Remove ads

Hmmph... this junior is a good seed [Cultivation Management Quest]

Voting is open
Reader mode
Remove ads
New Good Seed and Omake Rule Updates
  • Threadmarks
    • Good Seed and Omake Spreadsheet Rules:

    Firstly, if you have questions about Good Seeds and the like please read here. If that doesn't answer your question please ping me in thread, or on Discord.

    If you write a new Good Seed, or write an omake, please update the spreadsheet if you have access.

    If you do not have access, please ping a collaborator (Swordomatic, Alectai, Quest, TehChron, Insane-Not-Crazy, Humbaba, ReaderOfFate, Kaboomatic, no., BungieONI) letting them know what you want and they will update the spreadsheet here. To gain access, you will need a gmail account of some kind. Throwaway emails are fine (I'm using one for the spreadsheet), but to gain access it's as simple as sending me either your email via PM, via DM in Discord, or just in Discord's #spreadsheet-requests channel.

    This is mandatory. If a Good Seed does not record their omake by pinging collabs (or just requesting access and editing things themselves - this is the preferred option), I won't give out awards. If a new Good Seed is not recorded here, they won't advance. By doing this it makes the whole thing manageable for me - it's gotten pretty unwieldy!

    -----------------------

    Omake Writer Instructions:

    There are four fields you need to fill out.

    Omake Link, which is just a link to your first omake for the turn. This makes it easier for me to read them as I do the update - without this it's tough to know off the bat which omake were written this turn, and to properly

    Requested Bonus, which is your requested bonus for your omake. You can leave it up to me if you like. You can see more info in the Good Seed infopost here.

    Cultivation Aims. For those following unorthodox paths - higher than 9th Heavenstage or later than 7th Dao Pillar paths. Please put in what you are aiming for before you break through. I have left it as 'default'. If you do not edit it, I'll go with that.

    Turn Notes - Do you want to do something specific? Enter a Secret Realm? Help the Clan out in some way? If you have something specific you want to accomplish on this turn, put it in turn notes so I can adjust your Fate around it.

    All other fields are for QM use to record character information to properly run the flow of the game.
     
    Last edited:
  • Threadmarks
    • Third Elder Xie Xinya
  • Threadmarks
    • (This was entirely unexpected. I decided to roll for Nascent ascension on Discord in the public channel, with roughly a 1/1000 chance of it happening for Great Circle cultivators per turn. This was the turn the 1/1000 chance came up. I suppose the occasional mention of Xinya being the most talented of all the current Councillors really does hold up)

    (An image was here but Discord images broke - it shows a 100 on a 1d100 being rolled, followed by a 93 - a less than 1 in 1000 chance)
    =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

    Xinya pouted. It was almost perfect, this time. While others saw her as more adorable than she was, more loving, and so on - just as family demanded - she saw herself with all her flaws, had all the misgivings others didn't. So, she practiced her pouts.

    This one was more against a specific injustice, though. Casia was the clear choice for the next Nascent, to use the treasures they'd stolen from the Jingshen to help her through that barrier between Core and Nascent. That impassable breach.

    Xinya, on the other hand, would be left to rot. How was she to breach the barrier? Shatter her own Core? Abandon her own family?

    No, it was unthinkable.

    Perhaps...

    Many days passed, and Xinya passed them deep in thought. The transience of her Philosophy - or Dao, if you pleased - had always compelled her to think on its flaws, quietly removing each one as she sought to have a conception of family that ran both ways, benefiting her and those who shared her blood. Each person had their place around you, closer or further away, and the service owed - and demanded - depended on that degree of closeness. The interlinking circles in which one took one's place defined your relations with all other human beings, whether friends or family or lovers, competitors or enemies or fated rivals.

    Xinya sat and thought, but no new thought was forthcoming. She supposed she was not a terribly interesting person, compared to the remainder of the Council. The old man existed in shadows, unable to reveal his true self so much that she suspected that was his true self. Her offers of marriage were purely opportunistic, though they were honest. Xinya existed that way. Reciprocation was not quite the word sought. She did not simply reciprocate, give when given to, or take when taken from. She had relationships, and those relationships themselves determined what was due. In changing those relationships, she changed herself. Her offer would have changed her deeply - she had no true desire to marry a man who struggled being honest with those closest to him, who existed in a tangled web of lies designed to snare the unworthy and unwary alike.

    He had given everything over to the cause of the Clan, but he so rarely thought about what that meant.

    For Xinya, it had been her three sons. All dead, now. Her line continued on, though, with grandsons and granddaughters and great-greats for many generations. A family she stood at the head of, a friendly matriarch always willing to lend a listening ear if needed and a stern word as well. Sometimes a boxed ear followed her listening one, but she understood that the Clan was not merely some odd philosophical defiance of the natural order, it was made up of people.

    She was one of them, and her relationships with those people defined her. Tea-tastings with Anlong, her grandson many-times-removed last year. Spending time in the library with little Alexia, reading her moderately forbidden books on how to raise corpses to fight for you in the heat of battle. Experiences shared with people forged connections, and those connections linked together formed circles.

    Stepping into Nascent Soul would be easy in a way. She knew the theory - admitting you were wrong in some key way, using that knowledge to shatter your Core and propel yourself against the Heavens.

    For her... the reality was somewhat crueler. If she stepped into Nascent Soul the value of those circles would decline. They would lack the power to compel her, the benefits could only ever truly flow one way. The pain and necessity of cultivation would remove her from the dinners and luncheons, viewing the competitions her grandsons won, the glories of life. There would only be pain, and power.

    It was why she hadn't pushed too hard to gain the power, even though so much of her desperately coveted it.

    She looked into the sky, though, and thought.

    Right now the Trials were being fought. Or at least, the semblance of them that those many cunning children had managed to create, putting their own lives at risk to save many in the Clan.

    The truth was that even if they won, the Trials would continue. Moreover, the Favored existed. They were all fated to be Nascents, each one an existential threat to the Clan unless killed. A threat to her family. Without power, she could love and tend to her family, but she couldn't save them.

    With power, she could save them, but the care in her heart would be diminished. There was no path forward that permitted her to love them and save them. Not truly. The circles would continue existing, but if they were to do so... she would have to exist outside them. No longer driven by the care in her heart but by calculation, knowingly sending her descendents to their deaths for mere gains, sacrificing them as though they were pieces on a chessboard.

    She frowned.

    It was that simple? She felt her Core thrum with energy, ready to shatter.

    She leapt, running into the desert, far into the sands where none would suffer from her tribulation. Shattering her core in a single movement, she felt everything she was collapse, and then came a searing pain inside her head, inside her stomach, inside nowhere at all. She screamed at the skies as lightning came down, but it seemed almost... distracted, bolts of lightning swimming towards some peculiar spot in the sky and being devoured, many of them failing to hit her entirely.

    A mere few days later she rose into the air by her will alone. The pain was awful. Indescribable. She bore it, but knew now that every moment would be poisoned from now on. Anlong would be disappointed, but what taste could compare to the tearing of her very soul? Naturally she pressed it ever-further outwards, and the pain... how did the other two function? She reached into her pouch for pills, scoffing down painkillers and soul restoratives and found them entirely useless.

    Her eyes widened. No. No. There was... no escape from this.

    It would have to be borne, though, if her family were to survive.

    A third Nascent, Xie Xinya has been obtained.

    Consequently there is a decision to be made about the Nascent Treasures we hold before the next turn post is posted. I anticipate the first choice very strongly but didn't want to assume. If it virtually all goes one way or the other I'll close the vote off and post the (completed!) turn post in the next day or two.

    [ ] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.

    [ ] Save the Treasures and search for other candidates in fuure.
     
    Last edited:
  • Threadmarks
    • [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.

    Dont see a reason to delay this tbh as this was our OG plan.
     
    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.


    HERE WE GO, 4TH NASCENT HERE WE COME.
     
    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.

    Forward, Maximum Speed!
     
    ...do we have enough Spirit Stones to support 4 Nascents?
    And will our lack of Spirit Stones even matter when we pull 2 more (early, inexperienced) Nascents out of a hat as far as the other factions are concerned?

    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.
     
    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.
     
    quantum lurker said:
    ...do we have enough Spirit Stones to support 4 Nascents?
    And will our lack of Spirit Stones even matter when we pull 2 more (early, inexperienced) Nascents out of a hat as far as the other factions are concerned?

    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Afte securing the desert we have the capacity for 2 mids and 3 earlies i think.
    And with the yuan tribute coming it should rise again.
     
    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.

    speed is life in this case. Plus more diplomatic, economic, warfare, and so on from having four nukes instead of 3^^.
     
    Old Cannibal: Old Gold is distracted by the Trials, time for my Master Plan to come to fruition!

    Old Gold: Skips Trials and pulls 2 additional Nascents out of his back pocket.

    Old Cannibal: ... I think I want to quit.
     
    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.

    A thought : should we give the Stone Spear to one of our Early Nascents ? Manuel is decently strong already, and the Spear would let an Early Nascent "punch up" and survive a lot better if they get involved in a Nascent fight.
     
    TheGrape said:
    Old Cannibal: Old Gold is distracted by the Trials, time for my Master Plan to come to fruition!

    Old Gold: Skips Trials and pulls 2 additional Nascents out of his back pocket.

    Old Cannibal: ... I think I want to quit.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    OC: This is BULLSHIT. I had a plan in the making to bury him in nascent souls! I turn around and within 100 years he gets not 1, not 2, but three Nascent Souls while destroying the Jinshen!
     
    T_of_A said:
    A thought : should we give the Stone Spear to one of our Early Nascents ? Manuel is decently strong already, and the Spear would let an Early Nascent "punch up" and survive a lot better if they get involved in a Nascent fight.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    not a chance in hell when the Spear only makes Manuel the strongest Mid Nascent Soul when all of the rival factions have Late or better equivalents in their pocket that we know about

    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.
     
    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.

    Four Nascent Souls lets goooooo
    Marlin said:
    How many Nascent's can the clan have again?
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    According to this, five - two Mid Nascent Soul, three Early Nascent Soul. Odds are that Kleisthenes will be our second Mid, so the third Early will be either Sheng Yu or Destasia... But honestly I never thought we'd be in a position to consider!
    shibosho said:
    How many Nascents do the other factions have?
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    According to this it varies. We're not going to be soloing any given federation of powers, but suffice to say that having four Nascent Souls around is an incredible opportunity for us. We now have power projection. For comparison's sake, we now have more Nascent Power than Noble Knowledge, Heavenly Time Shatter, Gao Clan, Ma Clan, Chuan Clan, Bear Enslavement, Divine Tunist, Great Drunkard, Great Mountain Bell, Joyful Blacksmith, Qiguai... everyone except Strength Purity and the Demonic Altar.

    Not more than the Blood Defiance Federation or the Noble Devil Alliance or the Grand Abyssal Invasion, but as a singular power we have Quite A Few.
    T_of_A said:
    A thought : should we give the Stone Spear to one of our Early Nascents ? Manuel is decently strong already, and the Spear would let an Early Nascent "punch up" and survive a lot better if they get involved in a Nascent fight.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Oh god no. That spear is too important to hand to anyone who isn't currently serving as Archgetes. Not to mention, Manuel does still need to contend with Mid Nascents and potentially Late Nascents - and he can also make use of it arguably the best, since he's the one who can get trickiest with its ability to hit anything. It'll be useful for Kleisthenes because now she can block anything, but she's otherwise much more conventional with what she stabs.

    And that disregards that it's a Law Creation-grade superweapon that, if it falls into the wrong hands (and they don't even have to be enemy hands), will doom us all.
     
    Christ I missed this quest. Awesome update, I really enjoyed this bittersweet glance in our latest Nascents head.


    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.
     
    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.
     
    [X] Permit Casia to ascend to Nascent Soul. Will happen at turn start if so, and a fourth Nascent Action will be unlocked.

    Let'sa fukkin GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
     
    TehChron said:
    No, dudes under enough of a workload coming back into the quest as is given his issues.

    We are not asking more of him.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    The map does need to be updated. The old one is from year 240 and got made back in 2021. The RL year is now 2024. So, up to QM to look into that or just never do it. But it is something to consider, as factions shift even further now.
     
    Marlin said:
    The map does need to be updated. The old one is from year 240 and got made back in 2021. The RL year is now 2024
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    ...Marlin, I understand that you have difficulty communicating with people online but given your experience in DoDA I'd think you'd have learned to take the hint about QMs having irl and productivity issues and the lack of tact involved in asking for more especially when it's entirely because you want a recent map, rather than one that is needed due to any changes in the polities in the region.

    Changes that we dont even know if any have occurred since the last turn vote.

    You're not even part of the long standing conversations and planning all this time, so it's not as if you need it in the first place
     
    Reader mode
    You must login or register to reply here.
    Voting is open
    Remove ads
    Back
    Top