Or the fact that Bronie herself is the Herrscher of Reason -- generation one, most likely, given the absolute ease with which she uses it -- while having no clue how that happened, having none of Bronya's backstory, and in fact not even knowing she is.
blagh I really should have finished the Bronie event. In my defense, the exploration zone ran at, like, 3 fps on my phone for some reason so no, but still.
I'm perfectly willing to do that. @Baughn is the one who keeps insisting this is not a Nobilis quest despite all evidence.
Jokes aside, I think it's pretty certain we are working in a Mangled Worlds framework, because, um, Baughn's the one doing much of the writing and physics-fitting and keeps mentioning mangling?
This says something about the world as well, and Bronie isn't the sort to ignore a challenge. We've yet to determine what she'll decide is the challenge.
Jokes aside, I think it's pretty certain we are working in a Mangled Worlds framework, because, um, Baughn's the one doing much of the writing and physics-fitting and keeps mentioning mangling?
I don't know about Baughn's take on it, but from what I understand of how the Sea and Tree function as a multiverse is that its kinda both a mangled worlds framework and a reverse-mangled worlds framework.
The bubble universes seem to self-propagate... or maybe grow would be a better word... they grow, fall apart into the Sea, grow again, etc.
Some bubbles would eventually crash together, or even one just hitting a sweet spot on its own, and grow into something stable enough to not just fall apart back into the Sea. So mangled world in a sense because bubbles eating bubbles to become better bubbles.
Maybe.
And reverse because as the stable bubble keeps growing it also sheds off pieces that become tiny bubbles around it. This is mostly seen in the main story chapter where Bronya goes Sea diving to find Seele.
It's kinda what she does, but I doubt she'd describe it as anything as grand as "fighting fate".
Bronie just follows her heart, no matter where it takes her. She's skilled enough to survive it, but not skilled enough to avoid giving Teriri heart attacks.
I don't know about Baughn's take on it, but from what I understand of how the Sea and Tree function as a multiverse is that its kinda both a mangled worlds framework and a reverse-mangled worlds framework.
The bubble universes seem to self-propagate... or maybe grow would be a better word... they grow, fall apart into the Sea, grow again, etc.
Some bubbles would eventually crash together, or even one just hitting a sweet spot on its own, and grow into something stable enough to not just fall apart back into the Sea. So mangled world in a sense because bubbles eating bubbles to become better bubbles.
Maybe.
And reverse because as the stable bubble keeps growing it also sheds off pieces that become tiny bubbles around it. This is mostly seen in the main story chapter where Bronya goes Sea diving to find Seele.
The key thing to be aware of is that, while the mangled worlds concept provides an explanation of the Born rule, in the form of "most smaller universes fail to exist", it doesn't explain why that should be. It's an elegant statistical description, and that's it.
About two weeks ago, AI Dungeon decided they should try to filter out child porn and subsequently had a complete meltdown. You can find a lot about that online, but suffice to say that the output quality has taken a nosedive, and also it won't allow me to write about children. Such as Seele and Roza. Or numbers less than eighteen.
Yes, the filter is... bad.
At the same time I was given beta access to the GPT-3 API, and I've been building a better writing tool on top of that. Emacs is handy for that sort of thing, heh.
At the same time, a new HI3 chapter was released, which focuses on Seele... and Veliona. Naturally it's not fully compatible, but we already knew this story is Captainverse. It's still really useful, and closer to what I had in mind than I had any reason to hope.
(Einstein and Seele get quite well along, thank you. )
Retrospectively, you can say the story's been on hiatus for a while. That's going to end next weekend, with the final update to this particular HI3 chapter, and it shouldn't take long after that before you'll see an update. Until then...
...
I am definitely writing an interlude from Bronie's perspective first.
I'm not great at building web-UIs, and GPT-3 isn't great at helping me write, either. It's a capable network for sure, but it's too much of a generalist for this job. One which is ten times larger might do the trick, but without fine-tuning it's not doing great. Not to mention that I trigger OpenAI's output filter every five minutes. It seems I'd have a lot of work to do there.
Or, alternately, someone else might build a new system which is everything I ever thought I wanted, and then some. NovelAI.net is somehow outputting text that's of significantly better quality than the AI Dungeon model managed, despite NAI's model being literally 1/50th the size. Everything else is also improved. It outclasses AID to a quite frankly absurd degree.
It turns out that having competent developers can help. I'm certainly going to talk more about this system in upcoming updates.
Anyhow, progress is finally being made. At risk of making my own incompetence apparent, I must say it's a much nicer experience having a competent AI helping out with that; I've gotten more story content jotted down in the last hour than in the month preceding.
For those who don't mind spoilers, and with the caveat that this is relatively raw AI output that hasn't gone through any sort of editing, I think you can see what I mean re. output quality.
If there was anything she wanted from life, 'Veliona' thought, it was her sister's happiness.
It's not as though they didn't get along. They were close, if she was allowed to say so. And the more time went by the closer they got. Ironic, that; getting her own body, instead of being stuck in Seele's, had shattered all of her carefully cultured aloofness. Maybe it was because she was part of the group, now, instead of being a voice in her head.
But... despite all that... her sister was a big, fat... dummy.
It's funny how you can love someone and hate them at the same time. It made her feel kind of bad, but that wasn't really fair. Seele was... Seele was just...
Veliona fell deeper into her sister's embrace, eyes burning as she tried not to cry. It was stupid. This was all *stupid*. Why couldn't she have been a cat or something? She'd be a lot happier!
"I'm sorry, Vel," said the girl holding her. "I really am."
And that, besides–
"You don't think my name's really 'Vel', do you?" she asked, suddenly. "You don't think that's a real name. Do you?"
Something bitter in her tone made the question sound almost accusatory. She didn't mean to. This was Seele, of *course* she'd believed her, when she'd been joking around. But–
"...it's not?"
Seele's tone was surprised. Then, after a moment:
"I'm sorry."
Seele held her even more tightly, hard enough that Vel thought she could hear her bones creaking.
"No," she whispered.
"Sorry, sis..."
The two of them stood there a while longer. Finally Seele let up on her hold, gently, then stepped back. She looked away from her twin, at the diary table.
"You're right about one thing," she murmured. "It's scary. I'm terrified of what might happen to us here. What might happen to my family. But, Vel–" She gave a short laugh, more a bark than genuine laughter. "Sorry. Where did you get that name from anyway? If it's okay for me to ask."
Her sister was... really such an idiot.
"One of Liliya's books," she answered. "I snuck out to read it one night, when we were around eleven. She had a lot of fairy tales, and there were some really good ones about a goddess of death named Veliona. I liked the idea of being like her, you know? She sounded so cool. So, I decided to make up a character that would be just like her.
"It was fun, but–"
She trailed off, pictures flying through her head.
"Nothing bad." She shook her head. "Chains, claws and darkness are a lot cooler when there isn't anyone to comment on them. I'm imagining Roza's reaction. That's all.
"Anyway. I started thinking, if I was some sort of underworld goddess then I wouldn't *care* that I didn't have a body of my own. I'd be all aloof, and I could swoop in to help you at the last second, and..."
She was crying again, now.
"So... so I made myself a little bit like her."
That was a lie. It had never really been a conscious decision, but there were a few things that had happened—a couple of events—that had driven it home. The way her sister had reacted, in retrospect, made her think it was a bad idea.
Like the day Seele was kidnapped by slavers. She couldn't remember, right now, if that had been before or after. She'd been so angry—so furious! —at her helplessness at the time, that she hadn't even noticed how much more vulnerable Seele had been than herself. How scared she'd been at her appearance. She'd realised afterwards, of course, and that killed any notion of introducing herself like a normal person.
But that had changed everything. When she was Veliona she felt... safe. More powerful. Stronger.
She didn't understand Seele. She hadn't known how to talk to her, then. And she still wasn't very good at it. But if she was just going to be a guardian, then it didn't matter.
"It's not a perfect match," she said, sniffling. "But it worked. Even when it started to feel wrong, it still worked. It's all because of you that–"
She stopped abruptly, and turned away. Seele was silent. She reached over, took her hand. Squeezed gently.
"Vel... no, I shouldn't call you that. Who do you want to be? What kind of a girl?"
There were lots of answers she could give. But, eventually:
"I don't know," she whispered. "Maybe... maybe just someone who's not afraid."
Her voice was quiet, barely above a whisper. She had to concentrate to keep her emotions under control. She wasn't used to having them, or feeling them... she wasn't used to a lot of things that had been happening lately.
"I'm sorry I was always so cold with you," she said, quietly. "You deserved a friend who was nicer to you. A sister. Someone to love. I couldn't be that, and I was scared of trying."
Seele nodded slowly.
"Vel..." she began, then paused. "...you're my twin. And I wasn't always the nicest either. You have nothing to apologise for.
"...I'm sorry," she continued. "For lost time." She looked at her hands, and swallowed. "I didn't mean to hurt you, either. I was scared."
"That makes two of us, Seele," she replied. She smiled, weakly. "Sorry, I'm not very good at this."
"It's okay. Just... it was nice to hear you say that."
They stood there a while longer.
"Vel," Seele murmured, after another moment. "When you figure it out. I want to know what name you want to be called by; I really do." She hesitated. "If I can help you, you know I will. I promise I won't let you go, but I need you to tell me if there's anything else I should know about you. Anything at all. Please...?"
She was begging. It was so like Seele that Vel found herself smiling, despite everything. She stepped forward and hugged her.
"With a cute little sister, like this, how could I say no? Besides... it's good practice."
* * *
The next day they were back to work.
. . .
Now, thanks to this, there's been a story update to HI3 in the meantime. I'm happy to report that it doesn't actually contradict any of my assumptions, despite focusing on Seele, but even if it did it's worth remembering that this was an AU right from the start. That being said, I did figure out in the process that Seele is a fairly blatant expy of Hel, siblings included. Bronya is actually called the 'Silver Wolf of the Urals', which is about as blatant as you can get, here.
Now, thanks to this, there's been a story update to HI3 in the meantime. I'm happy to report that it doesn't actually contradict any of my assumptions, despite focusing on Seele, but even if it did it's worth remembering that this was an AU right from the start. That being said, I did figure out in the process that Seele is a fairly blatant expy of Hel, siblings included. Bronya is actually called the 'Silver Wolf of the Urals', which is about as blatant as you can get, here.
Hm. Something I've been worrying about: I am given to understand AID was randy as hell because they sidetrained it on some lewd fanfic content or something. But without that, and with the smaller network, does GPT-J-6B still have the capacity to create good content for an anime fanfic to the same extent? Or does NovelAI train on similar datasets, maybe less 18+? How's your experience with that?
Hm. Something I've been worrying about: I am given to understand AID was randy as hell because they sidetrained it on some lewd fanfic content or something. But without that, and with the smaller network, does GPT-J-6B still have the capacity to create good content for an anime fanfic to the same extent? Or does NovelAI train on similar datasets, maybe less 18+? How's your experience with that?
Neither AI is capable of writing stories. What they're good at is helping you write a story—specifically, you can use it for the wordcrafting, beats, and such. It's still up to you to steer the story as a whole.
That being said, fine-tuning is indeed helpful. AID had a single fine-tuning option, which wasn't actually optional, and it's... infamous, yes. As for NovelAI, it has...
And yes, in my experience they work. The fine folks at NovelAI are also working on an option for letting subscribers build their own fine-tunings.
If there was anything she wanted from life, 'Veliona' thought, it was her sister's happiness.
It's not as though they didn't get along. They were close, if she was allowed to say so. And the more time went by the closer they got. Ironic, that; getting her own body, instead of being stuck in Seele's, had shattered all of her carefully cultured aloofness. Maybe it was because she was part of the group, now, instead of being a voice in their head.
But... despite all that... her sister was a big, fat... dummy.
It was funny how you could love someone and hate them at the same time. It made her feel kind of bad, but that wasn't really fair. Seele was... Seele was just...
Veliona fell deeper into her sister's embrace, eyes burning as she tried not to cry. It was stupid. This was all stupid. Why couldn't she have been a cat or something? She'd be a lot happier!
"I'm sorry, Vel," said the girl holding her. "I really am."
And that, besides–
"You don't think my name's really 'Vel', do you?" she asked suddenly, twisting around to look at her sister. "You don't think that's a real name. Do you?"
Something bitter in her tone made the question sound almost accusatory. She didn't mean to. This was Seele, of *course* she'd believed her, she always believed her even when she was joking around. But–
"...it's not?"
Seele's tone was surprised. Then, after a moment:
"I'm sorry."
Seele held her even more tightly, hard enough that Vel thought she could hear her bones creaking.
"No," she whispered, unsure what to do next. "It's not."
"Sorry, sis..."
The two of them stood there a while longer. Finally Seele let up on her hold, gently, then stepped back. She looked away from her twin, at the diary table.
"You're right about one thing," she murmured. "It's scary. I'm terrified of what might happen to us here. What might happen to my family. But, Vel–" She gave a short laugh, more a bark than genuine laughter. "Sorry. Where did you get that name from anyway? If it's okay for me to ask."
Her sister was... really such an idiot. She took a moment to compose herself, then sighed.
"One of Liliya's books," she said. "I snuck out to read it one night, when we were around eleven. She had tons of books of fairy tales, and there were some really good ones with a goddess of death named Veliona. I liked the idea of being like her, you know? She sounded cool. So, I decided to make up a character that would be just like her.
"It was fun, but–"
She trailed off, pictures flying through her head.
"Nothing bad." She shook her head. "Chains, claws and darkness are a lot cooler when there isn't anyone around to comment on them. I'm imagining Roza's reaction. That's all.
"Anyway. I started thinking, if I was some sort of underworld goddess then I wouldn't care that I didn't have a body of my own. I'd be all aloof, and I could swoop in to help you at the last second, and..."
She was crying again, now.
"So... so I made myself a little bit like her."
That was a lie. It had never been a conscious decision, but there were a few things that had happened—a couple of events—that had driven it home. The way her sister had reacted, in retrospect, made her think it was a bad idea.
Like the day Seele was kidnapped by slavers. She couldn't remember, right now, if that had been before or after. She'd been so angry—so furious! —at her helplessness at the time, that she hadn't even noticed how much more vulnerable Seele had been than herself. How scared she'd been of her appearance. She'd realised afterwards, of course, and that killed any notion of introducing herself like a normal person. Not that she would likely have succeeded, but she hadn't even tried.
It had changed everything. When she was Veliona she felt... safe. More powerful. Stronger.
She didn't understand Seele. She hadn't known how to talk to her, then. And she still wasn't very good at it. But if she was just going to be a guardian, then it didn't matter.
"It worked," she said, sniffling. "Even when it started to feel wrong, it still worked. It's all because of you that–"
She stopped abruptly, and turned away. Seele was silent. She reached over, took her hand. Squeezed gently.
"Vel... no, I shouldn't call you that. Who do you want to be? What kind of a girl?"
There were lots of answers she could give. But, eventually:
"I don't know." She shrugged. "Just–"
She hesitated, then said, softly, "I guess I just want to be a little more like you. A little less alone."
Seele's eyes widened in surprise. Vel sighed; she didn't mean to say that, but it came out anyway. Seele squeezed her hand once, then let go.
"You're not alone," Seele whispered. "Not ever. You'll always have me. And Roza likes you, I can tell. Liliya…" She laughed. "Liliya would hug a Honkai beast right now, I think, but she likes you as well."
She smiled at the words, and saw Seele smile back.
"I'm sorry I was always so cold with you," Veliona said. Her voice was quiet, barely above a whisper. She struggled to keep her emotions under control. She wasn't used to having them, or feeling them... she wasn't used to a lot of things that had been happening lately.
"You deserved a friend who was nicer to you. A sister. Someone to love. I couldn't be that, and I was scared of trying."
Seele nodded slowly.
"Vel..." she began, then paused. "...you're my twin. And I wasn't always the nicest either. You have nothing to apologise for.
"...I'm sorry," she continued. "For lost time." She looked at her hands, and swallowed. "I didn't mean to hurt you, either. I was scared."
"That makes two of us, Seele," Vel replied. She smiled, weakly. "Sorry, I'm not very good at this."
"It's okay. Just... it was nice to hear you say that."
They stood there a while longer.
"Vel," Seele murmured, after another moment. "When you figure it out. I want to know what your name is; I really do." She hesitated. "If I can help you, you know I will. I promise I won't let you go, but I need you to tell me if there's anything else I should know about you. Anything at all. Please...?"
She was begging. It was so like Seele that Vel found herself smiling, despite everything. She stepped forward and hugged her. She'd never get tired of that sensation.
"With a cute little sister like this, how could I say no? Besides... it's good practice."
= = =
It didn't solve everything. Even as you held Vel in your arms—your strong, brave, capable big sister—she was still, blatantly, uncomfortable in her own skin.
None of that fear had been from physical danger, at least to herself.
Worrying she'd seen the future? You wished you could say for sure that that was impossible. But that wasn't really it, either. Your sister wasn't afraid because of what she thought might happen; she was afraid because, until now, she'd never had this much to lose.
She was scared that she wouldn't be able to protect everyone. That she would fail.
And...
What if she did? What if their opponents were too great, and she couldn't stop them? Would that make her a failure?
'No', you decided. It did not. Fail or succeed, at least you'd tried. You loved Vel and Roza, Liliya and Kiana, and Bronya... all of them, each in their own way. Whatever happened from now on, even though they'd failed, none of them were failures.
But there was one last thing you could do to help. You knew that, now. And you wanted her to be happy.
"One more thing, sis," you said, softly. "Something I've been thinking about. About this situation. What you said... 'Why did we think we can survive, when all of reality is dead?'"
You'd been wondering that yourself, but not in the same way. At first you'd been too busy, and then, well, 'all of reality'? That was just wrong.
Which was why you had an answer, finally. The truth.
"So reality is dead," you said. "So what? What does it matter if we're wandering a graveyard? You're here, I'm here, our family... We're all here. All of us are alive and together. Why would that change if the rest of it's gone?"
Vel was quiet for a long time before replying.
"Because," she said, slowly. "We're all alone."
You shook your head.
"I only cared about the world because all of us lived there. Bronya's here! She's still alive. Theresa's here. Kiana's here. Einstein's here. Everyone we cared about—everyone who mattered to me, everyone I loved, who was still alive... they're all here. If it was just me, or you, or even Lili... then maybe I couldn't have accepted being alone. But we're all here, and if the universe is dead, if we're all alive we can hope to make a new one. To rebuild what was lost."
"And you want to do that," she whispered. "It's absurd. Unreasonable. I can't believe you'd be so naive."
You shrugged.
"Wasn't I always? It doesn't matter, anyway. Maybe it's callous, but I've got everyone I care about, right here. What about you? Do you have anyone?"
She hesitated. Then she smiled. You could see the effort behind it, but you were glad to know that, at least, you'd made her smile.
"You, Bronya, Roza and Lili," she replied. "I... I don't know. My family, I suppose. I guess..."
She trailed off. You waited patiently. She took a deep breath.
"It's not fair," she muttered. "That I'm finally getting to live, just as everything else dies. There has to be something we can do. Something to fix it."
Better. You squeezed her again, eliciting a yelp.
"There is," you said firmly. "There are still bubble universes, stable ones even, and with Kiana, Bronya, and the two of us maybe we can find some way to build something new. I don't want to give up. And neither do you. So let's figure out how to do that."
She nodded. She'd stopped crying by now, but her eyes were wet. You hugged her tightly.
"It's going to be okay," you said, quietly. "This is just a bad patch. Things will get better."
"The entire universe is dead," she said, half-laughing. "Things could hardly get worse than this, could they?"
You laughed too.
= = =
You stepped out of the stigmata, and the world changed in an instant. The checkerboard floor of your soul gave way, replaced by... what? Nothingness, perhaps?
A vast ocean of pure, colourless nothingness, stretching into infinity. Shards of realities, ways of being that had been shattered and ground to dust too fine to be seen, littering its surface. Vast, temporarily coherent bubbles studded the sea like soap froth on water. Each one was unique, each one different from any other, each one containing...
A world.
They were always there, hanging in the void. Between reality and oblivion, between the imaginary tree and an abyss too deep for even quantum shadows to survive, falling forever. Inscrutable, inaccessible, but always visible. You hung in the middle of it all. A butterfly slowly flapping its wings.
A few more beats of that, a little harder, and you could fly away. If you didn't mind leaving everything behind.
"Seele?" Veliona whispered. "Get a grip."
You shook yourself. "Sorry," you said. "I was just..."
And then there was the dragon. No, the Dragon. No lesser word would do justice to the being that hovered before you.
It was massive, larger than the world it had wrapped itself around, and it had no real shape. Just a vague suggestion of where it should be, a faint outline, a shadow.
Vel had called it a 'snake', but you'd seen dragons like this when you were exploring the city around St. Freyja's with Kiana. Statues, of course. They were everywhere in the old capital, which was a little odd.
"I think they're supposed to bring luck, or something," Kiana had said.
They were also somewhat smaller.
"Vel," you asked, very carefully, so as to lessen the chance of being eaten. "Why is there a dragon this size here? Why wasn't this the first thing you mentioned?"
She blinked, then looked at the dragon. "Well... I mean..."
This was not going well.
"They wouldn't hurt us," Veliona said. She frowned. "I don't know how I know that. But it's true."
The dragon rumbled, starting to shift its weight now it had noticed your attention. Every one of its scales was the size of continents, and glittered in the darkness. It was beautiful. It—they, if you could believe your sister—was absolutely breathtaking, if also breathtakingly intimidating.
"We're safe," Vel repeated. "I'm sure of that. You don't need to worry. I know what I'm doing."
You exchanged a look with your twin. She nodded slightly, and turned back to the dragon.
'And what... are you doing, exactly?' you thought, but didn't say, as the dragon wrapped itself around you and Vel both. You felt a strange warmth, like being cocooned by a giant blanket of warmy, fluffy air.
"It'll be okay," she said, sounding much more confident than you felt. "Trust me."
You took a breath.
"Okay," you said. "I trust you, sis. I really do."
The dragon let out a rumble of agreement and shifted its position, wrapping you in a tighter embrace. You could feel its essence through your skin, such as it was; it tasted of lightning and thunder and the scent of a thousand worlds. You had never once in your life been this close to a quantum shadow, let alone one that could, you were certain, squash you like a grape. But it seemed to have no intent of doing so. Instead it—shifted, gently almost—and stroked your face with the tip of its tail.
"Um," Vel said slowly. "Well, that's... I'm not sure. I think they're happy I'm back."
She sounded uncertain. The dragon huffed, and you felt a wave of emotion wash over you, like the ocean on a hot day. Your senses swam, and your head spun.
"You okay?"
There was another rumble from the beast. A gentle nuzzle against your cheek, and then...
The world went black.
= = =
"Race you to the cinema!" Roz shouted, as she and her sister dashed across the yard.
You laughed, matching them stride for stride. The young girl was one of your brother's very best friends, but she was starting to grow on you. Like a fungus, or something similar.
"Don't push yourself too hard," Bronya admonished, watching you run. "We've got plenty of time."
She was right, of course. More importantly, you had to be careful. That's what the odd doctors had said… that, and how odd it was that you'd survived. That you'd been caught in an eruption zone, and lived to speak of it. You hadn't yet decided what to do about it.
(This isn't a good idea...)
"I'm fine," you assured them, waving off their concern. "Just a little tired."
It wasn't entirely true, but it would do for now.
(I want to go back.)
"Maybe we should slow down," Liliya said.
"I'm alright," you said again, more firmly. "No slowing down."
(But I think I'm going to be sick...!)
"Alright then," Roz said. "C'mon, Seele! Let's go see the movie already! Bron, race me."
The dream solidified, and you were suddenly heaving for breath with your hands on your knees. The two girls stood there, looking at you expectantly.
"Sorry," you gasped. "I... I think I need a moment..."
"Sure," Roz said, rumbling. "Bronya?"
"Oh, you're on," Bronya replied. They were both faster than you—you had to admit that. You couldn't keep up with either of them, and you weren't going to push it. Instead you smiled, watching Bronya's mischievous side flare to life as she grinned like a cat.
"On three," she said. "One. Two–"
And she was off, leaving Roz shouting about cheaters and running after her. You watched the two girls sprint away, laughing, before turning to Liliya. She was still standing there. Looking at you.
"What?" you asked.
"I'm just worried about you," the usually cheerful girl said quietly. "You haven't been yourself lately."
"I know," you sighed. "I'm sorry, Lils. I... I guess I needed to get my thoughts in order. What Fire Moth told me... what I saw..."
She looked concerned.
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm... better. I'll tell you all about it later," you promised. "Let's just go see the movie. We have to be back by dinner, anyway."
You could see her relax a bit. She gave you a smile and nodded.
"Okay."
= = =
You did not bend in half, hyperventilating from the shock. You did not have a waist to bend, and you did not faint, though you felt your nonexistent heart pounding in your chest like it was going to burst out and explode into confetti. Your wings, normally the same, deep-sea blue as your eyes, faded to a dull grey from pure fright. What–
The Dragon. Of course.
Before there was time to do anything at all, said dragon reacted. It curled itself around you further, almost crushing you with its immense weight and warmth. You could feel every scale on your body, each one as soft as a feather. And then, before you could begin to think about this—or wonder why Vel was doing nothing—
It purred, like a cat desperate not to be left alone.
You tried to breathe, but the dragon held you in place, pressing itself against you.
"Seele," you heard. "You okay? What was that?"
The dragon rumbled softly. You could feel its thoughts, and they were confused. Disjointed, even. As if it couldn't quite remember how to be a dragon.
"I... I don't know," you replied. "It was..."
"A day at the cinema?" she asked.
"Yes!" you said. "That's it! That's what happened, because—"
You stopped, suddenly realizing the implications of your words.
"Wait," you whispered. "Vel... we both saw the same thing?"
She nodded.
"And those weren't our Roza and Liliya," you said. "And I don't have a little brother. I... I don't think I have a little brother. Because we were orphaned when I was, maybe, five. That wasn't…"
You frowned, as another aspect of the 'dream' came to mind.
"I was hurt," you said. "Subcritical honkai infection. Like Liliya had, except with far worse treatment. Only that's not possible, is it? My honkai resistance is the next best thing to infinite. It couldn't happen."
The dragon didn't respond.
It occurred to you that the resistance was the only reason you'd survived, when your parents hadn't.
"But... Bronya was worried about me. Liliya was worried about me." And in the dream she'd looked both healthier and taller. Tail-less and horn-less. She'd been more confident, too. In a quiet way, not the over-the-top Roza way, but still.
Vel absently petted the dragon, stroking it with her hand. You felt something inside you shift, like a rock had fallen somewhere deep down. The dream hadn't been about you—it couldn't be. But Vel's reactions, whether she knew it or not...
"What does that mean?" you murmured.
You looked back at the endless expanse of infinite possibilities, and wondered how many of them could possibly be this absurd. How much of the multiverse was actually sane? In what fraction of worlds did your sister not—repeat, not—bring you a dragon-snake, claiming it had followed her home?
When was she ever this happy?
"You're smiling," you observed.
"I am?" she said, sounding surprised. "Oh. I guess I am."
You reached to touch the dragon. It rumbled at your presence, but otherwise ignored you. You took a deep breath.
"So," you said, "this is the part where you tell me what we're going to do next."
"Yeah," Vel replied, her voice soft.
"Sis..." you started.
"I know," she said, looking at the snake-dragon. "I couldn't make out what they were saying, when they said it. I don't know why. Now? It's perfectly clear. That dream? That was a happy memory."
She smiled, but there was something wistful in her expression.
"It feels like I'm dreaming, even now," she said. "Like I'll wake up, and they won't be there anymore. Do you think that's possible, Seele? Could we really lose each other?"
You shook your head. You could feel the world shifting around you, like the planet was tilting on its axis.
"No," you replied. "No, I don't think that's likely to happen. Not after all this."
You reached out again, and touched the dragon. Its scales felt like satin under your fingers, warm as a summer breeze. Like a cool winter's night, when you'd just stepped outside, and it was so cold, but there was nothing else in the whole wide world to be doing. Like cherries and pastries and mischief and, oh god, you thought you might have figured this thing out. You very much wished you hadn't, and you didn't understand the 'how', but some things stuck out.
Like Fire Moth, and... oh no.
"Vel," you said, looking your sister in the eye—as much as you could, in this place.
= = =
[ ] Do you know what your name is?
[ ] Do you know who's come to find you?
[ ] So this is the part where you tell me what you want to do next. Seriously.
[ ] Write-in
Long overdue, but here's a chapter. I'll be working on the Liliya/Rozaliya part of this while you cope with… well, with a dragon. Good luck with the dragon.
I'd say it's a pity that AI Dungeon died, and I suppose this would have been finished sooner if it hadn't, but since NovelAI outclasses it in just about every aspect (which I care about), I don't think I mind. Long-term viability not least among them. Here's hoping for stability from now on. And maybe a little higher writing quality? I'm not having to fight the AI on that front so much anymore.
So… you may have noticed I switched from a mixture of second person present / third person past tense, to 100% past tense. I never wanted to use present tense in the first place—that was because of a limitation in AI Dungeon—so that's staying. I'll go back and fix up the earlier chapters as soon as I can find some round tuits.
One of the in-development features of NovelAI is the ability to fine-tune a model based on player-supplied data. It goes without saying, once that's released, I'm going to experiment with doing so on Seele Quest, which should in principle provide proper long-term memory. However, GIGO still applies. I'll need to bring everything up to spec before I can try that.
Anyway…
No. There's no 'anyway'. This update was a long time coming, in multiple meanings of the term. Veliona's character arc is, at least for now, coming to an end. Let's make the best of it.
I am... not sure how to respond. Of the prepared responses I'm most inclined to go with "Do you know what your name is?" even though it's basically rhetorical at this point just because it seems like the most natural lead-in to this imminent talk but there's probably a better way with a write-in? Or because I've just completely misread this emotionally and that's a very bad lead-in?
I am... not sure how to respond. Of the prepared responses I'm most inclined to go with "Do you know what your name is?" even though it's basically rhetorical at this point just because it seems like the most natural lead-in to this imminent talk but there's probably a better way with a write-in? Or because I've just completely misread this emotionally and that's a very bad lead-in?
I don't explicitly know what Baughn meant, but I've known him long enough to guess and have information as a Beta, so...
The current votes are focused on:
1. Vel and her identity, possibly diving into her past
2. The Dragon and what's existence both means and how its related to Vel
3. Throwing the ball into Vel's court while she's visibly addled by her own emotions
I am... not sure how to respond. Of the prepared responses I'm most inclined to go with "Do you know what your name is?" even though it's basically rhetorical at this point just because it seems like the most natural lead-in to this imminent talk but there's probably a better way with a write-in? Or because I've just completely misread this emotionally and that's a very bad lead-in?
Yes, if Veliona gives it a few seconds of thought, she will realise why Seele is asking that and what the likely answer is going to be. The question still needs to be asked, and it's up to you how much—or how little—you want to try steering her reactions here.
It's not a question you'd ask because you need to know the answer. It's one you'd ask because your sister needs to know the answer. The same, of course, goes for every other possibility.
"Stupid fucking snake. Go away," you say, voice wavering a bit despite yourself.
The snake hisses angrily, and you're hit with the sudden terror that it understands what you're saying. But it slinks off into the darkness regardless.
[X] Find a nearby bubble you can settle into to pull yourself together that won't pop immediately or be a danger to your coherency like that one as a child almost started to do
-[X] Apologize to the snake-thing before leaving.
It's a creature. A great, beautiful serpentine beast made of pure nothingness, but she can tell that it's alive, because it's moving with purpose around the island world. Its scales are the same as the void around it—black as the darkest night. But wherever its skin touches anything even slightly more real than it, reality starts breaking down.
It can't be the same snake-beast her and Seele saw days ago… can it? It's a quantum shadow, clear as day, but when she studies it she gets an impression of familiarity. It's bigger than when last she saw it. Much, much bigger.
"I'm sorry about earlier," she tells it, mind running a mile a minute. She isn't expecting a response. She is expecting it to attack her, but there's no need to play the role of prey here.
There's no response save for a slightly more urgent wafting of honkai energy, and the slow rumbling of the snake-beast gnawing through the fabric of reality. Vaguely, she wonders if it's trying to communicate something, or if the beast just does everything at that infernal pace. Finally, it pauses for a second. Turns its head, and studies her. And then, it–
Nuzzles her.
Nuzzles her with a big honking maw that could crush her skull like a peanut. That could crush Mount Everest like a peanut.
As this vote has been in abeyance for most of a year now, I think it only just that we finally implement one of the very first votes in Seele Quest, and actually apologize for being rude to RozLilsSnek.
[ ] I don't know yet give me some time to think
- [ ] and actually apologize to Roz and Lils, like you meant to days ago.
[X] Step back from the precipice. This is new, and we're safe-ish now at the least. We don't have to rush this worrying about what might happen if we wait. So let's get to know this dragon of yours/ours and see where it takes us. I'll be right here for you, all the way to the end, and whatever we make afterwards.
-[X] Apologise to the snake properly. Like you meant to days ago.
I refuse to force Vel to dive into this no matter how hard a certain QM wants to tape down the accelerator. So lets take this slow. There's absolutely no reason to rush.
I'm not sure if the dragon still is offended by Seele telling it to go away the last time they met, but it's probably a good idea to resolve that considering this is a good opportunity for that, and to find out more about whatever it is supposed to be. Personally, I'm really curious about this creature and why it seems to know Veliona.
"Wait," you whispered. "Vel... we both saw the same thing?"
She nodded.
"And those weren't our Roza and Liliya," you said. "And I don't have a little brother. I... I don't think I have a little brother. Because we were orphaned when I was, maybe, five. That wasn't…"
You frowned, as another aspect of the 'dream' came to mind.
"I was hurt," you said. "Subcritical honkai infection. Like Liliya had, except with far worse treatment. Only that's not possible, is it? My honkai resistance is the next best thing to infinite. It couldn't happen."
At first, I was thinking of a bubble universe, where Seele sorts through memories that don't belong to her, but she still sees them. I'm thinking it might be related to Veliona's situation, maybe something in her past. But it wouldn't make much sense to me if she barely has any resistance, if the situation is that Veliona is the previous herrscher of death. She's a Previous Era creation of some kind that Dr. Mei made to contain a bunch of tech, but who is she as a person?
I'd like her to at least be comfortable with herself and not be in a constant existential crisis since she manifested herself outside of Seele's body (which may or may not be because the concept of locking is broken, therefore affecting the stigma). It's probably a little too early for Veliona to figure everything out, so maybe we can figure out what to do about the eruption, provided the snake-thing will let the two leave.
I think it would be good for them to sort out their thoughts, maybe starting with the dream they saw.
I am very tempted to have the doom-snake do some things though.
[X] Step back from the precipice. This is new, and we're safe-ish now at the least. We don't have to rush this worrying about what might happen if we wait. So let's get to know this dragon of yours/ours and see where it takes us. I'll be right here for you, all the way to the end, and whatever we make afterwards.
-[X] Apologise to the snake properly. Like you meant to days ago.
This sounds good to me. See, I thought Vel knew all this already but maybe that's just my memory getting all fogged up and I'm in need of a quick refresher re-read - that's why I had initially said I thought the question was rhetorical. ...Or maybe I'm still misreading this, Vel does know, but just hasn't really grappled with it emotionally at all so asking it very much would not be rhetorical for Vel since the asking would very much demand such reflection on it.
This sounds good to me. See, I thought Vel knew all this already but maybe that's just my memory getting all fogged up and I'm in need of a quick refresher re-read - that's why I had initially said I thought the question was rhetorical. ...Or maybe I'm still misreading this, Vel does know, but just hasn't really grappled with it emotionally at all so asking it very much would not be rhetorical for Vel since the asking would very much demand such reflection on it.
It depends on what, exactly, you think she may or may not know. I'm not going to tell you spoilers, or tell you not to re-read, but I certainly can point in the correct direction if it's needed.
For the time being: The fact that Veliona is the previous era's Seele Vollerei has been common knowledge in the HI3 community since, oh, possibly even before she was introduced to the story. Quite some time, in other words. Everyone knows.
...everyone, that is, except the in-story characters. They have no clue, with the possible exception of Kevin; the only knowledge she started out with was "I'm an AI system meant to protect Seele and the armory", which clashed quite badly with her actual mentality; to the point that, as of this time in canon, she appears to largely have forgotten.
During the Herrscher of Domination arc, Seele and Veliona—and I hasten to add, she isn't actually called that in canon; that's someone's overly enthusiastic translation, but Seele just called her 'Other me'–
They had a heart-to-heart talk where:
- Seele admitted she hadn't really been treating her as a person, and should honestly be a great deal nicer to her.
- Vel admitted that, yes, that kinda hurt. And also she should be nicer to Seele, since the idiot keeps trusting her. (Which is fully justified, heh.)
- Seele asked her what name she wants to use, instead of 'Other self'.
- Vel, whose only real life experience is Seele's, decided that actually she quite likes the name 'Seele'. Which was accepted, much to everyone's eternal confusion.
- Oh, and Vel has finally met Bronya again... and Bronya has demonstrated that she is justifiably Best Girl.
Now to be fair, her name is actually Seele. That's the one she was born with. It just... isn't why she's using it now, seeing as she doesn't remember, and being Vel probably a good fraction of that decision was because it'll help increase the confusion.
I thought she had deduced that she was the previous era Seele before but that was incorrect I see! So basically, my first reading of this update thought that Vel was testing the waters on broaching the topic with Seele, only all the... this-ness [waves hand at everything] had their emotions all a mess and Seele could sense it was a sensitive and delicate topic for Vel and wanted to give her time to settle it all in her mind before telling her.
But I was very wrong! And knowing this now definitely changes how that scene reads!
I thought she had deduced that she was the previous era Seele before but that was incorrect I see! So basically, my first reading of this update thought that Vel was testing the waters on broaching the topic with Seele, only all the... this-ness [waves hand at everything] had their emotions all a mess and Seele could sense it was a sensitive and delicate topic for Vel and wanted to give her time to settle it all in her mind before telling her.
But I was very wrong! And knowing this now definitely changes how that scene reads!
Like Shadow said, Veliona is far too addled by her emotions to think through the implications of anything she's seeing. She's also operating on false assumptions—she believes she's as similar to Seele as she is because she's been copying bits and pieces from Seele, not for example because she is Seele.
It's a perfectly understandable misunderstanding, of course, but the fact is that Seele has been able to take a step back and think about things, and Veliona hasn't.
EDIT: It's about time I roll the dice on Roza's side.
DOUBLE EDIT: Ouch.
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