While I was going to do a different Omake, in the spirit of the competition going on, allow me to present:
Richer Reality: Hunger Edition
In which one of Rihaku's Patreons won the lottery and decided to go full Nameless for the whole Quest. I'll be operating on a few assumptions. One, that it was me, locking in a few of the decisions later on in the Quest. Two, that this would not meaningfully affect the Remittances due to The Accursed being beyond the power of money, and OOC because, say, having Prolessarch as well as Gisena would likely trivialize much of the Quest between their intellects and the latter's experience in various magics, nevermind how utterly the Quest might be changed by Caethlynn being a Remittance. Like, can you imagine how much more powerful that version of the fusion with the maiden would be? Not to mention the possibilities of Hunger having extra instances of TSH on some stuff. Three, Arete generation would be the same because while my constant EFB-ing would lower the tension, it would also bring out even more interesting blurbs and let us see a lot of high-power Enhancements from the beginning, possibly get Rihaku to make more CYOAs due to a very profitable side hustle, not to mention people in other places becoming curious what someone was willing to shell out nearly a thousand dollars for, and I'd probably be willing to commission a bunch of art both for the actual Quest and certain Omakes, given I'd have 'never work again' levels of money. Four, Rihaku started his Patreon at the beginning of this Quest, and not around the time of Red of Sky and Fang. Now, since Picks aren't doubled like Arete, and Three Picks and the like still require specific enemy types, this is less outrageously potent than it might immediately seem from my usual fare. It's still pretty bonkers, of course, just not the insane engine of growth it might be before the Realm of Evening was available for Pick Farming. Let's begin with Evening Sky, the first update to mention Arete.
I'd obviously pick Dead But Dreaming as the first Nameless-tier pick, mostly because I'd be running out of time in that first month and not really have any other options. Presumably I'd have banked the pick to go off on our first EFB, and since it would only have been a handful of days/updates since the story began, it wouldn't have degraded significantly. Thus, Hunger might begin to spec into sleep-related powers in this alternate canon, as he would grow in strength passively via sleep, could not be artificially exhausted or made to sleep, and when he did sleep, he could advance Outer Sorcery with TSH applied to it, not to mention the dream-related reality-warping. Of course, since we're sticking at least somewhat to canon, mostly by necessity at this point, the more relevant bit is how, while Cloak of Evening/Evening Sky is still purchased unchanged, Fell-Handed Stroke is traded for Sword That Was Stolen, as Fell-Handed Stroke/Thousand Cuts will be available later, I suspect this would give more conjunctional Aerie Advancements, and the Beric fight seems to have had more issue with speed than insufficient cutting power. This also leaves 10 Arete available for spending further on thanks to the Wish. Well, 15.6(2.8*2+10 from the Wish)-9=6.6, but the 6.9 gained by Lady of the Lake being doubled would push him back to 20.4, though the Thread would almost definitely vote to burn 4 Arete on Gisena, since one extra Curse cost 2, so one Mitigation Stage on each Curse would logically cost 4, dropping back down to 16.4. Further, it's likely that rather than just saving one option, the thread would feel confident enough to put 1 Arete down on Once and Future I(15.4), Ruling Ring(14.4), and Pillars of Creation(13.4) in Enduring and Fleeting. Just in case of issues with Fell-Handed Stroke and Thousand Cuts showing up later without having the former purchased, the former(12.4) and Azure Moon(11.4) will also be bought into.
I don't expect Sword That Was Stolen to change things enough to prevent Exhausted as opposed to Tired by the ambush from Beric's Idiots, or dramatically reduces the danger of the Mire Wolf, as nothing I've seen makes me think Beric
wouldn't throw that final spiteful attack and unless Outer Sorcery did something, nothing here is sufficient to prevent that from injuring Letrizia as in canon. Of course, with the 4.2 canonical Arete generated doubled, to 8.4, we have 19.8 Arete available, and that changes things in Age And Treachery. Though I'll stick to at least one of the canon choices of Hunt For Healing, Fury. However, while Amaranth Star, and Age And Treachery were the canonical choices, Shard's recent Areteless Temple run has convinced me of the sheer ridiculous power of the Scent of Prey in the longterm, so we'll be buying that instead, with the third Pick going towards an Echo. This also has the benefit of negating a number of ambushes as 'nearest hostile' seems like a pretty simple cheese to have early warning for these things. There would probably be some idea about saving up for an EFB, as the thread would know not the power of, possibly a Ring-related one, given we'd had a glimpse of some of the Advancements we could get from our Panoply(though I don't believe we called it that yet) and doubling 1.1 Arete for 2.2 puts us at 22, a pretty good place to jump off of to get there. Of course, with Scent of Prey, we have 5 Picks to spend on things rather than 2.
Powergang awakens during
Hunter Hunted, to respond to the affront of voting for utility over power so early, and forcing Hunger to enter a bunch of 1 Pick fights on the way to and from the Mire Wolf to sate their own hunger for power. They not only buy the canonical Second Stage(20) and Pristine Star(1 Pick, no Arete), Shine Bright(18, stamina-based healing, doesn't work on Hunger himself, can be used for illumination, scales with Charisma, unlocks Findross research, which I'm sure Gisena will appreciate), Undying Vanguard(11, yep, getting this way earlier, definitely going to be a surprise to them when they suddenly sprout healing factor like a day after meeting Hunger), and Pitiless Maw(4, effectively grants lifesteal in melee combat, healing Hunger equal to damage dealt, and triples Ruin's power, though still in melee) and begin the great rivalry of the two gangs, Savegang and Powergang. Savegang wishes to save up for more Wish-tier stuff, while Powergang wants a bunch of incremental improvements now. There is more nuance, but that's the gist.
I suspect the thread would still be concerned about the chances of Gisena and Letrizia being attacked while Hunger was away, and nothing bought thus far actually improved Hunger's travel speed(well, Undying Vanguard hit him up with a +Agility, but it's not that much at this point, especially when no Amaranth Star means he's actually -Agility compared to canon and his state of Exhausted is worse, though all his healing probably lets him set himself a slightly more ruinous pace since he doesn't have to worry about muscles tearing or anything) relative to canon, so Mire Wolf would be chosen over the Tyrant Beast, seeing as we don't actually get this stuff until we beat it (and whatever other three things justify the other three Picks, presumably on the way to or back). On the bright side, Pitiless Maw would once again carry the day here, as there was already an 80% chance of a perfunctory victory, and now Hunger is hitting about 3 times as hard and absorbing any damage he deals as healing. This would be a case where Pristine Star's ability to heal the user would likely carry the day over Shine Bright, at least in a fight, though Chill of the Grave would likely still be inflicted, if only because Hunger was probably a lot more beaten on by the Wolf in this fight. It's likely that a different set of Advancements would be offered, as we'd have a bit more than the 5 Arete we had during the
Hunter Hunted update. 9.8(2.9*2+4), to be exact. Plus, there'd likely be people who would want to save up for a non-Nameless EFB, both out of a desire to see it in action, and out of simple pride that alternate me was carrying the thread and they wanted to contribute too dammit! It's not exactly completely out of reach, especially with three of them payed down 1 already.
Anyway, I'm not a hundred percent sure if the Chill of the Grave debuff was purely the Mirewolf or if there was some influence from Hunger offing himself with the Forebear's Blade with disturbing lack of hesitation or care. This would make Temple of the False Moon even more attractive, particularly with extra Ruin and Undying Vanguard in hand, and Scent of Prey makes it so Hunger can find Picks where, making the other two routes much less appealing. What's more, people would be concerned about someone trying to steal Verschlengorge(oh the irony), seeing as they'd literally just been attacked the day before. so things proceed roughly as canon up until we actually get to the Temple. During this time, as we hit June, I would buy us Total Eclipse, meaning we'd be benefitting from True Quintessence going into A Moment's Reprieve, particularly with Shine Bright as a Findross-y thing. I wouldn't know what it did, but I would assume it was good, want to know about it and it's lore, and have a faint hope the True Quintessence unlocked by Total Eclipse and Outer Sorcery might synergize. Who knows? Maybe they would, if only in the form of relevant Stats. More imminently important, the continued doubling would take us from canon's 3 going to somewhere between 8 and 9(we hit 11 before spending it either way, so it doesn't really matter, but let's lowball it to 8.1 for the purpose of actually having a hard number to double) which, discounting the +2 Arete from the Temple(which I would assume is not doubled) is 3.1, doubled to 6.2, then add the 2 for 8.2, then add 10 from the Wish, pushing Hunger to 28 at the time.
Given that Undying Vanguard has already been obtained, and Hunger has 6 Picks to work with, I suspect the vote started in A
Moment's Reprieve would go very differently even without the new options available. Assuming it still goes on that long, the additional doubling of 2.4 Arete collected(discounting the 0.5 from the Main Entrance) by
Solitary Moon is more than enough for a 25 Arete Advancement(33.3), though in this case, some immediate power now is probably preferred, since the sheer size of the edifice and Hunger's musings would almost certainly stir thread paranoia, egged on by Rihaku who, in the interest of remotely maintaining the planned arc, would be trying to steer us away from buying an EFB in favor of filling out some holes in our build, additionally pointing out that if we get too strong too fast, we'll be forced to rely on Apocryphal(which is still deactivated at the moment) for Picks, as we have nothing we are capable of training at any real speed, and few magics to train, for that matter. Scent of Prey can't find us a 1 Pick if there aren't any within Hunger's reach.
I suspect this would be where Rihaku begins
acting sus *cough* gaslighting the thread to prevent EFBs from being bought. Partially because it's funny watching us twist ourselves into logical knots over why we should buy all these weaker Advancements instead. Anyway, the plan is divided between those who want to keep stacking Forebear stuff, though there are some murmurs about some of the higher-end stuff having Mental Contamination, which the thread doesn't know much about, those who want to grab more Cloak stuff, opposed because we literally just got an EFB for it, and those who want Ring buffs, opposed because they mostly don't apply to Second Stage. Beargang takes the win, grabbing an Echo, Fall of Night(31.3, an extra third to blade projection damage and 50% more Ruin on them, blade winds cost less, and falls can now be controlled), Form of Rage(26.3, a 2.5th life(as it's conditional) is always welcome), Fell-Handed Stroke, immediately upgraded to Thousand Cuts(19.3, melee attacks inflict cursed wounds, septupled power and speed of FHS, and now it can be used with blade projections, which Fall of Night just upgraded), before the last 3 Picks are burned on Ruinous Valor: Zweihander, to give him his other arm back, behold the power... of two hands!), which I would guess would be called Forebear's Beginning, because of all these basic things he's doing and learning(or rather, relearning) to do via good old-fashioned monster-killing.
See, this is probably where the major divergences really begin. A few days to advance Outer Sorcery(which has TSH and Hunger pretty much not having a choice in sleeping and thus having nothing better to do during that time more or less guarantees at least some 'study' in) and whatever benefits Total Eclipse yielded, on top of having Thousand Cuts already, would change things dramatically, assuming the same options. I think the logic that a) Second stage already gives us a second life and making us stronger is probably going to work out better than a Rage Mode, but it doesn't hurt to have it while not having might mean the end of the Quest, and b) with Letrizia healed, preventing the damage in the first place becomes a lot more viable, though their Loyalty probably isn't high enough to give Letrizia or Gisena a massive amount of extra protection at this point so this is mostly bought so they won't be in too much danger waiting outside, in addition Thousand Cuts and Fall of Night's blade-wind buff added on top of canon Hunger will significantly improve the safety of Aggressive over Conservative investigation of the Temple, at least in regards to the Outer Ring. If Bright Vanquisher added ++Str, ++Agi, +++++Con, then Forebear's Beginning would add +++++Strength, +Agility, +Might, , so this Hunger is about as fast thanks to having Undying Vanguard(discounting lack of Amaranth and septupled striking speed) less durable, but stronger and he hits way, way harder.
I mean, we played fairly Aggressive anyway, and the +10% to Arete and damage might as well be added, right? That turns the time 2 multiplier into an effective 2.2. So instead of going from 2 to 4.25, the 2.25 generated improves to 4.5. That raises 19.3 up to 23.8 as of
War and Wind. Savegang would probably rally to try and prevent this from being splurged when this version of Hunger is badly thrashing any Craven Knights he encounters, aided by Rihaku noting that 30, 40, and 50 Arete Advancements are even better, so I could see a 5 Echo version of Brute Force(2 Echoes of the Forebear) winning, especially with the Arete bonus, but a little spending is still done. First, an Echo(the second), then Slayer Knell(2 Picks, increased effectiveness against enemies of the same type for each enemy slain, working better against stronger enemies, partially memeing about Hunger and fish, but also because the place is apparently crawling with knights, it will also eventually grant an effectiveness buff against pretty much everything, and I strongly suspect Augustine would grant some for the universe-succubus given her proclivity for Foremost Runes, and possibly Dien since they're both Foremost), and Swift as Death(21.8, Second Stage gains 5 Agility +s and a Willpower +, also improved phasing, and while healing the physical body takes a whole day still(assuming Hunger's mass of healing techniques doesn't accelerate it, as while overflow damage is blocked, it never said anything about overflow healing from Pitiless Maw), the Second Stage corpus only needs an hour unmoleted) which leaves Second Stage as our strong form at the moment. Don't get used to it.
However, Vanquish the Pursuers, enabled by Hunger's plethora of Advancements, including Slayer Knell making each successive knight easier to beat and Pitiless Maw healing him for free per attack, would likely have been selected, yielding an additional 2 Picks in the following update. This Hunger presses on, and runs smack into the Tiller Wurm nest. I Am The Danger being at 10% instead of 5 would also be used in favor of Vanquish, as was Second Stage's fast healing multiplying off of Hunger having a lot of recovery options, and they help keep him alive here. The 2.1 obtained as of The
Winnowing Garden would be doubled(ish) to 4.2, rounding down, totaling 26. As you can imagine, the build vote would be fiercely discussed as Savegang and Powergang clashed blades over buying an EFB or not. Most contentious would be the option of sacrificing 2 Arete in favor of a tenth(5 Picks achieved via Scent, 3 from the Wurm/Wurms, and 2 from Vanquish) Pick, when this pace of Arete generation puts a 30 potentially in reach.
Though the battle was hard fought... the end result was determined when people realized they'd only even been offered a single Defining Advancement, and that it was 0 Arete, thus, allowing Savegang and Powergang to achieve a compromise, in part due to internal division on Powergang's part over whether they wanted Once and Future I(power now), Ruling Ring(some power now, some power later via Progression), or Pillars of Creation(bunch of power later, but on a regular basis). Indeed, with an effective 2.2(2.4*2.2=5.28) multiplier, they were sitting at 31.2 as of Cutting Through. Thus, a combination of No(29.2), 2 Echoes(3 and 4), Feat: Apex(+0.2 Rank), Gardener's Hallow(22.2, basically, Ennoble fruit or animal, eat it, gain power, a prep/potential Advancement, be great for Pillars of Creation and his 9 months of downtime/Rulership) Stranglethorn(22.2, since it cost 4 Picks and only 4 Picks, combines with Apex to help get his Rank back up towards canon) to grant Hunger more self-healing and some self-augmentation, and the same for Letrizia and Gisena. Remember that Returning to the Antechamber was selected after this, and with Hunger being heavily wounded. Despite the ridiculous power growth he was experiencing, it is likely that we would want Gisena as backup before actively seeking out anything particularly dangerous after the Tiller Wurm ambush(in this 'verse, it was 2 or more with Slayer Knell and all his healing options saving him, hence him being nearly dead despite his major offensive buff), and Rank is the best way to protect allied units he's got right now, seeing as he's already got Undying Vanguard for them, and he was just supposed to scout anyway. Giving him some non-fight utility would probably also be a concern percolating in the back of people's minds, hence Gardener's.
More prominently, getting Stranglethorn here is a huge change to Hunger's build. It's likely that Vanquish the Pursuers offered some Rank thanks to Aggressive, though the Tiller Wurm(or Wurms if all the fighting riled them up and/or Aggressive screwed us over, having a general buff against the second one would be a lifesaver in that case) did so via Apex, which is obviously chosen here, +20% Rank gain will immediately boost gaining 0.2 Rank from Apex. Not to mention the huge power boost Stranglethorn represents. With Thousand Cuts' septupled speed for it's attacks and the blade wind buff of Fall of Night, Agility being at 80% isn't the problem it would otherwise be, particularly with Second Stage's Agility, and doubled Strength and Constitution are huge game-changers for the remainder of the Temple, not to mention that even at this point, Willpower is important to Hunger. It's why he has Arete instead of Willpower like Seram, after all. Of course, this would probably be enough to knock most of the current area of the Temple out of the running for much of import... unless, of course, Scent of Prey allowed the three options to be combined into one as Hunger will know exactly where to find each of these Boss encounters, with the pair encountering the Dreadbeast on the way to The Magus, with the Knight Legion showing their craven nature and attacking while the trio are drained and injured from previous fights. After all, Undying Vanguard makes Gisena much, much more durable, so the risk to her in any of those fights is dramatically reduced, especially when Hunger can blast away at at least some of them with blade winds before they get close. I am going to assume going back to the Antechamber deactivates I Am The Danger, so Arete production is *fingered air quotes* merely doubled from this point on.
The +0.25 Rank from the Dreadbeast would improve upon Apex even before the +20% from Stranglethorn, and the Ritual Ground update has a gain of 5.75 Arete... but The Magus provides 2 of that, so only 3.75 gets doubled to 7.5. The Knights add another 0.5, of course, for a total of 10, though still not as much of a difference as one might have expected. Still, going from 22.2 Arete to 32.2 as of The
Ritual Ground, and picking Seize the Day over Veterancy getting them 10 Picks(2 from the Knights, 4 from the Dreadbeast, 3 from the Magus for 9, then one more from participation, additional targets can be taken out mid-journey if they no longer provide these benchmarks), if all three fights are gone after, would significantly change the build. I suspect Ruling Ring would be offered as part of a modified Bloodmight, also has the fifth through tenth Echo though. That would raise the price to 20.5(RR is discounted by 1 from prepaid Arete), but that would drop the group to 11.7, with Tenfold Echo saved for later. That's a dramatic empowerment for Hunger, though all this fighting, only possible because Scent of Prey is functioning in a crude manner akin to Decimator's Lens, would likely make him Tired again, if not outright Exhausted, and he'd probably still return with Gisena sleeping the exertion off, as she might have been relatively unscathed from all the fighting, but be unable to keep up with Hunger's ruinous, borderline self-destructive pace without some enhancement, which he would promptly do upon their return. By the time of Coin and Realm, Arete would, thanks to doubling, be back up to 18.2, though without Picks to spend it on. The ++All Stats and ++Progression would also be very useful this early on, though it's interesting to think about how the Azure might react. From potential savior to approaching predator, perhaps. Would be quite something if Inner Ring people realized the Ring was concerned that it might be trading one master for another. A kinder one, almost by default, but still. What's more, Bloodcasting has a fell power when combined with the Gardener's Hallow... the boosted Ennoblement has
synergy with the latter.
Anyway, Hunger repeats his earlier bout of madness, and, in exchange for a guaranteed Complication of becoming Exhausted again(special offer of going into it in Second Stage and being Exhausted, like trading a Pick for 2 Arete in the Vote to follow, as Rihaku's way of balancing things for Hunger's current ridiculous stat growth, as major Stat penalties across the board have multiplicative effects on combat power, and when you don't have a second life as a safety net, well, that would be a lot more effective than wagering a lot of money, yeah? Particularly when you're simultaneously debuffing yourself in a way you can't trivially undo mid-fight. Dyinggang grows strong in these times, though the name is somewhat more ironic), fights the Hunter Trio(+0.5 Arete), the Resident Outriders(+0.5 Arete), and the Knight-Commander(0.25 Rank), possibly buffed in some way by an Inner Ring on alert from. Now he's in possession of 10(pretty much the same as last time) Picks and 25.6 Arete as of Meditations on the Sword. Once again, the canon option is modified, as Thousand Cuts is already purchased, as is Undying Vanguard and Ruinous Valor, Quickening(18.6) is instead purchased early as a means of dramatically improving Hunger's combat stats, mental stats, and healing(Lingering Paralysis is still chosen, as Exhaustion is not available due to prior commitment, the fell power of synergy once again rearing it's head at the temerity to spend 7 Arete right after buying an EFB) all at once, and beginning the path of rapidly obsoleting Second Stage.
For you see, the Quickening Advancement found in
Fending Off was merely a piece of the greater Blood Enhancement package unlocked by Ruling Ring, Quickened Blood, where 4 more Picks are spent on 1 Vigor Itself(++Might, +Charisma in blooded forms) and 3 Fierce Quickenings(++++++Agility, +++Wits in blooded forms), though it does render Second Stage rather useless beyond an absolute last chance. In addition to tripled healing rate for himself and allies(if this alternate version were to decide to bring Gisena along, or possibly all three of his Companions given his much, much greater stats), he has improved Rank(and markedly superior Rank compared to canon) and Stats, which will apply to basically any fight. Gisena, meanwhile has 2 Picks spent on an Evening Gown(11.6, immunizes the Cloak against Nullity, allows Gisena to initiate a Sorcerous breakthrough, presumable aided by Shine Bright) which will make her ultimate wash over Hunger like a strong gust of wind, changing strategies involving the two of them following this.
Throne And
Alter is a win for Savegang, as instead of grabbing an EFB, the 5 picks are used on an Echo, 2 Vigor Itselfs, the Exalted Spirit Advancement(16.6) instead of Fall of Night as in canon, and Blood Rage(14.6, roll twice to activate Form of Rage, if the second roll is needed, Form of Rage is berserk until the enemy that activated it dies or Hunger runs away) allowing another 1.8(0.9 doubled) Arete to be banked, reaching 17.4. Similarly, Sublime Attainment(15.4) is the choice made in Once and Future(1.1 doubled is 2.2, so we'd have 3.1 instead of 2 if that specific section were doubled), allowing Arete to rise to 17.6, and Savegang pushes the now enormously bloated stats even in wraith form for this section of the Temple as reason enough to go for Preparation: Resolve to save 2 Arete. Despite Hunger using the same strategy as in canon, he still takes that True Maiming to his liver because Vanreir can tell Hunger is really strong and reacts accordingly, and possibly because we haven't regenerated from Second Stage yet from deliberately weakening ourselves for Pick-farming, diminishing our Stats a great deal, not to mention having Exhausted up. This leaves Hunger with 9 Picks to spend(4 from Vanreir, 5 from miscellaneous enemies) on stuff in Sky Above Sky.
The Legacy of Vanreir plan is a Savegang victory, as it buys an Echo, Feat: Kinlayer(set Rank to 5 for 4 Picks), and Uttermost, Hunger's strength improves immensely. Still, with Uttermost picked(mostly because people have seen the sheer value Stranglethorn has, very much want to fix the Blade, and want to stack Rank modifiers on due to all of Rank options they've been taking, including this one, though Cut Through's Arete cost is mostly a non-factor, people come to the conclusion that it's a similar situation as Fell-Handed Stroke, where it's a prereq for something much better, as has been the case with a number of things, so, basically everything about Uttermost prompts people to pick it, and with Savegang's backing, it is) in that allows for an additional 12.6 Arete to be saved by the time of
Arisen Again(between Once and Future and Arisen Again, accounting for the 2 spent on Dialogue), or 30.2 total. Yet another victory for Savegang, as they are so intent on saving to 50(not that Rihaku will make it that easy) and they take 5 Echoes of the Forebear and Vacation, pushing them to 30.7. They splurge a little and heal Verschlengorge to 5.25 Rank, getting 2 Picks for their trouble instead of the one, though they still go to the Beseiged Colony for an actual Vacation, ie, curing Conditions.
Now I, quite frankly, can't for the life of me tell whether the Arete or the Reroll, but I'm going to say it's the former based on my extremely dim recollection, meaning the canonical Arete generated was 4.2 as opposed to 5.2, for a total of(since this isn't the Temple) 8.4+28.7(because of Versch) for 37.1, with 6 Picks to spend(as that was chosen instead) in
Impunity because that's the big choke point in this universe. Rihaku successfully gaslights the thread into buying Slice Fate with one Pick(30.1 left) because rerolls and a Sorceress who can into spells unlike Gisena, 4 Echoes, to buff his wraith form stats a little without draining Arete significantly, and Cut Through(5.1) for canon's reasons and because it represents a huge boost to his power. Also because they were under the impression that they can't buy Super Juggernaut Undead Chimera without higher Letrizia +s(which threw more weight behind Slice Fate) and only realized at the last second that wasn't the case by which time the vote had closed, and that, once we did, that it would be much, much better with 10+ Rank, and possibly a couple more undeath representations. Presumably he kills a whole bunch of Primary and even more Elite Rotspawn(spamming blade winds everywhere, presumably) for a bunch more money due to his greater threat riling them up even more, if not whatever comes after a Primary, assuming something does, which is largely useless to him, but allows Letrizia and Gisena to buy up a bunch of top of the line trinkets for their convenience/study, and makes paying off Aeria even easier, which is more of a no-brainer with Undying Vanguard set up. Or maybe he(and the thread) didn't learn their lesson from Vanreir and have him preemptively ghosting himself for a greater challenge, since the point of it was to use a challenge to improve his sword skills.
All Along The Watchtower canonically generated 8.2. Doubled, that would be 16.4, totaling 21.5. As of
Accursed Implement, Hunger has gained 10.5 discounting the +0.5 from the Major Complication of Studying the Blade, though doubled that's 21, Arete in this timeline, putting him back at 43, with Spendgang, as Powergang and Companiongang have Closed The Fist into to overcome Savegang, triumphing and spending 5 Arete to upgrade Letrizia's Element without having to spend the participation bonus on it, while Letrizia's Element is set to the 7 version(38), which is still Sharpbright because they don't really need a bigger hammer right now, they need more Rank and more precision with it, the participation bonus is set to a fourth(ninth) Pick instead. This allows Prime(+0.3 Astral Rank), to be bought alongside 2 Echoes, The King Stands Alone(31), Dreadnought's Bearing: Sharp of Eye(24, 50% Tired, stacking multiplicatively, and 25% Exhaustion resistance, eye regrown, ranged attacks gain acuracy thanks to restored vision, Iron Curtain will no grant permanent benefits on purchase, allowing you to ignore Exotic Attacks via Con check instead of deflecting them) and Pillars of Creation(0). Oh yeah, we're getting it
way early. Given it took 2-3 weeks to get to Nilfel after killing the Rotbeast(well, 1-1.5, but there was a significant span of time spent dealing with the Temple and Be The Change, not to mention all the travel time between the Sovereignty, going back to the Temple, and then heading over to deal with Mizuku, the Rotbeast, and the Crown feat explicitly saying it's been three weeks since he arrived...), and this Hunger hasn't even finished the Temple yet, I feel it safe to assume the group would get to jump into the Realm of Evening for the first time before Vacation ended. I suspect that, since the thread was confident in their powerups thus far, the whole time would be spent upskilling in the Realm of Evening's use and the others learning the very basics of their Elements. This period allows Gisena to tutor Letrizia in Sorceress-ness as best she can. As we all know, Slice Fate allows that, and, well, Hunger certainly isn't going to teach her about that.
Speaking of which, Total Eclipse and True Quintessence finally become useful in Vertiginous Heights as he buys the 7 Arete version of Edelross, as doubling is still active so generating 7 by the next update should be easy. With TE, making Pseudo-Graces via Edelross becomes a thing that
actually happens, since Hunger has real Graces to base them off of, and Edelross and Findross not being the same thing might allow him to simply duplicate any Findross Graces to get doubled benefits. My God, the fell power of money has awakened a power more fell still...
synergy. Oh, by
Scarlet Legion, whereupon he's made 13.9, which is doubled to 27.8, then add 1 because 1 of the generated Arete was consumed by Stay And Train, for 28.8, though that drops down to 21.8 for the 7 version of Edelross. Here is another deviation. Instead of 2 Vigor Itselfs(which we've already maxed out anyway), with Cut Through and Slice Fate, people feel comfortable picking up Philosopher's Wreath(14.8 Arete), which is incredibly fitting considering the circumstances of Scarlet Legion, to boost Edelross(and Sharpbright, Vigorflame, and Shadowcord by proxy) and by extension pseudo-Grace creation via Edelross, which means it will also boost Gisena's later Grace creation and Letrizia in the short-term. Gisena proves a capable advisor here, vicariously living out her own Sorceress fantasies via experimenting with Hunger's Edelross and Graces, while working on making the Devouring Sorceress out of Letrizia and boosting her Graces with refined Edelross as a catalyst. Side note, that will negate her issues with Hunger eating Versch, because a part of him will always be with her, though I suspect it would become relevant long before then. As you can imagine, this makes his choice of Control much, much more effective, though really it would have improved any choice. Gisena might have some issues with Letrizia's nature as a Sorceress being closer to an Orc than a conventional Sorceress.
In Fleeting
Respite, it is confirmed that Scent of Prey works for sparring partners too, allowing 6 Picks to be collected. So an Echo, Sublime Transfusion(12.8, blood transfusions grant healing at triple the doner's rate, with Rank treated as being 7 minimum, or 1 Rank higher than it actually is, ignores species barriers), Vigor Incarnate(10.8, adds Charisma to Protection), and the massive improvement of Edelross was further compounded by purchasing Edelross Adept(8.8), as in canon, which explicitly doubles Edelross Grace creation rates. In canon's
Force of Nature, after Crimson Flare had 1 put down on it, we ended up with 18.7 Arete, and by my calculations, we'd burned 9/10 from the point it was last announced how much we had, meaning we would have produced 37.4 with doubling, 46.2 with what we already had, which would have been enough to snap-buy Crimson Flare then and there(23.2, as Sublime Transfusion discounts it by 2) with 1 burned to unlock Sliver of Evening upon the next Pick point(22.2). Savegang prevails on the others to wait on spending it as Crimson Flare(thanks to Kinslayer setting Rank to 5, this already represents a huge powerup in terms of Rank, not to mention the +2 to Bloodcasting, assuming that Ruling Ring doesn't screw this up somehow. Not sure if the ++Progression for Ring stuff would cancel out any issues the Azure has with the Crimson being the Ruling Ring)... I'm just kidding! Scent of Prey allows single Picks to be farmed pretty much at will, so snap-purchases of EFBs that are 1 Pick is no more of a problem than 0 Pick ones. Gaining 9.3 Arete in canon by A
Wind Full of Knives means 18.6 Arete in this timeline, or 40.8, is more than enough to buy All-Defeating Stance(12.8) and the subsequent 4.4 is within the Temple, and thus... still only receives a 2 multiplier because even if returning to the Antechamber didn't deactivate I Am The Danger, Vacation definitely did, for 8.8+12.8(21.6), whereupon the Hero-Defeating Stance is absorbed.
While currently only one can be deployed alongside All-Defeating, as his base Rank is not sufficient to do otherwise, Hero-Defeating offers a great deal of flexibility, even if it drops him to 14.6 Arete, as with All-Defeating and Crimson Flare alone, he could probably solo the entire council. I suspect that Gondrar, Avecarn, and Selune would be deployed together considering how Hunger was ripping through the place before, but it probably won't matter much when he's got All-Defeating in addition to Crimson Flare. Another 5.6 is harvested to set him back to 25.8 regardless with
Battle's Close, and further still to 28.7 by Provinces, Roused, as while we have 5 Picks(Scent of Prey really is carrying us here, as it lets us sniff out hidden Bosses like Vanreir with ease, and the Voyaging Realm and sub-Realms like the Temple always have some weird stuff hidden somewhere) 3 are spent on What Rains May Come(3 Picks, 0 Arete, allows Hunger to take wounds from allies once a month, and reverses wound penalties, unless dealt by his own hand, which means he gets stronger as you hit him) because Arisen Blood strengthening the Wraith would make Pick farming more difficult, and he's so strong right now that he could probably manage in Wraith form what his canon self did in physical form. Shameless is chosen instead of Vigor Incarnate(we already have that), as Rank is much, much more important to the build than yet more Stats at this point.
Foment Rebellion is still chosen in
Provinces, Roused, but in this case it's a deliberate effort to gather the council together so they're actually worth some Picks, and so Hunger can kill more of the people who've been directly responsible for torturing the Ring, partially to appease Azure, and partially because he suspects they would be targeted by the Apocryphal for revenge like Beric unless he played his cards right. The strategy on that front might change to Hunger having Gisena hang back and deploy Nullity if he's being overwhelmed, which her new dress has immunized the Cloak too, and Hunger by extension as long as it's up. That is deemed unlikely between Crimson and All, though Apocryphal is back in play thanks to the Pillars of Creation proc, so it's not impossible, especially with a bad roll. Between the massive Stat boost and Holy Shit making Foment Rebellion disturbingly easy with all his Charisma, combined with further boosting Edelross, this strategy is the only means to avoid a total curbstomp, and I'm not sure how much that will matter, considering just All-Defeating had a chance to solo the whole Temple, nevermind in conjunction with Crimson Flare. Still, I'm going to cheat a little and say that Holy Shit and Scent of Prey respectively knocked a Pick off of picking Larisse(and may well have let him recruit The Silver Horde and/or Who Walked Away for free) and allowed him to just grab 1 to grab her with. He's being careful here, despite the recklessness of going into the fight in Wraith form, just in case Apocryphal throws a curveball, since, again, I think the extra week from getting Pillars of Creation so early would have reactivated it. I'm not padding wordcount here, Apocryphal is super-nasty, as all Crowning Curses are, and an unreasonable powerup for an enemy is one of it's most basic tricks. With 5 Picks from Scent, an Echo is grabbed, followed by Iron Maelstrom(26.7, +++Protection and ++Might to allies while Hunger remains undefeated, additional unlocks, yet another companion buff is likely to help with pretty much all of the army battles from this point, this one, Rotbeast, Augustine, Dien(remember that one time Gisena freed some of the soldiers and they helped out a little against Dien's monstrosities, and of course it still applies to our normal companions), and the maiden(+++Protection might raise that quarter who didn't become slaves a bit) and Heartpiercer(19.7, Ring can give Hunger pseudo-comabt(or romance) precognition based on capillary movement, granting a major boost to combat/romance against blooded beings, and a minor one against those without(ie, that shadow thing that was going to possess Aerie in the Realm of Evening). As mentioned, this takes the tactically worst of Full Frontal and Scorched Earth, which yields an extra Pick and Arete, rather than just the latter. It also leaves the Temple and Ring in better shape afterward.
Sure, they gang up on him in The
Ultimate Price, but Hunger just bulls through it all. Lucky hits, attacking while he's distracted with gutting another council member, nothing is working. It's so one-sided, that Sten has his mental breakdown anyway as Hunger notes that everything they did was for nothing while slaughtering the other Immortals. Building an entire civilization around the torture and harvesting of the Ring? Meaningless. They at best delayed the inevitable, and at worst, just made the Ring angrier and more inclined to cause horrific things, and now Hunger was taking them apart like toys. Eva going down is much of the reason for it as well. As mentioned in Day of Independence's options, she was much of his Sanity Meter. With an additional doubled 6.7, 13.4 Arete(33.1) and a set of six(thanks to two Immortals who are now corpses and the extra Pick I mentioned) Picks to spend, The Blade is modified due to Hero-Defeating having already been purchased. The Echo of the Forebear Pick goes to Knife(31.1, +0.2 Rank thanks to Uttermost, though since Hunger has both more Rank and more Rank boosters, it's hard to tell what he'd get), but since Fierce Quickening is filled out, Honing(29.1, already filled out Fierce Quickening, the important part is the stat feeder element, half of Wits is added to Int in combat-related scenarios), and Avenger(22.1, If Hunger or his kin are severely wronged by an enemy, double his physicals, and halve the enemy's Luck, Wisdom, and Protection, though the halving can be resisted, and every physical or social attack that lands gains tripled effectiveness, being considered a critical hit. Hunger's outfit and jab at the Maiden would have hurt her a lot worse, nevermind their exchanges of blows, can be upgraded to Blood Price for 21 Arete, but Savegang says we should wait until the end of the fight with Sten and see what saving Azure unlocks) is purchased, to aid in breaking Sten's mind by improving Hunger's ability to fight him while keeping him alive via improved (Combat) Int, alongside the canonical Knife which aids both in that and in direct combat, and, you know, in general.
Once Sten breaks, he's kept alive in a cruel mercy(so Hunger tells the Azure), I suspect Ruling Ring forces Subordination, but as mentioned in other builds, we're going to burn the Azure on the pyre of Archmage later, and between Nullity, Gisena having supergenius even before Renaissance Woman(even if, surprisingly, she's starting to have serious competition from Letrizia here, thanks to Sorceress Graces boosting her stats in general) Sliver of Evening(8.1, discounted by 10 because of Subordination and 1 downpayment Arete, Edelross abilities count as Graces and therefore no longer require upkeep or even coherent structure), augmented by Star of Grace, is bought immediately, with my Wish(18.1 thanks to that +10) spent on Heavenly Tomb, providing a massive Protection boost, massive durability boost for the Cloak in regards to raw health, and dramatic improvement of the Realm of Evening's capture/storage abilities is likely to improve the Archmage extrusion later on, which will likely be of use in attempting to take Augustine alive, which I'm sure Adorie would appreciate, and may well allow the Tower of Earth to be safely eaten alongside rerolls, and also grants the ability to take more precious metals along when the party leaves because HT basically gives Hunger an Inventory, leaving the total as of The
World Your Oyster(obtained 9.8 in canon, doubled to 18.6) at 36.7 Arete, which immediately drops to 29.7 thanks to Inherit The World's canonical purchase, and then another 4 (Temple is running out of even 1 Picks at this point, but the better direction helps with building up to stuff with 1 Picks) Lunar Coronet(22.7, hits Hunger with -Heartlessness in blooded forms, Vassals get +to Mental and Social Stats) and Feat: Mightier(20.7, added 0.39 Rank in canon, though it required a Propaganda action. Luckily Mass Ennoblement counts). Lunar Coronet not only empowers Letrizia and Aeria(the former immediately goes up an effective Rank, and who knows how the effective probability manipulation this grants affects things down the line, though improved Grace creation is probably the minimum bar, I assume the latter's stealth and thievery improve commensurately, it also provides them Protection from Hunger's Charisma thanks to Vigor Itself) as well as Hunger's own Edelross(30% boost->50%), but the proto-Companions of the King via fusion of Edelross and Ennoblement is of benefit to his party and allows rapid Ennoblement of everyone Hunger cares to do so for in the Temple(Vassale number is Rank^2*10, so about 250 currently) to replace the Azure's power, reducing Apocryphal buildup time, which would be a concern thanks to that Evening jaunt from before. Heck, not only is it faster then canon, I'd go so far as to say the new enhancements are at least comparable to the old Azure ones, at least for the vassals. Honestly, giving Gisena the Ring is probably at least partially Gisenagang trying to throw her a bone, since her Element is both not unlocked, and would basically be useless if it was, so she was never going to get an Elementalist Lunar Coronet slot, and Aobaru is not accompanying us currently, nor do we have much reason to think he would.
Rihaku is once again making paranoia-inducing comments, this about a large imminent expenditure. Sure enough,
Threefold Meditations comes up, and 25 Arete is immediately burned(-4.3) on the altar of a) Refinement of Quickness, b) Artful Thorn(as Scent of Prey means we don't need to wait on until later due to lack of Picks, and c) acquiring a new Curse and a subsequent Remittance. That conversation's been done to death, though I wonder if this scenario introduces enough new variables to make it go differently. Perhaps The Accursed is impressed with Hunger for advancing at least ten times as fast as a normal Progression type. Regardless, despite 7 Praxis picks being obtained, with 1 saved, and a new Curse(which is immediately Mitigated a stage by Gisena, so I'm going to say Plenary Brand, as while it's full power would make it impossible to do Treachery, a stage of mitigation makes that possible again, and Aeria's Shadowcord might also help) with a new Remittance(I'd go for TSH myself, given how useful Progression is and how bonkers it would be on Hunger, canon or here, especially if it's on the Praxis, which Rihaku has noted is the only means of improving Praxis Progression, as it exceeds normal Progression, which makes sense considering it's source, if combined with Imperial, well..., and another TSH on two of our extant artifacts(+300% Progression on our whole Panoply would likely translate directly or almost directly into +300% Rank gains, but just the Cloak and Blade would likely be really helpful in that regard still) or just setting them on Accretion and Surgecraft in hopes of the former unlocking more Defining Advancement and Panoply slots, and Rank is presently always useful, not to mention how important all of our Artifacts are, especially the given how important each of them is to our build at this point and in general, and how much we struggled to get proper utility from the Realm of Evening in canon) and Arete reserves at, thanks to the canonical deluge(12.5 from the last spending point, doubled to 25), 20.7. Yeah, probably not going to do much saving next build vote.
Triumphal
Gleam(13.7) is bought as it was in the canon Mists of Quickening, and the remaining 4 Picks are burned on 2 Echoes(hey, speed is important here), Opalescence, and Iridescence(general magic resistance), and Diplomacy drains 2 Arete(11.7), Choice of Import is... mostly unchanged, since Ruling Ring and Azure already being subordinate means a Ring War would be... difficult to pull off with so little credibility. As Apocryphal scales to our increased power, and had a few more days of effective charging time, she tosses in a breakthrough for the buffing Elementalist right as they fall into Rotbeast hands, making this a nasty fight still. Well, she also buffs Beric more, but does anyone really care? Apocalypse Now arrives. A modified Do It All. We don't go into Pick Debt, as we already have Refinement of Quickness, so it's more a matter of getting to Mizuku and the Rotbeast before they do too much damage, made all the more urgent by the latter being stronger than in canon, so getting there right the hell now via Quickness is very important, especially if we want to take the time to offer Mizuku mercy.
Earning 6.7 Arete as of
Eidolon of the Grand Travail means an additional 6.7 from doubling, for a total of 25.1. Offering Mizuku mercy, being more about skill than raw power, but Hunger's got a bunch of mental stats on his canon self, so it shouldn't be too difficult, especially since he's got more options for healing people here, and stronger Bloodcasting. Since no Pick Debt was necessary, and Scent of Prey would trivially resolve that if it were, we have the usual 5 Picks Hunger grabs Tenfold Echo(3 Picks, 0 Arete) and Outer Sky(18.1, merges Evening Sky and Outer Shadow, dramatically improves magic resistance, Outer Shadow's issue with draining mental stats if overused is negated, discounts Outer Darkness), with the last Pick being spent to get Hungry Vim(16.1, +++Agility, +++Wisdom(Combat, cheaper here than later, and as I said, Agility is important here, as canon demonstrated, higher Wisdom offers new tactics). The addition of Tenfold Echo should be enough to deal with the powered up Rotbeast, with Outer Sky being insurance. This Hunger should have enough mental buffs to be about as good or better at planning this shindig.
Endless Tides goes a little differently. While Hunger still opts for Cut Through, having Artful Thorn beforehand makes it slightly less dangerous, even if he's holding it in reserve for the Rotbeast itself. What's more, Letrizia has been working on a Grace to let her focus Verschlengorge's Decimation more precisely, as that's her biggest potential contribution against any of the armies Hunger's been facing recently. With a little help from Sharpbright, she can take out the rear lines of the Rotspawn safely, easing the pressure on the Sovereignty, which is good, because they weren't doing well against the canon Rotbeast, nevermind this further empowered one. Hence Aobaru's father still being dead. Even if he wasn't, Lunar Coronet on Aeria would be enough to convince him he should come along. She jumped a couple levels in like, 3 days. Hunger doesn't really see a reason to say no, since Undying Vanguard and his Ennoblement still have plenty of slots, and another buff can't hurt.
As for the decision in A
Fire Woken, since Silver of Evening is already bought, there is strong consideration to have Hunger instead grab Elixirdross. In addition to making Edelross Graces even better for him by making them permanent like Findross ones, and allowing him to use something that matches rather than mimics Findross, thus allowing to even more thoroughly refute the veil-woman, it also allows him to activate the Fairbright Bloodline, which grants him... lore. Apocryphal will have been Stage 2 Mitigated before much longer, so that part's not really relevant. Not to mention the option of making Letrizia or Aerie into magical girls via Lucenthorne seeking Hunger out. However, we buy Outer Darkness(-3.9, eldritch entities can be communicated with, though their treatment of you depends on relative power levels, -1ISH to all sanity-targeting effects, which would likely count the Beauty-based Mental Contamination of the maiden, since that's some serious cognitohazard shit, +2000% HP instead of 400%, Outer Darkness automatically defends allies within reach, may block that final attack from Dien automatically, which could in turn allow for his capture and having his expertise granted to Hunger and Gisena. Well, the rest of the party too, but mostly them.), the vote modified to include Feat: Reckoner since we didn't go into Pick Debt and Outer Sky is discounting OD(25-7=18). 13.8 Arete doubled is 27.6, so the total increases to 23.7. Given that version of Silver had a discount of 7, I assume Reckoner is a 2 Arete, 2 Pick purchase, pushing it up to a cost of 20 Arete. Cloakgang convinced the thread that OD's anti-insanity defense and boost to companion defenses when fighting alongside them trumped a further boost to Edelross. Aobaru's True Vigorflame drops it to 16.7 Arete.
Core Panoply(while canon has +1 Defining Advancement slot, +2 Panoply slots, +0.3 Rank/0.6 after modifiers, it's an Accretion thing, and would presumably be boosted by TSH, so who knows what it would look like here) is not still selected in
Sovereign Jewel, though in this case being 3/3 Defining Advancements in is making people even more nervous when I could, theoretically, forget about that and try to buy an EFB that costs one of those slots. The extra Rank (as it's getting harder to raise it) and Panoply slots certainly don't hurt it's cause, especially with all this Arete, but people aren't as concerned about that relative to boosting everything, especially since TSH on Accretion. Instead, A Promise Kept(50% positive Apocryphal at all times) is selected, as Apocryphal's scaling has been made more obvious, so people value a positive variant more. With TSH on Accretion(and Praxis and Surgecraft, if those are relevant to getting more slots), getting more Rank, Defining Advancements, and Panoply slots shouldn't be hard. Heck, with A Promise Kept greasing the wheels, Hunger might get them for free. I'm going to say that's what it's burned on, to avoid conflicts in the build with Tears and Seraph's Favor later on.
Huntress Moon is also selected as per canon in Dawn and Thereafter, not the least because of Scent of Prey synergizing with it, as is Opalescent Tower. Similarly, Be The Change, which should be much easier than canon with his improved stats and Ennoblement, which in turn should allow Gisena some more time for Artifice, which in turn should help with the Decimation Lens. In
Realms of Myth, the thread assumes we'll have enough Arete for whatever, because, well, duh. 9.9 Arete are generated in canon, 19.8 here, and 36.5 total. Drops to 24.5 thanks to Crown(it really is a lot of Rank, and again, that's only going to get harder to gain), and 22.5 thanks to Honing. Generally, things proceed as in canon for a bit, such as the purchase of Skyveil in Platinum Expanse, up until I also buy Elixirdross(32.5) at the same time, which changes a few things, not the least of which is the further stat boost. I believe it would only further boost Graces when combined with Silver of Evening, and simply having a 25 Arete version of Edelross, given how Vigorflame eventually turned out, would likely be of immense value in terms of conjunctional Advancements.
As of
Smoke and Miren, canon had gathered 26.1 Arete, counting the 7 used on Skyveil(Vanquisher and Skyveil cancel each other out, and I have no idea how that might affect Opalescent Tower, so the effective resilience Skyveil's Charisma reduction provides and might unlock in regards to Plenary takes priority) back during The
Platinum Expanse and the -2.1 that would have remained after Crown's purchase. So, double 26.1, subtract 7, 45.2, which in turn adds up to 77.7 Arete(maybe we'd unlock some special Luck Advancement). So, I don't think taking on The Princess Herself(75.7) and Shadow Mastery(68.7) will be a problem. With Elixirdross and Gisena, who has experience with making a Sorceress out of Letrizia(who cost nothing due to the Realm of Evening's first proc making it easy to suffuse her, which was part of his initial exercises to do control the place), making Aeria the Threnody Sorceress shouldn't be hard. Let us take the normal cost of a True Element and say her True Shadowcord is 25 Arete, purchased because it provides effective resistance to Plenary Brand. More than enough for that(43.7) even if it doesn't have a discount from Shadow Mastery, as unlocks implies a prereq instead. Funnily enough, Aobaru and Gisena are very much falling behind, moreso the latter since if Shadow Mastery exhorted Aobaru to greater heights, then True Shadowcord with Shadow Mastery would only increase his drive. Presumably in-universe the Opalescent Tower's connection to the Evening Realm and Aeria's connection to it through Shadowcord causes her to become more potent from encountering the Tower, kind of like Chad visiting Hueco Mundo accelerated his Fullbringer powers coming to the fore, with constant exposure to Vigorflame throughout her youth, and later Edelross/Elixirdross and the Cloak, then all three at once, having enhanced her Element. Given Shadow Mastery was enough to let her contribute, especially if it combines with her Threnody Sorceress abilities, she might actually become a relative to peer to Hunger, at least for the moment. Do remember that Lunar Coronet's two-stage enhancement is still in effect where Shadowcord is concerned, so it would be even stronger than a normal 25 Arete Imaginary Element by two stages.
Given a threnody is a poem, song etc. of mourning, I suspect it would be a morale/social-focused set of Graces, becoming as deadly in social combat and emotional manipulation as she is in ambush and assassination, and perhaps stuff like Persona Shadows as manifestations of guilt and grief to screw with their Mental Stability, potentially to the point of trapping them in a Silent Hill situation, or even outright animating one's shadow to act against them. Although since this Hunger has Outer Darkness, I suspect trying that on him would be worse than useless, as at best his mastery of darkness-related stuff would merely make it much less dangerous to him than an ostensible peer opponent ought to be, and at worst, he'd just hijack it, with something similar applying to insanity attacks for similar reasons. Assuming of course that the technique doesn't come with some inherent Willpower debuff relative to the target, since they're shadows rather than full-fledged people from the get go, in which case he'd definitely hijack it. For this reason, the seducer of armies would have some issues using it against him even beyond the fact that it's a combination of Shadowcord and Threnody Sorceress powers. Worst case for her, now she has to fight 2 Hungers, and I'm pretty sure a contest of control over a Hunger of shadow is one she would lose, so she'd probably avoid using it, predicting how trying that Grace or any insanity-related ones would go. I'm not sure if the Daylight Realm can block this sort of ability, seeing as the darkest shadows are caused by the brightest lights while casting a shadow on darkness isn't going to do anything, though I don't think Aerie would have the conceptual elevation to use it on her at this point. Anyway, Gisena really is falling behind here, huh? With Letrizia and Aeria both having more investment than canon, she and Aobaru, for the moment at least, are kind of being left in the cold, ironically. It would probably exacerbate her issues with lacking magic of her own to see Aerie as a Sorceress on top of Letrizia. Hunger's Total Eclipse making him a Sorcerer and Elixirdross as an equal to Findross certainly won't help, though in his case she likely excuses it as a Progression thing, seeing as Hunger is apparently developing powers all but spontaneously here.
As of
Contest of Kings, the thread had generated another 21.8 Arete, doubled to 43.6, adding up to 87.3. That's more than enough to purchase three of the EFBs on offer. I think that, rather than merely uniting Tears of Winter and Opalescent Tower(which upgrades Evening Realm stays to three weeks, Sliver of Evening to once a week, and presumably upgrades Outer Darkness, as it is technically a 25+ Arete Evening Sky Advancement, not to mention Heavenly Tomb, which is explicitly a 25 Arete Cloak Advancement. Here's a reminder of what it does: +10 Protection, ignores Protection penalties, massively improves the health and health regeneration of the Cloak, an unlimited number of defeated enemies may be absorbed into the Cloak, frozen in time, though they can be unfrozen to interact with when visiting the Realm of Evening. Doing so prevents them from ever defeating Hunger again, though they can still harry him both in combat and socially, even if they can't actually defeat him. This may eventually be used on aspects and ideas.) in the form of Eye of the Storm, Hunger also grabs Companions of the King in the Court in the Storm build, which mitigates the recklessness and greed of Hunger's style of rule, and of course since Undying Vanguard is already purchased, it only costs 25 Arete. However, in
Who Dares Wins, the thread had generated 21.6 Arete, doubled to 43.2, which adds up to 130.5, more than enough to add Once and Future in the King and Court Under the Heavenly Storm's Eye, and grabbing 4 EFBs(33.5, since the cost drops to 97 with 1 Arete already invested in Once and Future I) at once represents an enormous empowerment of the group, even if one barely empowers Hunger himself. With Companions up, leaving them behind to aid Adorie against Augustine's legions should be much, much safer than in canon, even ignoring how much stronger Aeria and Letrizia(sorry Aobaru) are. Not to mention this version of Adorie herself, as she has Undying Vanguard. With TSH on Accretion, Hunger might be matching an Armament's Rank outright by this point, or at least only be a half step behind instead of a full one, and since this is pre-Oath of Winter, Adorie would be one Rank down from that. Accretion with TSH+Companions is practically +Progression for the whole party, as I'm sure has been mentioned to shill Companions of the King.
Anyway, the Signs go as canon, as Hunger doesn't have Refinement of Place to obviate the need for a long-distance teleport, which eating the Tower rather necessitates, Bastion of Myth is still useful, as I'm not sure if Armaments have Rank above Hunger's right now in their base form, but they definitely do with their Shroud deployed, and Supreme Enclosure is going to see a lot of mileage later on, not to mention informing on the Lord-Protector being Augustine. The Armament Fish is chosen for all the same reasons as in canon's
Uttermost Pursuit, in addition to Slayer Knell meaning he'll get a boost against fish and Armaments, but things are a little different. Since Hunger was stronger when that Apocryphal proc went off, Beric's joining with the Armament Fish was more akin to a conventional Armament's Totality, though Beric has issues controlling the thing, as it's essentially halfway between a Prototype and a full Armament and as Letrizia has noted, Armaments do have minds of their own. Still, Totality dramatically improves Beric's ability to draw on the Blue, and the fact that it's Totality instead of just greedily absorbing power means his System is intact. His goal is to obtain the power to either bring his companions back and then avoid Hunger at all costs as a Secret Boss he is most definitely not prepared for, or kill Hunger, as he suspects, here at least, that Hunger's nature as a Cursebearer(the Fish recognizes something in Beric's description) is interfering with the System's efforts in this regard. Either way, this is a significantly more dangerous fight, as Beric's human mind provides significant benefits to the Fish, and the Fish's Blue, in turn, is more easily used to boost Beric's with it's willing support than Beric acting as a parasite. When Hunger attacks the Fish, Beric immediately knows who he's dealing with, and responds accordingly. Still, All-Defeating Stance, Heavenly Tomb, and Outer Darkness provide Hunger enough of a Protection/HP, and to a lesser degree offensive, buff to let him win the fight. Beric is substantially stronger, but there's decent odds of him just dying from a hit on the Fish, or with it, and he's not nearly as strong as it regardless. Even if Hunger is in Second Stage form, it's unlikely he would pose much of a challenge himself.
Heck, with Elixirdross, it's entirely possible Hunger might manage to capture him alive and maybe even secure his support by promising to help him with resurrecting his companions within the year(Ha! Try six months!), and Heavenly Tomb allows Hunger to ensure Beric can't directly threaten him. He's also got Supreme Enclosure, perhaps he could just summon the Astral Lord Beric was working for(with a little help from Scent of Prey), kill it, and free Beric from any obligations to it? Study of the Color Blue might give Gisena some ideas, and if it's Knowledge-based(with draining from the Fish being a cheat, which is part of the reason the System wasn't reacting well, as you aren't supposed to Advance the Blue this way. The System being the only reason Beric wasn't taking significant soul damage from forcing it in this manner, and the constant stream of information, some of which was secret to one degree or another, he was harvesting with it was massively improving his Advancement in Blue to begin with if it's like my version) like the version from my Lost Realm CYOA, then Gisena would be incredibly well-suited to it's pursuit. Though we have no idea what this counter-factual scenario would look like, nor the Advancements, so it's tough to say what the potential benefits or Arete costs would be.
Before the fight,
Shattering Ice consumes 7 Arete via Whiteout, dropping reserves to 26.5. All-Defeating is already bought at this juncture, so it obviously won't be bought here. As of
Titanomachy, I Wish up
Cold Light of Vengeance(the idea being that Hunger practices Praxis while he waits for the Nightmare Flight recharge, as his healing capabilities are vastly improved compared to canon and he's got a lot of Agility and the like on his canon self, so he can finish up helping people much quicker) here. Part of it being that each Praxis boosts Hunger's Praxis stamina, and part of it being so he can clear hordes of enemies quickly, particularly if separated from the others. It should be noted that the Wish used to bring out Renaissance Woman activates this month, so I'm only boosting September Arete production by 50%.
Okay, I'll be honest with you guys here. I don't remember what All-Defeating Stance cost at this point, but I think, from my research, that it was 14. Thus, I add 19.6(since there was 1.4 Arete left from the last canonical vote that tracked it, but Whiteout was also purchased) to the 14 produced by
Sea of Blades, for 33.6, which is multiplied by 1.5 for 50.4. Adding the reserve, and 10 from the Wish, and we're back up to 86.9. With Scent of Prey active, we can grab 1 and 2 Pick stuff with ease, so Fisher King(full 24 for full purchase, so 62.9) is bought in full now, with Hasten Signs bought, Arete drops to 43.9. Deathly Star and Armor of Midnight are unlocked early, with Night's Ambition(defer bonus until Seventh Sign) selected because we'd unlocked the first five within updates of getting them at all. Rihaku tempts us with another major Praxis round, and another 7 Praxis Picks are harvested, eight in total with what was saved from last time, which are used to get
Refinement of Place(only teleports one person at a time, unlike Nightmare Flight, but it's drain depends on how far you're being transported, so it can be used to 'flee' enemies under some circumstances by chucking them elsewhere), Unbound Severing(Draining, but allows the user to disrupt local forces in both physics, ie gravity, and metaphysics), and Shatter the Pane(Highly draining, and requiring proper timing, but the user may dramatically weaken hostile effects, such as a wound that causes instant-death being reduced to a moderate one), which all drops us to 18.9 Arete and 0 Praxis Picks, but also massively improves Hunger's Praxis stamina. While his first round of 4 Picks knocked him out, he later got the Refinement of Purpose and Imperial Refinement within like a week of each other to little ill effect, so this shouldn't do more than tire him out a bit. Exhausted isn't enough to counter the sheer stat advantage this Hunger has on his canon self to make Augustine's forces remotely a challenge. This 18.9 drops to 16.9 thanks to the Glimpse in
Vendetta. This also exhausts the Arete canonically generated in this time, meaning all Arete available at the next update to make note of it is fresh. Therefore, Aobaru doesn't receive A Chosen Purpose in
Phoenix Rising, but A Burning Spirit(presumably the attack is buffed to keep Aobaru and Letrizia distracted so they cannot intervene with the theft of Verschlengorge), as in canon. Sorry man, I honestly forgot this was coming up. Looks like Mordred is still on.
With Companions up, I'm not sure if stealing Verschlengorge would still have worked. Let's say it did, due to a further buffing of Augustine by Apocryphal to compensate for Hunger's increased power. I assume rerolls are only used on calamitous losses like himself or a companion dying or being grievously injured such as a baseline human with access to baseline healing losing a limb, as otherwise one would have procced on his original theft, so while Slice Fate would protect against Augustine sacrificing Versch for power, it would not block Augustine's theft, probably a good lesson for this counterfactual timeline, and while Hunger himself might have Rank to rival an Armament, the exponential curve of Rank means 8-9 is potent, but not impossible to overcome, especially since Apocryphal would be buffing Augustine even more than in canon, and Hunger isn't right there, and may not have been close enough to influence it at all before it happened. 11 is the point the universe starts snapping to attention at your presence, not 10, certainly not single digits.
Of course, with how many rerolls we've got, the thread would think going for the Tower of Earth(4.9, probably go for either tripled Protection or upgrading Supreme Enclosure to Bring To Heel, as both would be very useful, with the arguments largely boiling down to short-term and long-term gains conflicting. As we don't know what Bring To Heel would have done, I'll go with tripled Protection for expediency's sake) in
Fear Itself was fine, and the chance to subsume the Earth, considering the number and potency of the upgrades the Opalescent Tower offered, would be enormously tempting, especially when it would be advocated by Rihaku as offering some resilience against a number of the Cloak's weaknesses. In this case, it's also to support a Diplomacy route. They're way stronger, after all, and absorbing another Tower right out from under her ought to shock her enough that she'd at least be willing to contemplate surrender. It... sort of works. The Tower is absorbed, and will unlock a bunch of new features for the Cloak(not the least of which is screwing up the maiden's contest, as the Earth doesn't give a crap about Daylight being conceptually advantaged against Evening) but Augustine designed it to take out the Cloak for a little while, like blowing a fuse. The Cloak isn't permanently damaged or anything, and neither is Hunger, but it's a problem, because it won't be recovering for this fight, and Gisena's Nullity still affects Hunger without the Cloak. Thus, if Gisena hadn't gotten Renaissance Woman in The
Truth Manifest, he might actually have been in real trouble. Sure, he could have blown a bunch of rerolls on it, but he's only got so many of those at this point, and they should really be saved for a fight where Hunger didn't just screw himself over in the name of a show of force.
25 Arete generated in
Spoils of the Tyrant, so 37.5, or 42.4 in total. So we go on another spending spree. As Fisher King(which doubles the proc rate and mitigation for fish-based targets. Slayer's Knell is really going to do work here, huh?) is already bought, people feel comfortable going for Foremost Blade(30.4) which makes all 4 Pick foes count for Decimation targets, regardless of whether the difficulty is artificially inflated or not, which unlimited rerolls are great for, as will be the Realm of Evening, which, again, has Earth boosting it due to assimilation of the Tower of Earth. It also grants 2 Accursed Favor. Similarly, instead of Direct Mitigation, the Serendipity Mitigation(18.4, one in seven procs become helpful, empowering/benefitting Hunger in interesting ways, though more limited than hostile procs, and buildup is not slowed like in Direct Mitigation. Very helpful in timeskips and for Epilogue points, as building credibility over time is now a risky proposition for the Apocryphal Curse, as she might get distracted by some really cool beneficial circumstance she could cause instead of screwing Hunger over. Has a chance of dramatically weakening the maiden by having Apocryphal blow a bunch of credibility making Hunger even more powerful, forcing it to wait to even longer build up credibility again, which is an even worse proposition with A Promise Kept working in the background, meaning the Apocryphal now risks an uphill battle with every timeskip. Potentially taking long enough for a significant portion of the next paired Domain being worked through via Fault-Defeating is in the cards.) is taken, pushing us to a whopping 14 Accursed Favor, which is likely to be the in-universe justification for being introduced to the Cursebearer Association. Plenary Brand is Direct Mitigated though. 75% strength means Treachery is somewhat viable again, though it's likely to complicate the Procyon fight somewhat, especially when this is a somewhat more powerful Apocryphal proc due to Serendipity not affecting the actual strength of an Apocryphal proc in general, just it's positive or negative valence.
I'm going to say the extra proc power is burned on a breakthrough in Armament Prototype production, allowing a huge number of the things to escort Procyon, and this type in turn has some kind of affinity that pushes them to Rank 8.5 as long as it's around, like a bizarro mirror of Companions of the King. While little threat individually, they could prolong the battle and/or strike Hunger down after Procyon wears him down. After all, Bloodcasting doesn't work on them either, and a hundred 8.5 foes is a little much for Hunger on top of Procyon. Working together, the Prototypes might(with heavy casualties) be able to beat an enemy Armament without it's Shroud, and they have Procyon for that, so Hunger is fighting something like 1.75 Procyons here. This is rapidly becoming a keystone of the Republic's strategy, with grumbling about felling Armaments quelled by the ability to make a bunch of pseudo-Armaments to fill the gap. Sure, this makes the system more fragile, as taking out an Armament brings down a whole network, but it's not unworkable. Heck, since it's not proximity-based on the Armaments, merely their continued existence, it's arguably an improvement, because the Prototypes neither inflict Curses on anyone, nor have opinions on who can and can't pilot them, so in theory they might actually be able to increase humanity's domain over time by having a bunch of people who couldn't pilot actual Armaments for one reason or another form Prototype Companies(60-200 soldiers) to serve as pseudo-Armaments, alongside honor guards of the things for the Armaments themselves to make ambushes by Astral denizens or other Armaments a riskier proposition. The pilot himself also has a major breakthrough in it's use, figuring out something akin to Hunger being able to add his Charisma to his Protection, which is super nasty with the Armament's Plenary Brand. Normally, this wouldn't work, because Curses don't benefit you without Mitigation, but the Aporcyphal managed to convince Plenary to take a stab at Hunger somewhat more directly than the norm. He can also extend a weaker version of this to his 'knights' in the linked Armor Prototypes. He and the scientists working on the Prototypes openly speculate on a feedback effect unlocking previously unknown functions. I mean, only the Foremost really understand what's up with these things at this point, so it's not like they'd have any reason to think otherwise. It might even be true!
Elder Sign(6.4) is also bought, partially because Fisher King and Pillars of Creation have already been bought, doubling the effectiveness of each odd-numbered Empyreal Sign. Nightmare Flight can be used twice a day, Supreme Enclosure can summon two things at once, and so on. Most relevantly, Midnight Armor is upgraded, making it much more useful against the Armament. It also means that Once and Future always considers odd-numbered Signs to be being used for military matters, which is very useful to Hunger until he becomes Champion of Winter. Hunger finds the Ring's research penalty waived for odd-numbered Signs as well. Anyway, since
Intensive Research was for Signs 4 and 5 and Hunger already has those, and I don't know if Adorie's improved Rank will override the increased difficulty but I
do know Sign 6 is still just as hard for him to contribute to, I'm going to go for the Praxis. That is Study The Blade, though Regency and Consolidate Power remain in effect. With Rerolls, 4 Praxis Picks are generated. As we have already absorbed the last of the 4 or lower Praxis options we were initially introduced to, we elect to save them.
In
Tales Without Number, which signals October and the imminent Forced Induction and associated Wish, I buy True Sharpbright as a Companions EFB, further cementing
Aobaru's neglect, I mean, Letrizia's position as a useful Companion and granting enough Relationship pluses that even if Devouring Sorceress didn't manage it, SJUC is now unlocked. Don't feel too bad man. Gisena's only really gotten the Ring of Artifice off of us, since Companions was done to the whole group, and that was as much because she was the best person for it as anything else. Speaking of Gisena, as Companions has been bought early, her research into Graces(which will take at least 3 weeks per Major, considering she does have Companions Rank but doesn't have the Realm of Evening's facilities, and that Rank is lower than it was in the canonical Realm of Evening stay), Signs, and a method to leave the Voyaging Realm without triggering it over the mages being taken out is considerably improved. Still, I don't think enough time will have passed before Procyon arrives for her to get a Major going.
As of
Forced Induction, we generated 24 Arete. Since it was a Wish, I'm going to multiply Arete by 1.5, though that 42.4 increases to 52.4 thanks to my Wish's Arete bonus. While we will of course be getting Haeliel(Why would we not? We have nearly twice the Arete canon did at this point.), with her Advice Corner and Favor selected as per
canon, we will also be grabbing Blood Sorcery(40.4, I'm going to say the increase in Rank is enough for Adorie to figure out the whole deal with Mythic Platinum, possibly thanks to Gisena, so it's still on the table. BS allows Hunger to invert bloodline abilities, including Surgecrafters, though it requires his complete attention, and is thus not very helpful in combat, though it does allow for rapid advancement of Signs via the canonical method of having the Cloak chug Mythic Infused Platinum, which Adorie and Gisena's improved Rank presumably allowed them to figure out without Intensive Research being chosen, as Adorie can mass-produce the stuff with access to more common materials with her bloodline inverted, though it is somewhat tiring for her, and this can only be done with Adorie around for obvious reasons, still it should make advancing the Signs trivially easy, possibly enough to hit the Sixth Sign, though considering the exponentially increasing costs probably not the Seventh, and she can do it while the party is split up during their jaunt in the Human Sphere. It also generates 2 Picks, which we spend on
Pathway to Idyll(helps recover Mental Stability over time, and he can stay in the Evening Realm when resting to reduce Apocryphal charging) and it's upgrade, Perchance to Dream(Patreon has the description, but it was mentioned in the thread in the same update as Idyll), dropping us to 26.4) in
Lies the Crown. This is meant to reduce the odds of a 5-Pick fight in the future by effectively mitigating the Apocryphal Curse by two-thirds whenever Hunger isn't actually going anywhere, which Nightmare Flight and Refinement of Place dramatically reduce the time taken to do.
As of To
War and November, I'd have grabbed us
SJUC. While not the optimal time, +175% Rank(so at least 1 even if he's at 8.0(rises to 9.4, a huge Rank advantage at this level, thanks to Once and Future adding another Rank in military matters, but Hunger's stats are still way the hell behind) right now despite all the boosts. Hopefully Accretion has unlocked a new Defining Advancement slot, as I believe this would make 6, but I'm pretty sure SJUC gives plus 2 Defining Advancements), and +100% to Int and Wis(to improve tactics and battlefield judgement, as that small a boost to Might/Agility wouldn't do much) will improve things a lot. Immunity to most poisons and diseases isn't very helpful, but not needing to eat, drink, breathe or sleep(guess Outer Sorcery is obsoleted outside of recovery sleep and doing stuff while dead) is moderately useful for more training of the Praxis while retaining the benefit of Might's Repose by virtue of sleep still being the most conducive way to recover from that type of exertion, and not being hampered by the loss of most internal organs means ignoring a lot of wound penalties, and though What Rains May Come already handles that in combat, Hunger does do things besides fight. Being able to fight Shroud with Shroud(Shrouds being disabled was part of Once and Future II, as part of the price for a personal Ontology, as purchasing II was necessary to get III without the negative side effects via Haeliel's Favor) thanks to hitting Rank 9 is pretty good, as is halving the effects of Tired and Exhaustion, and doubling of the Shroud's radius and effects. Hold the Line is selected as per The
Curtain Rises, as is Follow Through in On The
Sword, which indicates 41 Arete produced since Forced Induction, accounting for Haliel's Basic purchase, which means 67 generated. As no canon Wish enters my recollection in November, the 11 days of November are doubled(67/31*2*11=47.54), as opposed to the 20 days of 50% increase(67/31*20*1.5=64.83), which totals 112.37, which in turn is added to the reserves for 138.7, 148.7 with the Wish(man, people would be bemoaning how close we were to grabbing Committed on Haeliel, though that vote would have closed a while before reaching the 200 necessary even ignoring Blood Sorcery), which should be more than enough to preserve 75% of Hunger's identity, and I doubt we'd need to with all our rerolls. Slayer's Knell's boost against Armaments from the Armament Fish and Hunger's comparatively massive protection and self-healing from wounds inflicted on Procyon and co. are really all that carries the day here.
Sure, Letrizia's newly boosted Sharpbright helps(presumably it's upgrade would allow it to buff others, though I doubt it would be good at it, as it's not really meant to be a buffing Element, not the way Edelross is), but Hunger can't use his Treachery against Procyon here, and all the Companions are just under the Rank of Procyon's Armor Prototype bodyguards. Remember that while Lunar Coronet upgrades Sharpbright to give Letrizia an effective +1 Rank, she was Mid-Ranked at most before Companions, and even something like True Sharpbright has limits as of Rank 8, especially when she's had almost no training time with it, and has more issues buffing people than Aobaru or even Aeria. Honestly, Aeria's improved stealth capabilities letting Hunger get an attack off from an unexpected angle might contribute more. Ironically, Plenary Brand makes the fight with the Plenary Armament much more difficult, though Aeria helps deal with that. So he has to take it in a more straight-forward fight, and Procyon and his swarm of powerful underlings ignore Bloodcasting debuffs, so while he wins in somewhat better shape, he still collapses from exhaustion.
In
Glory, Hunger being unconscious means no Scent of Prey, and 3 Picks not generated by the Realm of Evening or Apocrypahl procs are at a premium at this point even if he wasn't, so Myth and Legend is selected as per canon, dropping the total to 101.7, though 4.8 generated Arete sets that back up to 111.3 thanks to doubling. King of
Winter doesn't cost any Arete, so that doesn't really matter for this. It's too bad I can't use Scent of Prey to burn 50 Arete and 3 Picks to buy Pillars of Creation with Hunger unconscious from overexertion. I'm sure that massive a boost to the Realm of Evening would massively boost Archmage, not to mention that Pathway will reduce Apocryphal buildup to roughly a third about a third of the time as Hunger still needs to recover from overexertion, Praxis and otherwise, and sleep is the most efficient way to do that since time is really the only cure for Praxis training exhaustion at this level and Might's Respose makes sleep actively beneficial, as does Outer Sorcery, so dumping another 70 effective days to buildup would be the only effective means for the destroyer of minds to have the full Apocryphal proc she got in canon, just so this version of Hunger can dunk on her in spite of that.
In
Unshattered, we see our first canon use of the Evening Realm, though the counterfactual first use here was spent having Hunger learn the basics of it's use, so Plowshares to Swords, if the Blade was in fact wounded as in canon, which is unlikely, would be moderately more effective on that front, especially since Gisena's Findross stitching would be backed by Rank 8.4, plus whatever Saber granted Hunger, would be more effective. As is, I'll assume it wasn't necessary due to many more rerolls. Just as in canon, Evening Chill is taken first to regenerate a Mental Stability +, and unlock a third Social action. Similarly, Adorie, Aobaru, and Letrizia are taken as Socials, netting +Adorie, +Sign Augmentation, benefitting one of Hunger's Signs, +Aorbau, ++Aobaru Power, +Letrizia, +Imperial Data. Then we go with Always Forward and Hunger Sated, because a) people want to avoid Decimating their new loot pinata as much as possible, especially since it just got a huge upgrade, and b) finding Decimation targets without using the Realm is going to be really hard with all of the powerups he's about to get. Killing Dorminus is not going to be enough to Sate Decimation
and pay for Exalted Battle Array here.
In December, I Wish up Sword in the Stone(121.3), which in-universe is at least partially born out of Hunger taking note of Gisena and the group as a whole being displeased with Hunger for using a very weak(enough to avoid any significant penalties with Adorie there and working off of his Ennoblement/Companions boosts plus some extra expertise in the use of her bloodline accrued from using the opposite effects via Blood Sorcery) variant of Shattering Blow to slay Procyon when it engaged it's Shroud as Hunger chewed through it's special Prototype Armors, before the Walls could completely disintegrate, as even that variant would have been enough to destroy a significant chunk of his memories without her present. The next time we have a concrete number on Arete(generated 30.1 in canon) in
Eternity And An Hour, it's December 9th, as opposed to November 19th. December has Christmas doubling, in addition to the Wish Sharkey used on grabbing Refinement of Battle and Aerie's Shadowcord boon in exchange for that near-miss with the shadow creature that was going to possess her and try to flee the Realm. Thus, it only gets a 1.5 multiplier, so(30.1/21*12*2=34.4)+(30.1/21*9*1.5=19.34)=53.7. 175.0 Arete in total. Canonically,
Gifts of Plenty, when the Picks become available, saw 18.1 Arete generated, which improves to 27.15(202.1) thanks to my Wish.
So (Heroic Advancements can be bought for 3 Picks and 50 Arete according to Regalia, and Scent of Prey/the already significantly upgraded Realm of Evening(Tower of Earth, among other things, should be helpful in this regard) allows Hunger to reaccess previously unlocked Advancements), he burns 9 Picks and 150 Arete(52.1) on the Heroic Advancements for Crimson Flare(massive bloodsense scaling off of Int and Wits, triples Quickening bonuses, massive Ennoblement bonuses, if the Ruling Ring Ring War is still a concern, makes that a much more distant worry as this massive investment dramatically heightens it's power), Pillars of Creation(additional 210 days of Pillars proc, which can be used any time, granting +++Mental Stability and +Relationship to everyone taken inside), and Saber(doubles Saber's Rank bonus, which aids in resisting the new ultra-paradise of the Realm of Evening, provides actual skill with the sword, which benefits both direct combat and Sword Praxis, probably only get up 9.6ish with how much Hunger's Rank has improved, which is still relevant to Bloodcastng and the like despite Oath of Winter, especially with Once and Future I active) in The
Reward of Discipline. Assuming Hunger doesn't just explode, this might be an impressive enough rate of growth for Haeliel to comment on it next time she shows up.
Now, First Flare is of limited use in the Realm of Evening, but it takes some time for the power to circulate, especially in such immense quantities, so while the Realm immediately upgrades in both opulence and Hunger's control fidelity due to literally being inside of it as opposed to the Ring being rather disconnected from much in the way of creatures with Blood right now, the current visitation still ends at it's three week allotment to avoid Apocryphal buildup, though they can immediately return if they so choose. First Flare activates the moment they leave, empowering Nilfel and making it utterly trivial for them to putter along without Adorie's direct oversight. Of course, the downsides of this kind of power is that Decimator and Apocryphal scale with you, so, as mentioned, finding Decimator targets will be hard, and Dien is liable to be a lot nastier for one reason or another.
As of
Even Bigger Fish, where Midnight Armor is upgraded by Adorie and with proof in-universe that Shadowcord has some connection to the Realm of Evening from her massive powerup upon entering the Opalescent Tower, Hunger accompanies Aeria as happened in canon, with Haeliel's Favor negating the shadow creature's danger. Similarly, Vanquisher's Grace and Auspice Temporal are selected more to boost Gisena's non-Realm of Evening Grace research than for the combat boost, particularly when Hunger's sword being fine has negated any immediate need for Make Whole. Adorie was talking with Augustine, who had been frozen in the Realm of Evening for possible interrogation on Gisena's behalf, and possible reconciliation with Adorie. This would probably lower the -s to their relationships from fusing with Gisena later, if only in the sense of hitting them up with more +s. Adorie was also spending her time either producing Mythic Platinum or researching the Sixth and Seventh Empyreal Signs while resting from the former, which made hitting six and seven easy.
Additionally, the canonical 3.5 Arete, improved to 5.25, leaves 57.3 Arete and 9 Picks to spend. Rihaku notes that not giving Hunger at least a little time to cool off(not the least because of Refinement of Battle being bought by Sharkey) on the big stuff could have dire consequences even with Progression backing him up, so a bunch of little build-fillers are taken on from way back near the beginning of the Quest. First,
Feast of Lives(7 Picks. Gains modest regen and improved health, former is amplified extremely after beating non-trivial opponents. Quadruples appetite and makes the bearer more carnivorous. In return, gain 0.5% Decimator Mitigation that does not increase the difficulty of future Mitigation, though failing to feed this appetite will lead to increasing health penalties and -2% Decimator Mitigation) as feeding Hunger shouldn't be a problem when he can pop into the Realm of Evening basically whenever he wants, and this makes dealing with Decimator slightly easier, and he finally lives up to his name in non-fish related manners. Well, still mostly fish. Next,
King of Thieves(55.3, 6 Picks, ++Agility, +Stealth, +Theft, improved theft as Hunger goes through combat, improves the Abduction Art of Accretion in both power and ease, which should have some neat effects when combined with TSH) to avoid situations like the Tower of Earth. Do keep in mind that Might's Repose allowed Hunger to no-sell Dormins' sleep-based Ultimate, so even Advancements from this far back can be relevant. Third,
Ring of Blood(53.3, 5 Picks, allows Might's Repose to fully heal Hunger, and the Ring of Blood to inefficiently heal, though I'm not sure how that interacts with Bloodcasting's healing. Still, the former should help a little with Blood Halo hitting all healing with -1ISH, as Hunger will heal a tiny bit in his sleep, so in theory he could recover from his calamitous injuries by sleeping it off, as Might's Repose allows sleep to continue indefinitely, so I guess he'll be able to do a Forebear and enter recovery sleep, though I doubt Apocryphal will let him sleep for centuries unless he gets spectacularly lucky with Serendipity and A Promise Ketp procs, and I'm
pretty sure Slice Fate rerolls don't work there. Perhaps Haeliel's next visit would allow for some more healing to take place?). The last three of the backdated Advancements are a modified
Mage Lord build(39.3, 2 Picks, Azure Moon grants access to Soul Evocations of the fallen, the Librarian, Administrator, but I'm going to get a second copy of Sten's Outer Shadow for Imprisoner's Refinement later on, likely a result of Rihaku making note of it's strong affinity for Imprisoner. Linear Halo grants huge bonuses to a magic system, though in this case Hunger uses it on Elixirdross to allow him to somewhat match Gisena's Grace-making in his spare time, and of course dramatically improve the buffs it grants), with Outward Halo(32.3, 1 Pick) bought to regain the ability to learn new magics, which will be of use in the next Geas task, if nothing else. Last of those taken are Flight of Falling Stars(25.3) from EBF, which is, as is canonically bought and used on Deathly Star to allow multiple uses of the thing per battle, which are much more powerful thanks to RoB.
Novakhron goes as canon, as does
Avenger and Sharkey buying Exalted Battle Array(which would operate pretty much as canon) while I would buy a Patreon EFB, presumably a Praxis, for my Wish, but things take a bit of a left turn at the reawakening
Foremost and
Dien. While Apocryphal does give Seram serious consideration, pitting Cursebearers against each other outside of Culling shouldn't be done lightly, and it would really rather Hunger not get an effective 19.2% chance of Serendipity procs for the next century if he should win, and this kind of ridiculous Progression would be dangerous even for a fellow Cursebearer to go up against. Plus, intentionally triggering Apocryphal Onslaught against Hunger by having a fellow Cursebearer attack Aobaru felt a tad unsporting, you know? There's a difference between clearly labelling a 'you die now' condition and sending someone to trip that wire.
Anyway, Dien immediately synergizes with the news Caethlynn brings about the 'breakthrough' with the Armor Prototypes, and, combined with news of Hunger, immediately determines that he's dealing with a Cursebearer who has Apocryphal, as well as, thanks to Plenary, Indenture, Decimator, Tyrant, and of course Plenary. He would wonder a bit if that was a sign of low compatibility or someone who had weighed themselves down with Curses for more power, before dismissing it as largely irrelevant beyond allowing him to make more specialized counters, and some musing that his consumption of inhabited systems technically qualified as a direct attack on Hunger if his Geas taks was rule rather than assassination. Still, he gathers some of the modified Prototypes, and, since Apocryphal-based breakthroughs aren't like an Ork Waagh! Field(yes, I am aware of the irony) he actually learns something new here, which in turn improves his own craft. As you can imagine, this is very bad when combined with his hordes. Hunger's vastly improved Bloodcasting makes it relatively simple to free the population of any planet he's on, but there are so many different types of plague that immunizing the population to all of them is beyond him for the moment, and for the sake of focusing on Dien himself, the canonical strategy of focusing down on the more egregious examples of control while pretending the less obvious ones are vastly better at avoiding detection is taken on, with Dien observing the Ring of Blood with some interest as a very potent fleshcrafting tool.
In
Bravado, the Refinement of Purpose and Imperial Refinement, have been bought, so my February Wish is accounted for already. Still, 20.5(-20 from the 40.5 generated due to two Wishes) is increased to (8.92+17.33+2.23)=28.4, 38.4 from the January Wish, add 20 from the two Wishes for 58.4, and add the reserves for a grand total of 83.7. As we still have 4 Praxis Picks, we are free to buy The Open Hand(a passive ability that allows allies in proximity to benefit from stat-boosting Praxis, Battle and Quickness at the time, with the moderate reduction in Praxis endurance as a result likely covered by all the extra Praxis techniques) effectively for free, with Closing the Fist and the canonical Seal of Ruin bought for 37 Arete, dropping to 46.7.
This continues... somewhat as canon in
Gauntlet Thrown, with Breaker of Suns selected for more or less the same reasons as canon, alomngside the possibility that the Heroic version of Saber boosts the Advancement of the Saber. After all, between TSH, SJUC, and Feat: Orb, Hunger should have reached a base Rank of 9.7ish, possibly 9.8, so Tower's Rank bonus is likely to be a lot lower, and at this point, some extra Wisdom would probably be really attractive. However,
Untoward Mustering sees a change. See, Letrizia, as the Devouring Sorceress, has more in common with the Heroes than the average Maker in terms of how she is empowered, so she, not unlike Hunger, eats a Feeder Sun to vastly empower herself. The difference being, Letrizia can do a lot more of that and gain significant benefits. Dien takes quite a bit of interest in her because of this for a very simple reason. If it were possible for a Maker as degraded as this to replicate a Hero, shouldn't the
reverse be possible? Imagine what one could do if they could use the abilities of the other castes without compromising their identity and ontological coherence... At any rate, what he gleans from Letrizia and her fellow Quasi-Makers, Gisena and Aeria, not to mention Hunger himself, as Elixirdross draws some attention as being equally potent and yet different from Findross, accelerates his research quite a bit. Not unlike how Letrizia and Aeria's Graces will later empower the maiden. Funnily enough, he probably learns more from what he can glean from the party in their combat with his hordes and constructs than the combined lore accrued by the Republic. Though, to be fair, Cursebearers are bullshit, and... yeah. Not that Gisena isn't, but still.
Back in
Dueling Wits, 31 Arete is produced canonically, which here rises to 77.7 instead of 47 due to greater reserves, though since Promising Lead is taken, that drops back down 65.7. From there, On the Trail is still selected, because Hunger
was using Scent of Prey to try and track Dien down, but the Hero took advantage of his lesser buds kind of sort of counting as him to throw up a ton of false leads. After all, these lesser Orcs are
technically Dien. So reuniting in the interest of dramatically improving Hunger's power and potentially unlocking some counterfactual stuff now that Letrizia has force-ascended off the back of at least 3 Feeder Suns. Not to mention how much stronger the whole party is, with First Flaring providing +30 Might, +25 Agi, +20 Wits, +15 Will, +10 Other Attributes to everyone, probably changing up the Graces Gisena can make(+20 Wits plus Temporal Grace is going to be nuts, even discounting +10 to Int and Wis). Like the scenario I outlined with Beric, it's difficult to say what she might have unlocked, so we'll just say she's made some progress on Sealing Protocol to empower all her other Graces.
As of
Untoward Mustering, and the arrival of March, I Wish(75.7) for Refinement of War. Aeria and Letrizia might have a somewhat different conversation, as Letrizia's ability to eat Feeder Suns has probably pushed her immensely further along in her Sorceress powers, though she lacks Gisena's talent for it. Aeria, meanwhile, has Companions as in canon, as well as True Shadowcord and Threnody Sorceress.
A
Solemn Reprieve generated 19 Arete. 94.7 Arete. In
Wrack And Ruin, we generate the canonical 11 Arete, so we end up with 105.7 Arete total. With the Realm of Evening being massively, massively upgraded compared to canon, it's much more capable of restoring the group's stamina, and so Hunger. So, Halo Crown(40.7) has Hail the Queen appended, dropping Arete to 12.7. Another +++++to All Attributes for Hunger and Adorie offers improved options. Halo Crown involved buying Once and Future II to gain access to the positive effects of OaF III, specifically the special Ontology, and Mythology Halo for Gisena, which is in turn used to obtain Sophont Halo as in canon, which probably offers improved benefits for her because she has to parasitize Hunger, Letrizia, and Aeria's Findross, with Hunger using Vetruvian on everyone(since First Flaring allows Sublime Fulcrum-style modifications, being a stronger version of SF), allowing them to experiment with new magics in place of their old Graces, assuming he hasn't figured out how to make Elixirdross Sorcerers/Sorceress(which would presumably be compatible with Gisena's own Sorcerous nature allowing her to double-dip in support of her Findross abilities), and Gisena promising to find a workaround when everything's not on fire. Hunger's TSH on Surgecraft would apply to Elixirdross just fine. I mean, between Philosopher's Wreath and Linear Halo it's got a huge advantage over canon, particularly with the Elixirdross upgrade itself.
Things proceed pretty much as canon for a while.
Peace Through Strength selects Companions II(in part because of all the Companion EFBs purchased and partially because there is a strong expectation that we'll achieve Stage 3 relatvely soon) and Heavy Weapons Array. As I canonically bought November Sky in April, as seen in
Light of the Soul, in order to make Archmage viable, and then Ascendancy Halo(which directly improves Sword in the Stone via +10 Luck, on top of Hail the Queen's +5) in May, with the blurb quoted a few posts below
Defiance, and given the 65 Arete canonically spent on Halo Crown was everything we knew we'd generated at the time, Arete obtained should be pretty much the same, meaning affording Mordred(as it's noted he obtains the powers of Legendary and A Chosen Purpose, it's likely that this does not count against the issue of stacking Sublime Fulcrum templates, as this is not accomplished via Hunger's Ring but a mix of Dien's mastery of his craft, absorbing the Shogun, and the Apocryphal Curse deciding it would be cool) in Fate shouldn't be a worry for getting that.
I suspect the boosted Apocryphal proc, particularly when Aobaru has already had First Flaring massively boosting his Stats, would extend Aobaru's mastery of heat and light further to a slightly lesser mastery of cold and darkness. This allows for things like 'freezing' time, and messing with black holes, as they are essentially 'dead' stars turned to energy-drainers rather than energy-producers, vastly improving his options in a contest with Hunger. There is also the possibility that, as the other Imaginary Elements are but reflections of his own, as sparks cast from a fire, he might gain access to shadows of all other Imaginary Elements, from Hunger's own Elixirdross, to Letrizia's Sharpbright, to Aeria's Shadowcord, to Mizuku's Quickwater, and so on. Perhaps even the Elements they could have had, such as Inksky and Exavolt, which improves his value a great deal upon being restored as an ally, as it allows him to unlock secondary, tertiary, and so on Elements in others, meaning Hunger would gain Inksky and Quickwater following this, and since he had Philosopher's Wreath in Imaginary Elements, they would progress rapidly. Not to mention there might be an aspect of all Elements being shadows of his own that causes the Elements unlocked by him to match up to the progress of the main one, minus a stage or so. Gaining Exavolt would probably be helpful for Letrizia's combat abilities, especially with her high Rank and Sharpbright(a boost to being bright plus control over EM spectrum stuff sounds like a recipe for ridiculous power), not to mention whatever Aeria might have had, and Gisena might actually get something out of her Imaginary Element, or Elements, with all the upgrades she's had. Perhaps having a non-Findross version of Nullity to compare with would give her ideas on how to activate the effect in other ways. She was much dumber when Renaissance Woman was grabbed by comparing Augstine's Runes to her own Sorcery, after all, and isolating the Null aspect of Nullity outside of Findross might in turn have some utility for her work in getting around Sophont Halo's effects on fellow Foremost Sorcery users. Maybe Aobaru could also upgrade Elements to their 25 Arete variants at will, too, so Hunger would not merely gain Quickwater and Inksky, but Agilewater and Inkcosmos or what have you. Basically, he'd obtain a third upgrade centered on mastery of Imaginary Elements in general, possibly an outgrowth of Vetruvian, given Apocryphal was fully capable of granting Legendary, which would be incredibly useful to him when he takes over the Voyaging Realm. This would immunize him to Hunger's ability to shut down abilities based on genetic markers via Blood Sorcery, as his mastery of Imaginary Elements trumps Hunger's mastery of flesh via the old truism of a specific ability of lesser magnitude overcoming a greater but more broad one, though Legendary and A Chosen Purpose strengthening him certainly help, as does his knockoff Sharpbright enhancing his Companions-obtained Rank.
Still, Hunger himself is far stronger than canon. That huge number of Imaginary Elements Aobaru has gained access to is a double-edged sword because he doesn't have time to master them and Hunger won't be letting him use Philosopher's Wreath. I, as happened in canon, Wish up
Fault-Defeating Stance in June, which joins Imprisoner's Refinement: Flood of Rune as the last canon Wishes, mostly because there weren't any further Arete-based choices to make. Meanwhile, Gilded Cage is selected not only to be used against Dien and to heal Aobaru more quickly, but to defang the risk of addiction from Heroic Pillars of Creation and because there is likely synergy between GC and Heavenly Tomb. However. With all the upgrades Hunger has, I suspect Dien wouldn't get the chance to make that last shot, or at least that he wouldn't get nearly far enough to force Hunger to release Aobaru early, at least not with Aeria and Letrizia's upgraded Elements and the Vetruvian templates the party has been granted.
Heroic First Flaring is already unlocked,
Imprisoner True is even more attractive, and selected as in canon. Seeing as Hunger would have 200-something days of Pillars of Creation free to use and the ones not used in a given year just expire, he'd likely have hundreds of extra Echoes and quite a bit of time to further train up Elixirdross, True Inksky, and True Quickwater as unlocked by Aobaru, including creating a Sorcery equivalent with the former and granting it to the others if he still hasn't done that, though obviously Gisena would benefit the most, because no duh. Spending quite a bit of his time in the Realm of Evening(not sure if Praxis study would be viable in the Realm with all these upgrades on canon, and he has to spend at least some of his time outside managing the Human Sphere even with the upgrades the party has undergone) via Idyll and Perchance to Dream and his canonical use of sheer Rank and Archmage abilities to rule over the Human Sphere, with a little help from Sword in the Stone in this case so his few decisions are even further magnified in Rulership beyond even the Law Domain's ability to have his rule be just, has roughly set his Apocryphal buildup back to canon levels due to Serendipity over normal Mitigation, ignoring the possibility of a Serendipity proc, though A Promise Kept would be slowing down effective Apocryphal buildup. So the maiden, while likely reduced to a 3-Pick fight by Elixirdross(counters Findross without being vulnerable to her mastery of Findross ), Outer Darkness(-1 ISH to her Beauty's sanity-targeting effect means Hunger doesn't need to gounge his eyes out), Heroic First Flaring(mostly for the raw Stats it gives Gisena) and A Promise Kept(Apocryphal is basically at half-strength), among others, the fact that there's no way her attempted destruction of the Human Sphere like erasing a chalkboard won't trigger Sword in the Stone's 'you swung at the king' effect in Hour of Reckoning, and so on, will be about as buffed as she was in canon.
In
Full Circle, we chose Equinox Lacing and Innermost Sanctum. Here, where she's dropped to a 3-Pick due to Hunger outpacing Aporcyphal via abuse of the Realm of Evening, and with Rihaku encouraging the shit out of our self-destructive streak, we grab all four non-Flower of Victory selections, adding the powers of all Sorceresses everywhere regardless of their affiliation with Findross or lack thereof(though not Sorcerers, so we wouldn't have to worry about, say, Seram's Graces, and Elixirdross is obviously not available for her to trawl for Graces) with her Stats rising to match their highest and Rank 15(and loss of speech) while manifested in the Human Sphere from Implicate Veil, and 100 Arete of anti-Hunger Advancements combined with a 30% chance for any hostile effect to fail(and a 10% chance of being open to negotiation), but not neutral ones like the Cloak's Protection. With the Tower of Earth absorbed, the Daylight Estates have their conceptual primacy over the Realm of Evening disrupted, and Hunger's mastery over the Realm of Evening is massively more powerful than in canon, which likely makes his Archmage powers far greater, and makes such a conceptual primacy contest much more in his favor, as even Rank 15 only has so much power over superior ISH. Further, her Advancements are limited by her knowledge of Hunger, and while she can to some degree work around his Cursebearer protections, she cannot do so fully, meaning she would be unprepared for Hour of Reckoning's second Ontology, not to mention the Rank and ISH benefits. After all, he'd never have used it before. This would set his Rank to 14 in military matters, and he'd pretty much be guaranteed to have significantly greater ISH in fighting related matters. Plus the benefits of 25-Arete Quickwater in terms of Rank.
I'm not sure where the cutoff point for Wishes was in regards to the maiden, but I'd continue Wishing regardless for extra Arete. July, August, September, and November 2021's Wishes spent on a 100 Arete Praxis that I can't discuss in detail because it's an Patreon thing. Let me assure everyone it's good though. I keep Wishing for Praxis, mostly buffing the Refinement of War in hopes of obtaining Attainment of War, through
Ever Brighter and
Finality with one goal in mind: earning enough Arete to get not one but two of the Final Advancements. You see, there were 12 canonical Wishes, 4 of which were mine. Finality took 1 year and roughly 7-8 months to reach, meaning 19-20 months, or an additional 14-15 Wishes, leaving me confident that I'd have doubled the Arete generated in total, particularly because I'd have
always gone for Arete doubling and the +10 benefit, and likely have comissioned quite a bit of art through the course of the Quest. Especially when I would be happy to keep burning Wishes on gaining enough Arete for it, with Hunger likely gaining a ton of Advancements post-maiden, as if a dam had burst.
Thus, a pick two rather than a pick one of Inheritance, Blood Halo, and Imperishable Night. While the former had only really gained Sword in the Stone relative to canonical Advancements, Blood Halo had Ruling Ring, Linear and Outward Halo, Blood Sorcery, and Heroic First Flaring buffing it, while Imperishable Night had Heavenly Tomb, Hunger's new 25-Arete Inksky, Outer Darkness, Idyll/Perchance to Dream, absorption of the Tower of Earth, and Heroic Pillars of Creation on it's canon self. So I expect both would be much, much stronger. The former is giving up much more potent healing capabilities and the Ring itself has been made much stronger even ignoring it's extra Halos, not to mention already having the ability to use 4-Picks for Hunger Sated targets so dropping to 3 isn't nearly as much of a leap. The latter... well, the Realm of Evening is much, much more powerful now, and there's likely something special from the Tower of Earth. So we go for Imperishable Night combined with Blood Halo. The only question there is if their combined form is called Bloody Night or Imperishable Halo. The former is edgy, but I find a certain preference for it, particularly if the offense to the maiden's sensibilities counts as yet another attack.
Combining Imperishable Night's +++++++Quality of Life for the inhabitants with Blood Halo's ridiculous combat ability might actually raise the percentage on the maiden being open to negotiation a little, but let's assume it fails because she has a similar idea as the Shogun that amputation of trouble and strife removes free will, which we all know is the
worst thing
anyone can do, even compared to
anything Dien did, and Imperishable Night's boost to Quality of Life is definitely a removal of trouble for the inhabitants. The Cloak encompassing the entire Human Sphere should make it far, far easier to Hunger to have staked a claim on it with the Realm of Evening, and simply not being cast aside by the Daylight Realm is not a hostile effect, nor is preventing the destruction of the Human Sphere by the maiden's callous hand, and I'm sure Blood Halo would consider this a relevant defensive effect to boost by 1 ISH. Even if she removes the Cloak from a given portion, that only makes it all the harder to displace from anywhere else, as it's Protection increases exponentially both numerically and in terms of ISH as this occurs. As this would be combining with Armies of the Shogun and Sword in the Stone, the sheer, ridiculous quality of life would probably be a very effective Willpower buff to the soldiers resisting the maiden's memetic attack on the free will of any being who dares oppose her.
It should also be noted that every moment she fights Hunger is dangerous. Not only do we have the bleed effects of Blood Halo, but Imperishable Night has massively amped November Sky, with Hunger always considered a peer for it's effects on an enemy, it ignores defenses, and it always at least substantially inconveniences an enemy, even if that means raising it's effects until it does. Dog of War's +800 All Stats is only +0.8% benefit to Blood Halo's Might and Agi, 8% benefit to Int, Wits, App, Protection(which is of quite a bit of benefit with Imperishable Night as the effect says Protection +s defend against almost every attack the maiden could dish out, even if only Evening Sky Protection defends the Human Sphere itself), and Prowess, but Wisdom, Charisma, and Luck also receive that benefit. The former alone is likely to be significant pseudo-Apocryphal Mitigation on top of the actual half-stage Imperishable provides. On that note, the +Progression stacks with Blood Halo's removal of the Ring training debuff to further shove Apocryphal buildup in the gutter relative to Hunger's Progression.
Imperishable Night also offers Hunger a trump card in case even all this still isn't enough. Discard the Apocrphal Mitigation and associated 2 Accursed Favor in return for Hyper Novakhron providing +100,000 All Stats and +1000% All Stats, which is absolutely bonkers when stacked with Blood Halo, and +5 Rank, which changes the calculus from 14 Rank versus 15 Rank to 19 Rank versus 15 Rank. That would likely end the fight then and there as to say that's a nigh-unassailable advantage is such an understatement it's almost beyond comprehension. Even the differences between Rank 1 and Rank 5 is so great that a Rank 1 basically can't win. The additional +0.3 ISH is mostly icing on the cake.
So the maiden would probably be screwed. Hunger's Praxis stamina is magnitudes greater than canon, he's magnitudes stronger, and he can respond to her trump card with a nasty one of his own. The only question is if the Arete bonuses I Wish up are enough for Perfect Merger. Hopefully yes.
Hm, ironically, despite Hunger being even more aggressive than in canon, the playerbase of Richer Reality seems to purchase fairly conservatively considering their resources! Like, wow. 20+ Arete on a regular basis, and 40 semi-regularly! Not to mention the madness in the aftermath of Glory. Also, man. Letrizia used to be so much more cheerful. Hopefully this version's vastly increased power and potential relevance will improve on that. Maybe she won't do soul-brain surgery since she's got Sorceress-ness to back her up, as Gisena would definitely have had time to work out the kinks in Sophont Halo by that point. At very least, her studies on infinite Rank probably aren't nearly as futile, between Sorceress Grace stat boosts and 25-Arete Sharpbright, with 25-Arete Exavolt providing some serious oomph to her nervous system and perception once she's had some time to practice, as Hunger would provide amply. Aeria is much, much more powerful and versatile than canon, as is Adorie, whose Hail the Queen synergizes well with Law, to the point she might gain new unlocks in this counterfactual timeline, not to mention the both of them having extra Imaginary Elements. Ironically, Gisena and Aobaru have changed the least without major counterfactual speculation, like what might be extracted from study of Beric's Blue and what she might gain from multiple Sorceresses to work with, for the former, and the benefits to the latter being mostly confined to anything he might glean from the new 25 Arete Elements(mostly Aeria), and higher Rank, unless such a Master of All Imaginary Elements powerup did in fact exist. Though obviously none of them have anything on how different Hunger is. I mean, he's got Findross and Elixirdross Graces for crying out loud! What else was he going to spend all that time in the Realm of Evening on between Echo farming?
20260 words, discounting this line.
