Willverse

[pseudo sedge]

probably telling that I forgot the name of the one I just finished womp.

[dreamy sorrel]

Are you telling me you don't want to learn about the psychotic gray-orange goop man's backstory?

[opal wadi]

Honestly The Pilot is funny by everything that happens around the titular character's backstory

[pseudo sedge]

I'm hoping for more goop man and presumably Lemon since they're maybe kinda buddies or something?? but I need to get through All Fours first because I was peer pressured (unhinged fiction, per my gal pals)

[spice socket]

TCV 8 || it is pretty peak comedy that Simon decided to show off his 2 gym badges to Anduriel the edgymon league champion||

[spice socket]

TG General || I guess it might just be that there aren’t many travelers in House of Blades. But I was never under the impression they all have like. A specific uniform they wear||

[spice socket]

Alin really is adorable

TG all SLA minor || this is not like Kaladin and Adolin stuff, where I’m just convinced they’re in love. Alin and Simon really are just best friends and neither know it yet, I really hope Alin doesn’t end up groomed into a villain ||

[spice socket]

TCV 8-9 || it is ash ketchum levels of plot armor that simon got that poke in vallins chest||

[robust estuary]

||I'm generally pretty positive on TG but one of my bigger complaints is that Simon gets so good, so fast||

CV 9 + Cradle all ||Especially when you compare it to Cradle, where Lindon's prodigous learning speed isn't just that he's really good, its that he also puts in an absurd amount of time and effort to training, and he also has these incredibly powerful sponsors and teachers, and he also gets to coast on using switching between an straightforward, incredibly powerful fighting style, and an unorthodox one that most people don't know anything about. Simon is just sorta The Best and it barely even gets commented on||

[spice socket]

TG all || it really puts a limit on how much I can enjoy Simon and feel for the kid that I do also get to spend time with Alin. Like id probably be way more inclined to sympathize with how Simon feels about Alin if I wasn’t getting Alin povs where he’s basically just as scared as Simon is but he doesn’t have the luxury of being goth about it||

|| plus, in this book I found it alin also lost his parents, he just had the slight luck of having older siblings to keep him more or less adjusted. It’s just an odd thing that he never feels any sort of sympathetic connection to Alins family ||

[spice socket]

TCV 10 || bad touch Kai bad touch.||

TG all || does anyone have an explanation of how multiclassing works ||

TCV 10 || come on Alin, it’s called the tower of winter buddy.||

[spice socket]

TCV 11

https://tenor.com/view/scooby-doo-woof-bark-ruh-roh-gif-4303248

TCV 11 || damn, Anduriel got piccolo’d||

[inner loom]

TG general || You mean some people being travelers of multiple territories? I think it's just something people can do if they have strong affinity for multiple territories. Just very rare because in order to become a traveler you need to align yourself strongly with your territories belief system and not many people can strongly buy into two different belief systems. ||

[spice socket]

|| so my guy Galad is just built different ™ I always knew he was.||

Also

TCV 11 || okay everyone let’s give grand master naraka a round of applause ||

https://tenor.com/view/idiot-idiots-idiota-gif-22079545

TCV 11 || I sure hope Galad doesn’t die. That would suck.||

|| I appreciate that Kai was like “Alin?” As if his next sentence would have been “do you know a short whiny child? ||

[errant fractal]

||Unless I'm drawing a blank, I'm not certain we know how to actually become a Traveller who isn't of Valinhall (entering the territory, fighting through challenges, and claiming a Dragon's Fang), Elysium (being born to it or potentially having an affinity), or Ragnarus (being a blood member of the royal family).||

||I think there's something about having an affinity to a territory that is required to become a Traveller but its unclear if that's something you develop by Travelling or that you innately have and can't change||

[golden void]

TG + SA general ||Naraka are very Skybreaker. The brand is part of an oath to uphold the law iirc||

[errant fractal]

||Yeah, the part that I'm not sure was explained though is if, in Naraka's case, swearing that oath and gaining the brand is something anyone can do with enough training or not||

||I'm guessing there's something that stops every Traveller from collecting multiple territories, whether that its too difficult for most or that they are magically/ideologically incompatible with them and can't make it happen||

[spice socket]

Hm

[errant fractal]

There's still a lot we don't really know about Amalgam's energy system

Probably a consequence of the main character not starting the story as a master of their power, or gaining a competent and knowledgable trainer quickly

[spice socket]

Clearly it’s cause Simon didn’t punch enough children

Little known fact about Varic: he punched kids all the time on the space playground

[zenith kayak]

TLH general ||Nah, he comes from money. He had a person for that.||

[spice socket]

True I forgot

Still

Children were punched for magic science

And Simon is just too lazy to do the work

TLH all || tbh if you told me Benri had an entire division devoted to child abuse as it correlates to scientific magic discovery I would not be shocked by that at all||

Like not even memeing

TLH all || Varic: Benri wtf are you doing this is awful
Benri: Please stop being naive Varic, these children are paid a very normal wage for 10 year olds. You had your assistant do it to them for free. Who’s the real monster?||

[final quest]

TLH all || a subsidiary did make space bug viruses that raion needed to save people from ||

[spice socket]

https://tenor.com/view/see-catherine-ohara-moira-moira-rose-schitts-creek-gif-20254744

[dreamy sorrel]

TLH all: ||See that's Stellar Synthesis Labs, the ones who grew Mel||

[spice socket]

dammit

even when i make jokes wights already found ways to integrate them into canon

[errant fractal]

Harness ||Heck, even Ziel has gotten in on punching kids. Simon needs to step up his game||

[spice socket]

see this is why i feel justified in disliking him

weird sentence to say given the context but i stand by it

[dreamy sorrel]

Cradle all: ||Do you think Lirin gets punched a bunch? Or did Lindon decide he doesn't need more practice?||

[errant fractal]

||Kid's gotta learn how the Empty Palm works somehow||

[dreamy sorrel]

Willverse all: ||Will Lirin only be able to fill his cores with madra, or could he use another magic system to fill them?||

[errant fractal]

||I don't think there's anything stopping him from just, learning a different magic system while developing two Paths||

Incidently, now I'm wondering which Territory would suit Lindon best

[spice socket]

which one works on points

tg general || i think it might be lerial||

[zenith kayak]

Willverse all ||Nah, Lindon has that innate "Steal Cool Toys" drive that'd land him in Valinhall.||

||I figure the original enhancements would last all of a week before he'd earned, upgraded, and obsoleted them.||

[errant fractal]

||That or he decided the place would be a great place to train Lirin||

[opal wadi]

TLH/Cradle all
||Ignoring the powerlevel gap, I love the idea of Varric and Lindon meeting, fighting for a bit and getting absolutely geeked out about the other's magic "A magic powered ANTI-MAGIC FIELD?" "SEVEN PATHS?!?!?!?" The encounter ends with Varric learning Hollow Domain with seals and Lindon with an Archmage title and two pinnacle spells.||

JJK/Cradle/Last Horizon all
||Hollow Domain vs Terminus Mundi domain expansion type clash||

[violet apex]

same tags ||Lindon might freak out about how much more powerful he could be if he had just absorbed the memories from alternate timelines where he was on different Paths||

[robust estuary]

Cradle all + Last Horizon all ||I wanna see the weirdness that occurs from him seeing his Blood Parasite self and knowing all these these techniques that he just can't do because he doesn't have a Parasite||

||Especially if it means seeing him bond a Parasite and go through the same relationship with it that Varic does with his crew||

[robust estuary]

Cradle all (Unrelated) ||There's a moment in one of the books where Yerin talks about how, when she was much younger and still being trained by the Sword Sage, he had her try to split a boulder with one of her techniques once a day, and she always failed, until eventually she declared herself a failure, then the Sword Sage shows her all the boulders she's been cutting and they get progressively bigger every time, prompting her to recognize her growth and get excited to train again. Anyone remember what book that's from, or about how deep in it is? I've got a feeling I'm gonna wanna have it on hand to share around in the future||

[proud oar]

Pretty sure that’s Blackflame or Ghostwater. Will check

[proud oar]

Ghostwater 16

[robust estuary]

[robust estuary]

Ghostwater 16 ||"I can't wait to see what you do tomorrow" hits so hard||

[thick bay]

||Terminus Mundi really doesn't do anything against Lindon. His power comes from inward, the reason why it effects his enemies so much is because they get their power from outward sources.||

[spice socket]

TCV 12 || I could have sworn Enosh didn’t respect Vallin as an actual incarnation ||

|| Simon doesn’t know what Gravity is. Doofus.||

TCV 12 || there’s a yandere asphodel traveller?||

Sure why not

[opal wadi]

||I couldn't think of another Varric technique that's a wide AoE thing that's not just spamming water ||

[dreamy sorrel]

||He could just compress water into a laser again and shoot it at Lindon. Hollow Domain should limit the water, but not stop it||

[errant fractal]

||According to Will, Varic vs Lindon is an interesting matchup since while Varic has a ton of different authorities and a scale of attack that exceeds even the Monarchs, his physical abilities (speed, strength, durability, reaction time) are still fundamentally mortal.||

||Given some prep and casting time he could devastate Cradle's core planet with a spell but Lindon would survive it even if the planet got trashed. Then Lindon would kill him in a couple microseconds||

||If Lindon sensed him trying to cast the spell before it went off, then we get that one blooper||

[spice socket]

TCV 13 || why the hell does Elysium have smurfs||

[spice socket]

TCV 13 || I also forgot Alins weird anime girl mentor.||

[errant fractal]

Waybound ||Actually, I just realized that Lindon’s would know that a Dreadgod+4 would be a very unfair matchup with a young child. So instead he’d have Little Blue be the one to Empty Palm him. Truly the most responsible action possible||

[opal wadi]

Cradle all
||It's hilarious to think that by the end of the series, Little Blue could travel back in time and absolutely wipe the floor with the Monarchs with one hand tied to the back and only two techniques. ||

[errant fractal]

||It gets even better when you remember that she started as just one of many things in the Heaven's Glory treasure vaults. Turns out that they did have exactly one thing there that was worth it||

[spice socket]

TCV 13 || “you probably have a lot to say to my spy daughter. Don’t talk to me again or I’ll arrest you bye”||

[spice socket]

|| “no I’m an heiress no one says princess except in children’s stories”||

TG all || it seems hilarious to me that it’s as simple as cutting off their hands to defeat a naraka traveler.||

[errant fractal]

||It turns out that loosing a hand in a world where you can't replace it with a monster hand will really cramp someone's style||

[maiden tangle]

||Weak to blades? Yeah buddy so are we||

[spice socket]

TG all || why don’t they wear like Tartarus steel sleeves or something? I feel like that’s supposed to be super strong metal right||

|| idk what naraka does maybe that’s cheating or something ||

[inner loom]

TG all || tartarus steel armor would probably be too heavy. It's been a while since I last reread TG but doesn't Simon need to call steel just to swing his sword around properly? ||

[robust estuary]

||I forget if tartarus steel is supposed to be especially flexible (I don't think so, but its been a bit), but that sounds like it'd limit their range of movement a lot more than would be desirable, as well. Like, irl gauntlets aren't that bad, but making them out of a rare, magical metal sounds like it'd get expensive fast for a large group, and you can also just cut further up the arm||

[spice socket]

TG all bloodborne humor || calling all just feels like Hunter of hunters stuff. “You know what all travelers secret kryptonite is? A sword in the face”||

[errant fractal]

||Pretty much. Without steel the sword is almost too heavy to meaningfully move, never mind use as a weapon||

[spice socket]

TCV 15 || so now Simon has way more chains cause of this mask. My kingdom for a normal training arc to provide this “will Simon lose his mind” tension instead of a fast forward button while Alin has the pathos stick||

[errant fractal]

Question for you all, does anyone have any recommendations for progression fantasy series that are similar to Cradle in terms of tone (fairly lighthearted overall and not very grim and gritty)?

[final quest]

Mage errant is sick, big mage errant guy

[dreamy sorrel]

Arcane Ascension. First book is Sufficiently Advanced Magic. Cradle /AA general: ||If you like Lindon's build-everything-myself attitude and rat tendencies, you'll enjoy AA's main character Corin||

[errant fractal]

I read the first two books of AA, though I can't recall why I didn't read more since I don't really have any bad memories of it.

Haven't checked out Mage Errant though, so I'll definitely have to check it out.

[dreamy sorrel]

To be fair, Corin can be a bit annoying at times

[errant fractal]

I did get the impression he was more of a wimp than even unsouled Lindon

Especially since he was too nervous to use his head-marked Attunement to its fullest capabilities

Meanwhile Lindon's like "give me all of the venomous snakes"

[spice socket]

https://tenor.com/view/noise-tv-tv-noise-gif-13822466

Me every time the books mention this weird calendar system

[zenith kayak]

Just don't think about the implied distances

[spice socket]

TG all || at this point im really unsure if Enosh is on the other side of a continent or if it’s a 20 minute walk in the woods||

[zenith kayak]

||By my extremely rough spitballing, the Iteration seems to be about the size of France||

[spice socket]

|| that is. An insanely small planet||

[zenith kayak]

||It is a rough spitballing, but the only people that are mentioned are the Enoshi and the people from the Empire (I forget what they actually classify themselves as), despite lots of travel through the Territories, which don't linearly map onto locations in the mainland.||

||That and IIRC it was expected to take like 2 weeks to march prisoners from MC's village near the edge of the country to the capital in its heart.||

||Of course, Iterations being weird and magical, it's entirely possible that they aren't on a planet, and what passes for physics just allows for habitable slabs of earth that have a designated down.||

[spice socket]

Smh

Will you kill me sometimes

[zenith kayak]

Nah, I'm mean like that

[spice socket]

Lmao

[robust estuary]

||The short stories set after the main trilogy also imply there's more to the world than just Damasca and Enosh, as well||

||Well, really they sorta outright state it, but with some degree of ambiguity how sovereign some of those places are||

[errant fractal]

||There's at least one nation that's fully independent of Damasca: those people from across the desert descended from Elysium||

Generally in Will's books, he doesn't really mention places or peoples who aren't directly relevant to the plot but they usually do exist

[safe knoll]

Lightest in tone and progression is Beware of Chicken

Weirkey Chronicles is also fun

[jade notch]

I was going to suggest Weirkey Chronicles and Mage Errant

The Frith Chronicles are okay too

[ornate heron]

Are there any content warnings for Mage Errant or Arcane Ascension? In general I’m fine with violence and language there’s just some stuff I prefer to avoid.

[jade notch]

Nope

I think the worst in Mage Errant is ||The main character gets bullied for a little bit, and its mentioned that his foster parents beat him||

Very slight spoilers ^

I haven't read Arcane Ascension

Mark of the Fool is okay too, but it gets very repetitive

[ornate heron]

Alright, thank you.

[spice socket]

TCV 18 || so Kai really is just cracked like an egg.||

[spice socket]

|| I am. Frustrated to discover that Talos is a loser.||

|| “how threatening could birds be?” Simon you’re a fighting dark type birds are super effective.||

TCV 18 || you know, if Simon was more likable to balance out my empathy for his situation, Kai being such a terrible teacher would be more entertaining. But alas I’m kinda just like “yeah but Simon sucks so who cares what he learns”||

|| so now Simon’s getting attacked by Tenga warriors.||

[spice socket]

TCV all || for some reason, Lysander here is giving mr 3 vibes.||

TCV 19 || “enough ceremony boy!” That’s it, cut this ladies hands off again idgaf. She’s being mean to Galad.||

[spice socket]

TCV 20-21

https://tenor.com/view/disney-aladdin-gif-16660417646810396841

|| me at Simon with this mask.||

You know some how in true me fashion

I disregarded an obvious spoiler until the worst possible time

TG all || I remember someone in here mentioning that Crimson Vaults audible cover is just literally a spoiler. And now I realize that Leah or however it’s spelled is gonna become the Big Bad ™ ||

[errant fractal]

I think at least one character in AA gets permanently injured in a way that can’t be healed, other than that I can’t recall anything that would require a strong content warning

[errant fractal]

Beware of Chicken was fun, though I enjoyed the first half of the first book more than the second half

[errant fractal]

||Kai is basically Eithan except he’s actually crazy and mostly useless at anything that isn’t fighting||

[dreamy sorrel]

Arcane Ascension has some familial abuse, so be aware

[opal wadi]

I started reading that on a trip, never finished

Also, the commander releases today

sources from my dreams confirm

[spice socket]

Nick you can’t just say things like that

I would drop crimson vault like a hot coal

[opal wadi]

I've been imagining the book in my hands in the split second before I wake up

Will Wight's got me genuinely curious about what's going to happen next, this book has hit the perfect balance of space operaing that now I'm here wondering which of the many twists and turns will be resolved next

The Commander spec
||I want Benri to have a moment, like a totally stealing the spotlight moment Megamind style||

https://tenor.com/view/argument-villain-gif-25314989

[errant fractal]

The Pilot ||Considering his source of inspiration, I'm holding out (desperate) hope that Omega is still around||

[opal wadi]

The Pilot all
||I think he should stay corporeally dead, but the fact he died fusing with another character gives me hope we may see some of him still, like Shyrax absorbing some of his memories and mannerisms, imagine now she permanently has Omega whispering inside her brain at all times. ||

[errant fractal]

||My main case for Omega coming back is that (to me) there doesn't really seem to be a new Pilot candidate in the works and introducing a fully new character to serve the role seems dubious||

[opal wadi]

The Commander speculation
||People had been throwing some ideas around, his daughter for starters, Marialla with her luck magic too. She doesn't look particularly skilled as a pilot but a luck based magic pilot skill that saves you in the nick of time sounds cool, or we can go with Benri, piloting a ship can't be that different from a company right? ||

[thick bay]

||I want Marialla but I am afraid we're gonna get his daughter.||

[thick bay]

||It was me who noticed the thing, but I will say that you don't fully understand why I said that, but I won't explain it to you and spoiler it.||

[final quest]

Commander spec || benri really feels like chekov's pilot, he was offered a spot on the crew by the Iron King, thought of joining varic if the solstice thing didn't work out. Mariala is also unlikely for a pilot candidate unless she somehow gets 10 years of mage/pilot experience in under five minute; she just recently got her wizard certificate, and is probably a year or so away from being an archmage yet.||

[golden void]

||So Marialla's going to perform the 7fold ritual and become the perfect pilot candidate||

[spice socket]

TCV 22 || Alin buddy please. This is not the time.||

[opal wadi]

LH all
||Everyone does the ritual so we get mix and matches from alt lives like Sola with a Titan Knight, Archmage Mell, Raion with a gun that's it it's just a gun he doesn't even know where it came from but it's a gun. ||

||"I'm going to defeat evil with the power of friendship and this gun I found." - Alt Raion||

[thick bay]

||Isn't that Alin all the time? ||

[errant fractal]

||Incidently, you should be getting close to the point where the Northstrider vs Alin fight is no longer a spoiler||

[spice socket]

|| if we could fuse Alin and Simon together we’d have a really empathetic and competent protagonist.||

TCV 22 || “but inside, he cheered Simon on” cause yall are supposed to be best friends im sorry.||

Maybe it would have been more cliche but I feel like a lot of this plot would be better if this was a failing friendship not a one sided beef over a lesbians affection

This is as funny for being out of context as I had hoped it’d be

These dumbass kids I swear

TCV 22 || alin you are definitely smarter than this, who would hang out with Simon come on||

[ornate heron]

I’ve been checking out Arcane Ascension and it’s been fun so far, almost done the first book. I think it’d do well as a TTRPG setting or rulebook.

[thick bay]

EE ||Stupid thought, I was watching the Ninja vs Pirates Intentionally Blank and...that is basically the plot of this series.||

[spice socket]

TCV 22 || “Alin couldn’t imagine her keeping a secret from him and telling simon of all people” little rude Alin but I’m glad we got there. Also yet another line where it’s supposed to show Alins antagonism to Simon but I just can’t help but agree that Simon is annoying to hang out with.||

[spice socket]

TG all || its actually quite impressive how few characters in these books i like. But that for the most part i think that works for what wight is going for. The grandmasters suck, but so does Zacareth. I kinda genuinely don’t know which outcome here is supposed to be the like. Good guys win.||

[thick bay]

||Indirial probably is my favorite from the series.||

[spice socket]

Man wights spelling is killin me sometimes

[spice socket]

TCV 23 || DAYS?! IT TAKES “a matter of days” to GET TO BEL CALAM FROM ENOSH? That means it probably takes barely two weeks to get to Cana. Wtaf ||

[spice socket]

TCV 24 || man. Wouldn’t it be frigging GREAT if this terrifyingly sad ending was for our protagonist ||

[spice socket]

TG all || based entirely on how this entire series so far has worked out. The next book will end with Simon doing something wildly OP. But with zero emotional stakes, and then Alin will kill himself by using the Ragnarus door in Elysia and have a big emotional climax.||

TCV 25 || Zacareth the 6 come back tour oh snap.||

Crimson vault finished

Well that was certainly 1000 times better than house of blades as all of you said it would be

But with an increase in quality comes an increase in my frustration with it overall lol.

[errant fractal]

One book left then, and a bunch of short stories

I should probably actually read the short story collection sometime. I never actually got around to doing that

[final quest]

LH all || this brought up a claim: if Sola had the ritual and got the Green Knight, it would still remember her, which, mechanically is FUNKY that the blue titan remembers Varic
Also Paryl would be a great pilot candidate if not for one thing:
Paryl is green, and sola is also green, meaning that Horizon would never let that fly.||

[opal wadi]

LH All || I just think it would be hilarious if the characters get a glimpse into the multiverse and there's a world where Mell is the Archmage and her spell is something like "golem creation" where she can take metal and scrap from the area and turn it into soldiers.||

[spice socket]

|| now you’ve made me imagine a world where sola is the archmage and her big spell is just “bigger gun”||

[opal wadi]

LH All
||A Pinnacle Spell called just "World Slayer" that's a huge mungous blast of destruction sounds fitting. ||

[dreamy sorrel]

THAT'S HOW HER NAME IS SPELLED?!?!

I don't know why I continue to be surprised by Will's spelling, yet here I am

[zenith kayak]

LH all ||Oh, Paryl rhymes with Peril, doesn't it...||

[spice socket]

|| which ones paryl again||

[zenith kayak]

||A chunk of the plot of The Knight is driven by the fact that her life is in (stasis in) peril. Also, now that I've looked it up again, whoops, Parryl. ||

[spice socket]

Ohhhhhhhh

|| the green ranger. I’m dumb.||

[zenith kayak]

||Wow, her last name is almost crisis||

[robust estuary]

||That is hilarious||

[spice socket]

Will you silly Billy

[thick bay]

Lh all? ||I still think the ranger that went missing ascended.||

[errant fractal]

||I’m not sure. So far it seems that the main way to ascend from Fathom is through an archmage ritual. Though then again, it’s possible there’s a way for a combat artist to ascend||

[spice socket]

LH || do all these special abilities in fathom touch the aether or just combat art and magic||

[errant fractal]

||I think all of them use the aether, though mainly in the same way that everything related to the sacred arts uses or interacts with madra and aura||

[final quest]

LH all || which one?? All of the ones from the current life literally got parasited, the red one is raion, the yellow one, javik, retired, green parryl got parasited and the white and blue got parasited and then killed post parasiting by raion ||

[thick bay]

||I remember one of them disappeared. But it could have been in the other time line. ||

[dreamy sorrel]

Knight all: ||White left because she couldn't deal with the spotlight, Parryl died, Javik retired, and we don't care about the second generation||

[spice socket]

|| i happen to like aisha rocky and adam idk why you gotta hate||

[errant fractal]

Take a look at who showed up in Slay the Spire 2

There's also a card named Sword Sage

[spice socket]

This is a wild reference

[errant fractal]

Apparently Will is also a huge StS fan

[robust estuary]

I almost didn't believe it the first time I heard it, the one thing that could get me to play it

(The TG reference, not Will being a fan, that's easy to believe)

[thick bay]

I don't play any early access game but I liked the first.

[spice socket]

I think it’s really funny that everyone who uses that inheritance reference for things still uses the grammatical error version

[errant fractal]

Figured I'd let you know I'm giving this a try

[final quest]

huge, do let me know how it goes, and ping me if you post reactions anywhere

[spice socket]

I bought a dog

This has nothing to do with books

But he is cute

[errant fractal]

Name him Simon

[golden void]

Is there only one actual pet in the Willverse?

Call him Shuffles

[opal wadi]

Orthos

[golden void]

hmmmmm you're not wrong

also ||lil'blue||

[spice socket]

https://tenor.com/view/guy-throwing-trash-can-at-someone-gif-19450291

[errant fractal]

If you ask Shuffles, Caldur's the one who's the pet

[spice socket]

Speaking of weird pets

TG all || are these creatures summoned from territories dying for real or just like. Despawning||

|| Alin reacts to deaths like they’re actually dying. But Alin is…a bit stupid||

[robust estuary]

Huh. And I just decided on what to name my shiny Porygons (Cradle + Last Horizon general) ||Horizon for Porygon2 (Got it in Leaf Green, so its locked to a normal pokeball since you can only get them from the Game Corner/breeding), Dross for Porygon Z (When I finally get to use it competitively, it'll be using the title The Once Imperfect, and I'm gonna catch it in a Dive Ball, since ORAS doesn't get Dream Balls)||

[errant fractal]

||I think they die for real since they never mention a respawn mechanic for summoned creatures||

[robust estuary]

TG ||Yeah, I think most summoned creatures are fully mortal (but specific examples may be ageless)||

[errant fractal]

||I think in most cases, summoned creatures aren't sapient, which means there isn't a difference between respawning and summoning another member of their species||

||Though there are certainly sapient summons and unique creatures||

[golden void]

||they're almost certainly all sentient though||

[spice socket]

Hm

Well fair enough

That makes sense

TG all || sometimes it all feels a bit wonky or blurry if these territories are alternate dimensions or like. Places on this planet. But also given the apparent size of this planet it being different parts of the planet and no one really knowing about them is confusing||

|| then again if Simon is at all average they don’t know what gravity is so who even knows ||

[errant fractal]

(Reaper I think) ||We see Suriel observe Amalgam from the outside. Territories are basically sub-iterations caught in the iteration's figurative orbit||

[spice socket]

|| i would believe that Simon might just be that stupid though||

[spice socket]

Huh neat

I gotta reread cradle at some point with more of this context

[errant fractal]

Its only a paragraph, since she's more interested in Cradle and Asylum

[jade notch]

Willverse all but specifically Reaper ||There, down that tunnel, was Amalgam. A standard, almost barren world, with tinier balls of color and potential clinging to it like fuzzy moons caught in its orbit. What the locals called Territories.||

[errant fractal]

||I think out of the entire iteration, only Valin has any clue on what's actually up||

[spice socket]

Thanks Shara, much appreciated for the more specific context

[errant fractal]

||Amalgam is basically the Sacred Valley of Sector 11||

[zenith kayak]

Willverse all, Elder Scrolls Lore ||Turns out Amalgam is just Nirn.||

[spice socket]

I am out here with Simon legitimately beefing with a child

[errant fractal]

Punch the child, punch the child, punch the child

[spice socket]

Lindon would be proud

[errant fractal]

You can't call yourself a sacred artist if you haven't defeated someone at least half your age

[thick bay]

||Come ask me this after your done reading all of TG.||

[thick bay]

||My theory here is that th gates were all part of one place, but then something happened and they separated.

There was a throwawayish line about something being shattered or... Something and separating or something.

I feel like there is a link between them all.||

[inner loom]

This mini short story on Will’s blog explains territories but it does have spoilers for City of Light https://www.willwight.com/a-blog-of-dubious-intent/50-reviews-time-for-valinhall

[spice socket]

Rad thank you

I will read this eventually

[errant fractal]

||The gist of how territories work appears to be that all territories are fragments of dead iterations, like the fragments you can find in the Void, that connected themselves to Amalgam without corrupting the world. ||

||Its telling that Suriel's description of territories from the outside is identical to how anyone who has seen into the void describes the things floating there||

[ornate heron]

Finished the Arcane Ascension books that are out

Just bringing it up because I got started on them because of this channel

[errant fractal]

How were they?

[ornate heron]

I enjoyed them

[safe knoll]

They're... weird

but worth trying if you're in the mood

imo, for a series that coined the term progression fantasy they're weaker than one would expect

also, those books sort of assume the reader has familiarity and interest in the author's other series set in that world

and doesn't explain a lot of plot and magic elements from there

out of the first big three of western progression fantasy novels, I'd say AA is the weakest, behind Cradle and Mage Errant

but others here on the Shard liked them more than even Cradle

to each their own, I guess

[errant fractal]

AA Book 2 ||I don’t think it helps either that Corin (at least by book 2) is still kind of a wuss and that his powers aren’t as suited towards fights and adventuring as say, Lindon||

The books themselves were alright, but I don’t feel inclined to continue to book three

[final quest]

I think they consistently get better, I didn't read six sacred swords so I felt like I missed a large jump in Rowe's writing abilities between books but I really liked the mechanics aspect of AA

(professional mechanics guy for the record)

[jade notch]

I feel like this should be spoiler tagged

[jade notch]

Kidnap?

[errant fractal]

[REDACTED] applied

[dreamy sorrel]

Not sure of this idea had come up but Commander speculation ||what if the curse magic makes Horizon orchestrate situations where the ship of heroes is needed? So while Horizon is saving people, she's saving them from situations she created, almost a perversion of her purpose||

[spice socket]

https://tenor.com/view/interesting-batman-very-interesting-thinking-gif-16421084

[errant fractal]

||My guess is that cursed Horizon is going to fulfill her purpose of creating heroes by causing disasters in order to force potential heroes into action||

[thick bay]

||We sure she doesn't do this already? :P||

[zenith kayak]

Oh hey, the Cradle 10-12 FauxLB kickstarter's been announced!
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/author-will-wight/cradle-books-10-12-by-will-wight-special-editions

[spice socket]

Fancy

[golden void]

oh no! my wallet!

[errant fractal]

Books for the book god

[spice socket]

Every time I see Will in a video I am hit with the reminder that he looks exactly like I always imagine he does

[zenith kayak]

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/9Q14OgurWAM?feature=share

[opal wadi]

The Commander releases next week, a source from my fever dreams confirms

[spice socket]

A source as reliable as any discussing film tweet

[orchid merlin]

I'm reminded of this

[opal wadi]

Last Horizon ||Varric trying to get more Archmage Titles trying to explain that the magic came to him from a vision||

[orchid merlin]

||"Source?" "It was revealed to me in a vision" really does sum up a lot of LH||

[golden void]

||Mel: "but we already found it through normal means an hour ago!"||

[zenith fossil]

Manifesting the commander for my birthday

[keen sleet]

So, I decided on starting Cradle just through the idea of this thread existing on this server. While I have read cultivation books in the past, and while a good few have something refreshing to deliver... a lot of them, especially beyond the exciting moments are... pretty similar. Though, having been surprised by the freshness of dungeon crawler carl, while believing similarly about system apocalypse books, just because the Cosmere reddit told me to go for it... I started on the audiobooks.

Finished book 1 this morning, and having the benefit of owning audible credits, I started book 2. I will say, I am loving it. Mostly because of Kelsa at first, and Yerin atm... Mr Wight writes characters phenomenally... Just with the little things they do... BUT I love a good magnificent bastard... and so Eithan Aurelias is a fun POV... I hope he stays for more of the story.

tl;dr, started cradle because of this thread, hoping it's as good as ya guys say

(I don't think the above statement has any spoilers, lemme know if I was wrong)

[errant fractal]

I’m absolutely looking forward to hearing your thoughts and reactions as you progress further

[spice socket]

Hell yeah

Welcome to the crew

https://tenor.com/view/arrested-development-david-cross-tobias-funke-there-are-dozens-of-us-dozens-gif-5426075

[keen sleet]

[Soulsmith Spoilers] ||Awww.... I loved it when Arelius claimed that he wanted both Lindon and Yerin... as much as I am invested in Lindon's happiness, I want Yerin to be as much happy too... She just wants friends.||

Also damn... I finished a book in a day, cosmere could never (the books are too long... Man I want the next volume of stormlight right now)

[fresh pivot]

these books go by fast

[opal wadi]

I had a Cradle related dream that I forgot as soon as I woke up but I distinctly remember it being Cradle because it was about Madra compositions or something similar

I need to stop myself from starting a reread

[thick bay]

https://tenor.com/view/wolf-of-wall-street-jordan-belfort-leonardo-di-caprio-one-of-us-jonah-hill-gif-5441859

[lilac vault]

I just realized something very funny

Cradle Blackflame + Wheel of Time Dragon Reborn ||Both of these series have a Dragon that is not a dragon that get brain damage and go insane from using their abilities||

[spice socket]

https://tenor.com/view/coincidence-major-frog-themajorfrog-tinfoil-hat-gif-12737066454537454329

Almost certainly

[keen sleet]

Eithan's "fight, fight, fight" gave me such a whiplash to Cascadia's "kill, kill, kill" from dcc.

[keen sleet]

I was in the gym when ||Cassius' family was in danger from the Jai clan massacre. I was so stressed since cassius was spewing death flags left right and center... but then Cassius flipped the script and I gave the heaviest sigh||

[Book 3 spoilers]

[keen sleet]

||Ex-frickin-cuse me? Lindon lost an arm?|| [Book 4 spoilers]

(My bad, I thought I put the || around...)

[dreamy sorrel]

Skysworn 6: ||Sometimes you have to lose an arm to make an omelet||

Oh you're coming up on my favorite audio mistake!

[keen sleet]

audio mistake?

[dreamy sorrel]

It's in chapter 7

[errant fractal]

||Don’t worry about it||

[keen sleet]

(Also, I kinda missed reporting it, was busy throughout the day as I finished book 3 and started book 4) but I loved ||Jai chen's interaction with Lindon at the end of book 3, Little blue healing her was so soothing to my soul. I feel for her as a big brother myself|| [book 3/4 spoilers]

[keen sleet]

[Not sure what book spoiler this is... since this is like a speculation/question, but book 4 at minimum] ||So... with Cassius and Yerin's conversation, it seems like the Sage rank is above an underlord... maybe even an overlord, like the emperor of the bloodflame empire. How in the hecks, did 4 frickin jades kill Yerin's master, even with poison... It seems more than just impossible. What the hecks did the heaven's glory school study... It seemed to me like poison was no-one's mastery among sacred valley.||

[errant fractal]

And there it is, everyone

[dreamy sorrel]

Looks like you're past it now. Skysworn 7: ||When Fisher Gesha is telling Lindon about his arm options, Travis accidentally drops down to his natural register at around 10:45||

[keen sleet]

Is it a common question? (I mean... I am assuming it is, now)

[errant fractal]

||"How did a bunch of Jades kill the Sword Sage"|| is a question that basically everyone asks themselves or the community once they get to around Blackflame or Skysworn. Its practically a meme.

The actual answer to the question though, is RAFO

[final quest]

that is the question, some might claim

[spice socket]

I always thought the question was “wait you spell Eithan how?”

Maybe that was just me

[robust estuary]

Its spelled like "Eithan"

[errant fractal]

Clearly the question is "what hair products does Eithan reccomend"

[dreamy sorrel]

L'Oréal

[thick bay]

||Trying to guess what rank was what rank in what order was my favorite ||

[dreamy sorrel]

You weren't too far off

Some of your assumptions were pretty funny

[final quest]

Cradle all || the real 'the' question is, quite frankly, exactly what you expect it to be but I digress||

[spice socket]

|| the real real question is actually “what actually is a proper sacred artist?”||

I know that’s what I kept asking myself based on how many different definitions the series gave

[final quest]

|| gotta improve yourself... ||

[spice socket]

Something something the only definition that matters is the one you make yourself

Doesn’t make it less repetitive lol

[keen sleet]

Bloopers at the end of ghostwater are hilarious

[keen sleet]

What's the difference between Sword Aura and Sword Madra? Yerin switched techniques to take advantage of one because she couldn't take advantage of the other, but What's the difference?

[opal wadi]

Cradle general mechanics
||Aura is what's around you, in this case say there's a knife in the floor and it slowly leaks Sword aura into the ambient, Madra is what you get when you intake that Aura and cycle it into your core, slowly your core learns what "Sword" is and then starts outputting something similar.||

||Yerin's Ruler Technique uses Sword Aura from the ambient to resonate and ring like a bell as it blows up like a million razors blowing up in your face, so she takes control of the Aura and uses her own Madra to start the chain reaction||

[fresh pivot]

general mechanics
||I think of Aura as kind of the underlying field below madra. A sword has kind of... magnetic field lines of sword-ness, and it slowly bends the madra within it to sword madra||

[keen sleet]

Okay, so I looked back to where this occured, ||this was during when Jai long and the sandvipers attacked her and lindon. Because stellar spear is half sword half light madra, it seems like she was using the madra leaking from the vipers and jai long to use her technique, which is cool as hell.||

[fresh pivot]

||the aura is how something generates madra of a given type||

[keen sleet]

I am already on book 6 btw

Which to me, is crazy

[opal wadi]

That's when the story starts getting into it's stride

[keen sleet]

Ghostwater was my favorite book till now

Just the concept was crazy good

[opal wadi]

What can I say I love magic kickpunching

[keen sleet]

I love Will's action, I am more of the a Lore > Action kinda guy, but the fight at the end ||Lindon V Harmony|| was great.

[opal wadi]

Wait since you're now reading this, it means I get to post The Fish eventually

[fresh pivot]

Ghostwater is def a highlight

also introduces my favourite character so it gets an auto-win

[keen sleet]

||Dross|| is a pleasure

||He's totally a spren xD||

[dreamy sorrel]

That's my favorite character!

[keen sleet]

||The more I think about it, the more I feel like sacred valley was artificially stunted. How is jade their peak when ascending to gold is... frankly easy...|| [General speculation mid book 6]

[dreamy sorrel]

Cradle ATOMIC: ||So glad Dark is focusing on Sacred Valley and not... other... mysteries||

[cloud zinc]

Dark these are great and I am thoroughly entertained

[keen sleet]

[Also more speculation] ||I wonder if the lee patriarch was on the same path as naru huan... He had emerald wings as a goldsign iirc... But retrospectively... I doubt he was stronger than eithan, so I wonder why he wasn't permitted to live in cradle.||

[Now reacting to current events in book 6 audiobook] ||Eithan you bastard, let Yerin stay with Lindon... Why you immortal enemy bastard of adoloscent crushes||

[lilac vault]

What IS Sword.

[lilac vault]

||Little Blue is literally Syl but she can't speak||

[keen sleet]

||... Imma go tell lil blue you said that||

[lilac vault]

Am I wrong!

[keen sleet]

I mean... clearly... Go read the beginning of book 6, smh

Just because ||Lindon doesn't know her language, doesn't mean she can't talk||

[opal wadi]

||Twinkle twinkle, little sylvan||

[lilac vault]

||I want a Cradle/Stormlight crossover for no reason other than Syl and Little Blue to play together||

||And for Lindon to meet someone who doesn't instantly try to kill him for once in his life||

[keen sleet]

True on the second part... ||It's almost unnatural how bloodthirsty people are for Lindon... Like even good natured people are always pitted against him... and some people don't have to fight him, they do just cuz he breathed in their direction... Let my boi have more than 3 friends ong.🙄 ||

[safe knoll]

||The more you think about it, the more you realise how hostile Cradle is||

[final quest]

|| Cradle culture of "strong guy gives other strong guy the head of weak guy who offended the other strong guy" isn't necessarily the most ideal ||

[opal wadi]

Cradle general worldbuilding
||You got Aura Storms that can kill you, Sacred Beasts that can kill you, People that can kill you, hell, trees can grow strong enough to shred you to pieces if you step on their roots, Dreadbeasts, and that's not even touching on the Dreadgods that are more like walking natural disasters than creatures. ||

||Everything can kill you, the wind can kill you if you're in the wrong place||

[dreamy sorrel]

Cradle all: ||OK now I'm imagining someone does some questionable soulsmithing and does this literally||

[errant fractal]

WoR ||Apparently at one point Will had the idea that Little Blue should get the ability to turn into a weapon for Lindon. Then WoR came out and he shelved the idea forever||

[errant fractal]

I think you'll like a certain part of book 7 then

[lilac vault]

LMAO

||"Well dammit, now I'll look like a thief if I do it."||

[errant fractal]

All of Cradle ||I do kind of like how Lindon ended up not having a signature weapon and instead alternating between unarmed combat, techniques, and soulsmithing insanity. It kind of fits that he wouldn't settle for just a single weapon when he could have more||

[thick bay]

Ghost water might be my most favorite out of them all.

[thick bay]

||What do you mean, His signature weapon is pulling out a random souls with gun that breaks when he uses it.||

[keen sleet]

[End of Book 6] ||ORTHOS MET KELSA.... Man, I am so excited to see where this goes.||

[Bloopers at book 6] ||Did people want Lindon to split his core again? so the bloopers alluded to that? ALSO OREO, xD||

||WOAH... wtf... Orthos confirmed it, sacred valley weakens people... IS THAT WHY THE SAGE GOT FOLDED BY 4 JADES??|| [Book 7 beginning]

||GUYS... I JUST WANNA STAY WITH KELSA AND ORTHOS... WHY IS WILL TAKING ME TO THE WAY NOW ;-;... I swear to god, I need more of their interaction in this book... waiting 8 hours to start the next one would be torture.||

[Book 7+ obviously ^^]

[lilac vault]

||People were expecting it at least||

[keen sleet]

||Not sure cuz I might have missed it, Did lindon upgrade his hunger arm with the archstone before the uncrowned tourney?|| [Book 7 question]

||Also Zeil (Zeal?) is climbing up my ranks of favorites... He's just so done with it, plus he gives lindon actual good advice||

[safe knoll]

Underlord all || He did while ascending to Underlord||

[keen sleet]

||WOAH... PRIDE BEING A GOOD PERSON? WTH|| [big book 7 spoiler]

||Not sure why he gave lindon a crown, but good shtuff||

[safe knoll]

underlord all

[keen sleet]

||Also... can I just consider Yerin and Lindon married now... I mean, they got a house together.|| [book 7, don't actually answer the question]

||Lindon : I have a plan||
||Me : This boutta be some compound bindings (soulsmithing) bullcrap innit?|| [Cradle post book 4 in general]

[errant fractal]

||He upgraded it as part of his advancement to undelord. Without it, his arm would’ve been permanently ruined.||

||Completely unrelated question: what’d you think of Fury?||

[keen sleet]

||He's definitely cool, greatly insightful at fighting and chill as hell, I would like to see a bit more depth though, that could elevate him much higher.||

||Lindon healing Naian is so cool, I do love that aspect of him||

||WTF... SOPHARANATOTH IS SUCH A... WHAT?...||

||MAN... I hope he kills her.||

||Northstrider saying "The dragon advances" gave me actual chills||

[dreamy sorrel]

||Do you see any similarities to pop culture characters?||

[keen sleet]

Generally, yes... He is an archetype I am familiar with, though I can't think of examples on the top of my head

[safe knoll]

Uncrowned early, safe for Darkzap||I remember when the implications of Fury's "known for waging war singlehandedly" description finally got through to me. Man fought wars against sects and nations on his own. On Cradle. ||

[keen sleet]

||I mean... yeah, that doesn't seem too far off... He is a peak archlord if I understand correctly... though I still don't know the intricacies between heralds and sages and stuff.||

[safe knoll]

||You'll learn what every advancement level is, their order, and what they're generally about in the next book||

[keen sleet]

||WHAT||... Yeah, the thing in uncrowned happened

I am kinda madge

But

I hope ||yerin wins||

||I don't think I'll like the writing if Lindon won...||

[keen sleet]

Oh

||Fury's Goku||

Gotcha

||Little Blue pulled out a KNIFE||

https://tenor.com/view/kid-knife-running-with-knives-gif-13862209

damn wintersteel is the longest book yet

||OH... I am about to find out how the Reinhard died||

[dreamy sorrel]

Wintersteel prologue: ||Excuse you! His name is Tim||

[keen sleet]

Damn.... ||Tim was kinda reckless||

||I don't want Lindon to lose dross... He isn't just power... Dross is a friend||

[lilac vault]

https://giphy.com/gifs/nah-id-win-rezero-reinhard-YfwHZvRfVuzc1ZCcUn

REINHARD?!

[zenith kayak]

Oh, that Reinhard. I was wondering what made him feel like a Knight with a warhammer and energy shield wall.

[opal wadi]

Force Madra paths be like "Hammer"

[lilac vault]

Yeah ||he is the Sword Saint||

[keen sleet]

He is ||THE sword sage||

(I love reinhard, he's just so golden retriever)

[lilac vault]

||Reinhard would win.||

||Unironically||

[keen sleet]

||Tbf... since timmy got taken out by jades... Subaru could win alone||

[lilac vault]

||Nah Subaru would get his ass kicked in all possibilities||

[keen sleet]

||Timmy lost because of his overconfidence... Subaru's literal greatest strength is that he learns... He might have died to Yerin afterwards... but He genuinely might have killed timmy||

[lilac vault]

Nah man. ||Sword Sage got beat by Jades. Subaru is not a Jade. Subaru is Foundation level, undoubtedly.||

||it also ignores any possible context about why he might have died||

[dreamy sorrel]

||Who, Timmy or Car?||

[lilac vault]

||Timmy||

||In no world can Car kill Timmy||

[dreamy sorrel]

Cradle all: ||Yeah, without Authority you get clapped||

[errant fractal]

Unsouled ||On the other hand, we know that Jades can kill a Sage and that a Foundation can kill a Jade, therefore a Foundation can easily kill a Sage||

[lilac vault]

Damn I never considered that

[dreamy sorrel]

https://tenor.com/view/malreynolds-firefly-speechless-gif-5332816

[safe knoll]

Cradle all, nsf Darkzap ||I mean, he's a Sage. So, if you threw a big enough car at him, he would die. If he were a Herald, though, he could survive nukes without the will behind them ||

same tags ||I'm not sure where the limit is, though, since I'm fairly certain even Heralds can't survive their stars going nova.||

[final pulsar]

and ||Pride's Vegeta, that's why he's a good guy now 😉 ||

[robust estuary]

Cradle all ||One of the what if? battles does mention that even Monarchs still need to breathe, they can just go a really long time without it, so even if they survive the niva itself, they aren't gonna stay alive without getting out of that Iteration one way or another||

[keen sleet]

||Remember to see a barber... A barber, Lindon!||

God, Eithan Arelius is my favorite character by leaps and bounds.

||And just with me saying he's my favorite, bro advances to overlord... I'd wouldn't be surprised if he already knew his archlord revelation too...||

||Eithan: "I see!"||
||Me: "I see... you bastard"||
[Wintersteel]

[keen sleet]

The way Travis pronounced this... I have been repeating it like it's a tic since I've heard it

[keen sleet]

||"THIS IS ABOUT POINTS"||

[Wintersteel]

[fresh pivot]

Wintersteel is one of those books where everything about cradle just comes together and clicks

[thick bay]

||Does cradle have common law marriage? ||

[keen sleet]

||You tell me boss... I am only 2/3rds of the way... that too barely considering I am mid wintersteel||

[keen sleet]

||I will be the first to say it (I am probably not the first to say it), Ruby is cute... I hope she becomes fren||

[Wintersteel, near end]

[spice socket]

I gotta reread cradle at some point

[keen sleet]

||Min Shuei... isn't fun||

||I think both Yerin and Min shuei didn't understand why that revelation worked for Yerin at the time. From my limited knowledge, of the two revelations I have seen someone speak while ascending to overlord and from Eithan's advice... I think this revelation is specifically about other's perception of you. It literally has nothing to do about you, but what you look like to others.||

||Since the start, the basic reason why people want to meet, or train or pursue Yerin has been because she was the disciple of the sword sage. They cannot understand that she is not him, They cannot realise that she isn't Timias Adama... It is her confronting the fact that, even if she knows she isn't the sage of the endless sword, she actually has to tell that to the world... To those people who pursue her because of Timmy.||

||At least, those are my thoughts.||

[Wintersteel near end...]

||Oof... The ruby scene was rough... Rejection always is ;-;||

[keen sleet]

[Wintersteel question, don't answer] ||... So... is yerin a herald?... Like Northstrider said, It's fascinating.||

[keen sleet]

[Wintersteel end fight] ||I might be wrong, but it feels like Eithan has already advanced to the top before, and is advancing again... Because as Archlord he threw the hollow spear and his internal monologue said that it wasn't an imitation spear... But I clearly remember him saying that he made his own path... so... is it like a zeil/mercy sitch... or maybe he got reincarnated... since we know that death is not the end a-la unsouled. Souls exist.||

He is doing it

||(I think)... Lindon is ascending to sage||

||As a fudging underlord||

||He... achieved the void icon because he was unsouled... That is crazy fun...||

||Like so cathartic... It was such a good revelation.||

||Smooooooooooooooch||

Yay

||Lindon [Bloopers]: What do you mean, can you not see that Grace is a genuine big ... goth gf, of course I'll marry her (fill in the blank yourself.)||

The bloopers are such a highlight

[golden void]

||SMH Lindon should have gone for the harem ending. He's an underlord sage, the akura would have allowed it||
||If only Will weren't a well adjusted human being a coward||

[zenith escarp]

Wintersteel: Not an answer || This is personally the thing that bugs me the most about wintersteel, It trivializes the end of the tournament in a way that left me feeling dissatisfied||

[keen sleet]

||I am just questioning if a blood shadow counts as a personal remnant. Is it equal to a normal remnant advantage or is it something lesser... Not sure on the answer to that.||

[dreamy sorrel]

Cradle all (safe for Dark): ||You're not far off. The overlord revelation is about who you are. You are very close to yourself, so it can be very helpful to see how others see you. Yerin didn't want to admit to herself that she wasn't the Sword Sage because it felt like betraying his memory. Eithan sees himself as someone who sees all. This becomes more apparentwith more overlord revelations||

[keen sleet]

||Again, I might be wrong, but to me, it seemed more like she was telling that to the world than accepting it herself. To her it was obvious, she wasn't Adama. And, she had for the most part, reconciled with his death... the one missing on both accounts was min shuei.||

[dreamy sorrel]

Wintersteel all: ||There's a huge difference between knowing that intellectually and actually accepting. It took over 6 months before Yerin absorbed her master's remnant||

[pseudo sedge]

oh man, I forgot we were getting fresh reactions and was confused as to why I missed over 100 messages here

you're really going through these quickly darkzap!

[spice socket]

lol

[thick bay]

Cradle all ||No, she needs to be with Ziel!||

[spice socket]

Cradle all || everyone (except mercy and pride) should just be kissing all time.||

[final quest]

@robust estuary obligatory ruby discourse mention

[robust estuary]

Wintersteel all ||You can't do this to me, not when I've already scratched my throat raw helping a customer that didn't know anything about phone cables while recovering from a cold, I can't go into crying hysterics and make kt even worse 😭||

[safe knoll]

Wintersteel all ||My read was that while revelations are about you, most people don't have a full picture of who they are. They know who they see themselves as and who they want to be. It's like trying to accurately describe a box from the inside. ||

[keen sleet]

Gratitude for the insights, honored elder.

[keen sleet]

||I feel so sad for Lindon, I thought the first elder was a G... but nah.||

[keen sleet]

I finished all of cosmere under 3 months while prepping for college exams in the last month... These books are too short after stormlight lmao

[thick bay]

||Oh no, at least they weren't as bad as the skysworn. ||

[keen sleet]

||Northstrider is just a tsundere||

[lilac vault]

||I know what you mean by this, but I can also read this as "everyone should be kissing all the time, except Mercy and Pride shouldn't kiss ANYONE" and I think that is a very funny interpretation||

||But also. This implies that Fury, Malice, Grace, Justice, Jai Long, Jai Chen, Kelsa, Lindon, and more are all on that list. You have to make a very long list of exceptions for family, and if you're going to call out only two specific individuals I am of course going to call out all the others for comedic effect.||

[jade notch]

||OrthosxLittle Blue, clearly||

[lilac vault]

Yes.

lmao

[keen sleet]

||clearly thorn doesn't have anything against Jai long x Jai chen, or Lindon x Kelsa... They only have something against Mercy x Pride... probably because they hate pride like everyone.||

[lilac vault]

||Clearly, mercy and pride can't go hand in hand. If you're prideful, you clearly believe in your superiority and thus would never show mercy||

or something

[spice socket]

Cradle all humor || I bet lil blue has a massive crush on Ziel. Like I do.||

[keen sleet]

Haven't been updating a lot cuz ||Dross's death had me about as depressed as it had Lindon||

In the middle of Reaper rn.
||I did love the first part of the book, with the Kelsa and family stuff... That is one of my favorite subgenres where post hero's journey, when the hero returns to status quo, the people around him react to it. I hope I get more of that cozy stuff ahead.|| [thoughts so far]

||I think there's a higher connection between Ozmanthus arelius and Eithan... post reading his records, he seems like the person to reincarnate somehow just so he could correct the mistakes he had in his first ascension. That is, having friends to climb along side him... It may be a stretch... but I think my theory is strong.|| [Some thoughts on Ozriel]

[thick bay]

||Yeah, I never liked how he decided that.||

[errant fractal]

||It is rough, but it did help set stakes for how dangerous it is to mess with the dreadgods. Don't worry about it though, RAFO||

[dreamy sorrel]

https://tenor.com/view/batman-signal-aura-dark-señal-gif-2752502943183935479

[keen sleet]

||I don't wanna be the one to say it... but second half of reaper is kinda boring.... The labyrinth is just, unfun when every room is basically a fight with overwhelming forces... The few lore rooms are interesting... but that's about it really... plus dross is unfun|| [Reaper]

[zenith kayak]

Reaper safe for Darkzap ||Yeah, IMO Reaper suffers a lot from essentially being a dungeon crawl in a series that isn't built around dungeon crawls.||

[fresh pivot]

see, I actually enjoyed it
||it's a real showcase of where everyone is, at this point, and what they're playing with vs what they're up against||

[jade notch]

Same tags ||Yeah it definitely got repetitive. The reveal is worth it but it could have been a ton shorter||

[final quest]

Reaper general || I actually also like that section that section slaps but that's also because I happen to really like this version of Dross ||

[errant fractal]

||I got a few good laughs out of the Dross alternates, though they were certainly funnier on the reread||

[keen sleet]

||HAH, I WAS RIGHT|| [Reaper end]

[thick bay]

||I didn't like dross but I liked the dungeon.||