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Now You Feel Like Number None [Bleach Arrancar Quest]

Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
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Wow.

That stuff with Szayel is super-awful. It's just really, really awful.

Aaroniero was neat. Kind of scary, but neat. Might should have forced Cirucci to accept the dinner invite after all.

Something is clearly going on with all the old calaveras. Maybe they've all got the same potential as Jackalton, just much less extreme, and now that the hive mind is broken, they're able to start becoming independent? Or, the hive mind isn't broken, it just lost the smartest, most dominant personality. Or, they're still somehow connected to Jack, and they're working off his subconscious or something. Or Ichimaru Gin is doing something. Or the double-ghost of Ruddborne is haunting Nemo from beyond the double-grave.

Did I mention that Szayel is awful? He's really, really awful.

I think we probably need to get the healing. But if there's one person Nemo can't trust to heal her, it's Mayuri Kurotsuchi, and while he's not likely to offer, Szayel is pretty close to just as bad. But having crippling wounds and only not dying immediately because you have super-spirit healing powers holding you together is really bad. But Szayel.

On the other hand, many of the awful things Szayel will do to Nemo, he's probably already done while they were talking. But then, being complicit in his Szayel-ness by helping with his work.

Also, access to research materials. Tempting. But Szayel.
 
NSMS said:
Hmm... on the one hand, Szayel is almost certainly on the level here with his offer. We and Cirucci have given him enough new data and materials, both directly and indirectly, to keep him busy and researching for years. But on the other, even 'on-the-level' Szayel is a potential danger; he's got absolutely no moral compass or conscience, and if he thinks something will benefit him he'll do it without care for such piddly little things as 'ethics'. Hell, he's probably already filled us full of spy-bacteria so he can get more observational data of Cirucci and can keep track of our movements and find out what we get up to when nobody's watching (I suspect Nemo has something of a reputation for being sneaky now). Giving him free access to our insides is likely to end with a mix of beneficial, creepy, and potentially hazardous results- us having a permanent tracking device implanted and our lungs retrofitted so we can breath acid at people, for example.
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You've convinced me.

[] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[] Healing your crippling injuries. With the Quinta as your mistress, there is no risk of him offending her by turning you into a freaky mutant, but letting Szayel play around with your insides might still have consequences, even - especially - if he believes he's helping you doing so. Then again, these consequences could be positive…

Also I really love how each Espada has shaped their lair to resemble themselves in some way.
 
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Aaaaaaah fuck that's one hell of a vote.

...I'm gonna have to go with healing, it's just too great a chance to pass up.
 
Man, Szayel reminds me of one of those munchkin players in a tabletop game who optimises to levels of bizarrely horrifying and wonders why no-one else at the table is terribly enthusiastic about their idea.

Make no mistake, though. Szayel's not dumb. He probably has a very good idea of how Cirucci and Nemo feel about his work on Yammy, and he's playing on that with the Sarcophagus.
 
seriously though, the Hollow Knight Abyss style stuff with aaerionro was great, Even managed to somehow work in the whole Lifeblood angle, which was really cool.
 
You know we have been on roll for a while with all our upgrades and they all fit narratively. Like first after we kill Ruddborne we gain greater understanding of ourselves when we increase our reiatsu control giving us the ability to actually use our grand rey cero and not just faint from a single use. Next after our whole hostage thing we gain perception on another level thats helped us better understand others along with style in which we have perfected to a level some might call enlightening. Now were about to take the final step in la marana and achieve mastery in our greatest art.
 
I refuse to trade La Marana to this guy. Cold hard science lobotomizing and abusing the art of the weave. This is everything art stands against. This is not what art should be. I REFUSE! Art should not be sold to cold hard science to experiment upon. I have no true comparison to give, such a crime it is. No. A thousand times no. Refuse and never linger upon it again. Nemo is not power hungry, she does not need anything that would be a reason for such travesty. The only reason remotely acceptable would be a stop to Cirruci studies, for that is love. But anything else? No. No and no.
 
I feel that anything but asking for nothing would have too many side effects; we should heal on our own, Cirucci does want this person as a contact (and really, we have gotten along with less stable people before), and we really should be working on this, to make it less terrible if nothing else.
 
I am...extremely torn. Syazel is, quite simply, my favorite sort of villain. An innocent monster, caught up in the joy of creation, the wonder of science, things that should be beautiful and good turned cold and wicked, while losing none of their joy and beauty. I want more. I want to see more, of him, of this evil, I want to see more of my favorite sort of monster, done well by someone who gets it.

But.

I don't want to expose Nemo to that. Don't want to gain or profit from it. I think I have to vote...

[x] Refuse. Nothing is worth the moral hazard of working on this project, or the dangers of Szayel's laboratory. You will offend the Espada, who might not even understand why you're letting go of such an opportunity, but Style will let you do so smoothly enough that he won't hold a grudge.
 
[X] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[X] Healing your crippling injuries. With the Quinta as your mistress, there is no risk of him offending her by turning you into a freaky mutant, but letting Szayel play around with your insides might still have consequences, even - especially - if he believes he's helping you doing so. Then again, these consequences could be positive…
 
And the vote is open!

Linarka said:
seriously though, the Hollow Knight Abyss style stuff with aaerionro was great, Even managed to somehow work in the whole Lifeblood angle, which was really cool.
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the hilarious thing is that i still don't know what lifeblood or the abyss are

no don't tell me i will play the game someday

TenfoldShields said:
healing

from this guy



this guy



this guy

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how can you not trust that smile

and that beautiful, beautiful hair
 
[X] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[X] Healing your crippling injuries. With the Quinta as your mistress, there is no risk of him offending her by turning you into a freaky mutant, but letting Szayel play around with your insides might still have consequences, even - especially - if he believes he's helping you doing so. Then again, these consequences could be positive…
 
[X] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[X] Nothing. By feigning pure scientific interest in his work and an eagerness to help him, you will please him greatly and make him less likely to scrutinize your work, putting you in a better position to make the Sacrophagus less inhumane, and perhaps giving you the opportunity to pilfer Szayel's notes on other subjects for your own use.

He turned his Fraccion into consumables. He is the Hollow version of Mayuri, debatable on whether he's more or less sane.

We're not letting him operate on our body, or insert anything in there while we're out.
 
[X] Refuse. Nothing is worth the moral hazard of working on this project, or the dangers of Szayel's laboratory. You will offend the Espada, who might not even understand why you're letting go of such an opportunity, but Style will let you do so smoothly enough that he won't hold a grudge.

La marana is an art, not something to be qualified and studied and dissected and replicated endlessly upon immortal cloned fraccion.
 
[X] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[X] Healing your crippling injuries. With the Quinta as your mistress, there is no risk of him offending her by turning you into a freaky mutant, but letting Szayel play around with your insides might still have consequences, even - especially - if he believes he's helping you doing so. Then again, these consequences could be positive…
 
[X] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[X] Nothing. By feigning pure scientific interest in his work and an eagerness to help him, you will please him greatly and make him less likely to scrutinize your work, putting you in a better position to make the Sacrophagus less inhumane, and perhaps giving you the opportunity to pilfer Szayel's notes on other subjects for your own use.

I would prefer if Nemo had an actual plan for dealing with her injuries but I also recognize that letting operate on her is something that would almost certainly end up going horrible wrong. This vote seems like the best option as it will allow Nemo to gain the favour of a critical Espada and hopefully provide valuable skills.
 
[X] Refuse. Nothing is worth the moral hazard of working on this project, or the dangers of Szayel's laboratory. You will offend the Espada, who might not even understand why you're letting go of such an opportunity, but Style will let you do so smoothly enough that he won't hold a grudge.
 
[X] Refuse. Nothing is worth the moral hazard of working on this project, or the dangers of Szayel's laboratory. You will offend the Espada, who might not even understand why you're letting go of such an opportunity, but Style will let you do so smoothly enough that he won't hold a grudge.

Guys, it's not just Szayel as a threat we need to consider but the cost of working with him. Nemo is safe for a fraccion around the Numeros. Nemo has a reputation to consider here. We don't want to become another monster in the dark.

If Alphonse had been known to work with Szayel would you have voted to interact with him more?

This is a devil's bargain and walking away is the one exit without paying with Nemo's conscience.
 
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Huh

First time casting a vote here

[X] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[X] Nothing. By feigning pure scientific interest in his work and an eagerness to help him, you will please him greatly and make him less likely to scrutinize your work, putting you in a betterposition to make the Sacrophagus less inhumane, and perhaps giving you the opportunity to pilfer Szayel's notes on other subjects for your own use.
 
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