such abilities responsibly.
I understand where she's coming from, truly, but it's still regrettable that she let Hunger's seeming invincibility and Gisena's genius impact her motivation that much. I hope she'll find a reason to improve again soon, because we've invested quite a bit into our Companions and can't afford to carry them forever. Not while they're still targets for Apocrypha, at least.
This reminds me a bit of our problems with Seram and Nameless. Truly Hunger has spoiled us with his nigh-endless stores of Willpower and his willingness to train so hard the universe gives way. It's a bit strange that Letrizia feels so relaxed about completely entrusting her safety to Hunger and Gisena, since she has seen them both strain against their limits during Apocryphal procs and her involvement was critical in the battle against Procyon not long ago. She can't truly believe they will be successful each time without fail, can she?
Ah, the little brother of the Hard Counter? The Galvanic Truss isn't quite as effective as that option promised to be, but it's something at least, and can hopefully be further developed once Gisena has some more time for research in the Realm of Evening. The name reminds me of the Evoker Panoply's Lightning development path from AST0. I'm assuming it's no coincidence, since Gisena also has this Grace? In which case she might not be so much freeing the Republican forces from the Surgeon as taking control herself and using that control to contest Dien's.
The part about augmented Astrals is worrying. Like, we already knew that Dien's biological manipulation isn't just limited to the physical realm, but this means that his resource base isn't constrained to the Republic and that he can shape monstrosities from the Astrals too. I also remember Rihaku saying something about Accretion being a relatively easy path to producing findross, so the Surgeon might have ways of generating it other than the Feeder Suns... and we would have no idea about because we have no way to keep tabs on the Astral Realm.
Huh, that's... she's kind of right there if we look at the currently available effects. Aobaru's ISH bonus to physical stats will always be useful, as will Aeira's strength-scaling stealth shroud and Adorie's Praxis endurance buff. But it should also be noted that they didn't get those abilities until after we put the necessary Arete into their Advancements. Perhaps Letrizia could also give us such a scaling boost if we gave her an FB or an EFB? The Imaginary Element Sharpbright could lend itself well to improving our control over Pressure.
I don't think Letrizia is being fair to herself. While her greatest contribution to date has been as a cute thrown weapon, I believe that she'll come into her own as long as she continues to follow Hunger. Verschlengorge can improve, as can her control over Sharpbright, and it probably won't cost us that much Arete in comparison to the benefits we could gain. Her first relationship EFB SJUC also offers substantial benefits, so I don't doubt we'll try to see what is gated behind her second relationship stage sooner or later.
Still, that's all in the future, so I can see how she could be upset at her relative weakness and 'uselessness'. Not much we can do there other than show support and help her find her own niche. As I mentioned previously, she doesn't have to show her worth on the battlefield, research capabilities can be equally important, as shown by our latest enemy. Since her Element is so well-suited to manipulating Pressure and she likes researching the Astral Realm so much, maybe she could look into better ways for Hunger to improve his Astral Rank? It's getting increasingly harder to do so as our Rank climbs ever higher, but perhaps she could provide new insights into the matter.
Uh, 'terrible sweet death'? 'Beautiful destruction'? We did make sure to rein in our overwhelming Charisma around our Companions, didn't we? Or wait, she's describing Hunger while he's fighting, so he probably released Skyveil's limiters and is using his Charisma full-blast. And we can't only focus it on our enemies, so any allies that witness the battle will be just as affected.
Man, how much worse will things get for them once we acquire the Regalia of Strife? Right now they're still somewhat protected by their Rank, but Letrizia is already showing signs of being affected. I don't want our kids to become fanatics or develop suicidal tendencies because of getting addicted to watching Hunger fight!
It's a bit funny how she takes Hunger's ridiculous Progression for granted by now. Why, of course he has grown immeasurably stronger while they were away! Hmm, what were the Advancements he got since they parted ways? The (improved) Exalted Battle Array, the Refinement of Purpose and the Imperial Praxis, the Seal of Ruin (though it has been somewhat useless till now), the Orb Feat and the Breaker of Suns, which was later upgraded by Supreme Commander, the Attainment of Quickness, the Refinement of War...
The Patrons truly spoil us, since most of those are the results of Wishes. But from an in-universe PoV he is advancing even faster than he did in the Voyaging Realm. I wonder what the Watsonian explanation will be once we can't sustain that sort of pace anymore. Burnout? An increased difficulty of Progression past a certain point? A lack of external pressure to spur Hunger onward? I'm tipping on burnout as the most realistic explanation, because getting that many Praxis techniques in so short a time just feels unreal.
I've already mentioned my doubts about our meeting being a coincidence, but yes, I suppose theoretically she might have escaped the Voyaging Realm on her own if she hadn't met us, and Hunger would have had fewer reasons to enter the Human Sphere so soon, so he might have completely conquered the Voyaging Realm first.
In such a scenario Letrizia becoming our enemy would have been almost inevitable, either because a detachment of Armaments would have been dispatched to deal with the upstart king, or because we would have emerged from the Voyaging Realm to subjugate the Human Sphere.
I considered the chances of encountering friendly Republican forces first, but I don't think Hunger would have gotten along well with their Kill-Teams, so a situation where they would have hired us to chase down Letrizia sounds highly unlikely unless Apocryphal got involved. Which she might have just for kicks...
Hah, I get the feeling we're giving her unreasonable expectations for typical Cursebearer Progression speed, and meeting the only other Cursebearer we personally know (Haeliel) likely wouldn't do anything to fix the impression.
But not every Cursebearer is as talented as Hunger! While he's nowhere near the top, like those crazy guys that take the Doom of the Culling for fun or the Combat-types that reach High Cursebearer, he's still incredibly gifted by the standards of the 'average' Cursebearers, if there's such a thing. And I don't think this is the standard the Foremost held the Praehihr to when they coined their terms.
By the way, Letrizia uses terminology related to her Element in the last sentence, and I doubt it's unintentional. I remember that the Element's description said that it can be applied to anything described as 'sharp' and 'bright', metaphorical descriptions included? Perhaps Letrizia isn't quite as unmotivated at training as she pretends to be and is trying to broaden her magics' range of effects in what ways she can, by expressing as many things as possible in its terms?
I'll admit this paragraph was one of the reasons why I chose to vote for getting in the robot later on. If this is how strong Hunger is on his own, how much better would he be at the helm of an Armament? There might be some incompatibility issues due to the Armament specializing in long-range combat, but I don't think those are difficult to overcome for a Progression-type. At the end of the day Novakhron is Hunger's Armament, made by his own magics and meant for him above all others.
I refuse to believe that we'll complete the whole Geas task without getting in the robot even once!
I don't think Hunger would approve of this sentiment if he knew Letrizia's thoughts. We often accuse him (and thus ourselves) of being reckless and greedy, but no matter what his other flaws are, giving up is not in his dictionary. Even when he was at his lowest, his spirit shattered and all his friends and wife dead, he still fought for his beliefs. Maybe largely by inertia, but it was admirable in its own way. And when the Accursed came to him with the offer, he didn't choose an escape into a comfy life.
He hasn't let up since then and has demanded the uttermost effort from himself, which had admittedly culminated in stuff like charging at an Armament with very small chances of victory. Still, if there is anything I would like Letrizia to learn from Hunger, it's that it's never over till she says so. The Accursed believes that one can always find a way, and that the Praxis and the Cursebearer system exist is proof that he also wants other to try as well, even if things look hopeless.
As expected, Dien couldn't help himself and took the unintentional bait, marshaling his best forces against Hunger. And he lost. I'm not sure whether it's describing an evolution of Artful Thorn or the Power of Ruin here. The latter seems more likely, but it would be nice if Hunger had learned how to apply the Praxis technique to related organisms instead of singular targets during the War Refinement activation.
The fight was actually much closer than I thought, from what I read in the vote update. Refinement of War confers incredible power, but it only lasts an instant, and Hunger was pretty exhausted afterwards. Theoretically Dien might have won if he had staggered his forces, though Hunger & co probably would have still escaped in the worst-case scenario.
Another lesson in how much more important the appearance of invincibility can sometimes be than having an actual advantage? Hunger is a big fan of Age & Treachery, so plans such as these are common for him.
Look who is talking about unfairness, mister 'I'll just convert a few hundred systems into findross generators, no big'! But what a magnificent bastard Dien is, rejoicing at his enemy's superiority. What can I say? A Hero remains one even if he takes up science, crazily obsessed with martial pursuits till the very end.
It's a bit weird that he only sent Astral entities against Hunger's team and no Heroes. One would think that Dien would want to show off his Caste's power given the chance, rather than send random monster tides at us. Are there none strong enough to challenge the Cursebearer yet?
Truth to be told, it would have been a pretty successful feint if we hadn't had this glimpse into Dien's mind. I don't think I would have accepted that this was his best attempt after they suffered such an inglorious defeat! But that might be just me, I'm sometimes too paranoid for my own good.
Su- supplicants?! Hey, if I didn't think that this is just how he views the world rather than anything intentional, I would be pretty insulted on their behalf.
And yeah, it's not like we had some grand and elaborate scheme beyond 'reunite with our friends and grind in the RoE'. You know, I'm getting the feeling that Dien has some strange misunderstandings about us...
Well, it matters if the Tyrant actually cares about the populace? Not that Dien has a way to exploit that, since Hunger wouldn't succumb to hostage-taking tactics.
And it's curious that he continues to refer to Hunger as a Tyrant. The first time it might have been a metaphor, but I'm starting to suspect that there's more to it than that. I don't think the Tyrant's Doom is all that special in the larger context of the Rihakuverse, but we know that the Foremost are likely to have possessed some connection to the Accursed and his Cursebearers in order to get access to the Royal Praxis and Curses en masse.
So... perhaps they were conquered by a specific Cursebearer bearing the Tyrant's Doom, who taught them the Royal Praxis and how to build Armaments afterwards? And to Dien Hunger is just another Tyrannic Cursebearer.
One would think that someone important like that would have left traces behind in this world's history. It's almost as if someone had... erased them, like they did the Foremost and findross.
What a guy. Letrizia could learn a thing or two from him! Not the part about releasing genocidal plagues and turning humans into energy reserves, of course, but divorced from his methods his attitude is quite admirable. So what if Hunger shrugged off the best Dien had to offer like it was nothing? That just means he has to do better next time!
And that means it's finally time for the confrontation that has been in the making since the very beginning. Cursebearer vs. Apocryphal-enhanced Lesser Remittance, who is going to win?
I'm not certain whether Etrynome will be buffed enough to pose a serious challenge to Hunger, but even if she won't, Catherine can also be a problem in other ways.
1. Psychological warfare.
You can bet that Apocryphal will reveal her identity in such a way that Hunger will feel conflicted about just killing her. I don't know whether there will be mechanical maluses for dismissing her importance or if there will just be a sympathetic interlude, but she has been an important plot point since the very start of the quest, so I doubt she will go down quietly.
2. Time and action constraints.
We shouldn't forget that unlike everyone else, our Curses aren't sleeping while we're off training. They're gathering power to strike with even greater force once we're back. Decimator won't proc for a while,but I bet Apocrypha is ready to present new challenges, possibly ones that are power-agnostic. I don't know if it will be a Ring war, the other Foremost Shards, or something completely out of the left field, but it's entirely possible that we'll be hit by a distraction and won't be able to completely focus on the fight.
...a bit sad that we might have to kill Catherine, but one ought to look for the silver linings.
I reckon she will be dangerous enough for a 3-pick if not more, one way or another, and I also distinctly remember that when Hunger learned the Exalted Battle Array, the in-universe reason for getting an enhanced version was killing an Armament. It also said that we won't get similar benefits for destroying conventional Armaments again, but if anything counts as an unconventional Armament, it's a Dien-improved Etrynome! So we can look forward to another such boost, though it may cost us some Arete this time.
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are we sure about that? we have two levels of Geas mitigation unselected, and being able to skip one in some number of Geas tasks might be a valid mitigation strategy, though that would probably force us to leave behind several of our companions if we took it since we'd be spending that mitigation on skipping this Geas rather then bringing allies to the next.
I... honestly don't know? We have some Schrödinger's Geas Mitigation, but we have little idea what exactly it does as of yet. Though even if it were possible to skip his challenge, I would rather Mitigate the Curse into allowing us to take more Companions with us. After all, it's not like things will get much easier in the next world.
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I don't know if it's possible, but if we're talking about mitigating Indenture, then I'd encourage mitigating it so that the Accursed gets to decide where Hunger gets sent and what tasks he has to deal with. That seems like it'd help the Accursed out over time and also give Hunger more reasonable, or if danger is a separate mitigation statistic then at least more useful, tasks.
Not sure how viable it is though.
Not sure how viable it is though.
By the way, this tipped me over to switching:
[X] Strife Without End
[X] Critical Mass
Maybe I'll regret not choosing our Armament, but if Sharkey is so certain we'll want Closing the Fist and SJUC, I'll believe him, and Strife is the only option that gets them from what I understand.
Still not switching away from Gisena though.
[X] Strife Without End
[X] Critical Mass
Maybe I'll regret not choosing our Armament, but if Sharkey is so certain we'll want Closing the Fist and SJUC, I'll believe him, and Strife is the only option that gets them from what I understand.
Still not switching away from Gisena though.
Zampano
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Sharkey says a lot of things.By the way, this tipped me over to switching:
[X] Strife Without End
[X] Critical Mass
Maybe I'll regret not choosing our Armament, but if Sharkey is so certain we'll want Closing the Fist and SJUC, I'll believe him, and Strife is the only option that gets them from what I understand.
Still not switching away from Gisena though.
I think at this point your vote is more likely to result in Regalia of Strife + no Mythology Halo. Its up to you whether a 0-arete boost to her grace creation effort is more valuable than letting Hunger pilot the most powerful implement that exists in this galaxy.
[X] Barricade of Myth
[X] Full Throttle
It would be bad, but not the end of the world. For now I'll just assume that everyone here is acting in good faith.
Regarding Potency, according to my count, this is how our mods look like:
Might: 80% (Uttermost+Inherit the World)
Cha: 90% (Silver of Evening - Uttermost)
All Stats+: 80% (Edeldross+2xCompanions)
So Potency would have a total of 3x80+90=330%. Now, it has 500% min, so if we did something like using SJUC to get +100% to Might and Cha we would have 530%, up to 500%. Also, this obviously makes All Stats+ really nice as we get to double dip on %, so upgrading Edeldross will be very nice.
Also, rereading char shit made me remember this:
Might: 80% (Uttermost+Inherit the World)
Cha: 90% (Silver of Evening - Uttermost)
All Stats+: 80% (Edeldross+2xCompanions)
So Potency would have a total of 3x80+90=330%. Now, it has 500% min, so if we did something like using SJUC to get +100% to Might and Cha we would have 530%, up to 500%. Also, this obviously makes All Stats+ really nice as we get to double dip on %, so upgrading Edeldross will be very nice.
Also, rereading char shit made me remember this:
We have that +1 Defensive Rank. Now, before it used to be completely useless, but now that War Rank counts as normal it might actually be useful! And work well together with Bastion too!
Zampano
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This is a good reminder that Companions of the King is a teamwork bonus:
I'm not sure how likely it is that we will be able to get the full +50% all stats, but Adorie has a very high INT stat, and a partially recovered library of books about the Arcanist's runic alphabet. Hunger + Adorie + Gisena all working together on Grace creation would provide +30% stats. It might be realistic to include Letrizia as a Sharpbright search engine for the library, the way she helped find the correct page in Nilfel. That brings Gisena to +40% stats. Aeira and Aobaru probably can't contribute, but they could work on a project of their own.
So basically, I think there are some tactics that could be written in for the RoE training montage. I'm less sure about tactics for fighting Dien, because the voterbase is highly risk averse when it comes to letting the party do anything besides watch Hunger like anime sidekicks
Tactic 1: Group Research project with Gisena (as above)
Tactic 2: Elementalist Crossfit - The elementalism blurb indicated that the Elementalists are yet to reach the solar system+ range that their magic system could attain. However, Letrizia + Aeira + Aobaru have been Ennobled, they have High-Tier astral Rank, and the Realm of Evening is an effectively infinite (?) backyard where they can cut loose. Aobaru & Aeira are the most likely candidates for this kind of training, but maybe they can peer pressure Letrizia into joining.
What I'm imagining is that focusing on the quantity of output is something that was difficult to do in the Voyaging Realm, because there was always something to hit or break. But the RoE can be configured to have vast empty plains, and might even include the open sky itself. So, conjuring enormous quantities of their imaginary elements shouldn't be risky or destructive. The three teens could each benefit from increasing their output:
- Aobaru is the most obvious: He makes things blow up when they become supersaturated with Vigorflame. If he wants them to blow up faster, he needs to be able to summon more of his element.
- Aeira's element seems like it needs more control, but the prospect of slapping a shadow-cloak around an entire planet would be a huge strategic advantage if the war with Dien ends up dragging on because Gisena can't find him fast enough
- Letrizia's participation is the biggest reach, because "sharp" usually implies surgical precision. But the teens are literally inside the Pillars of Creation, which IRL is a nursery where stars are born. Sharpbright seems like it should excel in such an environment.
Gib +++++Elementalist Power, plz
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Proposal: Hunger should lower the quality of the amazing far and deific relaxing sights and stuff he has the realm give everyone else and say it turned out the realm was running over capacity last time or that it needs to save energy to keep summoning pick-monsters for him, because iirc it was said they were so high they deadened the will for most people.