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File 152787662193.png - (398.07KB , 1024x1024 , disthread.png )
123379 No. 123379 ID: 891b91

Wherein we discuss dead dust, and possibly other sorts of dust as well.
Expand all images
>>
No. 123380 ID: f8ff93

Dust is a pretty good game. The ending is gloriously overblown anime.

Also this quest is exactly how you start an intriguing ontological mystery right.
>>
No. 123381 ID: d35f61

So, probably silly to start theorizing right now, but:

I think we actually ARE dead. Whatever dust that we inbibed somehow brought us back to life, as it did select others. I don't know if we retained all our mental faculties because we're special or because that's the result of the dust, but I propose that once he's gone we do a simple health check on ourselves. Pinch and maybe hold our breath for as long as possible. We need to see if all of our nervous system is still intact and if we still need to breath and whatnot.
>>
No. 123383 ID: 166e1c

>>123380
Good game, cool story, but I felt something was missing from the villains. I didn't understand their perspective, why they though what they were doing was right? The existence of this reason is insinuated in the general dialog but never stated, a big emptiness considering the main antagonist had such emotional connection with Dust, who cannot reciprocate since he never discover what he used to fight for.


>>123381
Since the protagonist used to be human and now isn't, I see two strong possibilities: Either we were brought back to life in a new body, or we are an undead human with a distorted perception of the world.
Personally I prefer the first option. Second guess the reality of everything we see would get tiresome really quick.
Also being alive is a preferable state of being. Unless there is an awesome reward for enduring decomposition, being dead is preferential to be undead.
>>
No. 123413 ID: 5f80fc

Alright, plan of action: only as a last resort we'll follow the instructions on the page we tore out. That said, after leaving this place, we should find a library, and look up what this Vesper company is on a computer, and/or reading materials.
>>
No. 123418 ID: ad7c25

So quest is not porn quest obviously but is it going to be NSFW or exclusive SFW or if lewd happens whatever?
>>
No. 123419 ID: 891b91

>>123418
Thanks for bringing this up; I meant to make a disclaimer about this at the start of the quest, but I forgot to do it.

The short answer: the quest might get lewd at times, if it's appropriate to the plot/setting/characters and if suggesters make choices that direct the plot towards it. Or it might not get lewd much, if at all, if they don't.

The long answer:

I'm fine with including nsfw/lewd/romantic content in the quest so long as I think it helps develop (or at least fits in with) the plot, characters, setting, etc. For example, the holoporn in the latest update was meant to help lend to the seedy atmosphere, and to characterize the guy behind the desk. Sex won't be a major focus of the quest, but given the right conditions it could happen.

All that being said, I want to cater to suggesters' wishes when it comes to lewdness. I don't plan on nudging the quest down a lewd path intentionally, but if a majority of suggesters try to push things in that direction and it makes sense for it to happen within the bounds of plot/characters/setting, then I'll allow for more opportunities for it to happen. On the same token, if I consistently see most suggesters shying away from lewdness, then I'll be more likely to downplay those opportunities in the future.
>>
No. 123423 ID: f0e552

Hey, do you have places where you post art? Like a tumblr/twitter etc.
>>
No. 123425 ID: 891b91

>>123423
I do, here you go:
https://www.furaffinity.net/user/totalgarbage/
https://totalgary.tumblr.com/
>>
No. 123426 ID: 4eba89

Oh my god. That is quite possibly the most garish tumblr background I have ever seen. That is saying something.
>>
No. 123427 ID: 891b91

>>123426
Thank you, I'm very proud of its sheer obnoxiousness.
>>
No. 123428 ID: 8df643

Hmm. *checks his bookmarks* Yep, you're on my favorite artists list. Just love your art style!
>>
No. 123460 ID: 891b91

>>123428
Thanks!
>>
No. 123470 ID: 891b91
File 152834849176.png - (194.21KB , 657x1007 , 003lewd.png )
123470

Here's a panel from the 3rd update that I threw out, but I still like how it turned out as a drawing, so I figured I'd post it. (Plus, I figure it's a good consolation prize for those who wanted lewds in the most recent update.)
>>
No. 123473 ID: ae9b99

>>123470
very cool consolation prize, looks like our protagonist is going commando in this quest.
>>
No. 123489 ID: 61838d

>>123470
Very... fluffy.
>>123473
And yes she is, apparently her past self decided underwear wasnt necessary.
>>
No. 123508 ID: dbf422

>>123419
Personally glad to see it more limited. I don't mind it, I just need it to make sense.
>>
No. 123665 ID: 891b91
File 152921979536.png - (475.00KB , 1024x1024 , 013-4.png )
123665

(Non-animated version of post 013-4)

At first glance, it isn't clear what the card is for; it mostly lacks identifying marks, save for an odd glyph that takes up most of one of its faces. The glyph seems similar in concept to the one printed on the Vesper paper, albeit a different design. Cautiously, you glance at it, and to your surprise a holographic advertisement blooms from the surface of the card.

DELANEY SECURITY SERVICES LLC

We offer:
- Cheating spouse investigations
- Corporate fraud, theft, and espionage investigations
- Taffa syndrome background investigation and recovery
- Polygraph and voice stress analysis
- Dust scan analysis
- Surveillance
- Memory acquisition and analysis
- Murder investigations
- Body theft investigations
- VIP protection and body guarding
- Covert camera installation
- Rhythmograph installation
- Employee background checks
- Vehicle tracking systems
- Specialized undercover agents
- Service with a smile :)

Offices located at 306B Ablewild block, Gansett Shelf
nltp://delaneysecu.service/



It appears that this is a high-tech business card for a detective agency, which you suppose explains the presence of the evidence case.
>>
No. 123668 ID: 8df643

It's very thoughtful of you to worry about readers with epilepsy.

However, I don't think the warning was quite necessary this time.
https://www.epilepsy.com/learn/triggers-seizures/photosensitivity-and-seizures
This is because the flashing usually needs to be pretty fast, between 5-30 flashes per second. So the fact that the hologram displaces once every 2.5 seconds isn't a problem. The tiny flickering that's going on also isn't a problem because the brightness difference there is barely 2%, without any hue changes, whereas real "flashing" would be brightness going between 0% and 100%, or extreme changes in colors.

It's also worth noting that the triggers for people with photosensitive epilepsy vary from person to person. For instance, it could be that, rather than flashing lights, a trigger in one person is simply looking at a specific color. It's really not something that you can account for. Fortunately, such people will take measures on their own, such as reducing the brightness of their monitors and being in a well-lit room.

I'm not saying that you shouldn't worry, but there's also no need to be paranoid. As long as a person knows that a panel is animated, which is something they can already tell from the animated thumbnails, it's highly unlikely that a photosensitive person, being aware of their condition, wouldn't take pre-emptive measures on their own.
>>
No. 123672 ID: 891b91

>>123668
I appreciate the correction -- now I won't have to be as worried about the possibility of giving someone a seizure. Perhaps unsurprisingly, I was under the impression that any flashing, even subtle flashing like the flickering in that gif, was potentially dangerous for people with photosensitive epilepsy. I wasn't sure how true it was, but I decided I'd rather be safe than sorry.

Anyway, I see your point; I probably won't bother with epilepsy warnings in the future unless the flashing in the animation is particularly extreme.
>>
No. 123673 ID: 891b91
File 152926171050.png - (290.68KB , 742x1285 , swain-duo.png )
123673

A friend doodled our still-unnamed protagonist with Sunny, the protagonist of a quest he's been running over at /qst/. Not sure if this belongs in the fanart thread, so I figured I'd just post it here.

If anyone is curious/interested, here's the current thread for his quest: https://boards.4chan.org/qst/thread/2641255
>>
No. 123674 ID: 891b91
File 152926184998.png - (9.04KB , 336x440 , bluer2.png )
123674

Another friend's take on how the most recent update should've could've gone.

Art by bluercheese: https://www.furaffinity.net/user/the-bluercheese/
>>
No. 123675 ID: 891b91
File 152926190420.png - (4.71KB , 276x382 , bluer1.png )
123675

Another pic of the protagonist, also by bluercheese
>>
No. 123680 ID: 06fdc0

>>123673
is there a way to expand all images on 4chan like there is here?
>>
No. 123682 ID: 4f1cbc

>>123680
There should be an expand all images link in the OP of whatever thread you're in.
>>
No. 123684 ID: 891b91

>>123680
I don't think 4chan has a link built-in to expand all images, but if you install the 4chan-x userscript (requires greasemonkey/tampermonkey/etc.), you can expand all images in a thread by hitting the e key. If you can't install a userscript, you can expand images individually by clicking/tapping on them.
>>
No. 123757 ID: 8df643

Before I begin suggesting in the quest, I have a question.

Is there any sort of suggestions which you would prefer not to get? Any sort of content that suggesters should stay away from when suggesting? Some sort of rules or guidelines for your quest's suggesters?
>>
No. 123762 ID: 891b91

>>123757
The only major rule I have is that I want suggesters to act civilly towards each other (and towards me), and to take it to the big dumb arguments thread if they need to blow off some steam. So far, though, I haven't seen even a hint of that kind of posting, so I'm not worried about it.

On the whole, I'd like for suggesters to post whatever they want, so there aren't any specific kinds of content I that I want people to avoid. If a given suggestion isn't appropriate to whatever's going on in the quest at the moment, or is outright absurd, then most likely I just won't factor it in to the next update; I won't consider it a problem unless it's so prevalent that it hinders quest progression, but I doubt that's likely to happen on tgchan anyway.

Aside from that, I do have a preference for suggestions actually suggest a course of action for the next update, but only because it's helpful to me as a quest author. I occasionally receive suggestions that only contain commentary or speculation, but don't have any indication of what they want the protagonist to do next; while I love reading those kinds of posts, I don't have any choice but to pass them over when deciding what happens during the next update. That being said, if someone doesn't know what to suggest but they have something they want to say, by all means they should post it; and obviously none of this applies in situations where someone makes additional posts after suggesting what should happen next. In a sense it's a non-problem anyway, since if I'm getting very few suggestions that say what to do next, then it's most likely because I'm making things too confusing, or because the choices I'm giving are too subtle for readers to see possible next actions; if it happens, it's on me, not the suggesters.

I suppose that was a bit long-winded, but I hope it helps!
>>
No. 123813 ID: 8df643

So far, my opinion about the quest is that it's as mysterious as it is interesting. And it's very interesting. I gotta praise the art, which is pretty high quality, and it makes me wonder just how much time you're spending on each update. If things get too hard, remember that you can always simplify the writing or the art and work in smaller chunks.

As far as the plot goes, what I think is going on is that in the beginning, some sort of mass suicide occurred. Altho I'm not ruling out the possibility that all 4 of the characters in the starting room were one and the same person.
We don't yet know what exactly dust is, but I'm thinking it could a manifestation of a person's soul. Given the fact that body swapping is possible, I believe that dust is the means through which that happens.
Why they did what they did we cannot really guess. But given that everyone was in a comfortable position, I'd say that the act was intentional. And if dust can make a person immortal, what they did would be logical in a suicide (attempt) scenario, that is, I'd guess that suicide is illegal and the only means through which one could accomplish it would be illegal ones.
Anyway, at some point, we find remains of a crime scene. What I think happened there was that someone got wounded, and then had his body stolen. A crime which I'd say would be pretty common. The power drill-like device that we found could be a sort of a dust extractor. The rest of the equipment points to the fact that this person may have been a private investigator. The foxes there could be common scavengers, feeding on.. dead dust.
In the last update, we encountered a new concept called rhythm. Until more is revealed about it, I'd guess that it's something related to space-time or multiple dimensions. Thus, a rhythmic disturbance would be a space-time instability, but then I'm not sure what rhythm spikes would be or how they could kill people. I guess a person hit with a rhythm spike simply vanishes and that's why they would be considered both dead and dust-unrecoverable.
Perhaps what we witnessed on our way to the evacuation zone was an advanced rhythmic disturbance. This disturbance opening a zone where monsters from the alternate space would periodically emerge. Heh, perhaps that's a classified military info.
But yeah, it seems rhythm is an integral part of the advanced technology around here.

Well, this is just a part of my theoretical thinking for now. We'll see how the story goes and what parts turn out to be true or wrong. Or if the 2girls1dust video exists :P
>>
No. 123864 ID: 891b91

>>123813
Thanks for the kind words! I'm happy you find the quest interesting; my hope is to keep things compelling throughout, especially as mystery unravels as the quest goes on. There's a lot of stuff that hasn't been revealed yet (or fully revealed, in some cases) which I think will add to the intrigue.

>how much time you're spending on each update
It varies, but I'd say each update takes me between 1 and 5 hours to make. I'd say I spend more time writing the quest than I do drawing it, honestly.

>If things get too hard, remember that you can always simplify the writing or the art and work in smaller chunks.
Of course -- although I'm pretty happy with the amount of effort I'm putting into the art and writing, so I'd prefer not to sacrifice either of those. Instead I'll just slow down the update schedule if necessary, which I expect I'll have to do at some point in the coming weeks, due to school.

>Well, this is just a part of my theoretical thinking for now.
I so wish I could respond to it! I think giving any indication about how close or far you are to/from the truth would ruin the fun of finding out in the quest, though. Regardless, it was really interesting to read, and you have a lot of cool ideas for what might be going on.

>Or if the 2girls1dust video exists :P
Dammit, I meant to respond to that in the most recent update, but completly forgot! I was going to make the kiosk sternly reprimand you for trying to view adult content on a public terminal. I've figured out what 2girls1dust would actually be, so yes, now it exists.
>>
No. 124060 ID: ff82d2

>>123864
You're welcome. I'll try my best to provide feedback whenever I can. Of course, take it with a grain of salt as I'm not the only reader there is. And I can get quite biased from time to time!

>I so wish I could respond to it
Oh, don't worry about that. I was not asking for any sort of a reveal and I'm writing here purely for feedback purposes. Because authors often say they get too little of it.

>make the kiosk sternly reprimand you
Haha, actually that's exactly what I was expecting to happen! Would've been totally hilarious

>now it exists
[terminal usage intensifies]

Let'see...
>>/quest/891554
Lots of interesting new information here. We get to see the Concourse and the 5 layers it consists of. We also get to see the shelves. I used to think that they were a sort of large ship modules, but it turns out they're something else. They seem to be floating islands. I guess Gansett and Alton shelves are the primary shelves, while Oswego Falls, Red, Bellwether and Helas are the minor shelves. It was said that the Concourse orbits the Core, so I guess the shelves orbit the Core as well. But then, if Gansett is orbiting "below" the Concourse, which way is down? Well, it's probably irrelevant.

The current events seem pretty inconspicuous, but as I've written in my suggestion, the two that caught my eye were the "RESK-U Safety Net System", I think this may have something to do with recovering people's dust, and the one citing illegal Taffa trade. Before this, I thought that the word taffa was just some medical term that meant amnesia, but now it looks like taffa may be some illegal substance... which we may be carrying with us right now... 🤔

Free food? I'd expect such a search to return a bunch of shady-looking businesses heh. Well, I guess VITACAL is legit. I'm expecting some sort of a drawback to eating free food tho.

I gotta say, the paragraph about masturbating is well written. Altho I feel it's a bit out-of-place without an accompanying image. Perhaps one with the MC blushing would've been fitting. Don't worry, it's fine! I'm very happy that the suggestion was considered. I mean, it's certainly a good way to reduce stress heh. But alas, not enough votes. So I'll leave it there. For now.

>>/quest/891555
>landscape curving upwards in all directions
I... this is quite strange and I'm not sure how to process this. The image that we see may indicate that we're on a ring world. But if the curvature is in all directions, then that would either mean we're inside a huge crater or inside a sphere. Being inside a sphere makes very little sense tho, because then there wouldn't be any day/night cycle.
>>
No. 124205 ID: 891b91
File 153164770437.png - (182.61KB , 1024x1024 , 024-1-f1.png )
124205

Gansett Shelf map, ground floors
>>
No. 124206 ID: 891b91
File 153164773464.png - (256.01KB , 1024x1024 , 024-1-f2.png )
124206

Gansett Shelf map, underground floors
>>
No. 124207 ID: 891b91
File 153164774570.png - (101.19KB , 1024x1024 , 024-1-f3.png )
124207

Gansett Shelf map, below-shelf floors
>>
No. 124272 ID: ff82d2

>>/quest/892988
>taffa
So we learn here that taffa is indeed a drug, hard to legally obtain, and that it affects memories. We know that it can cause full and permanent amnesia, tho we've yet to learn what its effects are in smaller quantities. I think there's a high chance it's used as a way to selectively erase memories, which seem logical considering poor people would have a lot of bad memories they'd want to erase. But then, "mnemocognitive" could also mean alteration.

I still think that what occurred at the beginning was for suicidal reasons as losing all your memories is technically the same thing.

Perhaps I can venture a guess at what the faded label on the vial says.
GR____________O_PLEX-B GRAPHENE ANTICOMPLEX-B (technical term for taffa) PROPER____F T______________NAMICS PROPERTY OF TAFFA LABS & DYNAMICS (licensed distributor)

But yeah, a lot of new names and terms that would be wise to remember or look into at a later time. Memory salons, CMC, FFF, HM&B. Interlocutors general? Plasmodian Congress? Eh, politics.

>map of Gansett
Nice work on the design. 306B Ablewild... so I assume Delaney is in the 6th office of the 3B floor of Ablewild building. Good to know.

>>/quest/892989
>sun
Interesting. An artificial sun? Well, considering its small size, it can't be a real one. I'm not sure what's going on on the surface of that massive object but, it's kinda plausible to be used as a light source.
Btw, I feel that the image is missing a glow or a lens flare around the sun. I mean, an object would have to be pretty bright to turn night into day on the surface around us.

>RESK-U
So my assumption was wrong and this is just a system for preventing deaths from falls. But we do learn a few more terms of interest, such as "a network of dust swarms" (no idea about this one) and Chaser Fleet. It seems like Chaser Fleet is a name of a ward. So then, a ward must be something you can fall off of, just like the Concourse and its shelves.

>>/quest/892990
Oh, a person that's interested in us. The problem is, of course, that we don't know what this person wants. It could be military or law enforcement, a pirate or someone with ill intentions, or just a random passer-by. Altho, as written in my suggestion, the lack of badge on the person and marks on their shuttle makes me think it's less likely to be the first one. It doesn't look like voice communication is possible here considering this person hasn't tried contacting us, and we haven't seen any comm system options on the console. And even if this person was someone trying to help us, we can't control our shuttle.

Perhaps nothing will happen, in which case maybe I should've suggested ignoring this person and suggested more shuttle console actions instead.
>>
No. 124752 ID: 891b91

I should give a quick update on things, since I ended up disappearing for a month. Sorry about that! Things got really busy for me with school, and on top of that the next update is going to be among the largest I've posted so far, so the time I was able to spend working on it ended up not being enough to finish it. I kept deluding myself as to how quickly I could get it done, and in retrospect I should have just announced a hiatus until the class was finished. I apologize to anyone I may have disappointed with the lack of updates or who thought the quest was dead; in the future I'll try to be more realistic about how changes in my schedule might affect my ability to update the quest.

Anyway, the good news is that I'll be done with class for a while after this weekend, so I expect I'll soon be able to return to updating the quest regularly.
>>
No. 124758 ID: ae9b99

Has it really been a month? It honestly didn't feel long.

well regardless, we knew you were busy. But I'm glad you are coming back. This quest has been very interesting so far with a likable protagonist. I'm glad we've been for the most part keeping her a neutral traveling observer of this world trying to figure things out while also trying to stay out of trouble (though I'm sure trouble will come to find her at some point regardless I'm sure, lol).
>>
No. 124774 ID: 864e49

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO YOU'RE BACK!!!!
>>
No. 124775 ID: ff82d2

> >>124752 >the next update is going to be among the largest I've posted so far
Can't wait! Just don't go the way of Prequel haha.
If you ask me, it's fine even if it's a single panel with one sentence of text. While larger updates push the story further, smaller updates give suggesters more opportunities to participate. Well, they might also make writing a bit more inconsistent, so there's pros and cons to both and it's not a simple choice. Whatever you feel you're most comfortable with I suppose.
>>
No. 125122 ID: 891b91

It's been a couple weeks, so I guess it's time for another post on how things are coming along: I've been steadily working on this update, but it's proven to be a ton of work due to the amount of detail I've put into it. It's going to be a pretty big setting dump, so I think this is justified; most updates in the future won't require this amount of detail and effort, so there won't be so much of a delay. At this point I've got the line art nearly finished, and then I just need to throw some color/shading in there; my hope is to get the update posted by Thursday, at the latest.

>>124758
One of my concerns with this quest is that the somewhat "blank slate" nature of the protagonist might make her boring, so I'm happy to hear that you like her and that you're enjoying the fact that her condition makes her effectively a neutral party in the world.

>(though I'm sure trouble will come to find her at some point regardless I'm sure, lol).
;)

>>124775
Generally speaking, I try to go with whatever length/amount of detail seems to best fit the situation. I expect that there will be a lot more single-panel updates once we have more opportunities for drawn-out dialogue, but whenever I need to show successive actions/events, multiple panels tend to be my go-to strategy. I also try hard to make sure that all the decisions left to the suggesters are meaningful and have at least a small impact on how the story plays out, which sometimes leads me into situations where I can't split up a large update into smaller ones. That's basically what is going on with the next update, in addition to having a lot that I want to show in it.
>>
No. 125141 ID: ae9b99

that sounds exciting. But do not feel like you have to rush. If you need to get it done by Friday or the weekend instead of Thursday, that is understandable.
>>
No. 125185 ID: a48264

>>125122
Glad to see you're back! I look forward to the next update, but I hope you don't feel like you have to rush!
>>
No. 125299 ID: c0641d

Man, sorry if I've been overthinking things after that 6-part update. I'm guessing there's no "perfect answer" to how to go about getting through customs scott-free while also hiding our zombie status? I might be married to the idea of us becoming a woman of mystery; no past, nebulous present, completely untraceable. (I even have this cute idea of naming ourselves "Taffa" to frustrate anyone trying to ask around or search for us, in the same vein as David Wong from "John Dies at the End.")
>>
No. 125306 ID: 891b91

>>125299
>sorry if I've been overthinking things
Don't be! I think this sort of speculation/debate/etc. is really interesting to read, as well as helpful with developing the quest. I wouldn't call it overthinking things, either, since a lot of factors could influence how things go for us in customs, and since there is no obvious best outcome to the situation.

>I'm guessing there's no "perfect answer" to how to go about getting through customs scott-free while also hiding our zombie status?
I think it's best if I don't give a clear answer to this, but I'll just say it might be helpful to consider why the Concourse requires evacuees to submit to a customs inspection in the first place.

>naming ourselves "Taffa"
I plan on leaving the choice of name up to a vote, but I have to admit that I like this idea! I think it could cause some... fun situations.
>>
No. 125319 ID: ff82d2

Time to get off my lazy ass and write another update review.

>>/quest/900073
That went well. Or not. I have a lingering feeling of a missed opportunity here, tho I can't quite guess what it was. Perhaps there was a chance we could've convinced this pilot to stop our shuttle and give us a lift instead. That might've been a way to avoid the customs. It seems kinda obvious now with all the talk about wards and stuff that there would be customs involved. No one to blame but ourselves :p

So you chose not to go with the video. Yeah, I think gif's are a better choice because, sadly, video uploads lack the in-place video player and thus, unlike gif's, have no preview. Also, I think that making videos is not worth the effort. Heh, come to think of it, the video file extension support was added when I requested it and I don't think that anyone else besides me uploaded any videos (btw, seen >>110900?)

>>/quest/900074
A nice general view of the Concourse. Quite a floating city... oh. From the initial design (>>/quest/891554) I thought it would just be a boring bunch of thick plates. Of course, it's my fault for failing to realize that the simple design hid the buildings and it turns out to be a much more dynamic landscape.

>prison or mandatory hospitalization
The information presented here does confirm what I suspected, tho I'm worried about the involvement of mandatory hospitalization. In other words, if we officially reveal that we're a taffa syndrome sufferer, it could lead to a lot of action that's outside MC's control.

>>/quest/900075
Geez. This is way too high quality! All the effort... I can certainly see why the update took so long to make. 1, 2, 3.. 24 animated characters (27 including holograms)?! It's like 5 updates in one panel. Madman I say! ... I like the lady up in the window.
Anyway, this panel is excellent at portraying the diversity of species in this universe and the building architecture which looks surprisingly old-town considering the high tech it's built upon. The real estate must be pretty cheap hehe.

>>/quest/900076
>>/quest/900077
Amazing perspective work. I noticed that you started using a ruler to draw straight lines during this update instead of the usual freeform stuff. It looks great and I got nothing against it, tho personally I'd prefer the freeform style. Not sure how to explain... freeform looks more artsy? Also maybe for consistency reasons. Oh and, the speed. Generally, precision comes with a cost.

>renaturalization process
I'm definitely against picking the name "Taffa". That's like wanting to be called "Cocaine" heh. Surely something better than a drug name could be thought of.

>licking the glass
Poor thing. Should give him something else to lick. Damn you lewd thoughts!

Again, props for all the hard work. I just hope that all of this doesn't cause you to burn out, which is something I fear greatly D:


>>125306
>why the Concourse requires evacuees to submit to a customs inspection
The most obvious reason would probably be to prevent the import of illegal/hazardous goods. But there could be any number of reasons, laws that require the inspection, or for tariff purposes.
Perhaps some of the items in our possession aren't strictly illegal but require a handling license. I thought that perhaps, in that case, we could ask the customs to mail the items straight to Delaney (who should have the required licenses), or call them to come pick them up for us. Hmm.
>>
No. 125337 ID: c0550f

When we get around to choosing a name for our character, I am hoping we choose a name that is gender neutral. I think it will be interesting in the story to play with the idea of our character being female, yet being mistaken for a male by some people from time to time. A gender neutral name will add to the confusion towards other characters. Just a fun thought.
>>
No. 125339 ID: 91ee5f

>>125337
So you basically want to pull an Undertale and name our character Frisk?

I mean, that’s not a bad idea, but I’d rather name her “Taffa“, since Teegee has implied here: >>125306 , that some fun things could happen if we did that.
>>
No. 125358 ID: ae9b99

>>125339
well not exactly like undertale, as the gender of the main character in that game was left to the gamer's interpretation. We already know our character in this quest is female. So I just thought giving our character a gender neutral name would make it so that if allies, or people we come across believe our character is male this whole time, but finds out much later our character is actually female, it would make for some confusing awkward, yet hilarious reactions.

Taffa does sound gender neutral enough though, so going with it would be kind of ok by me giving the same possible results from the characters we come across.
But as I must admit as >>125319 stated, it would be kind of weird as it is: like wanting to be called "Cocaine"
>>
No. 125362 ID: 69d4b9

>>125358
The character's gender is the least interesting thing about her in this game.

It was an interesting decision in Undertale not because gender identity is inherently interesting, but because Fox used the ambiguity to keep Frisk's interactions with the other characters childish and to emphasize that Frisk was a stranger in a strange land. Frisk's exploration of relationships wasn't about eros but instead had a very strong focus on philia and ludus, divorced almost entirely from the roles that our society imposes on people because this monster world is a weird quirky reflection of our own with its own rules where the particulars might not quite match up but the first principles of love, fellowship, and charity still apply.
>>
No. 125399 ID: ff82d2
File 153669495660.gif - (68.46KB , 600x305 , VirginVsChad.gif )
125399

>>/quest/901320
>You think you can afford to lose any of your other items
Yeah, I think that, strictly speaking, none of the items are so important that we couldn't just toss them away. After all, we did start out without any of them so the chances that any of them would be a major plot element is pretty low. I'd guess that at best they might lead to side plots, but even then there's no saying we wouldn't get access to those plots anyway.

>you should hold on to [the vial with the faded label] no matter what
There's one thing that I intentionally chose not to suggest in the last update. That is, to detach the label from the bottle. In which case the bottle could be discarded and there would be no need for any hiding hehe. But that wouldn't be very fun now, would it?

>>/quest/901321
This panel cracks me up so much. And she looks so cute!

>>/quest/901322
This room looks like it's seen better times heh. And hey, there's a WC. A place where stuff might be disposed.

>Window licker
Actually, out of all the people in the room, this guy seems like the biggest mystery. Why is he licking the glass? Did he take a bit too much taffa and now believes he's some sort of a washing machine? What could've caused him to act the way he does? And would he notice if we stole his boots? We may never find out.
>portly woman
I bet she hates memes. Other than that, she's the only one here who actually looks unhappy which is why I think she would be easy to talk to.
>The llama(?) guy
I wonder what he's so scared of. It's not like he's waiting for a dentist or something.
>the strange, tentacle-armed canine girls
Don't have much to say about them, altho I wonder how they walk with those tentacles.
>the wolf-shark-thing woman at the end
Now there's someone that looks confident in herself. Definitely looks like a go-to person for all our needs.

>The two guys snoring by the door
Image attached ;)
Altho I couldn't think of much funny stuff to describe them with.
>>
No. 125402 ID: ae9b99

Oh crud, I just realized, what if the reason this place is clean despite it being in disrepair is because that window licker didn't just lick the window, but licked this entire room clean. Gross.
>>
No. 125487 ID: 93f082

>>125486
Umm, I'm not sure how you came to the conclusion that he's getting paid to lick the glass. Can you elaborate?

Also, I don't understand why you (and others) are so obsessed with "Spade". There's absolutely no precedent that would link that word to the MC.

The MC's original name (as appears here >>/quest/887022) was not only jumbled but specifically written that it was wrong. What appeared to us was 14 jumbled characters. It could've been any characters, but it just so happens that we ended up with these ones.

Of those 14 characters, the first one looks like a spades icon. But there's also a sun, a smiley, a note, etc which are ignored. Why would you choose the first character and discard the other 13? Isn't that mean to the other 13 characters?
Again, those characters have absolutely no meaning as they were supposed to be jumbled. So drawing any sort of conclusions from them makes no sense.
>>
No. 125490 ID: b1b4f3

I think the window licker is being paid to collect tastes. I suspect this society can outright manufacture memories/experiences, not just forget them via Taffa.
>>
No. 125500 ID: 93f082

>>/quest/902043
>"Cowwectin' paysps. Good mummy."
Would probably translate to
"Collecting payslips. Good money."
Of course, that doesn't tell us much. Only that he believes that he's earning money with whatever it is that he's doing. Whether he's actually getting paid, or is simply crazy, I still can't tell. As for what he's doing, it could be cleaning, applying a glossy substance, or collecting something unseen. In any case, there doesn't seem to be much purpose in coming up with theories about him right now as it would be inconsequential.

>>/quest/902044
>pancakes
Heh, it's definitely amusing that she called us that way. Would it be because of our chest or because of the floppy ears? Or is it some sort of a nickname attached to the suit we're wearing? Pancake baker suit!

>>/quest/902046
>how obvious it is that your undies are missing
I'm sure it's gonna be fine!

>"Nice box."
It's interesting that she took notice of this box of ours. Perhaps there's something special about it. Maybe this box is shielded in a way and would allow its contents to pass the customs undetected.

>name
It looks like a lot of suggesters have already started voting on the character name. Sigh. I'm not fond of the name "Spade" because of how common it is for /quest/ to do this, that is, I'm tired of quest characters getting names based on the first thing / pun that comes to mind.
Please, please don't let something as important as the MC's name get chosen preemptively or with little to no thought. If possible, come up with some naming guidelines and use a proper 2-step voting process.
>>
No. 125584 ID: 7969eb
File 153759295926.png - (27.81KB , 458x760 , penny spade.png )
125584

>>
No. 125589 ID: 93f082

>>125584
Ahaha, so true
>>
No. 125591 ID: 93f082

>>/quest/902331
>"it's a dustbender. This baby'll write, rewrite, erase, extract, inject... pretty much anything you might wanna do to someone's dust."
*fistpumps* I was right. It is a tool to extract dust. Well, one of its functionalities at least. It also explains the purpose of the extra canisters on the tool. Probably to hold the donor and extracted dust.

I'm a bit worried at how casually she talks about this tool. I mean, wouldn't erasing someone's dust kill them? Then again, a kitchen knife can be used to kill a person also so... it's all about perspective. It seems that playing around with people's dust really is an everyday thing in this culture. It's just odd to us because we're not used to it the way they are. Either that or she's just a total geek about it.

Ah, maybe the violet liquid is some sort of a fuel or oil used for tools and devices. It makes some sense considering we already found two jars, always next to a device.

>body-mod, modder
It seems logical that the people who swap bodies would be called body modders. But it looks like some suggesters got confused and think it's to modify parts of the bodies. Or maybe I'm confused? Can we use dustbender for breast expansion? :x

I had a funny thought. We could try out the dustbender by swapping the dust of Virgin and Chad.
>>
No. 125606 ID: 10c408

>>125591
We have absolutely no clue how this device works. It might not even do any of the things you just thought of.

We should try and find a manual or person with explicit knowledge about it's operation before we do anything with it. (assuming that we still have it after getting processed through customs)
>>
No. 125609 ID: 91ee5f

>>125584
Yeah, that’s a good point. Penny Spade is an incredibly stupid name.
>>
No. 125612 ID: b1b4f3

>>125609
I hope we can change it later.
>>
No. 125613 ID: 91ee5f

>>125612
The name hasn’t been decided on yet, so hopefully we still have a chance at not giving ourselves that name.
>>
No. 125614 ID: 93f082

> >>125606 >We have absolutely no clue how this device works. It might not even do any of the things you just thought of.
Umm, in the last update (I even quoted it), it's quite clearly written what the tool does. And hey, we just happen to be talking to a person that knows how to operate one.
Don't worry, it was just a thought. I'm sure that no one would actually vote for such a prank, right?
>>
No. 125616 ID: 891b91

>>125612
Since the protagonist's name is unknown, any name that you give her is effectively just an alias. There's no reason why it couldn't be changed at some point if enough suggesters want it, although there may be in-quest consequences for it. I definitely wouldn't disallow it, though.
>>
No. 125623 ID: 05ff2f

>>125616
Wait, are we sure it'll be a alias? I was under the impression that customs would scan the protag to get something like a DNA or dust ID or some other unique personal identifier and run it through the citizen and public records to get her name. If so, that'd mean we'd be choosing her real name, or at least what the government records consider her real name. ...Though, I'm not sure if this is the way it would go was said in-quest, so I may be speculating too far.
>>
No. 125626 ID: 93f082

>>125623
Considering the protagonist was scanned (>>/quest/890360) and they couldn't read our ward affiliation, it's safe to assume that the rest of our records are going to be unrecoverable as well.

>>125612
Unfortunately, once a name is voted on, I think it's highly unlikely to be voted again in the future. This is because suggesters get used to a name over time, and it sorta becomes an acquired taste. I don't recall a single instance where a named quest character would have their name changed based on suggester demand.
>>
No. 125791 ID: 891b91
File 153854176387.png - (41.27KB , 1088x896 , asstits.png )
125791

so channel3 and I were discussing the possible merits and pitfalls of using a dustbender for breast augmentation

and then he drew this
>>
No. 125800 ID: 06fdc0

>>125791
I don't see anything wrong though?
>>
No. 125807 ID: ad51b8

>>125791
can't decide whether or not your an ass or tit man? while why not be both?
>>
No. 125808 ID: 3cf5f3

>>125791
That's awful! Even with the enhancement she's still flat D:

Also, it gives me an idea. What if the more dust one had, the sexier or the chubbier they became?
>>
No. 125811 ID: 891b91

>>125808
>even with enhancement she's still flat
Serves her right for cheaping out on it! And hey, she got lucky. She could've gotten titties on her forehead or her knees or something.
>>
No. 125848 ID: 93f082

>>/quest/903523
>a poke at its glyph
Interesting. I had no clue we could poke the glyphs to get more info. Based on this, poking the glyph on the Vesper page seems like a much better idea now. Of course, when we have privacy.

>Moira Elgin
Considering what happened, I'd be very surprised if she was ok. So it seems like a high-priority goal to try contacting her.

>up on holo
Holo... chat? That's probably what she meant. Altho this is a very important piece of info, unless that ball we got is a holo-projector, we currently have no means of using holo-chat. But yeah, a high-priority thing to do after we're past the customs.

>>/quest/904452
>Penny
Gonna take some getting used to this name. In my opinion, the name would sound a lot more legit if was, or also had a non-diminutive form of the name.

>He lets out a terrified shriek
Haha, poor guy!

>pancake ears
At first I thought it was a coincidence, but now I'm certain. You changed her ear design, didn't you? I think I like the new design better. It's a bit hard to say since I was used to the previous design, but yeah, thumbs up from me! However, I refuse to call them pancake ears - it's just not nice :p

>purple liquid is taffa
I found this to be quite unexpected; another form of taffa? This opens a whole venue of questions. Like how are the two forms connected, and how is this form used. Quincy says that the dustbender primes it, so maybe my guess about this taffa being some sort of fuel wasn't wrong but, more info will need to be gathered to confirm or deny anything.

>>/quest/904453
>internal storage
I totally missed this. Or rather, I think it's unlikely that the canisters on the bender would contain anything - any filled containers should be immediately removed and replaced with empty ones. Because it would be dangerous to leave stuff inside bender in case someone accidentally tried using it. Considering we found bender in a proper place inside the equipment case indicates that whoever used it before had plenty of time for whatever standard procedure they needed to do.

>>/quest/905080
>I can't sell it if I don't know what it is.
If she doesn't know what the ball is, then we either need to find an appraiser or experiment with the ball ourselves.

>I don't got a whole lotta use for stem taffa
Well, this confirms that the legal taffa is neither rare nor very useful.

>You're a bit shocked that you actually suggested that.
I am downright electrocuted! But really, it had to be done with how she keeps calling us pancakes.

>Play with your ears?
She really hates to use the word ears, huh?

>I ain't the kinda girl
Well, this does say quite a bit about her character and it's not a bad thing. Personally I think it would be a bit uncouth to immediately hook up with the first friendly character we get to talk to. How to say, it feels a bit too much of a coincidence.
>>
No. 125850 ID: 93f082

>>/quest/905080
And dayum, you really pushed Penny's sexiness to the next level here. I kinda wish there existed an uncensored version of the panel.
>>
No. 125851 ID: 7969eb
File 153879509022.png - (9.85KB , 117x75 , Capture.png )
125851

>>125850
There is, but teegee won't let me post it. The insider info of what Penny's dick looks like is killing me inside.
>>
No. 125852 ID: 891b91
File 153879595447.png - (178.39KB , 681x798 , DICK.png )
125852

>>125851
the horrific truth is revealed
>>
No. 125855 ID: 06fdc0

>>125852
does she faint when she gets an erection because of sudden blood loss?
>>
No. 125856 ID: 891b91
File 153879910484.png - (193.72KB , 1024x1024 , lewd-031.png )
125856

>>125848
I always enjoy seeing these reaction posts you do; I tend to avoid saying too much in response to them, out of fear of accidentally giving something away that spoils the mystery of the quest, but please know that I do appreciate and read them.

>You changed her ear design, didn't you?
Her design has changed over time, although it was less intentional and more a result of me getting used to drawing her. (In retrospect, I should have spent more time practicing drawing her before starting the quest, so that most of that semi-conscious design iteration would've already been out of the way.)

>She really hates to use the word ears, huh?
Nah, she just took "play with my ears" to be a really awkward euphemism.

>>125850
>And dayum, you really pushed Penny's sexiness to the next level here. I kinda wish there existed an uncensored version of the panel.
Thanks! I went with censoring the panel because I thought it helped illustrate her discomfort with offering her body for rent like that. It can't hurt to post an uncensored version of the drawing for shits and giggles, though, so here you go.
>>
No. 125858 ID: 891b91

>>125855
it'd be impressive if she's able to get one at all, with a dong that long
>>
No. 125860 ID: 93f082

>>125852
Haha omg
*cough*
May our beloved protagonist have a fun time stepping over the "knots" of her(?) journey.

>>125856
>I should have spent more time practicing drawing her
I think it's only natural that all designs evolve over time (in most quests the evolution can easily be observed) so I don't think that would've really mattered and you don't need to be worried about it. I also found it particularly coincidental how in this case the design changed to better match the nickname she was given.

>she took it to be a really awkward euphemism
Mmm, I see. Thanks for clarifying it. She almost made me think she had a fixation on large round objects!

>censoring
I'm not criticizing it at all. It was perfectly in place there, elevating the humor of the situation and protecting the casual readers from the unexpected exhibition. So great job!

>here you go
Thanks a lot!
>>
No. 125920 ID: 7efe6b

>>/quest/905834
>freemen
I wonder what the reasoning would be for someone to decide to live there. I mean, I don't see an obvious advantage to not simply living as a hobo on the Concourse. Maybe it's to bypass certain restrictions on drugs and alcohol but... wouldn't they just starve to death?

>the itch
This definitely seems connected to the rhythm spikes. Probably the same thing but simply much weaker. I can't wait to get to experience it hohoho. Well, or just find one of the freemen and ask them about it. Like, is it simply uncomfortable, or can it actually hurt and kill you?

>You're gonna need some boots
If this turns into a paperdoll where suggesters submit their boots designs, I'd like to say that I can't draw a straight line to save my life.

>Wow, that's pretty forward of you
Lol, now she's gonna keep teasing us for being super easy on top of calling us Pancakes. I am ok with this development.

>the address is 217U
Good thing we got a photographic memory~

>Furthermore, you somehow feel certain that she knows you know this.
What manner of dust sorcery is this!

>make your amnesia a little too obvious
We did make it known that it was our first time scavenging, but I still wonder if she suspects anything now, with all the questions about scavenging that we had. Well, even if she does, she probably doesn't care.

>>/quest/905835
>time skip
I find that the only time suggesters would vote for a time skip (outside of MC sleeping) would be if there was literally nothing to do. After all, suggesters like using time efficiently and exhausting all the options. So I don't think you can rely on suggesters to decide on this.

>>/quest/905891
What do you mean an art error? But the newer ears look cuter!
You aren't planning on reverting them back, are you?
>>
No. 125961 ID: 891b91

>>125920
>After all, suggesters like using time efficiently and exhausting all the options. So I don't think you can rely on suggesters to decide on this.
Honestly, that's what I expected, but I thought I should give the option in case I was wrong.

>What do you mean an art error? But the newer ears look cuter!
>You aren't planning on reverting them back, are you?
Nope, I was talking about the way they look in >>/quest/905835 specifically. The shading and perspective makes them look round and bulbous, when what I was going for was having them draped down her back.
>>
No. 126002 ID: 1872dc

>>125920
>freemen
Well, given what the magazine from the latest update says, there's now plenty of implications of trouble in paradise. If "terrorism" is seen as a necessary step to better conditions, maybe living in abandoned cities isn't the worst idea.
>>
No. 126010 ID: 7efe6b

>>/quest/906693
Your reasoning seems plausible, although there's a few problems with it.

>May have physically altered appearance thru taffa
While Quincy has confirmed that body swapping is possible, I'd like to point out that "dust scanning" is a thing. As the name suggests, I believe that a dust scan relies on your dust, rather than the body you're in, to retrieve your info. In this case, would swapping the body even have a point?

>presence of taffa expert being worrying is understandable
He looked worried even before we started talking with Quincy. Also, Quincy's no taffa expert. Knowing about taffa is just common knowledge.

>start a life under a new identity
If changing your dust to the point of changing your identity is possible (other than how we did it), then it should be possible to do it anywhere and pick up a new identity in any government bureau. Does it make sense that we found Preston here, considering that using an evac shuttle seems unnecessary in the process?

I think there's many equally possible options for what Preston is hiding. Assuming that he changed identity seems a bit strong on the conspiracy theory.
Alternative conspiracy theory: He's an undercover agent here after returning from a mission, knowing what his mission was but not knowing his identity which was removed to protect him. He's here to return to the HQ where his identity will be restored. Heh. Sounds way too cheesy.

But yeah, as far as I can tell, it would make just as much sense if he was a nerd whose nervousness is causing him difficulty in forming coherent sentences. And he just wanted to know what time it was.
>>
No. 126017 ID: c0641d

>>126010
> Dust Scanning
We don't know if dust scanning happens during evac, if you need a warrant to scan someone, if a register is kept across concourses, etc. (though I could be wrong; I forget where it was mentioned). Altering your name and body would certainly help to prevent people from recognizing you by sight.

> Quincy (Not a Doctor)
Actually, she said she had a forensic taffa license. Perhaps that means she (or the contact we openly discussed) could legally perform that dreaded scan?

> How to Disappear
Never said he needed to change his base taffa. It's possible that while he's evac'd before, it wasn't here. We don't know how taffa registries and jurisdictions work across fleets and concourse platforms.

> Hypothetical Spy / Nervous Nerd
Those... both seem possible as well, despite my rebuttals. But then, I knew that there was a real chance I was wrong, even if I was sure my reasoning was sound. That's why I wanted to test my theory by gauging his reaction to Quincy's occupation and the stuff she can potentially do with it, to see if he panics even harder than he did before. It would certainly prove whether whatever he might be hiding is related to his taffa identity.
>>
No. 126025 ID: 7efe6b

>>126017
>We don't know if dust scanning happens during evac
Err, yes we do.
> >>/quest/890360 >Please wait while we perform a limited scan of your dust

>she said she had a forensic taffa license.
She did not. She implied that she's got a "license". A license that allows her to pass the customs with a dustbender. So it's more like a driver's license? I don't understand how you came up with the "forensic taffa" part.

>change his base taffa, taffa registries
I'm confused. I think you've started mixing the terms dust and taffa. Taffa is a drug. Dust is... physical manifestation of a person's ego or something like that. We don't know exactly.

>reaction to Quincy's occupation
Again, holding a license says very little about a person's occupation. However, what we do know is two things that she said:
> >>/quest/905080 >I deal in equipment
> >>/quest/905834 >I wouldn't've gotten into scrappin'
Based on this, we can assume that her occupation is "a scavenger and dealer of scavenged equipment". But that may simply be a side job for her, with her day job being something else.
>>
No. 126053 ID: 7efe6b

>>/quest/906670
>plasmodians
I'd guess it's a name of a race. Maybe some sort of a slime or sea creature considering they can't move around freely.

>enclaving pact, terrorism between the wards
I'm having less and less clue as to what a "ward" is supposed to be. I thought it was a name of a residential area but, that can't be right.
In >>/quest/892989 I think it was implied that Chaser Fleet was a ward. And yet, that's just a collection of ships. So a ward is definitely not a region/district.
When we used the evac shuttle, we were told that we'd have to board the Concourse since our ward affiliation was corrupt. This implies that belonging to a ward is mandatory.
A ward also seems to govern certain resources, so it's not just a legal description / domain or a family name of sorts.

I think that for now the best way to describe what a ward is would be "a clan".

>Preston
The way he answered the question about his first time being here makes me think that he's been on the Concourse plenty of times, but first time using evac system. This would make sense if he's been flying around with a personal shuttle. Maybe something happened to it, or there's been problems between him and his ward.

>>/quest/906885
Heh, let me write what I originally wanted to suggest here.
"Oh, you know her? Are you her friend? Friends shouldn't hurt each other, you know. But she had to go, huh? Btw, how did it feel? You know, when you last saw her."
But that would've been too alarming to him haha. Anyway, let me explain my reasoning.

>So you... don't know her?
The fact that he changed his tune when he learned that we don't know who she is tells us a ton of things. First, it means it's highly likely that he knows her (he wouldn't care if it was a random person). And, it means that he thought we knew her - the reason for his fear of us. And not just us, he was already nervous the moment we got there, so it seems that he was involved in something disturbing quite recently. One plus one... something disturbing involving her. What could the disturbing thing be? We saw the remains.

We don't really know who she was collecting evidence on. Maybe him or his ward. But all of this leads me to believe that he already knew that something bad happened to her. And this makes it likely that he was either one of her assailants, or is directly related to them. Him asking for a location to "help us" sounds like him trying to cover up tracks.

Yeah, it's a funny theory.
>>
No. 126099 ID: 2054c0
File 153997848969.png - (51.57KB , 771x1562 , toilet_candy.png )
126099

>letting the toilet eat all the candy
eat it all before the toilet does
>>
No. 126107 ID: 7efe6b

>>126099
I know, right? It must be some really good candy if they have to smuggle it!

Also, I like how despite the simplification, the tentacle girl boob sizes are kept proportional.
>>
No. 126108 ID: 7efe6b

>>/quest/907386
>he pleads
His desperation seems somewhat unusual. It's as if his life depended on finding this person. I would assume his superiors threatened him or something. Perhaps they had captured her but then lost her. And he's the one responsible for losing her. Such a meek guy. Good luck to his endeavors!

>Moments later, the big guy and little guy in the back of the room jump up and rocket over to the door
I can't stop grinning when looking at these two.
Virgin: Even when his number is called, he's reluctant in making his move!
Chad: Always waits for his number to be called the second time to ascertain its importance!

I'm not surprised Preston was able to enter before them.

>>/quest/907387
Haha, totally Chad-like behavior

>>/quest/907458
Hmm, so they were going to smuggle some drugs but now they chose to flush them. Why?
I guess a logical explanation would be that security wasn't great and they would normally have been able to smuggle without a problem. But since Chad decided to go on a rampage, they're probably afraid that additional security will arrive and do a thorough search of everyone in the vicinity of the incident.

That's one theory. The other theory is...
...the toilet is the smuggling channel. Since Chad went on a rampage, it means their own ticket number would be turning up much sooner, and that's why they're in a hurry to send the drugs through the toilet. It also makes more sense that this is what they would be afraid of us reporting.

As far as suggestions go, I'd like to mention that I'd default to "not telling on the twins". But since I saw that that course of action would already win, I took the liberty of providing an alternative suggestion. So there's a bit more variety of what we could do if we weren't acting super nice. I almost felt bad writing it lol
>>
No. 126121 ID: 7efe6b
File 154010551281.png - (1.24MB , 1400x990 , PennyByTac2.png )
126121

Penny doing totally non-canon things.
>>
No. 126129 ID: ae9b99

How lewd~

I hope she doesn't get caught.
>>
No. 126142 ID: 7efe6b

>>126129
Who knows if these shuttles have live audio and video broadcast.
>>
No. 126170 ID: ae9b99

>>126142
...can they~?
>>
No. 126292 ID: 7efe6b

>>126170
Ask teegee :x
>>
No. 126293 ID: 7efe6b

>>/quest/908979
>Dust is the essence of a person,(THAT has been spelled out, at least)
We both assume that but, sorry to disappoint you, that hasn't been written anywhere either.
The stuff that we know about dust is:
- It's called "Hoefler-Kurosawa corpuscles"
- It can be scanned to retrieve a person's information
- It can be recovered after a person dies
- It can be manipulated (as a whole) via a dustbender
So... it surely is an essence in a way. But still, it was never spelled out :P

>taffa syndrome is a problem with your Dust
We know that amnesia is one of the symptoms of taffa syndrome, sure. But that isn't the same as saying that amnesia is a result of a problem with dust. Just because a person has no memories it doesn't mean that there's something wrong with their dust.
Now, in the beginning we did see that our name was unreadable, so perhaps this is why you're assuming that our dust was corrupt. I have a counter-argument. In computers, when you try to read unallocated memory space, you'll get random data. So it's possible that the name we saw was simply the result of trying to read blank memory space.
So yeah, we don't know if anything happened to our dust. We know that our memories were probably erased, but that doesn't necessarily mean our dust was corrupt. In fact, we don't even know for sure that we used raw taffa or that we actually have a taffa syndrome.

>so raw taffa is needed to mess with memories
Yes, we know that using raw taffa can erase memories and cause taffa syndrome.

>the tool we handed off is further evidence
The dustbender does not use raw taffa. In fact, we don't even know if it uses stem taffa. We just know that stem taffa came with the bender.
Even if we assume that the bender uses stem taffa in a way, "extracting a person's dust" is not the same as "erasing person's memories".
There's proof for this. We know that raw taffa is needed to erase memories. If erasing memories was as easy as getting a dustbender and some stem taffa, then there would be no need for raw taffa at all. Considering that raw taffa is in high demand, if stem taffa could perform the same function, then Quincy wouldn't have said that she didn't have any use for it. This proves that stem taffa and dustbender cannot be used erase memories.

Hmm, writing all of this got me thinking.
Maybe a person's dust is like a cartridge. And memories are the contents of this cartridge.
>>
No. 126341 ID: 7efe6b

>>/quest/909424
Do we post suggestions, or wait for a new chapter to start first?
>>
No. 126342 ID: 10c408

Great, we lost three whole days and almost starved to death.

Let's never do that again.
>>
No. 126343 ID: 891b91

Now that the first chapter of the quest is complete, I want to thank all of you for reading and participating in it. Doing this has been fucking blast for me, and I hope everybody else is enjoying the quest as much as I've enjoyed making it. What makes it particularly special, too, is the influence the suggesters have had on the quest. Obviously there's the overt influence that comes from your votes on what to do next; but in addition to that, some of your suggestions and theories have ended up causing me to revise or otherwise change my plans for the quest. I think these changes have been overwhelmingly positive for the quest. To put it simply, I think I now have a better story to tell than if I wrote it completely on my own as a comic, and it's all because of your participation.

Anyway, I'm considering taking a brief hiatus before starting the next thread, but I'm not completely decided on it yet. I don't think it'd be for more than a week, but if that changes, I'll be sure to make a post about it in this disthread.
>>
No. 126344 ID: 891b91

>>126341
If there's something you really want to see addressed at the start of the next thread, feel free to post it, and I'll try to work it in, if possible.
>>
No. 126346 ID: 7efe6b

>>126344
No, was just wondering. I don't feel there's any particularly important things to suggest as any questions we may have for the newly introduced characters would probably get answered no matter the order.

Anyway, I'll write my comments on the last few updates a bit later and afterwards I'll probably also add some general thoughts on the chapter as a whole.
>>
No. 126350 ID: 1872dc

>>126342
The glyph might as well have been a skull with an X over it, and yet here we are.
>>
No. 126352 ID: 05ff2f

Penny nearly starving to death after three days without eating anything? That feels off to me 'cause the rule of thumb I remember is that it's three days without water before a person dies of dehydration and three weeks without food before starving to death. Though, Penny could have significantly different biology from us so it basically comes down to whatever the author chooses.
>>
No. 126353 ID: a0504f

>>126352
To be fair she isnt human (anymore?) So perhaps wherever species she is can survive without water for a long time?
>>
No. 126354 ID: 26bb62

>>126352
Maybe not to death, but she would definitely be starving.
>>
No. 126355 ID: 05ff2f

>>126353
But I thought all the folks we've seen have been classified as "human," despite how different their bodies are. I figured it was 'cause of such common and easy bio-modding that basically every human changes up from baseline.

So going on from that, my guess for why Penny was nearly starving to death after three days without food is whoever designed the body Penny has wasn't concerned with calorie efficiency, figuring food is so readily available why bother. But it could also be 'cause Penny is so skinny and didn't have any fat reserves to burn. Or a combination of factors we know and don't know. We can ask about it next chapter to get answers.
>>
No. 126380 ID: 7efe6b

>>126342 >>126355
>nearly starving to death
First of all, it's not said anywhere that she was starving to death. The word famished simply means very hungry so it would be a non-sequitur to claim that she was dying.

Secondly, as >>126352 mentioned, one normally dies from thirst, rather than from hunger. The feeling of thirst will always triumph the feeling of hunger. Yet when we woke up, we were feeling hungry. This implies that during our time out, our body did ingest water. Either during the trip, or when we reached our destination. Btw, any theories that we don't require water are discredited in >>/questarch/889360 where it's written that we've been feeling thirsty.

Lastly, and most importantly, Vesper protects us.
Does Vesper want us dead? No, they want people alive. The whole reason they spread these glyphs around is to bring taffa syndrome sufferers safely to them. They certainly wouldn't have done so if these glyphs could harm anyone or decrease their survival rate. It would go against their own interest to harm their own kind so I don't believe there was any chance of us dying at all.
>>
No. 126381 ID: 7efe6b

>>/questarch/908211
RIP candy D:

Heh, Pico looks kinda cute with that fang of hers.

>>/questarch/909199
>Ponytail seems surprised by the question, as though she was expecting something else;
My guess here is that after we laid out the items, she was expecting us to ask her to smuggle them, or how to do it at least.

>she whispers something to her sister, who also reacts with surprise.
Yeah, they're probably aware of our lack of memories now. Perhaps this makes us look a bit more trustworthy.

>"Trouble," she says solemnly, giving you a confused look. "Taffa."
It's interesting how fast she was able to recognize raw taffa just from some residue. A pro at work!
I was actually not expecting this. If this jar held raw taffa, then was it us that emptied this jar? If so, then what's the weathered vial for? Well, I think it's more likely that this jar's simply been in that room from before our visit, and we only picked it up coincidentally.

>You want kroy-vons?
Do I want candy? Yes :P

>"...You tell, you get big trouble,"
What could they possibly do to us with those small tentacle hands? I dare them to try it!

>>/questarch/909200
>finally, an inky darkness overtakes you.
How exciting! My theory about the glyphs is that they're imprinted dust. And whatever dust was in that glyph reacted with ours. Also, as I argued before, this is probably only possible because our memories were erased. Something that only works once, and only on taffa syndrome sufferers. The reasoning for this is, if glyphs could do this on anyone and at any time, well, it would be quite a dangerous, possibly illegal weapon, and the Vesper organization would get in a lot of trouble for producing them.

I also find it interesting how quickly the glyph moves... faster than anything we've encountered before.

>>/questarch/909201
To be honest, I kinda expected this to happen. However, I didn't want to argue against it because I didn't want to scare the suggesters and... well, it's for meta reasons. Since we found this glyph at the start, it's quite clearly an important plot element. And as such, I didn't want to, quite literally, flush a part of the plot down a toilet.
It turns out it was pretty important after all.

>>/questarch/909231
>You try to open your eyelids, only to discover that you can't feel them.
Sometimes, to open the eyelids you need to feel them. Other times, you just need a screwdriver.

>it feels as though you are traveling a great distance, very quickly.
I doubt teleportation is possible, so the feeling of traveling is probably the result of a lack of perception of time. A time skip during which we travel to a place far away.

>it seems plausible that the glyph might have knocked you out.
Knocked out people don't think. Maybe dream, but this isn't a dream. We're capable of rational thought. So quite a strange state of mind.

>I think it's better to just wait.
>You don't think you have much of a choice.
For my suggestion here I first wrote a whole essay of what kinds of things to try to force our mind to overpower the effects of the glyph, only to delete it all as I realized that I'd prefer a skip to our destination. Sometimes, the best thing to do is to do nothing.

>You wonder idly what led you to that conclusion so readily.
Probably some of the knowledge that was embedded in that glyph. Now that I think about it, if we obtained this knowledge, then we probably also obtained other knowledge. Perhaps if we asked ourselves questions, such as where were we going, we'd get interesting answers. A wasted opportunity :P

As far as the panel goes, I did notice the change in the color of the noise that we see. Progress!

>>/questarch/909256
>whatever it is that drove you -- her? -- to that point.
Or perhaps it was a guy trapped in a girl's body and he just couldn't take it anymore~

>if you lost more than your memories alone, what else might be gone now?
Sadly, I don't think our virginity was restored.

>Unpleasant ideas of what may be happening to your body bubble up from your subconscious
To each their own~

>Still, thousands more lie quiet, dark. Dormant, waiting for something.
Oh? I was not expecting to see something like that. These are clearly our own, the question is just, are these temporarily deactivated due to Vesper glyph, or are they our past self. Or something else.

>It pains you to think about what it might be, but if you can just --
if we can just what? WHAT?!

>...Right, stay focused
Inner enlightenment, denied QQ

I'm just kidding. It would be boring if too much would be revealed too fast. All in its due time.

>you still pick up hints of concern and weariness in their speech.
It looks like at this point we've already arrived at the destination. It seems there's some problems with restoring control of our body. We'll have to ask them later on the specifics.

I do hope we're in a Vesper-owned building as that would put Vesper in a better light and make things more intimate.

>>/questarch/909345
>TAUNTON MICRODYNAMICS
Yeah, there was no way we could've guessed that was the name of the firm on the vial. Still, it's a very important clue since now we have a lead where to begin looking. Tho the state of the building we see makes me a bit worried.

>>/questarch/909346
>"...relief. I'll go... cider... you get... revived."
This isn't the time to be drinking cider!
I wonder why she's called that way.

>the situation between your legs is normal
Normal or... an emergency?!

>>/questarch/909422
>Perhaps feeling a bit delirious
Yes, it was a crazy suggestion heh. Thank you for not using it. It wouldn't have done us any favors and besides, Penny just isn't a joker so it would've been waaay out of character.

>>/questarch/909423
>"We were just about to intubate you. Three days is a long time to go without eating!"
I'm not sure what he means with intubate and three days is nothing special if you're sleeping the whole time.

>They sit down on the side of the bed and grasp your hand in both of theirs, rubbing it gently. There's something... warm about it, in an almost maternal way.
Mom! Is that you?!

If the doctor and Cider know each other on a first-name basis, it would mean this person has been here several times. It implies that this situation has repeated in the past, so it's highly unlikely to be our real family.

>>/questarch/909424
>"Welcome home, Sigarzghar."
You've done a great job making her look friendly. And "Sigarzghar" sounds way better than "Penny" hehe. Altho it's probably just an expression.

This is where things get complicated due to the nature of things she's going to offer to us. Will the suggesters accept, or will they choose to go their separate ways. Stay tuned for the next exciting chapter of Dead Dust!
>>
No. 126382 ID: 05ff2f

>>126380
Well, I'm foolish for just going by what >>126342 wrote and not going back to check the quest itself before writing my posts and ending up wrongly thinking Penny was nearly starved to death.
>>
No. 126402 ID: ae9b99

Well that is one way to get through customs. Success?

The tentatwins must've had quite a terrifying experience, first the alarm spooked them along with the angry guy trying to bust the door open, then they are panicking over getting rid of their contraband with the fear of getting caught by someone (us appearing didn't help much on their fears) and to top it off, they most likely witnessed us falling in a coma. I'm wondering if they are okay.

Actually the main thing I would like to see addressed is what happened at customs from the time we collapsed to the time we got to the hospital. Quite a lot has happened there.

As for Cider, I wonder if she is a religious figure of some sort. Hopefully not a dark religion. I'd say we be careful with what we say to her.
>>
No. 126417 ID: 7efe6b

>>126343
>I want to thank all of you for reading and participating in it.
It's really us that are the beneficiaries of your creativity. Thank you for writing this quest, it's been a pleasure suggesting. I really liked the sheer amount of suggestions that you've been able to include in the updates as it really made me feel how important our actions were.

As far as the chapter goes, the story has kept up the interest as each update introduced something new to think about. I like the unique premise, the many mysterious concepts it introduced, and I have to commend the variety of character species and personalities that we've witnessed in such a short time span. And even though the atmosphere has been quite heavy/serious, I couldn't help but laugh at the occasional humorous element.

Critique? Perhaps it would be a good idea to put sentences mentioning permanent changes to the character (such as picking up items) in their own lines so that they stand out better (easier to notice in case a person is skimming the text). But other than that, I can't really think of anything in particular. The events seem well-connected and logical, the art is great, the updates have been steady, the pacing is good, suggesting isn't confusing, suggesters have agency, the nsfw parts are there, a Sunny was included (yeah, I noticed it now lol, are there any memes I missed? >_>)... wait, there is one thing. I don't like cliffhangers! But then, no one does hehe.

There's a few specific things that I'm curious about.
The chapter's number is 0 instead of 1. Does this mean it was a prelude? Hmm.
Also, I wonder if the same thing would've happened had we looked at the glyph right away at the start. Probably not since the Old Town is much further away from the Vesper HQ than the Concourse is. Well, it's kinda pointless thinking about it as that would've been a different storyline then.

>a brief hiatus
Enjoy!
>>
No. 126419 ID: 10c408

I may have been a bit overly dramatic with my response to the ending of the first thread but A: Penny is still pretty small and we have no idea when the last time she actually had something to eat was and B: using the glyph which we had little to no factual and established information about was still a bad idea and, again, almost resulted in starving to death on a toilet.

(We also have no idea who found us during our glyph induced coma, odds are likely it was the tentacles twins but it could have been someone else entirely, like the janitorial staff sweeping the concourse and finding us after several hours had passed.)
>>
No. 126420 ID: b1b4f3

>>126419
I don't think the glyph was malicious.
Either it didn't work right due to something weird going on with Penny, or it did what it was supposed to do but we didn't do it in a good spot. It's possible it was intended to put the user into a deep sleep until the Vesper group can go find them, but we did it somewhere the Vesper group couldn't reach in time(either because Customs didn't let them through, or the incident broke the door so they couldn't get in). In that case what was intended to be a temporary nap turned into a permanent one, until Penny woke herself up.
>>
No. 126422 ID: 10c408

>>126420
We won't know for certain if it was either us that caused a problem with the glyph or if the one we had was faulty in some manner, not until the new thread starts.

And as for as maliciousness goes... Well, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. If the glyph is suppose to render a person unconscious to ease retrieval efforts, then I wonder what the actual ratio of successful retrieval missions is like given the giant city destroying things, the freemen and whatever the heck the itch does to a person.
>>
No. 126424 ID: 7efe6b

>>126420
>until the Vesper group can go find them
But how would they find us? You see, I don't believe that a glyph can act as a beacon. If sending signals was possible, then that would mean any two-way communication would be possible. In that case, we could just talk to Vesper directly and receive instructions. No need for any blackouts.

>>126422
>If the glyph is suppose to render a person unconscious to ease retrieval efforts
I find very little merit in the idea that the glyph disconnected us from our body just for the sake of putting us to sleep. In that case, a simple written message to stay still would've done the job. As you explained, forcing someone to stay still wouldn't really be a safe solution.

Let me present my theory.

In >>/questarch/887433 we notice that a guy uses a gadget to have the girl stand. This implies that control over motor functions is something well-researched and common in this quest. It's probably used to easily transport bodies around.

Do you see where I'm going with this?

I'm about 90% certain that the glyph took control of our body to move it to where we needed to go. An autopilot. It needed to disconnect us so that it could move us around.
Perhaps it also had the ability to talk with people, that is, maybe Vesper has a contract with the authorities which would allow Vesper-piloted bodies to pass the customs and/or arrange transport to the Red Shelf.

>>126420
>it did what it was supposed to do
It did. It brought us to a certain location and then shut off. And then we were moved to a room where we would rest until we could wake up.

At least that's one theory. A bit different theory is that it tried to pass the customs where it was stopped, and we were simply taken to a hospital.
>>
No. 126425 ID: 10c408

If the glyph allows for vesper personnel to remote control our body and move it along, then there's a new slew of problems with the glyph

A: how is this even legal
b: Why did it take three days to move us to wherever they needed to go
C: what gives them the right to bodyjack us and how did they even get us through customs
D: they couldn't grab any kind of food along the way
E: Did it even work properly?
and finally, F: if it did work properly, it still amounts to kidnapping and thus we should not associate ourselves with a group that has legal grounds to do this kind of shit.
>>
No. 126426 ID: 10c408

Also, adding "do you see where I'm going with this" after listing an example to support your theory is INCREDIBLY rude and demeaning.
>>
No. 126428 ID: 7efe6b

>>126425
>how is this even legal
I guess the same way that moving a patient to a hospital is. Assuming it's legal at all.
>Why did it take three days to move us to wherever they needed to go
It probably didn't. I think the autopilot did its job fast, and then we slept for 3 days.
>what gives them the right to bodyjack us and how did they even get us through customs
Same as A. And we don't know if we passed the customs. Maybe Vesper has certain privileges. Or maybe we were simply redirected to the Red Shelf.
>they couldn't grab any kind of food along the way
I guess we weren't hungry back then.
>Did it even work properly?
We don't know. It's something we'll have to ask.
>it still amounts to kidnapping
Yeah, it's a pretty unconventional way to help someone. The way I see it is like this. Vesper pulled us to safety. Sure, getting pulled isn't nice as it's something done without our consent. But I would rather that they pull us to safety than get crushed by a falling boulder. So the way I understand it is that sometimes, if you want to help someone, you have to do it without their consent and this is what Vesper did in this case. No one was harmed and we even got an important clue during our time out.

>>126426
>rude and demeaning
I'm sorry if that statement sounded rude. I did not write it with any such intentions or feelings at all. It was a rhetorical question akin to "You know?", "Understand?", "Right?".
>>
No. 126433 ID: 02a0f7

I just think this is a cute protagonist and an interesting setting and want to watch her hang out and explore. Just 2 cents.
>>
No. 126437 ID: 891b91

Just a quick update, since it's been a week since I posted >>126343 -- The first update of the new thread has been written, and I'm in the process of drawing the panels now. I'm hoping to have it finished and posted either tonight or tomorrow.

>>126417
Thank you for the kind words! I'm happy that people have been enjoying the quest so much.

>I really liked the sheer amount of suggestions that you've been able to include in the updates as it really made me feel how important our actions were.
Suggester agency has been a major focus of mine throughout the quest, so I'm happy to hear that it's paying off. I figure that it's best to try to include as many suggestions as possible, even if some of them just get mentioned only as something Penny considers and then decides against.

>Perhaps it would be a good idea to put sentences mentioning permanent changes to the character (such as picking up items) in their own lines so that they stand out better (easier to notice in case a person is skimming the text).
This is a great idea, considering that there seemed to be some confusion regarding Penny's items during the first thread, particularly the vial and empty jar. Most likely I'll include a recap at the end of relevant updates, where I'll explicitly list inventory changes, etc.

>a Sunny was included (yeah, I noticed it now lol, are there any memes I missed? >_>)
Yeah, that panel had several cameos of characters belonging to friends of mine, including Sunny; as well as a cameo from a character of mine that may appear as a main character in another quest I might run in the future. Someone picked up on it late in Chapter 0, actually, but it had been so long since the update in question that I decided against responding to it.

>>126433
Thank you!
>>
No. 126469 ID: 7efe6b

>>/quest/910512
Hmm, is that a painting of the Red Shelf in the background? The shape seems to fit. It implies that we're with Vesper now.

>Yesterday was a blur.
I guess the hunger was such a minor issue (and easily dealt with by eating some food) that it wasn't even mentioned. This is pretty much what I expected.

>sometimes it feels like they find you familiar in some way.
It's unusual that so many people are visiting us in the first place since none of them should know us personally. I think the most likely reason is the fact that they're Vesper and most of them went through the same thing that we did.

>your possessions are missing
Something to ask her about. Of course, I think more important questions should be asked first, such as who she is, where are we and what exactly happened.

>>/quest/910513
>opportunity
I can't really guess what opportunity they're talking about. Probably something political. Still, it implies that Vesper is an active organization which does more than just help the recovering taffa syndrome sufferers. This is also supported by the article we previously read which mentions Vesper's comments on a law.

>Matteo
My first impressions of this guy would be that he's a very serious person. Focusing less on the sentimentalities and more on the business side of Vesper. That's probably why he's not too fond of us as helping us might be perceived as a financial inconvenience. I'd expect his views not to be shared by the majority of Vesper members tho since we've seen that many people chose to welcome us at the infirmary. Alternatively, he might simply be jealous hehe.

>>/quest/910515
>a compact, dimly-lit room
A very decadent-looking room. The fact that she's wearing a robe implies that she feels very comfortable being in this room and it's likely that this is her private apartment.

>fyura sabiha
The unknown words that she uses seem to be used by all the Vesper's members. As for why she's using them, I'm not sure. Perhaps they have unique meanings, or it might be to improve the familial sense between the people. Or perhaps these words have something to do with dust. In any case, from the context in which they're used, I can guess pretty well what they mean.

>her robes
The top part of her robe implies... that my first question for her is going to be what's her breast size :x
>>
No. 126471 ID: 7efe6b

>>/quest/910581
>these guys are throwing up a lot of mafia flags
Interesting. Can you elaborate on which flags exactly do you see and where in the quest they appear?
>>
No. 126483 ID: 7efe6b

>>/quest/910512
There's one thing that I missed here. The symbols on the carpet... they seem meaningful. Especially the sun-moon one, since it also appears on the door. It might represent the shape of our world.
>>
No. 126507 ID: 891b91

In light of some stuff that happened recently in regards to another artist's work, I'd like to make it clear that I'm fine with it if people create and post edits or other modifications to my quest panels, art, etc. (Just try to let me know about it, because I'd like to see it!) My only stipulation is that I would prefer that nobody tries to make money off of my work without getting my permission beforehand.
>>
No. 126524 ID: e95cec

Hey, I noticed a thing!

>>909228
may have been on the money; look in the crosswalk in
>>900075
It's the protagonist from Aux Oculo! And this image was posted 16 days before Aux Oculo started!
>>
No. 126525 ID: e95cec

Uhh. I know how to use the questdis, definitely.

>>/quest/909228
and
>>/quest/900075
>>
No. 126526 ID: e95cec

Ok. That was a lie. I have no idea how questdis works. Those are supposed to be links to the guy who posted "half of those characters are real OCs", and to the post of all the people on the crosswalk. How do I link posts from /quest/, if not either of the ways I tried?
>>
No. 126528 ID: 05ff2f

>>126526
Once a quest goes in the archive, you gotta use 'questarch' instead of 'quest' when creating new inter-board >> links. Like so:
>>/questarch/909228
>>/questarch/900075

Also, through mysterious board magic, already existing inter-board >> links to /quest/ posts will still link to the correct post in /questarch/ when the quest is archived. For example, the /quest/ links farther up this thread.
>>
No. 126533 ID: e95cec

>>126528
Ah, I see. Thanks
>>
No. 126546 ID: 891b91

Just a heads up: the next update probably won't be out until sometime Saturday or Sunday, at the earliest. I had hoped to get it done earlier, but my free time has been pretty limited lately, between school and family obligations.

>>126524
Yep, that's Sunny alright! naileD mentioned it in >>126417 as well. Channel3 is a friend of mine, so I wanted to throw a Sunny cameo in there for shits and giggles.
>>
No. 126759 ID: 891b91

Sorry for the wait; things got really busy for me at school again. I'll be done for the term as soon as I finish my final this week, though, and soon after I'll finally draw the next update.
>>
No. 126760 ID: b70ae2

>>126759
Thanks for the info. Good luck with the final!
>>
No. 126859 ID: 891b91
File 154501386418.png - (103.34KB , 371x602 , pennyclaus.png )
126859

Class is finally finished for the term, so I plan on getting the next update out within the next couple days. I'm officially on vacation now, and my hope is that I'll be able to keep up a more frequent update schedule during the coming weeks.

>>126760
Thanks! I feel like I did pretty well.
>>
No. 127196 ID: fd3369

Cider said she'd be a couple minutes, but that was last year.
(Obligatory New Year jokes are obligatory.)

Okay, serious time.

This quest has been awesome so far. I love mysteries, and this is a brilliant example of how one should unfold. Our protagonist is amnesiac, not uncommon for the sake of mysteries, but the way you've used this to introduce a deep lore universe is well thought out.

The art is pretty swish as well, I love the contrast between the almost neon pallet, and the way it's used to portray a decaying environment. I'm generally not a fan of the color-tint art, but I've caught myself several times just staring at the pictures, transfixed by the beautiful colors and unbelievable detail.

I'm ranting. Point is, this quest is great. My sincere thanks and applause.

Keep doing what you're doing, dude.
>>
No. 127219 ID: eceda8

Any word from teegee lately?
>>
No. 127220 ID: c2508b

>>127219
This is information I require as well. perhaps he is mearly tied up in post holiday shenaniging. Speculation however, is just that. As I have a severe deficit of information pertaining to our elusive author.

I call to you, tgchan! Anons, regulars, and quest authors, I behest you; find teegee's whereabouts!

(Perhaps it's milk-carton-missing-poster time.)
>>
No. 127244 ID: 6ebee4

>>127220
The only thing we can do is patiently await teegee's return
>>
No. 127249 ID: d0b835

>>127244
Totally. I just meant more like, if he's been suggesting on other quests or if he's been talking on IRC that would be confirmation that he's alive. Not that I doubt he is, but the illuminati could have gotten to him by now. You never know when they'll strike.

Until then, I'll wait as long as it takes. This quest is worth it.
>>
No. 127303 ID: 891b91

>>127219
Don't worry, I'm still around! So sorry about taking so long both to update the quest and to post in this thread. Holiday stuff ended up taking up much more time than I expected, and aside from that I just kind of let time get away from me -- I don't really have an excuse for it aside from getting lazy due to being on vacation. (I also had a lot of trouble early on with writing the update -- I just couldn't get it to a state I was happy with at first.) In retrospect, I probably should have just given myself a longer break between the first and second threads.

As I write this, I've got two panels out of six finished, while the third is partially colored and the rest are fully sketched, so I don't think it's going to take me too much longer to get it done and posted.

>>127196
>amnesiac
One of my worries with this quest was the possibility of leaning too hard on the amnesia trope, so I'm glad to hear that it doesn't seem too contrived. I don't think it'd be spoiling much to say that Penny's amnesia and the implications surrounding it will be a major theme of the quest, and my hope is that upcoming events will prompt some pretty interesting questions.

>art
Admittedly the color tinting has become a bit of a crutch (color filters are a cheap way of forcing a bunch of colors into a more cohesive palette), but I do intend to use it for thematic purposes as well. I'm glad the attention to detail has paid off, too!

>Point is, this quest is great. My sincere thanks and applause.
Thank you! I'm really happy that people have enjoyed it so much.

>>127244
Thank you for your patience! It won't be much longer now, I think.
>>
No. 127314 ID: 73866c

Im glad to see youre good and well. Welcome back :)

I'll reread the previous updates to refresh my memory and find anything we might have missed before the new update.
>>
No. 127331 ID: 725bd3

>>127303
Yo man, that's cool. I definitely don't mean to rush you, I just wanted to make sure you were still doing the quest.

I always have this fear that a quest auther will disappear without a trace forever, and I'll never know what happened. I've seen it before.

I'll wait as long as it takes, and I urge you to take your time, there's no rush.

Just wanted to confirm the quest wasn't dead, and now I've got my affirmation.
>>
No. 127356 ID: ebd50b

>>/quest/918154
>The room is furnished with a sense of careful economy
Well, nothing controversial here.

>cooking implements
So she can cook, huh? Maybe we should ask her for a sample.

>"Just fixing some tea for us"
That's nice. Good thing we didn't catch her doing something inappropriate, like changing clothes. Or perhaps it's a shame we didn't~

>"make yourself at home!"
I'd be glad to stay here with her hah. I kinda doubt she takes tenants tho.

>>/quest/918155
>this place is at the top of a hill.
We saw the wall-painting of what seems to be the Red Shelf at the beginning of the chapter. So then this must be the top building here. Which seems like a logical place for the Vesper's leaders to reside at.

>>/quest/918156
>thinking the wrong thing
If they could read our minds, they would've already done so when we were knocked out. So it seems unreasonable to be worrying about this now.

>a hologram
Heh, looks like Cider gained a bit of weight since the time this picture was taken. Quite a bit indeed. And if she was already that busty back then... damn.

>Matteo, who stands rigidly off to the side
The fact that he's on the picture at all is interesting because it means he does consider himself a part of this group. And a very loyal member too considering how old this picture seems to be.

Hmm, is that one of your kobolds in the back?

>>/quest/918157
>a subtle, pungent undertone that you can't quite place, something that's been there or has built up there for a long time now.
Ahahaha, I can guess what that is

>>/quest/918158
>you nearly throw the pillow across the room out of panic
We must've been absorbed in the pillow too much, eh?

>a nice pot of tea!
I'm inclined to suggest we spill the tea all over ourselves. Would definitely lead to some intriguing developments heh.

>wide, girthy hips; a pear-like figure ending in a round rump; and a heavy bosom that fills out the top half of her attire.
👀

>You feel a brief twinge of envy as you reflexively compare them to your own modest assets.
I'm afraid Penny's gonna have a tough time competing with Cider in that department. But hey, no one can compete with Penny's floppy ears!

>>/quest/918159
>"I like to meet one-on-one with newcomers"
I'm surprised she finds the time for this. I suppose another question that I would ask her would be how often do they get new people and if that's changed over the years.

>"Ask me whatever you'd like -- nothing is off-limits."
"Is Matteo still a virgin?"
But yeah, I think she may regret saying this hehe.

>"I understand if you'd rather not ask anything right now"
I'm not sure why wouldn't we want to ask anything. I mean, this is pretty much the best time to be asking questions, since this person is fully aware of our condition, and has the will and patience to answer them.

>"Once you become a Jarmu, you'll be ready to reintegrate with the outside world."
I wonder if this means that we can't leave the Red Shelf until we become a Jarmu. Because I'm sure that a lot of suggesters would object to that. I suppose one way to solve that would be to allow us to leave, but to bring an escort with us. Or provide some other sort of protection.

>Qatra
I'd rather just call her mom :p

Well, this update certainly took a while. Man, drawing these elaborate backgrounds is gonna kill ya. Are you sure you're still spending more time writing than drawing? I know I'm repeating myself, but I still think you should try to simplify your updating process to the point where you don't spend more than a couple of hours per update.
>>
No. 127382 ID: 891b91

>Hmm, is that one of your kobolds in the back?
Well, it's not like I wasn't going to throw in at least one kobold-like character... "Kobold-like" is definitely the way to put it, though, within the context of Dead Dust's universe.

>Ahahaha, I can guess what that is
;)

>I wonder if this means that we can't leave the Red Shelf until we become a Jarmu. Because I'm sure that a lot of suggesters would object to that.
I agree, if that happened I think it'd be too much railroading without justification. Rest assured that there are options for getting Penny out of this situation, albeit each with their own limitations and consequences. (Of course, consequences really only stand to make things more interesting, from a narrative perspective.)

>Well, this update certainly took a while. Man, drawing these elaborate backgrounds is gonna kill ya. Are you sure you're still spending more time writing than drawing? I know I'm repeating myself, but I still think you should try to simplify your updating process to the point where you don't spend more than a couple of hours per update.
Like I said in a previous post, most of the time I took was due to getting carried away with other stuff while I was on vacation and simply losing track of time. I get that it seems like the art takes longer than I say it does, but the writing really is the longest part; this is mostly due to the fact that I'm rarely satisfied with the first or second draft of an update's text, and I often end up doing a full rewrite, once I've got a better grasp on how I want to structure the update's narrative. In terms of the art alone, the most time-consuming part is character design, rather than backgrounds (which are usually pretty quick for me to make); for example, the 3rd panel of the most recent update was the most time-consuming one, since I had to iterate on all of those characters' designs until I was happy with them (aside from Cider and Matteo, anyway).

>a couple of hours per update
I wish I could get to that point (because I could update very frequently that way), but even with completely streamlined art I'd still be bottlenecked by the writing. Most of the work in that regard involves figuring exactly what is going to happen in an update: which suggestions Penny will act out and the order they'll take place, how other characters will respond to her, etc.
>>
No. 127383 ID: 78dbfb

>>123379
teegee likes peepee hahaha
van wuz heer
i should actually read this with how much free time i have
>>
No. 127384 ID: 864e49

>>/questarch/900075
I only now do I notice Sunny from Aux Oculo.
Dammit Total Garbage what other secrets are you hiding!
>>
No. 127391 ID: 78dbfb
File 154839827573.png - (19.10KB , 389x441 , isador-bust.png )
127391

>>127384
you may notice this lad in there
he's mine
>>
No. 127392 ID: 891b91

>>127384
>>127391
Yeah there are a number of cameos in there, haha
>>
No. 127393 ID: 891b91

>>127384
>>127392
Oh, and some other secrets (that don't pertain to the quest's plot in any way) lurk in that panel as well
>>
No. 127401 ID: 864e49

>>127391
Yeah I see him, looks very surprised.

>>127392
Don't know why but I swear I've seen the rabbit looking chick with the Big tits stripped shirt and the two goblins(?) before somewhere.
>>
No. 127403 ID: 78dbfb
File 154848583535.png - (8.23KB , 219x394 , isador1.png )
127403

>>127401
If you're wondering, his name is Isador.
it's not often i get to say anything about him online
>>
No. 127404 ID: 864e49

>>127403
He dosen't look very much like a door :y
>>
No. 127405 ID: 78dbfb
File 154848773606.png - (37.22KB , 500x552 , angery_isador_2.png )
127405

>>127404
I haven't heard that joke in years jesus christ
>>
No. 127406 ID: 891b91
File 154848845097.png - (357.75KB , 1222x1470 , isadoor.png )
127406

>>127404
I disagree
>>
No. 127407 ID: 78dbfb

>>127406
i'm very disappointed in you son
>>
No. 127519 ID: df1b0b
File 154914349061.jpg - (76.84KB , 1024x1024 , image.jpg )
127519

By Auldin, Penny is the cutest protagonist on TG. I am elated every time we get a close up.

I don't know what the design and concept process was, but something went very right.

(Also, what drug induced fever dream led you to make a flat chested female on TG, Teegee? It's almost like you're trying to have a narrative drivin story!)
>>
No. 127535 ID: 05ebc7

I need to get back into this quest. Very interesting.

Fuckin' Happy Happiest Cult shit right here. I ain't about it, chief.
>>
No. 127564 ID: eeb7d9

>>127519
Hey! Flat chests are cool! They are perfectly fine in TG, if you ask me.
>>
No. 127607 ID: 7f3520

>>127564
Oh no, I absolutely agree. I was just making a joke about how, like, 79% of tg females have huge boobs. And how suggesters are often pushing for female characters to get larger boobs whenever possible. (*Cough cough* Venji.)

I appreciate greatly Penny's lack of bust. And I will continually vote against her gaining more boob.

It's not that I have a problem with some, eh, well endowed characters. And in less serious quests, it doesn't bother me at all. It's just that it gets a little old when virtually all the girls on tg look like fifty percent of their body weight is hanging from their chest.

When the extreme becomes the mundane, the mundane becomes the extreme.
>>
No. 127609 ID: eeb7d9

>>127607
I could not agree more. I don't specifically remember a quest where females got their boobs bigger, but i don't find it strange. I don't find it strange to see desportioned breasts. So it is a fine change of senary when girls have small/normal sizes boobs.
>>
No. 127611 ID: 20aff4

You know, I suspect there are better things to talk about in a quest's discussion thread than the bust size of the main character and others.

PS: All of Dead Dust's characters have very good designs.
>>
No. 127674 ID: 10c408

>>127609
Does "enhance knockers" ring a bell?

Anyways. teegee. Your handling of the hufflepuff reference in the latest update is hilarious and well thought out. Kudos.
>>
No. 127703 ID: 891b91
File 154984559402.png - (610.28KB , 1440x1082 , penny_concepts.png )
127703

>>127519
Thank you, I'm glad you like her so much!

>>127519
>design and concept process
From what I remember, designing Penny was a pretty organic process. I just kinda put pen to paper (or, rather, stylus to screen) and started doodling. I think at the time I knew I wanted the protagonist to be diminutive and a bit androgynous, as a sort of visual reflection of the powerlessness and confusion of her predicament, so that's definitely a more intentional aspect of her design, but aside from that I mostly doodled the design and refined it until it felt right. There's definitely some subconscious influence from the kobolds I've drawn, too, particularly in the tail.

(Here, have an early concept image I drew last April.)

>(Also, what drug induced fever dream led you to make a flat chested female on TG, Teegee? It's almost like you're trying to have a narrative drivin story!)
Honestly, it was just another decision that just happened organically. I don't think I even was considering tgchan's tendency towards well-endowed female characters -- it just kind of worked out this way. Variety is the spice of life, anyway, so I find myself inclined towards trying to mix up characters' body proportions.

>>127564
>>127607
>Hey! Flat chests are cool! They are perfectly fine in TG, if you ask me.
>I appreciate greatly Penny's lack of bust.
I agree! I appreciate pretty much any bust size, but I think Penny's sub-a cup endowments add to her cuteness.

>>127611
>You know, I suspect there are better things to talk about in a quest's discussion thread than the bust size of the main character and others.
Probably, but I'm happy with bust size discussion so long as it doesn't detract from more serious discussion about the quest's plot, etc.

>PS: All of Dead Dust's characters have very good designs.
Thank you, that's really encouraging to hear!
>>
No. 127704 ID: 891b91
File 154984578756.png - (1.04MB , 2981x3406 , penny-enhance_knockers.png )
127704

>>127674
>Does "enhance knockers" ring a bell?
Well, knocker enhancement is definitely a possibility in Dead Dust's universe... but just don't overdo it! (pic related, doodled this for laughs a while back)

Seriously though, increasing Penny's bust size is a definite possibility, if she ever gains access to the means to do so -- but it would absolutely take an overwhelming majority of votes to make it happen.

>Anyways. teegee. Your handling of the hufflepuff reference in the latest update is hilarious and well thought out. Kudos.
Thanks, I'm glad it went over well! Also, I don't want to spoil anything, but I didn't go for it solely for the sake of comedic relief.
>>
No. 127705 ID: 891b91
File 154984588834.png - (172.76KB , 1000x1068 , penny-breakfast.png )
127705

Also, I happened across some non-canon doodles that I drew a while back and forgot about, so I figure I might as well dump them here now.
>>
No. 127706 ID: 891b91
File 154984594269.png - (331.37KB , 1015x1330 , penny-facial.png )
127706

>>
No. 127707 ID: 891b91
File 154984598615.png - (265.35KB , 1011x1394 , penny-preggo-confusion.png )
127707

>>
No. 127708 ID: 891b91
File 154984607825.png - (270.85KB , 1024x1024 , tiddy.png )
127708

A mildly lewd edit of a panel from Chapter 0.
>>
No. 127709 ID: 891b91
File 154984627354.png - (227.57KB , 668x1110 , penny-dontlook.png )
127709

And finally, a doodle I did as part of a pose/gesture practice session.

(Full disclosure -- the pose is heavily referenced from an image drawn by Siroc: https://www.furaffinity.net/full/25814813/ )
>>
No. 127711 ID: bad12e

Just popping in to say this is my favorite quest and I look forward to each update.

Penny is too precious~
>>
No. 127712 ID: 891b91

>>127711
Thank you, that's an enormous compliment! I'm really happy you're getting so much enjoyment out of this quest -- I find it really rewarding, not to mention motivating, to hear stuff like that.
>>
No. 127715 ID: e51896

>>127709
ENF Penny is best Penny.
>>
No. 127717 ID: 891b91

Considering that I've just started a new quest alongside this one (Arzfayz Amazing Adventure Quest -- but let's call it 3AQ for short), I'd like to head off any concerns people might have about how it'll impact this quest. I've thought about it quite a bit -- whether I can manage running two quests at once, whether a new quest is likely to affect my interest in working on Dead Dust, etc., and I've come to the conclusion that it isn't going to harm this quest.

First of all, I'm going to follow a strict policy of putting this quest first; so if it turns out that I'm wrong and I can't handle running two quests at once, I've already decided that Dead Dust will continue and 3AQ will put on the back burner. Secondly, I've designed 3AQ to mesh well with DD. I put a significant amount of time into the writing and artwork for this quest -- that's especially true for the writing, since DD's story is very important to me and I try very hard to get the writing "right". (In retrospect, this is the main reason why I had a large delay at the end of last year -- I had writer's block and had to let things sit for a while.) 3AQ, on the other hand, is deliberately designed to be "easier": it's more light-hearted and open-ended, and so I expect the writing won't be so time-consuming; and I'm deliberately going with simpler art overall to keep the time spent drawing low. Additionally, I don't foresee myself becoming so enamored with 3AQ that I lose interest in DD, because I've got a ton of stuff in store for DD that I'm very excited to get to.

I suppose this raises the question of why I decided to do this. I suppose the biggest reason is that I've been itching to run an explicitly lewd quest -- while lewdness is certainly a welcome possibility in DD, it's also not the main focus of the quest and I refuse to allow it to compromise the plot. Having something like 3AQ lets me have that fun without running the risk of harming the quest, since the entire point of the quest is to explore the sexual misadventures of a goofy kobold girl. Also, I feel like 3AQ will be nice for those periods where I have writer's block and need to let the ideas congeal in my head for a few days before I get back to work on DD.

Anyway, I hope that answers any questions/concerns anyone might have, but if it doesn't, I'd be happy to discuss it further.

>>127715
Agreed!
>>
No. 127724 ID: 864e49

How do you make your gifs, also why.
>>
No. 127728 ID: 891b91

>>127724
It's a pretty simple process. After I finish the character line art, I trace over it loosely on a couple new layers, resulting in 3 frames of animation. Then I just export the whole thing as a PSD, load it up in Photoshop, and set it up to display each frame for 0.2 sec.

As for why, it's not just a stylistic choice -- there is a point to it that pertains pretty deeply to the quest's plot, setting, and backstory. At this point in the story, I don't think I've introduced enough clues for anybody to have a reasonable chance at figuring out what the animation is supposed to mean, but that'll definitely change in the future.
>>
No. 127749 ID: 864e49

>>127728
You crafty bugger you.
>>
No. 127813 ID: 891b91
File 155031433981.png - (233.51KB , 1800x1252 , penny-triglyceride.png )
127813

A warm-up doodle today ended up turning into a chunky version of Penny.
>>
No. 127815 ID: 556568

big chonk
>>
No. 127871 ID: 9a89ed

Just saw the update. I'm wondering if the next update we will get to customize what Penny wears like some of the other quests does.

>>127813
Loving these non-canon pics of Penny. Thanks.
>>
No. 127873 ID: 891b91

>>127871
That's the plan for an upcoming update, yeah -- assuming more people vote for the wardrobe change than against it, of course. It'll be the typical sort of paper doll stuff you see in quests, although I plan on providing a bunch of pre-made options so that people who don't want to draw their suggestions can participate too. Most likely I'll ask suggesters to come up with 4-5 outfits so that there can be a bit of variety in Penny's wardrobe.

>Loving these non-canon pics of Penny. Thanks.
Glad you like them!
>>
No. 127876 ID: 05ebc7

So I'm thinking, actually, that we could go about this another way if we REALLY wanted to risk it for the biscuit.

Simply put, they tend to get newbies in on a semi-regular basis, right? 'A few weeks' is still pretty often if that pattern holds. I'm wondering if maybe we can't extrapolate on that 'bring others with us' idea, and instead try to do our best to extend our influence among as many people here as possible. Try to do favors, keep our ears to the ground, get people indebted to us in non-monetary ways.

If we keep things subtle and entirely voluntary (with maybe the odd circumstance here and there to convince people of our goodwill) we could de-facto run this place!

This idea was brought forth by the idea of Mob Boss Penny just popping up in my head.
>>
No. 127884 ID: 158da5

>>127873
That's great! Having options is really cool, since I can't draw at all.
>>
No. 127885 ID: 7969eb
File 155054611673.png - (675.38KB , 1478x1051 , unknown.png )
127885

>>
No. 127887 ID: 891b91

>>127885
this is now canon ok maybe not really
>>
No. 127946 ID: 05ebc7

So, the fact that everything is "free" is definitely something worth looking into. They seem to have some sort of influence, so they might be financed by someone of importance, as well as some other ventures. And if we can get IN on those ventures, then we'll be in an excellent position.
>>
No. 128189 ID: 773e32

There was a big argument here about sexuality and sluts and slut shaming and stuff that wildly degenerated from quest suggestions into personal attacks.
This hit both the quest thread and the questdis thread.
If you wish to continue having this discussion I have carefully and delicately extracted the posts from both the quest and questdis thread and thrown them into the cesspit they belong, the Big Dumb Arguments thread on general. I'm not linking it because it doesn't deserve linking.
Consider this a warning to all parties involved in the argument, and if someone decides to dredge the argument back up or fire off any parting shots, they're getting more than a warning.

Friendly reminder that if your suggestion in a quest is starting to turn into an argument directed to another suggester about their personal moral or ethical code, you are getting far too off track of what a quest is supposed to be. There's not that a fine line between trying to point out why someone's suggestion is in error based on facts of a quest setting and trying to point out that someone's suggestion is bad because you're bad and you should feel bad.

Thank you to the two people who did actually clear the air between them before I hoisted the argument out of this thread, but you were not the only part of the problem.
I still moved your posts, though, because without context they make no sense and clutter up the disthread.
>>
No. 128208 ID: eceda8

So, uh, I missed the argument when it happened, but I'm sorry to hear that it happened. It can be incredibly off-putting to an author to see people arguing over their work in a bad way - I hope that you're doing okay after all this, teegee.
>>
No. 128209 ID: e51896

While I (and most likely others) despise arguments as they can be quite a downer to everyone and it is a shame when it happens, we can at least know that this means that there are people who really care about this quest enough to argue over it.

That said, You have some very passionate fans for your quest, Teegee. Keep being awesome with what you're doing.
>>
No. 128215 ID: 891b91

First of all, thank you to Cirr for stepping in and handling the situation.

>>128208
>It can be incredibly off-putting to an author to see people arguing over their work in a bad way - I hope that you're doing okay after all this, teegee.
I'm doing fine, but I appreciate the concern. I wasn't put off by it, since I accept that this is the internet and fights are going to happen from time to time, but I do worry a bit that they could drive people away from the quest if they happen often enough.

>>128209
>we can at least know that this means that there are people who really care about this quest enough to argue over it.
This is how I prefer to look at it. While the argument was partially about semantics, I don't think the people involved would have said anything at all if they weren't personally invested in this quest.

>You have some very passionate fans for your quest, Teegee.
I agree, and I'm grateful for all of you. (This includes anyone who was involved in the fight; it's over now and I don't hold it against them.) I find the continued enthusiasm for this quest really motivating, and it's frankly the greatest compliment I can receive as a quest author.

>Keep being awesome with what you're doing.
Thank you, I'll do my best!
>>
No. 128349 ID: 05ebc7

>>128215
I'm loving this mystery and hope we can do some really cool things later. I've got some ideas and hopes for Penny's future.
>>
No. 128354 ID: 891b91

>>128349
I'm glad you're enjoying it so much!

>I've got some ideas and hopes for Penny's future.
I'd love to read them, if you're willing to share them.
>>
No. 128370 ID: 05ebc7

>>128354
I mean, it really depends on the players, but basically I'm hoping we can learn how the Vesper Society ticks, and perhaps we can eventually integrate ourselves into the system in a way that allows us relative autonomy without anyone realizing it- something like building up favors from a lot of individuals by doing this and thats for them. We'd need to keep everyone at an emotional arm's length while making them feel special, use their eventual trust in us AND the positives that they get from our doings in order to build clout and influence.

I like the idea that eventually we could become a 'hidden power' like figure in the Society, and basically instead of escape the Vesper Society, we turn it to our advantage and use its resources to accomplish our goals, even beyond our search for our identity. We would have to make sure everything can be interpreted in a clearly positive light, and we'd have to keep Cider in the dark, or at least unable to retaliate in a way that DOESN'T make her look bad. We can essentially usurp power right from under our nose if we play everything right.

If unable to do that, then we just escape this Happy House Cult as intended and I'll have to rethink things from there. My main point is really that it seems like the Vesper Society has tools we can use if we're careful.

I'm kinda obsessed with the idea of Penny becoming this mafia-like figure by the end of it all and I really want to fight to make it happen.
>>
No. 128381 ID: 8d23f0

finally got around to reading this quest today and I got to say its really really good. well done on world building, art, writing, and moving along at a very reasonable pace which some quests get bogged down in the details.
it was also funny to see my other nickname as one of the name suggestions "Pwaffle"
I am looking forwards to seeing how Mint shakes out and Rosalyn is incredibly cute and I adore her.
>>
No. 128397 ID: 891b91

>>128381
Thank you! I'm happy to hear that the pacing is good, since that's one of the things I worry about the most -- balancing between not rushing things and not going too slowly.
>>
No. 128455 ID: 891b91

>>128370
>mafia boss Penny
I think this is a pretty cool idea! I shouldn't say too much about it, but if most suggesters want Penny to pursue that strategy, I won't block it from happening. (Whether Penny would succeed at it is another matter, but as with any strategies for her to improve her position in life, I would try to make it a fair challenge with balanced chances of success and failure.)

I should add, too, that it's only one of a variety of possible ways forward, and that I want the choice of how to proceed to be left up to suggesters whenever possible.


On an unrelated note, I think this is probably a good time to mention that it's starting to get later in the semester for me, and so I'm going to be getting a bit busier with coursework. If possible I'm going to try to maintain my current pace of 1-2 updates per week, but depending on how things go with class, things may slow down. Also, given that it's happened twice before, I'd say there's a possibility of another month-long hiatus towards the end of the semester, although I'm going to try to avoid it if I can. This time around I'll try to be a bit more communicative about it if I find I do need more time for school.
>>
No. 128458 ID: 42c2a3

My brain reads 'Chits' like shits, so I actually had to take a break from reading for a moment to let my mind process out all the terrible jokes that come from my mispronunciation.

Anyway, I'm really excited about this new 'mods' revelation. I am now imagining Penny with a ton of military-grade augmentations. Greater mobility, reflex boost, targeting solutions programmed straight into her brain, software to aid in social interaction, a navigation system. Oh the possibilities are endless.

I thank you, Teegee, for this plentiful food for thought.
>>
No. 128459 ID: 42c2a3

>>128455
Don't worry about it, take as much time to do what needs to be done as you want.

If there's another month long hiatus? So be it, I'll still be here to read and suggest whenever you update. A quest like this is worth waiting for.
>>
No. 128464 ID: 05ebc7

>>128455
Been a hot minute since I've had to deal with school... How far in are you?
>>
No. 128471 ID: 891b91

>>128458
>My brain reads 'Chits' like shits, so I actually had to take a break from reading for a moment to let my mind process out all the terrible jokes that come from my mispronunciation.
It's cool, who gives a chit anyway ;)

>mods
>Oh the possibilities are endless.
Quite, as are the implications.

>>128459
>A quest like this is worth waiting for.
Thank you, I'm glad you think so!

>>128464
I'm in my first year of grad school. (Still feels weird to say I'm done with undergrad, but it is what it is.)
>>
No. 128620 ID: bcc41d

Y'know, I didn't really think that checking whether the dates as listed were 'correct' compared to one another was going to lead anywhere, but here we are. Deviant dates discovered!

Hella kudos on some sneaky-ass worldbuilding there, teegee.
>>
No. 129055 ID: 891b91
File 155486755987.png - (2.41MB , 2048x3848 , 1-011-paperdolls-2048.png )
129055

Higher-res pre-made outfits, for anyone who wants to edit them.
>>
No. 129056 ID: b1b4f3

>>129055
I feel like I should recognize some of these.
>>
No. 129058 ID: 05ebc7

>>129055
I want to draw a custom piece, but I don't much have the tools available right now. But at least one of those looks familiar...
>>
No. 129059 ID: 864e49

Man I wish had and could use any image editing software.

Cause I have this idea of starting with the pink one-piece from D then the pants from C and the boots either from E or C, then maybe the sleeveless waist coat from C either done up or not, then the jacket from E not closed with the belt replaced by the one from D, then either the gloves from E or C and then finally the glasses from C.

I can see it in my head but it may be to punk for this setting.
>>
No. 129060 ID: 891b91
File 155489803215.jpg - (108.04KB , 975x850 , transmetropolian_yeah.jpg )
129060

>>128620
>Hella kudos on some sneaky-ass worldbuilding there, teegee.
;)

>>129056
Well, A through F are all based on clothing suggestions made earlier in the quest, so they might be recognizable that way. (Granted, I think Roz's singlet was suggested only as an excuse for bluffing Roz, but I couldn't resist.) The glasses in C are a reference to Transmetropolitan, although I drew them from memory so I got the design reversed.

Anything else you might recognize in the outfits wasn't intentional on my part, though.

>>129058
Which one, out of curiosity?

>>129059
>image editing software
A few free options off the top of my head are Krita, Paint.net, and Gimp. Doesn't solve the "could use" part outside of experimentation, but they're all viable options.

>I can see it in my head but it may be to punk for this setting.
Nah, I don't think it would be. Wearing three layers (one-piece, waistcoat/vest, jacket) seems to border on excessive, but I'd still allow it if enough people voted on it. It's looking like I'm going to have an additional round of voting due to the number of custom suggestions, so feel free to post your suggestion in the quest thread.
>>
No. 129061 ID: 11f0db

>It's looking like I'm going to have an additional round of voting due to the number of custom suggestions,

That Sounds like a fair idea, especially since some people are posting their own paper doll designs after other people already voted and there might be more submissions late into the voting. Some of the designs people are making so far are pretty neat after all.
>>
No. 129071 ID: 891b91

>>129061
Exactly, I want to give the newer designs a fair chance. Depending on how things shake out, I might do a third round of voting too. Ideally, I'd like to end up with four clear winners.
>>
No. 129075 ID: 5bdd53

>>129060
Looks like B will be a winning outfit, maybe. Modern casual clothing. How old are these clothes?
>>
No. 129076 ID: 05ebc7

>>129060
G. Feels almost too specific.
>>
No. 129077 ID: 891b91

>>129075
That sounds like a question for Roz!

>>129076
Nope, G was completely off the top of my head, so any resemblance wasn't intentional on my part.
>>
No. 129078 ID: e51896
File 155495465791.jpg - (149.96KB , 562x913 , shirt.jpg )
129078

Of course, you can't have a paper doll creation design without this classic tgchan running gag showing up sooner or later. It is expected at this point in these sort of moments. Sorry. (posting it here because it's a silly meme).

Joking aside, I'm hoping more people will make more clothing designs using the paper doll model.

It seems like there are plenty of interests in having our character go around nude for the rest of the day. Not complaining, though I wonder what will give her that idea after she had previously been uncomfortable with being in her b-day suit around others? unless maybe it will happen involuntarily if that choice wins?
>>
No. 129082 ID: 05ebc7

>>129078
It's a law, no worries.
>>
No. 129083 ID: b1e749

>>129078
cant wait for this "hilarious classic gag" to not be a thing anymore
>>
No. 129084 ID: 891b91

>>129078
>Sorry.
No worries, it's expected at this point!

>It seems like there are plenty of interests in having our character go around nude for the rest of the day. Not complaining, though I wonder what will give her that idea after she had previously been uncomfortable with being in her b-day suit around others? unless maybe it will happen involuntarily if that choice wins?
If it wins, I'll most likely have Roz prod Penny one last time towards embracing nudism, prompting Penny to have a "you know what, fuck it" moment and realize that deep down she kind of likes it (which is in line with occasional suggestions that have been made throughout the quest.) It'll also solidify Penny's attitude towards nudity: if she ends up going naked now, she'll be more daring and adventurous about it in the future; but if she doesn't, then she'll be more reluctant to get naked outside of normal, appropriate situations. It'll still be possible to change her mind, but it'll take a very large consensus to do so, along with a plausible reason for it.

That being said, I should have anticipated how polarizing the nudity vote would be, but I didn't. To account for that, and for a couple other reasons I'll get into later, I plan on balancing things out in the second round of voting by turning the nudity vote into a simple majority vote. (Also, I had said earlier that there might be a third round of voting, but now I'm pretty sure there won't be.)
>>
No. 129090 ID: 2202fb

>>129084
So I was bored and decided to catch up on the dis thread.

After reading this, i feel like having the internal nudity outcomes would be better, but actually going nude would have bad social repercussions later. I propose a compromise(and given how i am one person, this is a suggestion to you rather than a vote choice since the majority wont even know it exists let alone vote for it).

So you do the final push thing, Penny does the fuckit response but then stops when she thinks about how it would probably hurt her socially at present.

I kind of thought of something similar when i posted my neutrality vote, but after reading your post, i figured i would expand on it.

(if i dont make sense, ask and i can try and elaborate on my idea)
>>
No. 129115 ID: c2daab

>>129078
Can someone explain me this meme? I'm pretty new so i don't understand it, at all.
>>
No. 129117 ID: e51896

>>129115
https://tgchan.org/wiki/Steve%27d

Hopes this helps explain
>>
No. 129254 ID: e51896

I'm glad to know that Mint was laughing a bit during the dress-up. it shows she is showing some signs of opening up and is not totally withdrawn and getting a little more comfortable being around us. I feel like I want to protecc her. For the time being, if we want to maintain our friendship with her, I think we shouldn't pressure her into doing what she isn't comfortable with and give her space until she is ready to be a little more social. Though, it would be cool if she does decide to follow us for the tour, but only if it is by her own choice alone without anyone influencing her to come with.
That said, once she is a little more courageous and ready, one goal I would like to achieve is to ask her about the nightmares Roz mentioned she had. If I remember, Penny had a dream too. Maybe we can talk to her about the building Penny saw in her coma-fueled dream, as well as those lights she saw as well. Maybe by some crazy coincidence, Mint may have had a similar experience and saw that building in her dreams as well which may jog some of our memories. Who knows? For now, we'll continue to try to become her friend.

Also, been meaning to give my thanks. It might not seem like much, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that the hoodie design I created was one of the four clothing options chosen. It was cool to see it drawn in your art style too, and to know that a decent amount of people liked the design. I think that inspired me a little more to be a bit more creative and perhaps make my own quest at some point (just gotta find the motivation to do so, especially after being burnt out from work).
>>
No. 129350 ID: b5d6fa

Something that I noticed, but I don't think many people have brought up, so correct me if I'm wrong:

People in the Vesper Society have government positions in Red Shelf, right? So wouldn't that mean that the VS has particular influence in the local government? I've been wondering if they really DO run things behind the scenes and just put up an interesting front. Red Shelf apparently is by size and economy a smaller area, but considering what they do, I have to imagine that the right people in the right places could lead it to have a disproportionate level of influence and power.
>>
No. 129395 ID: 891b91

>>129254
Sorry for taking so long to get back to you on this! You're welcome, and thank you for participating in it! I was glad to see so many suggestions for outfits, too, since it made the whole process more interesting. If you decide you'd like to start your own quest, I say go for it -- it's a lot of fun, if also a lot of work!

I don't think I can comment much on your thoughts about Mint, but I do agree that trying to find out more about her situation would be a good idea.

>>129350
I can't comment much on this either, but I think you might find it fruitful to pursue this line of thought within the quest itself -- there are many paths Penny can take at this point, and investigating Vesper's power and influence is one of them.
>>
No. 129409 ID: b5d6fa

>>129395
Oh, I have every intention of trying to do so.
>>
No. 129455 ID: b5d6fa

So, uh, teegee, I hope you can pardon the impertinence, but what's up with your new quest? Is it intended to be short? I'm supremely worried about Dead Dust with you taking up a third quest all of a sudden. Your drawing is detailed enough that it takes some weeks for a single entry- per quest. A third being worked on at that similar level of quality...
>>
No. 129456 ID: 891b91

>>129455
No worries, it's a legitimate concern and I'm glad you decided to ask about it. I expect the new quest will be shorter than Dead Dust, but that's largely a guess on my part. Given the amount of detail I put into my quests' art, I see how it would give the impression that the delays between updates are largely due to that detail. (You aren't the first person who has had that impression, either.) That really isn't the case, however; most of the time I start and complete the art for a given update in a single evening. For example, the project files for the most recent Dead Dust update were created on May 10, the same day that I posted the update.

That raises the question of what actually causes these delays, and I think it's due to several factors. First, I find writing updates takes more time than drawing them; it's fairly common that I will revise major portions of an update, or even rewrite it entirely, multiple times before I'm satisfied with it. Sometimes I have to sleep on it a night or two before I figure out the right way to write an update, so that adds to the amount of time as well. Another cause is various distractions in my life -- some of which are necessary and others which are just other things I do during my free time. Additionally, I suffer from intermittent back problems as a result of an old gym injury, and over the past month or so it's limited the amount of time I can comfortably spend working at my desk. Thankfully, it seems to be clearing up now, so I should be able to work on my quests more frequently.

All of that only serves to explain the delays, though, so that alone probably won't do a lot to assuage your concerns. I've been thinking about how to get my rate of updates closer to where it used to be -- keep in mind that, at Dead Dust's outset, I was updating the quest on a near-daily (!) basis. (I probably won't ever go back to updating every day, though, because doing that ate up pretty much all of my free time at the time.) Up until now I've been trying to alternate between Dead Dust and AAA Quest, so as to give each "equal" focus, which has inadvertently compounded delays. For example, if I'm taking a while to finish writing a Dead Dust update, that would delay progress on the next Arzfayz update, and vice versa. Alternating quests, then, seems like it's doing more harm than good, so I'm going to stop doing that. Instead, if I encounter writer's block, I'll just set that quest aside for the night and work on a different one. Hopefully that'll cut back on the delays and mitigate any additional delays caused by adding a third quest.

That being said, if I find that I'm having significant trouble maintaining three quests at once, I'll simply put Flora on hiatus and return to it later. Same goes for Arzfayz; if handling even two becomes too much for me, I'll put it on hiatus as well, and work on Dead Dust alone until it's finished.
>>
No. 129459 ID: b5d6fa

>>129456
Cool, I appreciate the candidness! Makes me feel better about it, really. Although just to say, if you're maybe having issues deciding on what to write, maybe look into the possibility of beta readers if you haven't? I don't use them myself, but I hear they can work wonders as far as revising writing.
>>
No. 129466 ID: 83ea0c

>>129459
I volunteer my services as a beta reader/editor. I used to do a bit of editing work, so I'm fairly confident I could help clean up drafts without messing with your style.

Not saying you need it, Teegee, your quests always have wonderful writing. But perhaps I could help expedite the proofreading process. Just an offer.
>>
No. 129470 ID: a27a13

>>129455
dude, taking up new quests and abandoning the old is a time-honored tradition!
(teegee don't do that please, it's terrible)
>>
No. 129472 ID: 891b91

>>129459
Taking on a beta reader or two could be pretty helpful, actually -- not so much for proofreading per se, but for critiquing content. Most of my indecision when writing is a result of trying to write updates that feel believable and have good pacing, both of which require me to think about it in terms of how the audience will perceive it. Having someone I can go to with a draft update would let me do a bit of A-B testing when I'm unsure of which direction to take a particular update.

>>129466
Thank you for offer! Keep in mind, though, that one of the most common revisions I make when writing updates is to split the events of one update into several when I decide that too much is happening without suggesters' input. It's pretty much a given that you'll end up getting spoiled on some future updates at some point. If you're cool with that, then I think I'd like to give it a shot at least on a trial basis. Are you on Discord?

>>129470
When I started Dead Dust a year ago (hard to believe the first anniversary is almost upon us!), I promised myself that I would never abandon it nor any quest I started after it, unless some extreme circumstance arises that requires me to do so. If I ever feel like one of my quests is going poorly and there's no way to salvage it, I'm going to at least try to find a way to wrap things up quickly. I don't think that'll ever be an issue with Dead Dust, though -- I have a bunch of really cool/interesting events planned out for Penny to bump into. I'm pretty excited about all of it, actually.
>>
No. 129473 ID: b1b4f3

>>129472
>I promised myself that I would never abandon it nor any quest I started after it
You're the best.
>>
No. 129475 ID: 7ff895

>>129472
I don't actually have a Discord. I know, practically living in the Stone Age. Been meaning to get one, but divine intervention keeps getting in the way. I'll try to get one soon, but until then do you mind Email? That's pretty much the extent of communication methods I use. If it's not too much a bother my username is a link. Pardon the inconvenience.

And as for the other point you brought up, I promise not to make any sort of meta suggestion, or reveal any information regarding future updates to the audience, you have my word, sworn and binding.
>>
No. 129476 ID: f8b1f2

I just caught up with the story, i was hoping for the F outfit with the leather jacket from B

though i am pleased with the results <3

I can't wait to see future updates and will totally keep an eye on things!
>>
No. 129483 ID: f3310b

Hmm, now where was I with my reviews... ah, it looks like I have a little bit of writing to do.

>>/quest/918847
>a form of rehabilitation
Yeah, this matches the info that we got from the evacuation kiosk. In other words, she's not trying to deceive us about what Vesper is.

>You were covered with a strange, red powder
How does she know this! Well, the logical explanation is, of course, that this is exactly what everyone else went through. And her assumption would be correct. Either that or they simply found some dust on our suit.

>take control of your body and deliver you here
Ah, it feels so good when my predictions turn out to be perfectly on point. So the glyph did exactly what it was designed to do.

>Penny, we know you have taffa syndrome
Lying to people who're only trying to help us doesn't seem like a good way to start a relationship. We're lucky that they're used to people like us, otherwise we'd probably be in trouble.

>the glyphs only work on people suffering from the syndrome
I guess this would be another good "I told you so!" moment hehe.

>>/quest/919736
Heh, that grumpy expression on Penny. She really needs to loosen up a bit.

>It's never taken more than a couple of hours for newcomers to wake up
The way medical personnel before were reacting certainly implied that something like this was the case.

>there is something unusual about your dust's structure
A clue is given. What do I think about it? Well... how the structure of our dust came to be is hard to guess, but perhaps what we drank may not be what we believe it to be.

>it does help make counterfeiting a bit more trouble than it's worth, for them.
Indeed, it would be quite easy for the authorities to use a counterfeit glyph on a bait to catch the fish.

>and be compensated for your work
Something tells me we ain't gonna be getting rich. In fact, they might not even use money at all and the compensation would take a different form.

>it takes between two and five years
As far as I'm concerned, it takes one update with a time skip~
>>
No. 129485 ID: f3310b
File 155847411543.png - (686.92KB , 562x800 , kroy-vons.png )
129485

>>/quest/920579
>You're lucky that you haven't touched your tea
Boo, it was probably some really good tea. Should get some of them kroy-vons to go with it next time.

>artifically-constructed memories
Well, this is probably one of the things that the memory salons are there for. But, geez, the fact that this is possible really complicates things. Now we'll always wonder if the person before us has real or fake memories. And could they even tell if their fake memories were fake? Are they telling us the truth or do they simply believe in something due to their fake memories? Too many implications :P This is why I think memory alteration isn't the best concept to include in a universe.

>We are legally obligated to keep you here
I actually love this little fact presented here. Because the fact that they're a government-supported organization means it's highly unlikely that they're doing anything illegal or that they are a cult.

>there's no outward indication that she suspects your lie at all
She really is a great actor, isn't she? It only makes me love her more haha. But yeah, with all the resistance we put up, I'd be very surprised if she didn't suspect us. Well, or she's just not worried about it. Because in either case, they're ready to catch us if we tried to escape.

>just a sliver of your past self's memory that wasn't wiped out completely
[x] Doubt

>you'll be given a day or two
Sounds like a chapter or two hehe.

>those that invited you
I bet that Matteo's dar (probably Ormi) doesn't take anyone new.

>tomorrow we'll have some invitations for you
Whatever invitations they may be, the suggesters will choose one of them. In other words, it's highly likely that they won't wait for any other invitations after the ones we initially receive.

>dars
I thought about going into what I would consider the pros and cons of joining each of the dars, but writing all of that out seems largely unnecessary since we'll be getting to see them in more detail in the future anyway.

>>/quest/920580
Pff, at least someone's excited to see us. Finally some good fucking food warm reception! Does she bite? :x
Hmm, that's some interesting clothes she's wearing. I certainly wonder what's the purpose of her belt.
Also, I can't help but notice how Cider's size is showing...

>Polenta's waiting
Haha, Polenta! I can't believe you chose that name! You see, I eat polenta about once per week - it's a popular side dish here. However, polenta is quite a rare dish, only common in a few small countries in the world. So yeah, an interesting coincidence.

>my door is always open -- well, figuratively speaking
I'm not sure if those last three words made things better or worse :P

>feel free to stop by anytime
Ah, I hope we get to see her again soon. Such a warm person.

>a bit tighter than you'd prefer
Looks comfy to me~ Besides, I can't see how getting used to soft, tight places would be a bad thing for Penny.

(image shopped so people don't get any ideas)
>>
No. 129486 ID: f3310b

>>/quest/922053
>drastic times call for drastic measures
Could be worse I suppose. At least we're not stuck between her legs!

>They're remarkably soft
I can imagine Penny might get some more fun time with those in the future hehe

>eliciting a loud squeal from Rosalyn
A weakness! Now we know how to deal with her!

>>/quest/922054
>friendliest welcome
So she considers a stranger playing with her breasts as a friendly gesture.
...
I can't help but grin at the implications this entails.

>>/quest/922055
>your room
Room paperdoll when? Just kidding. Some things are probably better left out of suggester's hands.

>I really, really can't help it
It's fine. She should be free to act like herself! *nods*

>the last time we had newcomers was maybe a few weeks ago
So this means they get a new person about once per week. Basically, they're getting new people all the time. I was expecting it to be more like once per month, because if it's this often, it's actually quite concerning. It means that the taffa syndrome is quite a large problem. Another question is, is the problem getting bigger, or worse.

>I saw them being led onto a ship later on
Oh, that's new. In that update (>>/questarch/889585) it wasn't mentioned that there were any bodies from that starting room being led into the ship. This changes a few things, because now it may become important to find out who that ship belonged to. I mean, if that ship belonged to a reputable ward, exposing the fact that they're doing illegal body trading could provide us with leverage to get some... favors.

>>/quest/922056
The room looks nice. But based on the fact that it only contains beds and drawers, it looks like it's primarily used for sleeping. In other words, it would seem that it's normal for people to spend most of their time outside, working, socializing, entertaining, etc., before coming home to rest. Or perhaps this is only the case with sigarzghars.

>>/quest/922057
>...Okay
I feel sorry looking at this secluded girl. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like there's any direct way we can help her. Should we be pushy to get her to socialize? Or should we just keep back and hope she opens up to us? I can't really say.

>>/quest/922058
>put together a wardrobe
A whole wardrobe? I guess that's better than a single paperdoll, tho I wonder if the extra sets of clothes will ever really be used.

Other than that... have we always been this small compared to Roz?
>>
No. 129487 ID: f3310b

>>/quest/922876
>Sports bras
Don't be silly. Just look at the size of those huge things that Penny's been flopping around! Do they even make support for those?!

Anyway, I'd prefer no bra but, *shrug*, not missing much anyway :P

>It's all charity
Hmm. So this means that Penny can... eat as much as she wants without needing to pay! Alright, take us to the nearest all-you-can-eat buffet!

>cheerfully yanks the zipper down
Haha, thank god someone's here to help Penny stop acting like a prude.

Overall a very funny update, especially the art.
>>
No. 129488 ID: f3310b

>>/quest/923824
Oh, this is actually the first time we get to see Penny's fangs. I guess to see how they compare to Roz. Well, it looks like Penny won't be using those to scare anyone.

>I hardly even know you
Pff, Penny's clearly misunderstanding how relationships in this universe go. I mean, when someone unzips your jumpsuit, you're practically already married! So what's this stuff about taking things slow and dinner?

>We'll go at your pace.
While we may not be getting a strip show, it just may be one from Penny's perspective heh.

>I'm too tired to care about seeing naked people...
She's gonna regret her decision someday!

>>/quest/923826
>Roz's clothing hits the floor, defying your expectations.
Oh dear. It looks like Penny found the wrong person to mess around with. And right when she finally found some confidence too. How unfortunate is that? Surely no one could see this coming ;)

Best development haha
>>
No. 129489 ID: f3310b

>>/quest/923968
>I can't say I was expecting you'd actually do it.
She wasn't expecting a person who's fine with casual breastplay to be fine with casual nudity? Eh, anyone could make that mistake.

>Never try to bluff a nudist
I mean, that's one way to find out that she's a nudist. A pretty good way hehe.

>attempt to save your dignity
Well, there's Penny in almost all her glory.

>then you can get dressed again if you want.
I like those last 3 words.

>modifying it into something a little less drab
Yeah, this jumpsuit could definitely make some pretty useful clothes, ones good to get down and dirty in, but then it probably wouldn't be useful for its original purpose anymore. Not that we'd want to use it for that anyway; we don't even know what it was.

>>/quest/923969
>Fashion's kinda my thing
It's interesting how she's a nudist, but at the same time she likes fashion.

>leaving yourself fully exposed
Well, there's Penny in all her glory.
But really, it's great to see that she's extremely cute especially even in her canon nudity and I'm loving every moment of it hehe. She's gonna have people swooning over her in no time!

On the other hand, Roz is smokin' hot herself, with her fluff (not) covering all the right places~

>>/quest/923970
>the sight
This sight fulfills my soul. I'm ashamed to say that lewd stuff in quests is one of my preferences.

>it's a little early on for you to worry about saving yourself for anyone
I concur. While making friends is all fine and dandy, I feel that it would be too arbitrary to immediately claim any character as "the one". Also, it may all be a joke now, but as time passes, people will get more and more attached to their favorite characters while having more prejudice against any new character.

>>/quest/923971
>I'm into girls
Similarly, I don't think it makes sense for Penny to decide on her sexuality from one single experience. A completely innocent experience at that. Not that I object to her liking girls, I'm entirely fine with that, but the whole point of being at Vesper is for her to discover herself. There's not much discovery if you stop after climbing the first hill heh. Personally, I'd vote for straight or bi, altho it looks like the straight ship has already sailed~

>There's some text printed across it
If Penny's been wearing a Delaney work suit, it can mean one of three things. That she found or borrowed the suit, that she used to work at Delaney, or that she's still supposed to be working there.
In all three cases, the suit should definitely be returned to Delaney where it can be analyzed and possibly determine who the owner was. Assuming they don't recognize us right away. So we may get some important clues, either about our own past life, or the other person that wore it.
>>
No. 129490 ID: f3310b

>stuffing a breast deeper into her suit
Good thing Penny's never going to have issues like that!

>modding
I was wrong! So it turns out that modding doesn't refer to body modding, but dust modding. In that case, it's possible that a dustbender isn't the right tool to use for body swapping either, and that theory of mine may also be incorrect. Hmm, I'll have to revise my theories on what may have happened to Moira.

>if they can do it
That's a big if! Because I suspect that any larger change to the dust would run the risk of damaging it. In fact, the hint about Penny's dust structure being different plays an important role here. It implies that, just like with the glyph, modding of our dust may have unforseen consequences. It may cause modding of our dust to be easier. Or it may just flat out kill us. So I'm a bit reluctant to try it.

>they'll program a bender and zap you
But what if we brought our own bender? I know. It's probably the programming that's expensive, not the 'bender usage.

>500 chits
500?! That's absurd! Considering we don't have a single chit on us, one could say that that is infinitely expensive~ But yeah, no idea how much money that is. Would need a comparison with a monthly wage or something too see how much of an investment that would be.

>There isn't much danger of that
I wouldn't be too sure. All it would take is a couple of steps back~

>you doubt you'll be thinking of him while in the throes of self-passion
Hey, don't dis Matteo! He's the sexiest nerd so far and as far as Penny's concerned, he's the only male that exists in Vesper! I'm joking but, heh, a funny thought. What if the proportion of males that survive raw taffa isn't the same as females? And it's something skewed like, 10:90? Or 90:10?
Anyway, what would Penny be thinking of then? That's a good question. No, don't do it. Don't actually have suggesters vote on this - it would cause too much conflict early on. Better to just give Penny some porn to look at heh.

>>/quest/925679
>I think some body mods are grafted on
So you're saying... Penny with a huge dong is possible... D:
>I really don't think you need it, though
What? Why wouldn't Penny want to drag a 3ft shlong behind her?!

>We all are
I...
>That just raises more questions
...yeah. Questions like, is Penny the only one that believes humans look different? Normally, the word human would refer to a species, but perhaps here the word simply refers to being sentient. It's also possible that human here could be a reference to all the species at the same time, that is, there is no differentiation between species at all, however that's a bit less likely due to the fact that we have (probably) encountered at least one other species reference - the plasmodians.

>>/quest/925680
>you aren't convinced by Vesper's whole "you are a new person, let your old life go" ethos
Cider said that "they offer an opportunity", which doesn't sound like anyone's forced to forget their past life, so I don't think they would actively prevent us from trying to do what we want. As long as we provide logical reasoning and not make it sound like an obsession.

Theory time. Vesper has a lot of experience with taffa syndrome sufferers, so they obviously dealt with people who were obsessed with their qabels before. If such people would turn out fine, then there wouldn't be any issues, and they wouldn't really care. But this likely wasn't the case. I suspect that something terrible may have happened to people who were obsessed with their qabels. With terrible I mean, severe mental disorders, or even disintegration of their dust. And this is why Vesper would truly wish for people to forget their qabels. Not because of arbitrary ethics, but to protect them.

>Nothing else, right?
"Cross my heart."
[later on the holo with Quincy]
"So where's the partyyyyy"

>Just need a username
fl0ppycakes

>>/quest/925681
>You're new here, right?
So is she!

>Do you feel like there's something... wrong with this place?
Now that Penny found someone even flatter than her, not anymore!

It's strange how she became more talkative as soon as Roz left. As if she distrusts her. I suppose this means that her reclusiveness is at least partially a result of her perception of the people around her, and not just due to her nightmares. In fact, she may have a completely normal and social personality otherwise.
>>
No. 129491 ID: f3310b

>>/quest/926812
>They're pretty culty
No, that's probably just her trying to act friendly / agreeable towards Penny. She has no memories and she's only been here a couple of days, so how would she know what culty is? That makes no sense.

>You aren't fuzzy at all
Another clue is given.

It's mysterious how our own perception is different than Mint's. Are Penny's and Mint's perceptions unique? It's entirely possible that various people have various types of perception and that neither is special.
>>
No. 129492 ID: f3310b

>>/quest/929223
Hmm, are there perspective problems in this panel? I'm not sure. Anyway...

>I'm still the only one who can feel it
I'm assuming that she talked to all the prominent people in Vesper and they all told her that no one's ever had an experience similar to her before. In that case, yeah, that's quite weird. And quite a coincidence. Imagine the chance of us meeting a special person like her, and her joining Vesper at a similar time as... no, wait. She's been here for a few days, but we were also here for a few days, except we were... busy in a bed. Which means that Penny and Mint both entered Vesper at the same time? That can't be a coincidence. Something's going on. We'll need to ask Mint about her initial circumstances to see if there's any similarity to ours.
But... if it's Penny and Mint, then there could be another special person as well. If this hypothetical person is not at Vesper, then either they're dead, are stuck somewhere / captured, or they're in a hospital. Fuck. Should we be checking up on hospitals? Cider would most likely know if someone in a hospital somewhere recently rejected Vesper's invitation...

Or something like that :P

>I feel it
Can you feel it? Can you feel.. the rhythm?! Let's dance!

>>/quest/929224
>courteous enough to consider your height and put it all in the bottommost drawer
Haha. Look, Penny is a grown-up girl and she doesn't need hand-outs. She can climb the drawers by herself! With a ladder!

>What if this place... made them that way?
That's a very strange thing to say. Why would she say that? If she thinks this place makes people fuzzy, then why is she fuzzy and we're not when we've both been here the same amount of time? Has she been to some place that doesn't make people fuzzy then?
Something tells me that taking her to the Old City would give us some clues. Altho I don't see this happening anytime soon.

>>/quest/929225
>at long last, underwear!
And then, having gone without it for so long, Penny developed an obsession with underwear.

>>/quest/929226
Hah, I imagine that if the base was animated, you could call it Hard Mode~
>>
No. 129493 ID: f3310b

>>/quest/929441
Bummer, none of my picks passed the first round. I kinda don't like the military-style outfits because, well, we're not in the army and they don't really fit the atmosphere. Nor do I like the male-style clothes because they eliminate what little feminineness Penny has left, which is what was mostly left in the second round.

>>/quest/930709
Man, seeing Penny wear underwear is so weird!

>Dare you to go in the buff
Don't be silly, Penny can't do that on the first day! On the second day however...
>>
No. 129494 ID: f3310b

>>/quest/932536
>we can just meet up again later
Little did Penny know, that this would be the last time she would be seeing Mint...
Kidding. But really, she's Penny's roommate now. They will meet again one way or another.

>It's quiet and empty here
Indeed, I'd expect more people to be out and about.

As always, excellent art!

>>/quest/932537
>Where is everybody?
The thing is, shops need customers. So if there's no people walking around, it means there would be no customers. And the shops wouldn't have anything to do. I suppose it's a part of the day when most people have chores to do, however, I'd still expect these streets to get busy at some point and the place becoming alive.

>It's not like you could've known 'em for long.
She's right. Looking at it like that, there's nothing particularily special about Quincy. However, she's unique in a way that she doesn't belong to Vesper and thus can provide a different perspective on things.


...
Don't ask how long writing all of this took.
>>
No. 129495 ID: f3310b

>>127703 >>127704 >>127705 >>127706 >>127707 >>127708 >>127709 >>127813
Thanks for sharing, all of these look absolutely awesome!
>>
No. 129498 ID: 891b91

>>129475
Alright, I sent you a quick message just to get the ball rolling. Thanks for offering to do this!

>>129476
Glad you're liking it so far!

>>129483
Thanks for doing all these reviews! It's genuinely helpful to get this sort of in-depth feedback. As always, there's a lot in here I can't say much in response to, lest I spoil my plans for the quest, but I'm going to address what I can.

>Ah, it feels so good when my predictions turn out to be perfectly on point.
Likewise, I like it when suggesters make accurate guesses as to what's really going on -- not that I want it to be trivial to guess, but it's really fun to see you guys pick up on clues and piece things together.

>As far as I'm concerned, it takes one update with a time skip~
That's an interesting idea. If it were to happen, chances are that the Penny we no know would be a significantly different person, having had time for her personality to redevelop as she acquires new memories.

>>129485
>Bag of kroy-vons picture
Well done, gave me a chuckle.

>And could they even tell if their fake memories were fake?
People at Vesper would say yes, definitely. There's a reason why Vesper's way of doing things has gained legitimacy in recent years -- the constructed memories are mostly factual records, and nothing else. So the patient remembers that an event happened, but it doesn't have the sort of emotional meaning that a genuine memory would have. If you've read Unnatural Selection, it's kind of like what Glitcher went through after Likol's team resurrected him.

>Haha, Polenta! I can't believe you chose that name!
I'm glad you got a kick out of that. At the time, the name just popped into my head and I liked the sound of it, and I thought the idea of having some characters with food-based name was interesting.

>>129486
>I can't help but grin at the implications this entails.
Anything is possible!

>Other than that... have we always been this small compared to Roz?
That's one of the things I've had some issues with in terms of consistency, although since then I started doing some extra stuff to try to ensure that proportions between characters stay constant.

>>129487
>Anyway, I'd prefer no bra
Well, as I've said all along I'll allow lewdness (to varying degrees) so long as enough people are pushing for it and if it makes sense within the context of the plot. So if you can come up with a good reason for it, feel free to try to convince everyone else!

>>129488
>Oh dear. It looks like Penny found the wrong person to mess around with.
If only she'd known about Roz's reputation beforehand! Curious that Cider didn't warn her first.

>>129489
>I'm ashamed to say that lewd stuff in quests is one of my preferences.
Hey, I wouldn't be allowing it if I didn't like it too!

>Similarly, I don't think it makes sense for Penny to decide on her sexuality from one single experience.
That's true, but on the same token it's not like Penny's going through puberty, she's an adult. She may have lost her memories, but she's emotionally developed enough to be able to quickly accept the reality of it when her body says, "hey, you're physically attracted to this naked person standing in front of you."

>Personally, I'd vote for straight or bi, altho it looks like the straight ship has already sailed~
Clearly Penny just needs some, ahem, exposure to what the male form has to offer before she can be sure whether she's into dudes too.

>>129490
>Hey, don't dis Matteo! He's the sexiest nerd so far and as far as Penny's concerned, he's the only male that exists in Vesper!
Unfortunately, he's also a big sourpuss and Penny ain't into that!

>Penny with a huge dong is possible... D:
Hypothetically speaking, yes.

>Now that Penny found someone even flatter than her, not anymore!
Perhaps a comparison is in order!

>>129492
>Hmm, are there perspective problems in this panel? I'm not sure.
Yeah, the perspective didn't really work out the way I'd intended it.

>>129494
>As always, excellent art!
Thanks!

>>129495
Glad you like them!
>>
No. 129499 ID: b5d6fa

>>129498
I have to argue FIERCELY against the idea of such a massive timeskip. It robs us of agency in developing Penny's character, and may cause issues with her characterization that we had no intention of. General short term timeskips are fine (maybe a month at a time, depending on a vote or something), but nothing so large and allowing all that potential plot and personality to just be 'boop' done. That, I think, does disservice to the individuals who are here precisely FOR that purpose- and yes, I'm largely talking about myself.

Then again, naileD, we've always been at loggerheads when it comes to what we most desire out of quests, so this opposition makes sense enough.
>>
No. 129501 ID: 891b91

>>129499
While I thought it was an interesting idea, a several years-long timeskip would require near-unanimous agreement among suggesters (as well as an opportune point in the quest for it to occur), since it would deviate enormously from my plans for the quest. So it's technically a possibility, but not likely to happen.
>>
No. 129503 ID: f3310b

>>129499
You need not worry since I wrote that mostly as a joke. Neither I nor teegee have argued in its favor. It was merely a way to explore the possibilities. If you want my opinion on the idea, I personally think it's not a good one either, so we're not at odds here. Altho my reasoning would be more from an objective standpoint, where I believe that such a long time skip would create a large inconsistency in the pacing of the story, it would create plot holes, and it generally wouldn't make sense for Penny's established plans and characteristics.

While we're on the topic of characterization, I'd like to note that I consider imperfect characters as the most realistic. If the suggesters get to have a full hands-on approach to the characterization all the time, they would most likely try to create a perfect character. So there is such a thing as having too much agency.
I'd also like to note that character development is something that is happening in the quest all the time, from beginning to the end. So it's not something that would suddenly be in a short supply.

>we've always been at loggerheads
I'm sorry but, I don't know who you are.
>>
No. 129504 ID: b4b7b2

>>129503
...okay, fair cop. I remember you from Coxwette so I got paranoid. Sorry about that. Glad we're on the same page.

Also I change names and IPs a lot so yeah. I realized that not long after I posted.
>>
No. 129511 ID: e51896

Y'know, I almost thought that insectoid attendant at the desk of the bath house was an Arthocob, a species from Sarcopholacooda's quests. But looking closer, it looks like he isn't.
But it would not be the first time a cameo appearance from a character or species from another quest appeared, like Sunny lol.
>>
No. 129517 ID: f3310b

>>/quest/933785
The owl. It knows!

I still think that there's nothing particularly unusual about these animals, that is, I don't believe they're spying on us or anything. Actually, there's evidence against it. The foxes that we saw before, when we found them, they were busy with the remains of the body. This means that, until we got there, they had no interest in us at all. And once they figured out that we weren't interesting, they left. If they were spying on us, then we would not have found them the way we did. It would've been more similar to the owl. So yeah, the owl staring at us may be unnerving and it's possible it sees something unusual about us. But that's not the same as spying, which, without any evidence to support it, would be a very paranoid thing to claim.

>You almost ask Roz about it
I don't see how asking her about this would be any worse than asking her about being human. But I suppose we should hold back on the most freaky questions until after we've talked with Quincy. So she doesn't get any second thoughts about helping us heh.

>>/quest/933786
>The owl flies off suddenly
Maybe it thought we were spying on it and it got freaked out ;)

>the bathhouse's down here
Down here? Where's the Olympic-size swimming pool then?

>>/quest/933787
>and doesn't wanna be alone.
I'm confused. Did you mean to write "or wants to be alone"?

>hang a left for the ladies' section
I wonder how he was able to tell that Penny's female.

>Roz's nudist club for weirdos
The question now is, how does this nudist club fit in with this spa.
One possibility is that it doesn't fit at all, and everyone in the spa is required to be covered regardless. So we're not actually voting on whether we want to go nude right now or not. However, that's unlikely considering the guy didn't already mention any such restrictions, nor are there any warning signs about that anywhere.
So it looks like nudity is allowed. However, he's waiting for us to give him our answer first, so that he wouldn't unnecessarily be giving us the rundown on the code of conduct for going au naturel.

>that's cheating
I guess the little corner for the Nudists United in the co-ed isn't anything great, which is why he wouldn't want Penny to get any... inaccurate info heh.

Checking out the room, there's one other thing that may be of interest. On the far left there seems to be a diagram of the layout of this place, which matches the directions he gave us.
We should definitely visit all the rooms of this place. I mean, it's important to be intimately familiar with the exact layout in a case of, cough, an emergency.
>>
No. 129518 ID: 891b91

>>129511
Nah, not an Arthocob, just an insectman!

>>129517
>I'm confused. Did you mean to write "or wants to be alone"?
In retrospect I could have worded it better, but Roz is saying that she's gonna do her usual thing (heading straight for the co-ed spa), unless Penny wants Roz to tag along with her to a different part of the bathhouse.

>The question now is, how does this nudist club fit in with this spa.
This is another part I should have written more clearly. The attendant's asking Penny about Roz's "club" as an aside, unrelated to his duties at the bathhouse (which amount to acting as a helper and making sure the bathhouse doesn't exceed its capacity for customers.)
>>
No. 129520 ID: cb6404

Petition to rename our shelf thing "Cider's Home for Wayward Cigar Czars"
>>
No. 129526 ID: e51896

>>129518
>Nah, not an Arthocob, just an insectman!

Nah, not an insectman, just a human!
just like how a lot of characters in the quest believe and insist that they are human, even though they don't look human, lol ;)

joking aside, that owl, one thing that is unnerving is that while the owl has two left vertical eyes like the foxes, this owl's eyes were pure white with no pupils (maybe even glowing?) while in comparison, the foxes eyes, while also vertical, were at least normal enough to have pupils in comparison. I don't know, even if all wildlife in this world has vertical eyes, something was definitely up with that owl.
>>
No. 129544 ID: 5ba090

Hey I just read this, and it's quite good.
I want to ask something though. There's this quest on the Major Completed Quests page of the wiki called Crowmanticar https://tgchan.org/wiki/Crowmanticar
In it, there's a mist which turns humans into zombies (the undead kind). Some of them kind of recover and regain sentience. Some space whales take these smart zombies and transfer their minds into animal bodies, where their memories eventually end up combining with the animals'.
It's not really *that* similar to Dead Dust but while reading I felt reminded of it, with stuff like everyone thinking they're human. Did you know about this quest at all, or is it just an interesting coincidence?
>>
No. 129577 ID: 891b91

>>129526
>just a human!
;)

>that owl
No joke, I got a little spooked by that owl while working on that update!

>>129544
Thank you, I'm glad you like it! I read part of Crowmanticar years ago, but I don't think I got to the part with the mist. (That sounds pretty interesting though, I really ought to go back and finish reading the whole thing.) Any similarities probably aren't intentional.
>>
No. 129646 ID: 790132

Hasn't been an update for a while, it feels like. Everything okay?
>>
No. 129664 ID: 891b91

>>129646
Yep, everything's fine! I just got distracted by other stuff for a bit, but now I'm back in the saddle and plan on posting the next update tomorrow (or today, depending on how you look at it).
>>
No. 129665 ID: f8b1f2

>>129664
I am hyped :3
>>
No. 129695 ID: 891b91
File 156100849326.png - (203.78KB , 848x810 , penny_thanos_swimsuit.png )
129695

>>
No. 129696 ID: e51896

>>129695
that does put a smile on my face.
>>
No. 129697 ID: b92204

>>129695
This sent me into hysterics.
>>
No. 129698 ID: c240a7

teegee, please, murdering readers is illegal
>>
No. 129699 ID: f2136e

>>129695
why
>>
No. 129700 ID: 864e49

>>129695
OK, Now this is epic!
>>
No. 129701 ID: 3d1dd5

Oh snap
>>
No. 129931 ID: 891b91

It's been a hot minute since I last updated any of my quests, so I figure I should give a little update. In short, I got pretty busy between schoolwork, family plans for Independence Day, and taking care of a couple medical issues that came up. (Don't worry, it's nothing serious.) Things have calmed down a bit now, though, so I'm hoping to get all 3 quests updated this weekend, assuming I'm able to finish up my schoolwork for the week tomorrow. Starting with next week, I'm going to try my best to get started on a weekly update schedule for my quests where each one gets an update over 3 consecutive days (probably either Wednesday through Friday or Thursday through Saturday). I believe it'll be doable, but if not, then I'll try seeing what my other options could be.
>>
No. 129933 ID: e51896

Thanks for the news. schoolwork is most important and comes first, so we understand if you're pretty busy. Do your best.
>>
No. 129975 ID: bcc41d

>>129931
Best of luck with it!
>>
No. 130004 ID: b1b4f3

>>129931
Things didn't go as planned I assume?
>>
No. 130132 ID: 891b91

>>130004
Yeah, schoolwork ended up taking me longer than I expected.
>>
No. 130221 ID: bddb0f

>>130132
Not to worry, schoolwork should always take priority.
>>
No. 130268 ID: e51896

Hey, even though you are busy with school, I gotta say thanks for finding time to squeeze in a new page.
>>
No. 130401 ID: 891b91

>>130221
Thanks, I appreciate the understanding! I've got a month of vacation coming soon-ish, so with any luck my quests should be more active during that time.

>>130268
No problem, I've been making a concerted effort to try to organize my time better so I can have more time to work on getting updates out. Thank you for reading/suggesting and for your continued patience!
>>
No. 131089 ID: 49e4d4

Alright, so obviously Roz doesn't want us to know, which means it's probably a good idea for us to find out without anyone KNOWING we've found out. I still want to see if we can't manipulate that girl while letting her think she's manipulating us, but we should take precautions before we 'succumb to our curiosity' and inquire in a way that she notices.
>>
No. 131090 ID: b1b4f3

I mean, we CAN just go ask Millie.
>>
No. 131105 ID: 19da47

Is the whole dust concept inspired by his dark material dust?
>>
No. 131119 ID: 502f42

>>131105
If I remember right (and I probably don’t, it’s been years) the mechanics of the dust in Dead Dust are pretty different from the “Dust” in His Dark Materials series. Can’t really elaborate without spoiling the hell out of that series (not to mention it’s off-topic) but the Dust in Dead Dust seems to be like, I don’t know, a manifestation of the soul (it’s mysterious, in a good way), whereas the Dust in His Dark Materials is more like, ambient magic or something, I don’t know that stuff’s also mysterious. And confusing.

But that’s just my two cents.
>>
No. 131121 ID: 891b91

>>131105
I’m not familiar with His Dark Materials, so any similarities are completely coincidental, I’m afraid. I don’t completely remember offhand how I came up with the idea for dust, although I do seem to recall that I came up with the name for it after I’d already thought up the concept for what it is. No doubt it’s inspired by several things, but a lot of my inspiration creeps in on a subconscious level, which makes it a bit difficult to pin down what those influences are sometimes.

>>131119
>the Dust in Dead Dust seems to be like, I don’t know, a manifestation of the soul
I’d say you’re on the right track, but that’s also not the whole picture.
>>
No. 131123 ID: 5a7f1b

I have to wonder, were they meant to come off so very cultish? Because the beginning of chapter one has me put off from them so very, very much. That and it feels like we're being strung along.

Also I can't stop thinking "When's the next update!?!" Because damnit, now I'm emotionally invested in the protagonist.
>>
No. 131128 ID: 49e4d4

>>131123
Personally, I don't want that question to be answered. Would affect our decisions, and I like the debate going on now.
>>
No. 131131 ID: b28250

>>131128
And I like the mystery. Lore should be uncovered, not expounded upon.
>>
No. 131133 ID: cb6404

>>131123

I might be one of the only people in the thread who read all of Cider's stuff and thought, "Yes, I trust this person implicitly with just how much they're revealing." But maybe that's just me.

Also dang, yes, I need more Penny in my life. She is the most adorable little not-a-cutebold and she gives me sustenance.

>>131128
>>131131

Agreed here as well. I like that the "dust" is some kind of unknown, and it almost makes sense that coming to terms with it might be part of the whole Vesper Society deal, and information they might not be willing to toss about to those who've messed with Taffa so recently.
>>
No. 131143 ID: 49e4d4

>>131133
Although I'm glad you agree with us not being handed revelations, I have to insist that it's not the fact that she's telling us stuff, which is useful. It's the fact that she's keeping us against how will, and the way their system is set up, we have no choice in the matter. It's a lack of agency. Yes, they're supposedly legally bound, but it's clear we're a bit more clever than your average cigarztsar. Cider's attitude was so cloying that I can't help but be suspicious of them one way or another.
>>
No. 131145 ID: cb6404

>>131143

In hindsight ... yeah, you actually make a pretty good point. She was a bit coddling about things, but I suppose I'd read it as Cider being used to weepy / pouty / resistant / whatever ciggies who were probably distraught and in need of guidance.

Who knows.
>>
No. 131146 ID: cb6404

Crazy and 400% Not At All Serious, caffeine-fueled thoughts on the whole affair:


The "medicine vial" is indeed a graphene-complex, that is to say HK-dust and thus potentially a programmed or charged Taffa substance.

We acquired this from that Taunton Microdynamics place by some means and used it to become The Ultimate Cutebold, perhaps illicitly.

Moira was sent to hunt down the missing stuff, because it sounds like any kind of substantial body augmentation is The Big Money and TM was pretty angery about it.

Enraged that our humanity was forever lost to us upon discovering the process irreversible, and that we were being tracked, we killed Moira or otherwise led her into a trap, stole her jumpsuit (remember, only a jacket was found and we were totally commando, so our original clothes no longer fit!) and possibly some chits, and rented a room in a basement to commit ego-suicide because we were totally unappreciative of our Ultimate Cutebold form.

Ergo, upon returning to the surface, does Preston, who is secretly part of a mafia-like organization that was trying to stop Moira, if not tasked with being rid of her, recognize both her image in the business card and our (stolen) jumpsuit, as well as the equipment case, and fear that his own involvement is about to come to light -- hence his reactions and his fearful state. And potentially why a craft came by to figure out who ELSE had just left "O-Town" by way of the evac system and had to go through the renaturalization process.

Because having your ward affinity blanked via a bender -- like the one we had -- would be the perfect disguise!

As for why her body is missing, I don't know, but the funky-eye-critters are also secretly agents of the dust and are indeed attempting to guide us toward something.

>>
No. 131149 ID: 891b91

>>131123
>I have to wonder, were they meant to come off so very cultish? Because the beginning of chapter one has me put off from them so very, very much. That and it feels like we're being strung along.
As others have said, any real answer I could give to this question would veer too much into spoiler territory and unduly affect suggesters’ decisions. So, all I can really say right now is that it’s up to you (and everyone else) to figure out what Vesper’s moral character is and decide the best course of action based on that.

(That being said, I’d love to answer your question eventually, so keep it in mind for sometime in the future, when it won’t be spoilery to discuss it!)

>Also I can't stop thinking "When's the next update!?!" Because damnit, now I'm emotionally invested in the protagonist.
Right now!

>>131133
>>131143
>>131145
>>131146
I can’t comment on any of it in detail for obvious reasons, but man do I love reading all this discussion and speculation. (Same goes for the discussion going on in the quest thread recently.) it’s one of my favorite things about running quests, so thank you for posting it!
>>
No. 131150 ID: 015bf2

I've gotta admit that I made an early decision to treat the Vespers as a 'cultish thing' intentionally despite the current low levels of evidence. We've seen suspicious behaviour of precisely one Vesper so far, but nothing that indicates that things are as bad as all that. It's just that it's entirely possible our suspicions are true and validated to some extent and it's much more fun to have Penny sit on that suspicious mindset, especially if it makes her more woke to the situation she's in, for good and bad. Not to mention have her hold a grumpy grudge over her sudden recruitment to the faction when all else was going so swimmingly with her attempt to strike out on her own.

Anyway, really loving the quest, teegee! It's deep enough that on occasion I catch myself rereading parts to brush up on my knowledge of the setting's lore.
>>
No. 131165 ID: 10c408

>>131150
I'm on the opposite side because we never really asked quincy about them and now that we've woken up on their property, it seems that information is being tightly controlled, on top of some other stuff I find perplexing and shifty.

To wit: A whole parade of people, including the medical staff, came and went to see how we were doing after finally waking up from the coma but not a single one of them said anything about Cinder, or said anything about anything that didn't pertain to ourselves or our coma. (red flag #1)

The entire deal with staying at the vesper society and having a personality grown from scratch is fine on paper, but the execution and even the explanation from cinder has been pretty shifty and the logistical cost alone (red flag #2) on top of the duration (RF #3) just smacks of some kind of exploitation in and of itself (though whether the 'fix' is for free labor or circumventing some statue of limitations we're not aware of remains to be seen)

And then there's millie and her unsubtle pitch to get in her van for information candy. (more red flags!)

As of now, I'm... kinda sure that vesper is on the lighter side of morally grey? If we can take Cinder at her word then we lucked out but if not...
>>
No. 131173 ID: cb6404

This occurred to me a few days back, but I never committed it to a post here:

You know how Mint talks about weird fuzziness to everyone?

I think she has The Itch, or whatever Quincy was talking about. I'd propose we see if Q's One Weird Trick for O-Town Hobos (read: booze) works, maybe as a way to loosen everyone up (Roz included), but ... the girl is a twig, we're a short-stack cutebold, and Roz is amazonian in stature. I don't think it'd work well.

That and we're a bit far, both in time and personality, from a chance to be all, "Hey Roz, let's head back to my place and drink booze with the cute shy girl I literally just met and have a slumber-party!"

(20 points to Dar Balzan)

Back on topic, however, "The Itch" seems to be related to rhythmo-whatevers, and Penny was purportedly the only person to have freaky interactions with the glyph and to not have the same fuzziness as others on Red Shelf. What are the odds that Mint was exposed to a rhythm-shift that mucked with her -- or is otherwise sensitive to it and the effects of Taffa Syndrome on the HK-dust of a person -- and is thus noting how our dust is all funky because of whatever that medicine vial was ...?
>>
No. 131187 ID: 19da47

Honestly i really hope the Vesper organization isn't a evil cult. I kind of like the idea of a organization that goes out of its way to help people recover.
>>
No. 131189 ID: b233f0

>>131187
I mean... yes, I like that idea too, but it wouldn't be much of a story if it was all gumdrops and sunshine from here. There will likely be good and bad both. We've already stumbled over hints of SECRETS AND LIES.

But hey, if we can root out the truth, maybe the Vespers will become better for it and we can have a proper home base among them. Or at least run off with the good bits.
>>
No. 131190 ID: 49e4d4

>>131187
Iunno, I'd like the idea of a morally-grey organization (darker grey preferably, but any but the lightest shade is acceptable). It's interesting intrigue that I'd really hope has a good payoff.
>>
No. 131241 ID: 30f4b7

>>131149
Its less that they're outright *evil*, but more that they're bad for us and we can't do anything about it that I dislike. Penny is basically a prisoner and dispite being told its to help her, the one in charge apparently doesn't care at all about what they think/feel. The Vespers simply don't seem willing to actually act in syxh a way as to be believable or trustworthy. Being nice costs nothing, but they withhold information and give no choice and expect her to be happy qith it. THAT (among the various red flags) is what pushes them from dubious or just weird into being bad. Its also somewhat frustrating, making it feel like we're on rails and unable to affect change. I get that they're meant to be mysterious, but from my viewpoint they just seem bad instead of morally grey or neutral. I mean, is staying/escaping the Vespers meant to be a choice? Because if it is then their shoukd be SOME good side to them.

Also, it seems like Roz may be trying to butter us up so her clan can have us for whatever, which makes me sad. I really liked her at first.
>>
No. 131248 ID: 719f92

>>131241
I think you're overly paranoid and im in the camp that Vesper is so far misunderstood in a lot of things and is over all a neutral foundation with good intentions that said i still think that there are people in said organization that has nefarious intentions. We should get more information before passing judgment. If they are truly evil then we could always just runaway. Its not like they have us in a prison cell.
>>
No. 131252 ID: 891b91

>131241
>Its also somewhat frustrating, making it feel like we're on rails and unable to affect change. I get that they're meant to be mysterious, but from my viewpoint they just seem bad instead of morally grey or neutral. I mean, is staying/escaping the Vespers meant to be a choice? Because if it is then their shoukd be SOME good side to them.

This is a really worthwhile piece of meta-criticism, so I think I should address it. I'm going to do my best to avoid spoiling anything, but just in case I'm going to place my response in spoiler tags.


I don't intend for the quest to feel like it's on rails, but I see your point. I don't think it's much of a spoiler to say that I have never planned the quest around Penny following Vesper's plans, since if she did that'd make for a fairly boring quest that fails to hit the major plot points I have in mind. So, to me, it's less of a question of whether Penny will cease to be under Vesper's control, and more a question of how, when, and with whom.

I think a significant part of the feeling of railroading comes from Penny having played things very safe with Vesper. (Granted, that sort of thing is common for tgchan.) While Cider & co. have been unwilling to give Penny what she wants, Penny has gone along with them in the face of their reticence, when she could have been more demanding or defiant. I'm not saying that being compliant was the wrong choice, but it is one that has contributed to this feeling of being trapped. That being said, I can say with complete certainty that Penny will gain significantly more control over her situation, regardless of the path she takes.

>>
No. 131253 ID: 891b91

>>131252
After discussing this a bit on Discord, I've become convinced that another major cause of the railroaded feeling is due to the relatively slow pace the quest has been moving at. I think it might be best if I change my strategy for running multiple quests from running them concurrently to running them on a chapter-by-chapter basis like Lagotrope tends to do. I think it may be easier for me to keep up a faster pace of updates if I focus on one quest at a time, since I won't have to "switch contexts" all the time, so to speak.

If I go forward with this plan, I'll start by putting Flora and Arzfayz on hiatus until I've got both the current chapter and the next chapter of Dead Dust complete. Then, at that point, I'll focus on either Arzfayz or Flora for a chapter, then the remaining quest for a chapter, then Dead Dust for a chapter, and so on.

Before I bite the bullet, though, I'd like to get everyone's opinion on it, so please let me know what you think and if you'd prefer that I switch off like this as opposed to running them concurrently like I have been.
>>
No. 131254 ID: b1b4f3

Well, it seems like a shame to pause Arzfayz when we're so close to getting her the dick (or at least it seems like we're close) but otherwise yeah it'd be good to focus on Dead Dust.
>>
No. 131255 ID: 9b2d3c

>>131253
I may just be particularly patient, but I have no beef with the current pacing and haven't felt particularly locked in by the Vesper storyline. This is from someone whose opinion was that we shouldn't have looked at the pamphlet in the first place (it was suspicious and we should've gotten more information or solicited a second opinion), but didn't get a comment in at the time.

I also have an important question: do you enjoy or find it easier running quests concurrently and swapping between them? If so, I don't think there's anything wrong with sticking with that. I'd rather you have a fun quest-making process than more focused updates.

That said, if you were to focus on any one quest then Dead Dust would definitely be my favored pick and I approve of your plans. Not that the other two aren't interesting, I'm just more invested in DD.

Perhaps you could have a 'best of both worlds' where you update Dead Dust 3-4 times for every time you update the others?
>>
No. 131257 ID: 891b91

>>131255
>I also have an important question: do you enjoy or find it easier running quests concurrently and swapping between them?
Well, on one hand I do feel a little sad about the idea of putting the other quests on the backburner, but on the other I think it'd probably be easier for me to stay focused on upping the pace on Dead Dust if I'm not having to switch to thinking about other quests as much.

>Perhaps you could have a 'best of both worlds' where you update Dead Dust 3-4 times for every time you update the others?
I think this might be a good compromise, especially since as >>131254 pointed out, Arzfayz quest is getting close to some real action. That way the pace in Dead Dust will pick up significantly without sacrificing progress on the other quests entirely.
>>
No. 131259 ID: aaa179

>>131253
I'll be playing the role of the selfish queste, then:

I'm largely interested in Dead Dust over your other ventures, not that AAA gets no love from me. So having a '3 per 1' kinda style in favor of Dead Dust is most preferable to me, though alternating chapters is acceptable too.
>>
No. 131260 ID: eeb7d9

I kinda got lost on this quest, but if you plan on finishing this thing first, i will stick around and wait for Arzfayz and Flora.
>>
No. 131261 ID: a0dfd2

>>131253

I'm fine with that, as long as you're comfortable with that change.
>>
No. 131263 ID: 32b5ec

>>131253
I'd prefer the chapter-by-chapter approach.
>>
No. 131264 ID: 92425d

Sounds good
>>
No. 131285 ID: 1eb1bc

>>131257
Hey man, you gotta do what you gotta do. Total honesty, I like Dead Dust the best; but I know from experience that ignoring passion or inspiration for the sake of consistency or speed is a one-way ticket to burnout. It’s art, the art of storytelling, and like any other art it’s quality is 100% based on the passion behind it. If you’re exited for it, fulfilled by it, than that’s what you should be pursuing. Never treat your art as a product, our input may matter but in the end your preference, your desire, takes precedence.

All your quests are great. But that’s because you can feel the intention and emotion behind every word and every picture. If you’re forcing yourself to do it? It’s just not the same. At the risk of sounding like a cliché for the ages: follow your heart. Art is not about duty or obligation or even what your audience wants; it’s about expression, and that is something you just can’t force. So if passion tells you to write Arzfayz, Dead Dust can wait.

Besides, choosing between your quests is like choosing an Ice-cream flavor: one might be your favorite, but you’re hardly compromising by picking something else.
>>
No. 131289 ID: 891b91

Thanks for your input, everyone -- I think I'll go with a bit of a compromise, for the time being. I'm going to shoot for updating Dead Dust 2-3 times for every time I update Arzfayz and Flora, at least until the next thread of Dead Dust is complete. Once that's done, I might put DD on hiatus until the first threads of Arzfayz and Flora are complete, although I'm not completely decided on that yet.
>>
No. 131300 ID: eb1fcc

>>131253
I think the chapter approach is the best way to accomplish this, yeah. I like all your quests but arz is the only one I'm able to currently keep up with thanks to time pressure.

It's cool that you juggle so many, but this is very much an update-speed oriented format :6
>>
No. 131305 ID: 15a025

>>131253
>>131289
Late to the party, but I'm fine with either plan.
>>
No. 131335 ID: 719d94

Well, dividing your attention between two quests at once... how have you been doing it? It probably is rough to push yourself to switch gears, but if you're jumping back and forth as inspiration strikes you that's a lot more reasonable.

Personally I'm used to quests often having a slow update pace and sometimes undergoing significant hiatuses, so I'm fine whether you decide to break things into chapters, continue running two quests concurrently, or run one quest at a time and switch whenever fancy takes you. Just do what works best for you as the author.

(I suspect that switching gears for extended periods in the middle of chapters would be real frustrating to some readers, so take my opinion with a grain of salt.)
>>
No. 131336 ID: 864e49

First, Discord?

Second, I've always been of the belief that it doesn't matter how slow a quest is so long as it doesn't die.
Quests dying cause the author felt like they had some responsibility to us and/or ended up overburdened is one of the worst things for me.
>>
No. 131342 ID: e5e15e

>>131336
theres a tgchan discord now.
>>
No. 131356 ID: 845319

>>131253
Yeah, that would probably be better. Personally I wasn't aware you were doing more than one at once but it makes sense in hindsight. Personally I find that when splitting my attention between multiple things if I don't have sufficient time/progress on each individual thing it makes all of them as a whole slow down. Though honestly I'm only really focused on Dead Dust, even if the others seem nice.

Also, does anyone know where I can find the Discord link?
>>
No. 131357 ID: eba8a7

>>131356
Here's a link to the post here with the invite link: >>/meep/29292

I'm thinking we could do with a pinned thread with the Discord link, rather than buried in a post in a site suggestion thread in the General Discussion board.
>>
No. 131440 ID: 49e4d4

I have to admit I'm curious why Roz thinks that way. Is it JUST because of Millie? Or do people know more about their pasts than they think? This kind of judgement seems like it's something that's really hard to quantify based on nothing but suppositions and heresay.

They may have been approaching it differently- fully believing that if they were that way, they had to stay that way, as opposed to more of a history/fact finding mission that, like was said, has little to nothing to what they're doing now. Really, it sounds like most of them were scared out of it rather than actually had any measure of success. Perhaps there was a number of Vespers who discovered something about themselves and got obsessed with those small pieces?
>>
No. 131451 ID: a0dfd2

>>131440

This response is going to contain some pretty heavy shit.

Raw taffa in sufficient quantity is tantamount to suicide. In fact, it might as well be, as we saw for those left completely burned out. Death isn't limited to the loss of life, after all; the complete eradication of the ego, of the self, is a form of death.

The "dead dust" in the title is part of that; the expulsion of this past self due to corruption from taffa, resulting in the blank slate that Penny has become.

Now imagine if you'd attempted to commit suicide, whatever the reason, and "succeeded," only to lose all of your memories -- an identical scenario to what is presumed of Penny and the rest of the Vesper Society. That isn't something someone can easily look on dispassionately, even if it was "their old self." Trauma may be able to be regarded coldly, as objective fact, but when that trauma is your own ... there's a reason that psychiatric professions exist, that people struggle for years (if not their entire lives) to understand what they go through.

Now imagine you've learned every reason why your past self chose to die -- not bodily, but the complete eradication of the self, in what I presume must be the equivalent of making their dust non-recoverable, given hints found throughout the quest.

Even if it wasn't the present "you" who did this, you still chose to take your own life and destroy who you were. That is, like the circumstances which bred it, not something which is easy to accept in any sense. And given what we know of Millie, she could be described as being in a dissociative fugue, a form of psychogenic amnesia -- having experienced such stress in learning her past, that her mind has effectively fragmented and created a new persona -- a new ego -- to protect itself from this knowledge.

In a syndrome that is embodied by the complete loss of identity and subsequent ipseity disturbances ... yes, I would say that learning of what led to your former self's desire for complete and total eradication would be deeply and profoundly disturbing.
>>
No. 131500 ID: 891b91

Just wanted to make a quick progress update -- as you might have guessed, I've been pretty busy lately with schoolwork, since the semester's coming to a close and I have multiple projects due soon. Thankfully it'll be over after another week, so I plan to get back to updating more frequently within the next couple weeks.

Regarding the discussion a month ago about quest pacing and rate of updates, I've decided that I'm going to mostly stick to a schedule of 3 Dead Dust updates, followed by an update each for Arzfayz and Flora. I might tweak it here and there as needed, to account for cases where I want to keep going for another update or two with one quest before switching to another, but most of the time I'm going to mainly focus on keeping the ball rolling with DD. That'll continue until the next Dead Dust thread is complete, at which point I'll reassess things and decide how I want to proceed from there.

>>131336
As others have said already, you can find me on the QuestDen Discord server. I haven't been very active there lately, though, again because of school.

>Second, I've always been of the belief that it doesn't matter how slow a quest is so long as it doesn't die.
>Quests dying cause the author felt like they had some responsibility to us and/or ended up overburdened is one of the worst things for me.
I agree, and I'm well aware of the pitfalls that come with letting running a quest feel like work rather than fun. I try to keep in mind that I'm doing this for me as much as I'm doing it for the audience, and that it's okay to slow down if I need a break. I am grateful for everybody's patience, though, and I have every intention of seeing these quests through to the end.
>>
No. 131542 ID: 891b91
File 157572214682.png - (298.39KB , 1818x1628 , pennymono.png )
131542

uh oh penny turned into a neumono
>>
No. 131543 ID: cdabe3

>>131542
Best ending

too bad her boobs didn’t fill out though :P
>>
No. 131544 ID: 015bf2

>>131542
It is a mystery most profound.
>>
No. 131549 ID: 9e04c9

>>/quest/951131
>Aw yeah, got it all to ourselves
Boo, got a dud. I mean, it's too bad that we don't get to share the enjoyment of being in a spa with other people. Yep.

I wonder what happened to Roz's nudist club then. I thought there would be one here. I guess the bet the receptionist has with Roz then was just in general and unrelated to the spa then.

>the water is cold
Is the water cold, or is it simply Penny's perception that makes it seem this way? Was there someone in this tub before Penny and they wanted to cool down, or was this water just right for them? One thing's for sure. Penny's not Canadian.

Also, nice job on Penny's legs... and the background kobold dong :P

>>/quest/951132
>how much male anatomy appeals to you
It's a bit hard to say how much would fit without trying ;)

But yeah, it feels like bad luck that there's not much male traffic at the spa right now. Then again, there were some people in the shower stalls earlier, so I think it's just a matter of time before someone comes along.

>having to resort to staring at some dude's body from across the room
Hey, better than nothing!

>You wonder if she'd even care if she noticed
With how her hair always covers her eyes, we can't really tell. Assuming she has eyes, of course.
Hmm. Surely Roz wouldn't intentionally cover her eyes like that, would she? So that she could spot people staring at her without them knowing that she's looking back? It's... plausible lol
And then it's just a matter of Roz asking Penny if she wants a go.

Anyway, as always, nice job on Roz's assets! It's pretty funny seeing Penny staring embarrassed.

>you could probably go back there
Probably. If enough pervs besides me voted for it. Or if there was a good opportunity for it.

>>/quest/951133
>something just seems wrong about your whole situation
It's hard to tell but yeah, we did get a couple of clues about it in our interactions with Mint (fuzziness) and Roz (humans). However, I don't think pressing Roz further about it would be a good idea at this time.

>She went lookin' for answers off-shelf
What I wonder here is if what Millie did is something that's allowed in the Vesper society. I did have a theory about the dangers of seeking your past self (>>129490), but if Millie really did that and it didn't kill her, then maybe this ethos of Vesper isn't that important to uphold. Still, I feel that before we go digging in our own past, it's crucial that we learn what happened to Millie first. I mean, it's entirely possible that what changed Millie has little or nothing to do with her own past, in which case the dangers of having your dust damaged by this act remains. Or perhaps Millie is simply lucky to have survived.

>I just don't wanna lose another friend
Roz definitely doesn't want Penny digging into her own past and it seems Millie is the reason for this. But I wonder if Millie is the only reason for it. I think that Roz knows more, but feels that telling us about Millie would be enough to persuade us

Anyway, let's hope the heat from the spa doesn't cause Penny to accidentally pass out hehe.
>>
No. 131552 ID: b521ed

>>131542
>Penny turned into a Neumono.
Ultimate life-form achieved.
>>
No. 131560 ID: 891b91
File 157579597606.png - (543.99KB , 2221x2104 , neumonoroz.png )
131560

Roz makes a surprisingly good neumono, I think
>>
No. 131577 ID: a0dfd2

>>131542

Thank you for this. It made my day.
>>
No. 131607 ID: 336cc0

Alright, so we know to keep the topic of Millie (and the outside in general) away from Roz. I wonder just how many people will be attending this festival. Maybe we can put in a subtle inquiry or two about our Delaney, although it'd have to be careful. We should also try to be less obvious about our inquiries, otherwise I'm sure people are goong to talk to higher ups and result in us being watched closely.

I'm SO in this for the intrigue and story as opposed to the lewd that I'm a bit worried the latter will distract from the former, but I trust teegee.
>>
No. 131613 ID: 891b91

>>131607
If anything, the former is probably going to distract from the latter, in the medium-to-long term. For the most part, anyway.
>>
No. 131614 ID: 864e49

>>131613
Good
>>
No. 131639 ID: 16955b

>>131613
I just hope you don't skip parts when it comes to sex or extremely lewd stuff.
>>
No. 131641 ID: 9e04c9

>>/quest/951372
>wonder if it could happen to more people I care about
So she didn't know that this could happen? I wonder if that's because she's not a Quatra yet and she's inexperienced on these matters, or it's genuinely a rare event.

>It's like I don't even know her anymore.
Considering body-swapping is possible, could it be that it's actually someone else in Millicent's body? Nah, any dust scan would've revealed that, so I think the chance of this is extremely low. Either something happened to her dust or her memories.

>>/quest/951373
>He's naked, of course
Like everyone else that we've seen in this bathhouse so far. What kind of a bathhouse is this...

>he's kinda got a nice butt.
The behind's important yes, but we can't be sure until she sees the front as well. Still, I like the fact that she's not averted.

>Oh. That's his... his thingy, isn't it.
Penny really wishes she had one of those now, doesn't she?

>>/quest/951374
>You tear your gaze away
Some tasks are harder than others.

>kicking idly through the water
Is this really only water?

>we kinda handle everything with entertainment 'n art 'n stuff around here.
Being all srs bzns all the time, Penny doesn't strike me as an entertainer hehe

>the fair
I wonder what's the purpose of this fair. I'd guess it's mostly to raise money for the shelf, but who knows what sort of things go on behind closed doors.

>it's the only time we actually let outsiders on the shelf
It makes sense that, like any hospital, outside visitors would only be allowed in provisionally. What's interesting to note here is that Vesper actually owns the whole shelf.

>some people come just 'cuz they're curious.
Curious to see Roz's assets heh
>>
No. 131660 ID: a0dfd2

>>131641

>Vesper owns Red Shelf

You know, I'd not put much thought into it, but now I'm rather curious quite HOW this came to be. Is it a set-aside, some kind of government arrangement to keep all the taffa syndrome sufferers (I think we should call them "taffies") cordoned off -- especially considering the approved use of the sigil? Or do Cider and her counterparts have access to impressive means that haven't yet been revealed?

>Millie

I think you've got the right of it; Roz doesn't yet have all the information, but she knows enough people to begin piecing things together -- at least inside her own Dar. So what she knows is that Millie left for a different Dar, delved into her past (perhaps not in that order), and now Millie is Sillie™ and their friendship is in tatters.

In hindsight:

* Roz trying to get us to not follow Millie makes sense, given her emotional attachment to the situation, and her being Roz. I think we can also infer that her present knowledge, position within the Vespers, and her personality would make what she says MUCH more likely to be in-character rather than a Big Red Flag of "don't pursue this" from teegee -- basically giving us something of a choice in what we want to believe, kind of like with Cider.

* I think as well that the holo-tattoo thing might have actually been a silent way for Millie to say "come find me, look for this symbol." Perhaps there's another faction within the Vespers that Millie has fallen in with.
>>
No. 131665 ID: 891b91

>>131639
No, I don't plan on skipping through any lewd scenes. I've said in the past that I will allow for lewdness to whatever degree suggesters go for it, so long as it is believable within the confines of the plot, characters, setting, etc. As the plot progresses, though, Penny will probably end up in some situations that don't lend themselves to believable lewdness at all, and in those instances the plot/intrigue/etc. will necessarily distract from some suggesters' lewd ambitions. This doesn't mean that opportunities for lewd content won't exist in the future, but rather that for various plot reasons they might appear less frequently as the quest progresses.


>>131660
>I think we can also infer that her present knowledge, position within the Vespers, and her personality would make what she says MUCH more likely to be in-character rather than a Big Red Flag of "don't pursue this" from teegee -- basically giving us something of a choice in what we want to believe, kind of like with Cider.
Since this is meta-commentary, I think it isn't spoiling anything for me to say that you've got it right: this is Roz speaking as Roz, not me telegraphing a warning to stay away from Millie.
>>
No. 131666 ID: 9e04c9

>>131660
>Roz trying to get us to not follow Millie
Roz never implied such a thing. Only that we shouldn't believe that we're special or try finding out about our past self. In other words, we're free to visit Millie to check out dar Ormi.

>the holo-tattoo thing
Perhaps we should look for a reflective surface (if only there was one nearby... :p) and look under our own ears. Well, we can do this at any time, so there's no rush. Probably when Roz isn't nearby.
>>
No. 131689 ID: 9e04c9

>>/quest/951864
So guys, what's your guess on what the other Penny could be?
>>
No. 131691 ID: b40fdf

>>131689
A hallucination caused by not taking our schizophrenia medication.
>>
No. 131692 ID: a0dfd2

>>131689

My in-world guess would be one of the fragments of our former self that Cider talked about, embodied in a "familiar" projection of our current self.

My meta-answer is a briefly available window into secrets that we should leverage if we wish to delve deeper into who and what we are, why we are this way, and what, precisely, happened for it to occur.

My "this is questden" answer is: after thinking about sex and our preferences, we're going to fantasize a version of ourselves that allows us to experiment (for the purpose of humor when Roz walks in on it) with either a guy or girl at our choosing, thus getting to build out more of Penny's character with regards to future relationships, based on reader feedback to Lizard Junk.
>>
No. 131693 ID: fd5772

>>131689
We're about to get a lead, partner. Next clue to the case! We're gonna talk to this thing right? And we're gonna talk to people about the fact we're hallucinating ourselves, just in case we're experiencing medical problems from erasing our ego that result in hallucinations.

Or maybe we're 'bout to get shocked that some people share our "body type", which would be weird since we haven't seen to two people who look the same since we left that building we woke up in.
>>
No. 131695 ID: 9e04c9

There's clearly a reason why the other Penny isn't wiggling. For instance, it could be that, because Penny has her eyes closed, that she's not seeing it. In which case, it's also possible that the other Penny isn't actually an illusion.

Actually, since Penny has her eyes closed, how would she know that there's someone there? Do our suggestions to interact even make sense right now?
>>
No. 131697 ID: a0dfd2

>>131695

Imagination
>>
No. 131847 ID: 404f0f

>>/quest/953251
>Omen doesn't respond.
It seems there are many things which it cannot talk about. Simply giving us a list of names would obviously be too easy hehe.

>Your surroundings melt away and reform, giving way to your will
Good. Now to summon a few naked males...
I'm kidding. I'm actually surprised that it worked so well. That Penny is mentally sound enough to do this and stay in control. It's as if she'd practiced in the past.

>Surprisingly, it doesn't bother you
Maybe it doesn't bother Penny, but it bothers me haha. I mean, in one's dream, your own body is usually one of the most easily defined and controlled things, so it's a bit strange that it would stay blurred. Maybe this is a result of some deeper repressed thing.

>A liar sleeps here
We can assume that it means Cider, but we can't be certain. It could be that with "here" it means this whole house, and even if it's the couch alone, it's possible that multiple people sleep here occasionally. I'd actually find it strange if Cider wouldn't occasionally enjoy some male or female company at night, so we can't know which specific person it is that Omen is referring to.

>We immerse in the shuddering expanse beneath.
Beneath, sub, subconsciousness. Most likely yes, a dreamscape.

>Intention floods the expanse. Directness at this distance would invite... interference.
The word interference here could mean that some third party could notice this communication. And interrupt or intercept it.
However, what most people seem to miss here is that, if we take the former sentence into account, what Omen could mean is the interference to the intention of this expanse. Where this expanse, Penny's dreamscape has a certain intention, a certain flow to it that shouldn't be disturbed. In other words, if Omen was more direct with its communication, it would simply wake Penny up, because instead of throwing water balloons, sending precise information would be like shooting nails into Penny's head.

So yeah, it doesn't necessarily mean that spying is involved.

>>/quest/953252
>You aren't quite desperate enough to have dream-sex with a monstrous doppelganger of yourself. You think.
If Omen knows all about Penny, then wouldn't it also know where all the Penny's G-spots are?

>Spiritual congress... would narrow the gap
Since this was a response to Penny having lewd thoughts about Omen, it could mean that spiritual congress, in this case, simply means some lovemaking. However, it could also mean a number of other things, such as recovering Penny's old memories, falling in love, reducing physical distance, exchanging ideas, feelings, creating friendship, etc. Should we be taking Omen on a date while in dreams?

As for "narrowing the gap", we can assume that it refers to the distance Omen mentioned previously, the distance, due to which it has to be cryptic with its communication. Of course, it's also possible that it means something else. Narrowing the gap, closing the gap, closing the hole... maybe Omen simply wants to plug Penny's h*les haha... I'm sorry.

>Powerful hands pull at the Gordian knot! The blade they cannot wield rests in your lap. Some seek to stay your hand, others to guide it... but few to cleave the knot in twain.
What Omen is saying here is that there seem to be three types of forces at play. The ones that want to control Penny's blade themselves, the ones that want to prevent her from using it, and the ones that want to use it to cut the knot.
In other words, the vast majority want to either use it for their own gain, or lock it away. But only a few want to use it for its original intended purpose. What the knot is, what the blade is, and who the forces actually are is anyone's guess however. But most likely they're not limited to within Vesper.

>how long do you have until Roz comes back?
Dunno, but from personal experience I can say that a few minutes in real life can stretch to a few hours in dreams.

In general, I like this update because it reveals a sort of a grand scheme of things, so a lot of food for thought. And I personally find Omen cute and pretty easy to understand. However, some readers may find it scary and its words confusing. I think that as long as the cryptic parts aren't too important to the story, that it should be fine.
>>
No. 131852 ID: a0dfd2

Am I the only one who finds it interesting that Omen / Dollar essentially has Roz's face?

Not entirely her dentition (canines are too pronounced for sharkface), but it could be a lot of subconscious projection going on.
>>
No. 131858 ID: 6a2d5d

dust tastes good
>>
No. 131874 ID: a0dfd2

>>131847

Gotta agree on most every count of your observations here!

Though oddly, as someone who experiences fairly regular lucidity (of varying degrees) in dreams, I find that a physical body or self is rarely if ever defined, so much as sensed, until it's necessary within the parameters of the dream.

... though that could be manifestations of various mental health issues, but my understanding of psychiatric influences upon the dreaming mind -- and equally how one's perception of the self, like the occasionally dissociative nature of dreams -- translates into unwaking perception.
>>
No. 131875 ID: fd5772

I think having sex with the apparition is a bad idea. I don't like the idea of strong psychic connection with someone we just met.

At least we now have reason to be suspicious of our own origins. No way we can stay locked up in Vespers.
>>
No. 131876 ID: e51896

>>131875
I agree, I can't help but feel this is a trap we're walking into. Everything has it's price after all, and I feel there is going to be a hefty price to pay if Penny continues.
>>
No. 131877 ID: 10c408

>>131876
Sadly, the votes didn't allow for this. My theory that Omen COULD in fact read our thoughts was proven, but now that spiritual congress has started, might as well get as much information as possible.
>>
No. 131879 ID: 404f0f

> >>131875 >someone we just met.
What you mean to say is that you don't think they're trustworthy, right? The thing is, even if we talked to Omen a hundred times, I don't think that this perception would change. This is because they can only communicate through dreams, so we'd always be limited in our ability to communicate with them, and their answers would always be ambiguous. Whether their answers turn out to be true or false would be something entirely up to our own interpretation (for instance, when they said that "a liar sleeps here", even if Cider told a lie, we don't know if it was Cider that Omen was talking about, or whether it was actually a lie) and due to this, it would be more or less impossible to prove that they're trustworthy even if they were trying to do that.

Since Omen's trustworthiness isn't something we can easily prove or disprove, the fact that they're someone we just met is not a useful argument we can consider in our decisions regarding them. In this case, waiting wouldn't do us any good and it would logically make more sense to make our decisions for Omen sooner. Also because if we decided sooner, we'd also get better information sooner.

> >>131876 >Everything has it's price after all
Considering Omen said that their job was to prepare us for the future, and since getting closer to them serves this purpose, it's possible to assume that that's all they want and that there's actually no negative consequences here. That there's no price to pay. Of course, we can't be sure of this.

I'd also like to point out that, unfortunately, we can't expect our old memories to just come flying by. If it was possible for the taffa syndrome sufferers to recover their old memories, then Vesper wouldn't be doing what they do, and you wouldn't have hospitals forcing artificially-constructed memories on people.

So yeah, it's a risk-reward thing. Omen clearly gave us a choice on whether we want to go through with this (which also implies that they can't really force it), so it's on us to weigh the pros and cons. Personally, I'd follow the old saying nothing ventured, nothing gained, simply go with it and not worry about it. If nothing else, it makes the story more interesting.

> >>/quest/953691 >>We're essentially becoming one
Omen said that "The memory is unforgettable". So I think it's more likely that this is about creating shared memories and not about becoming one.

> >>/quest/953760 >Our collective hornyness is pushing her into a situation that she clearly isn't 100% comfortable with.
While this may be true, it doesn't mean that it's a bad thing. There are several reasons.
- Life isn't so simple that you'd always be able to do only things which you're comfortable with, so this happening is nothing unusual
- It would make for a very boring quest if the characters were only doing comfortable things as there would be no action, no conflict, and no challenging situations
- The character is properly expressing our subconsciousness. They're following our suggestions and this is a simple result of that

Maybe you feel that we should be acting nicer to the character, and that's really nice of you, but by itself that has very little to do with the general appeal of the quest and the plot itself. At the end of the day, I think that pushing your personal moral worldview on other suggesters isn't a good idea and that your dilemma would instead be more easily solved through suggestions for Penny. For instance, if you simply suggested that Penny enjoys her time with Omen, wouldn't that actually cause her to be more comfortable?

> >>/quest/953763 >losing all agency within a situation wherein we are no longer certain of our own consciousness
Since we were able to make a conscious choice to change our surroundings, I think it's pretty much proven that we're both conscious and that we have agency. Therefore, I disagree with the implications you put forth.

> >>/quest/953779 >there are other ways to get our memories back
We don't know of any other ways, so I'm not sure why you wrote this. But there's plenty of arguments that I wrote above which I think are relevant and which may alleviate your concerns.
>>
No. 131882 ID: e51896

>>131879
>We don't know of any other ways
one of the services Delaney Security Services specializes in is memory acquisition and analysis. They can help retrieve memories if we can somehow contact them. Plus Penny seems to be connected to them in some way with her jumpsuit being owned by them. Thats why I wrote that. It sometimes pays better to be patient.
>>
No. 131883 ID: 3ae33e

>>131882

We can't afford to "be patient" and try to waste time trying to find a way to contact Delaney for help. With how shady Vesper is, we need information ASAP before they brainwash poor Penny.
>>
No. 131886 ID: 404f0f

>>131882
Memory acquisition and analysis...
No, I don't think that's what you believe it is.

You see, they're a security firm, and as such they deal with security-related things. Such as theft, crime, detective work, etc. So in this case, "memory acquisition" would be related to memory theft, stealing or exchanging memories, memory salons and whatnot, where memories can be manipulated and moved around.

This is very different from Penny's situation, which not a result of any crime, but a medical condition. All evidence points to the fact that Penny's memories were erased with raw taffa, not stolen, so there's no known place or a person her memories could be acquired from.

Delaney can't get Penny's memories back. This is proven in the story where it's mentioned (>>/quest/920579) that "artifically-constructed memories are forced on taffa syndrome sufferers in the hospitals". The fact that even hospital doctors are unable to retrive such erased memories and are forced to use artificially-constructed ones instead, proves that Delaney wouldn't be able to do it either.
>>
No. 131887 ID: 10c408

>>131886
Your argument on what delaney can and cannot do rests entirely on the word of mouth from one character, with no corroboration from any other sources of information to prove one way or the other if we've been told things that are in fact actually true.

And on top of that, Omen indirectly claimed that the person who gave us this knowledge in the first place lied to us, so your already fragile claim is even more in doubt.
>>
No. 131889 ID: a0dfd2

Guys, this has gotten pretty fucked up.

I get it, most of us can't even seem to remember our rebellious remarks against Cider or our attempt to work with Q and learn more about Delaney -- and also Moira, who's still dead by the way, as far as we know -- or why it was we wanted to get out of here in the first place.

We seem to have forgotten everything the instant we got flashed with Roz's tits.

But without a place to call our own, without a cover we can conveniently hide behind if shit goes wrong, we're just some unregistered idiot on their own. No memory, no affiliations, no help. And rather than being brought back to Vesper and given a talking to if we fuck up, we're in some hospital, getting our head pumped full of lies the instant the word "taffa" even leaves our mouth otherwise.

And nobody seems to realize that.

Instead we've gone on a fucking bender and we're now trying to basically have sex with ourself in the midst of a goddamned hallucination where one of our inquiries is rightly "prove to me this isn't all a dream," because the nightmare plot device is speaking in fucking riddles and most of us don't seem to comprehend what "spiritual congress" means in the wake of having committed suicide.

Because we did. Multiple times. And apparently we forgot about that, too.

But sure. Is Cider likely being manipulative with us? Quite possibly, but she's also leading a social commune that is steadily gaining legitimacy with the authorities of the shelf and in charge of a bunch of equally post-suicidal substance abusers with acute and permanent retrograde amnesia. Whom we number amongst.

Is Roz a bimbo with a heart of gold as big as her tits? Yes, absolutely, but she's also the only person who has really opened up to us and shown a genuine level of care.

Can we stay here and work with them, establishing a base of operations and creating a social webwork that allows us to use them as proxies in our stead, protecting ourselves whilst we hunt down our past and interrogate Millie for answers?

You're damned right we can.

But instead we've forgotten that. We jumped at the first promise of tits again. Just like last time. And the time before that.

We don't even know who Q is, outside of being a junker with cool hair who knows her way around illegitimate business. And considering how Preston reacted back at intake, we're deep in it, and stepping foot of Red Shelf without a lifeline and a cover to work behind is the stupidest thing we can do right now.

So maybe instead of bickering about whether or not that same Gordian Knot is what we believe it is or if we can trust the word of the thing that's looking pretty close to raping us and jumping into the first warm hole we see and making all of this even more uncomfortable and unnecessary than it is, we can actually sit down, think, and use the fact that we aren't a goddamned husk with no memories to our advantage.

Because it was cute and a fun teasing Penny before and getting our bluffs repeatedly called; even the bath house was a nice departure to the land of exposition-thick fanservice. But this? This is just creepy and getting progressively more gross.
>>
No. 131890 ID: e7c7d3

>>131889
It's legit that you find this gross. I'm not seeing the problems that you are, but I won't tell you that you're wrong for that.

Complaining about QuestDen being horny, however, is a futile effort. The nature of the audience getting distracted is also an unfortunate result of this method of story telling. The audience is always shifting with each person having different agendas and different levels of engagement. Keep in mind that there are people who want Penny to have sex over actually figuring out the mystery of the current plot.

Also also, this is by no means an mutually exclusive situation like you're making it out to be. We can have spiritual congress with Omen, we can do all that stuff that you're suggesting, we can see Delaney, and everything else. Just cause some people, (myself admittedly included,) want Penny to see some lady action doesn't mean that we're against figuring out what's going on.

There's stuff here that I think you're wrong about, like you're concerned that we're ignoring that Penny has committed memory suicide many times before, but that info is one of the things we're trying to get out of Omen. Heck, I don't know where I've mentioned it, but my current theory that Omen is our past selves a la Avatar style. But who knows! Point is, don't take our disagreement that people are actively working against you to ruin the plot.
>>
No. 131891 ID: 6c7837

>>131889
I have to largely agree with you fellow personally. I feel like we've lost sight of how we initially were playing the character. >>131890 brings up some good points for why this is happening, even if I don't agree with the entirety of the message. The way the quest is structured means that some posters won't be here, and different ones may show up. What's more, the place is really really horny for whatever reason (the reason is it'sQuestDen and we/they're always horny), and that is influencing decisions. For the worse, IMO. Means we lose sight of context to make important decisions. Teegee is handling this issue with aplomb, and I commend him for doing his best to keep things from going off the rails, but its quite the fight to prevent such an intriguing world from devolving into just a smutquest.
>>
No. 131892 ID: 6c7837

>>131890
Also, just to note on my last statement. I don't think people are maliciously trying to ruin the plot either. But I do fret it's happening regardless.
>>
No. 131893 ID: 10c408

>>131892
There are voting blocs being formed, same as what happened during the later parts of the coxwette quest.

Those that are voting for things they believe will lead to more pictures of a very specific nature, and those who are voting for literally everything else.

I'm probably paranoid, but there's been more votes in total for the current update than there were in the last several and a lot of those were from account names I've not seen in either thread thus far.

That said, it's a bit hyperbolic to say that the plot is being destroyed by this division. It is certainly being marred heavily in my opinion, but not "destroyed"
>>
No. 131894 ID: 404f0f

>>131889
>Because we did. Multiple times.
This statement is unproven. Omen saying, "Names are fleeting. How many have you left behind?", neither implies that we died as a result of a suicide, nor that it happened multiple times.

>that is steadily gaining legitimacy
Incorrect. Vesper is already a fully legit and government-supported organization.

>post-suicidal substance abusers
Implying that everyone who lost their memories had it happen as a result of a suicide, or that they were substance abusers, would be a faulty generalization. For one, we know that raw taffa has lawful uses.

>most of us can't even seem to remember
>We seem to have forgotten
>nobody seems to realize
>most of us don't seem to comprehend
>we forgot about that
I hope that you're aware that statements such as these sound like projection.

That said, there are three points that I'd like to make.
Firstly, we aren't forgetting anything. Instead, what I'd say is going on is that... people change. We change. As new facts are uncovered and we become more familiar with our surroundings, our perception changes as well. Our understanding of the characters around us adapts. And as it does, our suggestions for Penny change as well, which, consequentially, is reflected in her subconsciousness. We are not static.
Secondly, I don't know why you're in such a hurry, but I'm sure that we'll get to everything in its due time. You shouldn't get agitated just because you feel that we're inefficient or aren't taking the shortest route through the plot. After all, a quest is all about the journey. And who knows, maybe the current events are actually a shortcut? How do you know what is necessary and what is not?
Lastly, unexpected things happening to quest characters is nothing unusual. Creepy and gross? Yeah, plot elements can be like that. I'd argue that if a quest author is able to invoke strong feelings in the audience, then they're doing a masterful job.

>>131891
>For the worse
I'm offended :p
But you shouldn't worry because, well, teegee already explained it here: >>123419.
>>
No. 131895 ID: e7c7d3

>>131893
I sincerely hope that the quest discussions won't devolve into the tired "hardboy vs. softboy" argument.

I don't think we're quite at risk of that yet though. (Admittedly, I don't tend to read other suggestions too much once I've posted one, for the most part.) Sort of stating my one point again, the lewds don't mean that progress is not going to happen. Most suggestions right now prompting for the sex are still choosing which questions they feel we should ask Omen. "We get answers and we get to see tiddy? Win/win!" Is how I'd sum most of the intent behind these lewd votes. (What it looks to me, anyways, these things can be hard to read online.)

If people are worried about the straight up yes/no vote for spiritual congress in the last update. I want to say that's a bit of an outlier, brought on by a comment on the discord.
>>
No. 131897 ID: 891b91

>>131889
>This is just creepy and getting progressively more gross.
Originally I had written several paragraphs of spoilers about Omen to explain why I'm writing things this way, but I ended up scrapping it because I think it would carry too much risk of strongly affecting suggesters' theories and opinions. Instead, what I will say is that if Omen's forcefulness creeps you out, you aren't wrong to feel that way; to some degree I intended for at least some of the audience to have that reaction to her. I just hope that it's clear that Omen's demeanor and actions are relevant to the quest's plot overall, rather than simply being fetish fuel.

>>131891
>its quite the fight to prevent such an intriguing world from devolving into just a smutquest.
>>131892
>I don't think people are maliciously trying to ruin the plot either. But I do fret it's happening regardless.
>>131893
>That said, it's a bit hyperbolic to say that the plot is being destroyed by this division. It is certainly being marred heavily in my opinion, but not "destroyed"
I don't blame anyone for having these concerns, but from my perspective things are very far from going off the rails. While Penny's actions are a significant part of what determines the quest's plot, the other major determinant is the motivations and actions of other characters and groups in the quest's universe, which progress regardless of Penny's actions. Simply put, there are things in motion that will affect Penny and likely will occur in one way or another regardless of what she does; her actions mostly have the potential to modulate how these events play out, rather than deciding whether the events to happen in the first place. If we assume a worst case scenario of Penny becoming completely distracted and complacent, the outcome would probably be that she would be unprepared for future events, when they occur. That wouldn't bring the plot to a standstill, but instead would just be one of various avenues for the quest to progress along.

The events in question also pretty much guarantee that Dead Dust is incapable of becoming just a smutquest, in the long run -- it's hard to be distracted by sex when [BIG IMPORTANT EVENT THAT VERY MUCH INVOLVES YOU] is happening. That being said, if my reassurances here aren't satisfying, I'd be interested in hearing your concerns in more detail -- how is the plot being ruined/marred/etc., in your eyes?

>>131895
>If people are worried about the straight up yes/no vote for spiritual congress in the last update. I want to say that's a bit of an outlier, brought on by a comment on the discord.
In retrospect, maybe I should've been less willing to discuss meta-aspects of ongoing quest votes, since I feel like I may have unintentionally encouraged vote brigading to some degree.
>>
No. 131900 ID: 4854ef

>>131891
Honestly it's starting to feel like "If you aren't voting this way it's wrong" in this sort of situation with how people are reacting on some level. Some people wanted lewds, Some wanted information about memories and this was a method of doing so, and yet everyone is getting lumped in "Hurr durr lewds" as if this choice had nothing more to do then sex.
>>
No. 131901 ID: 015bf2

>accidental vote brigading
Huh, I did wonder where the sudden influx of votes came from.

Now, if those voters can get off their butt fetishes to engage with the normal intercourse of events and fondle about for clues too, I'd be quite gay to play along with the thread's fancies. It's better than having the life sucked out of it it by fewer posters coming around over time. Then again, everyone coming all the time might be a little much, no?

(TAKE THIS, YOUR JUST REWARD)
>>
No. 131946 ID: 404f0f

>>/quest/954676
>You grab Omen's ear suddenly
Haha, that's one way to return Omen's favor!

>I'm not as submissive as you think
Something tells me that this is going to backfire just like that time when Penny dared Roz to... you know.

>What a welcome surprise, she cackles.
The fact that Omen endorses Penny's participation probably means that it would help with the communication. However, I can't really guess if that's all there is to Omen's intentions.

>>/quest/954677
>Omen slides herself away from you and opens your legs, and as she does so the scenery around you grows very dark.
Heh. From this one might assume that the way to Penny's memories is thought her nether region.

>odd, glowing structures
The glowing containers that we see are large enough to hold bodies, so perhaps that's what they were designed to do. It could be that the place is a cryo-chamber or a cloning facility, but it's hard to guess what goes on there.
The place also looks like it hasn't had any maintenance in a long time. This does link it to the previous memory of the entrance to the Taunton Microdynamics that we saw, which also looked abandoned. However, the entrance that we saw looked way too small, like an entrance to a small firm; not the kind that I would expect to lead to a large high tech facility. So we can't be certain that the two are linked.

>>/quest/954678
>You stole something from here.
Look, that Hot Vesper Mommas holo tape that someone forgot on their desk was just asking to get stolen!

>You drank taffa to escape the consequences.
I had a theory that another substance which mirrors the taffa syndrome existed, but it looks like that's not the case. Anyway...

The revelation here is pretty important. It implies that Penny didn't consume taffa due to substance abuse, or with the intention of suicide, but to escape consequences of stealing something. I would assume that the difficulty of escape and the consequences were pretty severe if drinking taffa was the only way out. Then again, Omen said that "it didn't work" so, it looks like Penny's memory loss was ineffective for whatever purpose it was to serve.

As for what we stole, the first thought that comes to mind would be "the blade". So the question is, was it "the blade" that we stole? Maybe. Maybe not. If it is the blade, then it would imply that the consequences of stealing are dictated by the people who are after the blade.
Of course, it's also possible that what we stole from this place is something else and we either had the blade already before, or we obtained it after.

>She finally relents, leaving you wanting more.
All these revelations really get Penny going, huh?

In general, excellent job on the art and writing. Mixing the plot and the lewd is usually something that's difficult to execute, but I think you pulled it off flawlessly here.
>>
No. 132024 ID: 9b97e0

>>/quest/955495
Nothing much to say here except that I like the art hehe

>>/quest/955496
>Your surroundings fade into darkness
The fade-to-black trope strikes again!

>a spherical hologram
A hologram of this world. The various shapes are the wards and shelves that we've seen. The cityscape in the bottom-left is probably the Old City.
The two sets of lines are likely the path that Omen's voice took before and after the tongue action. What's important to note here is the place where both paths start (the city) and where they end (the Red Shelf). This indicates one of two things. That either Omen is located in the Old City, or that they're using the Beacon as a non-transparent proxy.

>now you see mine -- and I can see yours
Geez, another huge reveal. So the wiggles that we see are the rhythm. I definitely had a strong suspicion of this and I even left a tip about it here:
> >>129492 >Can you feel it? Can you feel.. the rhythm?!
Altho what Mint feels and what Penny sees might not be the same. That's because Mint said that Penny, unlike everything else, isn't fuzzy at all. So it's a bit more complicated than that.
How to explain this? I can think of three theories.
- Mint feels a differential in the environment, where Penny leaves none
- Penny doesn't have anything of what Mint can detect
- Penny is passively blocking Mint from detecting anything about her

>>/quest/955497
>Rhythm surrounds us, pervades us. For some of us, it grows stronger when we... exert ourselves, and we leave our mark upon it.
The logical analysis of the following paragraph is trivial and is left to the readers as an exercise.
In other words, if I went and broke this down into every implication that could be drawn from these words, I'd be writing all day lol

>you flip over, taking Omen with you.
I wonder what Penny's wrestling name would be.

>You and I are alike in that way
If Omen resembles Penny in more than just looks, then perhaps they're not just a doppelganger.

I'd say that the whole segment with Omen is starting to reveal a bit too much information at once, rather than it being gradually spread throughout the story. But other than that, it's very well written.
>>
No. 132066 ID: 10c408

Soo, if I've got this right.. Penny's former self acquired the blade of illusion, used it to conceal itself and then committed suicide via taffa syndrome.

And now because there's going to be some impending disaster, we need to highlander the other blades since we can't become professor oak.

I'm sold, let's get started.
>>
No. 132080 ID: 9b97e0

>>/quest/956258
>This is our world
They almost make it sound like we're the guests here.

>you are not going to let her win at this
I would've preferred if Penny wasn't treating this as a game or as some sort of competition. That's not what sex is about heh. You're not winning or losing anything. inb4 a game-over screen

>the advantage of rhythm
It's interesting how the jolts are coming down Penny's butt, and how Penny's ears wobble really hard here. It's as if one's being converted to the other. Well, that's probably what's actually happening; Omen's rhythm is adding up with Penny's.

>>/quest/956259
>Dark figures
Hmm, a major reveal. It looks like there's six of them. And the third one from the right looks like, well, the size of that bust is somewhat unmistakable :P

>There are many blades in this world
With "many", besides ours, does she mean these six? In other words, it's possible that there are more but that only these six are relevant.

>they reject each other
If they all reject each other, there must be a good reason for it. That not a single pair of them would choose to work with one another. Then again, I wonder if they even know about their own powers and about the knot. Do they even know each other? Because if they do, then we'd only need to talk to one of them to be able to get the info on the others.

>>/quest/956260
>through its potential also the most powerful
Sounds OP. Until we find out that we're lvl 1 noob going against lvl 99 wizards.

>brings others into harmony
So many people that Penny's gonna have to sleep with haha

>a blade of illusion
Ah, the seventh. But, an illusion? Was Penny's qabel's death an illusion? Based on the fact that Omen said that we drank the taffa, it seems unlikely. Also, this might explain why Mint didn't feel anything about Penny. Actually, it might also explain why Omen couldn't find Penny while she was awake.

>you must obtain the rest -- or their bearers will destroy you utterly.
I'm having difficulty understanding what Omen meant with this. Get the blades or the bearers will come to kill us? Why would they want to kill us but not kill each other then? And if they're coming to Penny eventually, why would Penny have to pre-emptively seek them out? Hmm. It might be that they'd perceive Penny as a common enemy. Perhaps there's some sort of status quo going on and they'd want to get rid of Penny since she's a threat to it.

>>/quest/956261
>feedback loop
Actually, this might be the primary reason why Omen looks similar to Penny (assuming Omen could choose their avatar). So that it would be possible for Omen to initiate a feedback loop.

>She screams
Oh, I was not expecting Omen to be phased by this to this degree. Or at least I think it would've been better if they weren't. Maybe they weren't properly prepared.

The other interesting thing I'd like to point out here is that despite Penny's strong movement in this and the following part, Omen's body remains still. This means that the movement that we see is purely from the rhythm itself.
At the same time, I like how it illustrates the way Penny feels. After all, the rhythm is a part of her body, so it's not just a visual thing.

>>/quest/956263
>mind-obliterating, universe-shattering orgasm
Penny's secret weapon has been revealed.

>parts of your soul you never knew you had
So Penny never knew that she had an Omen-shaped hole in her Omen-shaped soul. Makes sense!

The speed of the wiggling here definitely confirms what Omen said before, that is, that the rhythm grows stronger when we exert ourselves.

>>/quest/956264
>explodes from within you
Man does Penny make a MESS!
I hope the suggesters won't become scared of repeating this in the future haha

RIP Omen. Sacrificed her life so Penny could bust a nut D:

>>/quest/956265
>vague figures scattered across the distance take notice of you
Geez, another huge reveal.
Now, we do see six of them. Is this a coincidence? Maybe. If we assume that Omen was supposed to be one of them but is temporarily missing, the number could rise to seven, which would coincide with the number of blades. However, this is discredited by the fact that... one of them just said that they're on Bellwether. If they can be on Bellwether and here at the same time, then there's no saying Omen couldn't do the same, which would mean that Omen is here and is one of the total six. Then again, it's also possible that Omen simply isn't connected to this place at the moment, or that one or more of them are off-screen on the panel.

>WHO IS THAT
The fact that they don't recognize us can be due to several things.
- They know who Penny is, but we look like same vague figure to them as they do to us. Either due to the nature of this place, or due to the blade of illusion. So until we engage in communication, they won't know who we are.
- They don't know who Penny is. In this case, it doesn't matter if we look like a vague figure or not.
I think that it's a bit more likely that they simply don't know who Penny is. This is because if Omen is not here, and we suddenly appeared here instead of Omen, they might think that we were Omen. However, it's clear that they were able to instantly tell that we're not Omen.

>relax this isnt the first time this has happened
Interesting, but nothing much I can assume from this. I think that Penny's former persona wasn't the one to enter this place before us. If they were, then I'd expect the reaction to be different. Because it would've been a much more recent event, I'd expect them to react more like "AGAIN?!".

>TYPHON IS THIS YOUR DOING
Typhon must be busy programming heh.

>I hope not, that's boring~ My money's on Nemo!
Hmm. This seems to indicate that Nemo isn't here right now.

>hey new guy can you uh come kill me im on bellwether
>haha that wasnt a joke uhhh please im begging you just fuckin destroy me uwu
Is this guy a masochist? lmao
Also, the typos and that uwu haha... if we're able to perceive those, then wouldn't it mean that we're in some sort of a chatroom?

Anyway, these guys don't seem to have any common agenda and I can't guess very well what they could be. However, I'm almost certain that they're not the blade-bearers themselves because Omen seems to be one of them.

A very interesting development. Certainly the most major event in the story so far.
>>
No. 132084 ID: e7c7d3

So how do people feel about nicknaming Omen "Dollar" during that exchange? Seemed like mixed results to me? It's just that HowDoIshotTrip mentioned in the discord about the possibility of naming the other mysterious after other currencies: nickel, quarter, pound, quid yen, peso, etc. Quite frankly, I think it'd be fun.

I'd suggest Mr. "please destroy me" should be either Loonie or Pound.
>>
No. 132085 ID: 9b97e0

>>132084
>how do people feel about nicknaming Omen "Dollar"
I think that that joke has run its course and that I simply don't find it humorous anymore. So I think that trying to preserve it would be a poor choice.

I also believe that nicknames should hold deeper meaning and be related to the character in a relevant way. For instance, giving a character with a long name a nickname that's an abbreviation of their name. Or if a character is good at something, a nickname that signifies this skill or some special achievement.

As fun as naming characters may be for you, I don't believe these characters are in need of new names. They're not throwaway characters and they already have names of their own. Also, if a character has a preferred way in which they want to be referred to, disregarding that would risk offending them. Considering that all of the characters in question are extremely powerful, it's not something I'd wager at this moment in the story.
>>
No. 132090 ID: b7d9f7

>>132085
I'm pretty sure Omen was nicknamed Dollar because at the time, they seemed to be more... complete than us? A fuller Penny, in other words, more informed and knowledgeable. But still very 'us'. Thus, nicknaming them a currency as Penny might be alluded to be, but a larger denomination.

As much fun as the passing joke of nicknaming everyone we can after currencies/denominations would be, it wouldn't be great unless we could find meaning for those names. Someone who is overly direct, brutish, and crude? Pound. Someone who is off their rocker and doesn't make any sense? Loonie/Toonie. Someone from a land that's clearly an analogue of Japan? Yen.

It's a little sad that Zimbabwe's inflated-to-fuck currency doesn't seem to have a unique name (just 'zimbabwe dollar') because then it'd be great for someone with a really inflated ego.
>>
No. 132091 ID: b1b4f3

>>132090
Nope. It's just referencing a genderswap version of Penny that people called Dollar.
>>
No. 132104 ID: b07f1c

>>/quest/956725
>You try to flex it, and you feel it do so, but there is no apparent effect
The solution here is simple. Penny first has to saturate the limb before she may use it on others or herself.

>they keep me on the center floor i think. just watch out for the guards
This implies that the person is kept in some sort of containment in a secured facility. Also, since they're on Bellwether, getting there doesn't seem possible at this time.

>she's on Red Shelf
Oops! It looks like Penny revealed her gender and location.

>Stop using your voice in here
Hmm. What if Penny tried communicating with video then? What sort of video would she livestream?
That reminds me. We need to get access to one of those terminals again...
>>
No. 132116 ID: 7ae67b

As >>/quest/956850 said, the chat IDs have the right number of digits and all use only characters that are valid for hexadecimal, so they could be colors.
If they are,
Penny (d01c35) is a kind of deep-red ██████████,
ff358f is a hot pink ██████████,
and 32b0cc is a slightly greenish blue ██████████.

Although this is only three examples. Could just be chance that these three IDs work as color codes.
>>
No. 132117 ID: b1b4f3

All the IDs are in hexadecimal so they will work as color codes, intentional or not.
>>
No. 132118 ID: a0dfd2

maybe we should ask all the other blades (gonna call them "b-tards" for now, lol) what their trip codes are
>>
No. 132123 ID: 7ae67b

The person who wants to die, cc45d0, has a magenta color ██████████.

I propose either Ceecee or Cas as a nickname for them.
>>
No. 132126 ID: b07f1c

>>/quest/956834
Now that I think about it, if they know that a new person appeared on the Red Shelf, it would be pretty obvious to them that we're with Vesper. And that we're most likely a person that had their memories recently erased because it makes less sense for the older residents to have any shifts in their dust. So we can pretty much assume that they know that we're a fresh zombie. Anyway...

>you become aware of a... running log of communications, and a clearer sense of who said what.
Yeah but, it's a bit hard to figure out which ID said what in the previous panel. Hmm.
32b0cc likes using "~" character
ff358f likes to insult everyone
cc45d0 can't use caps
We don't know the ID of the one that used all caps.

>...No, of course not.
That's exactly what a cop would say!

>we are all above the level of being policed by anyone but our own kind~
Their own kind... I think this could be understood in two ways. Either they're some sort of supernatural beings, or they're normal people but who ascended in a way. Heh, maybe we should ask them if they're humans.

>>/quest/956904
>It really does feel like you have an extra limb -- you can bring it close and examine its properties
Stop touching that Penny! Hmm. It's that long huh...

>orthogonal wave interference
The sticker said "illusion", not "stealth". I want our money back!

>you can use these names to help you make better sense of who's who
Or we could just, you know, ask them for their names.

>you'll try to get the others to refer to you as Dulcinea
I would've preferred Pancakes :p

>I didn't say you were intruding
He certainly implied that we were unwanted here. Anyway, since I was unsure who was the one that mentioned their "neck of the woods", I could only assume that with "intruding" he meant intruding into this chatroom.

>I'm not risking my hide
A-ha! So he has a hide! Now we know who he is!

>he let those fanatics on Bellwether capture him
Them fanatics always ruining all the fun. Altho I wonder if he actually let them, or just made a mistake. We'll probably need to ask more about these once we decide it's a good time for a visit to grandma's house.

>Who did it to them?
*squints eyes at Omen*

>Maybe you've been here all along, listening and never talking
From our perspective, he does make a logical fallacy here. If we were noticed as soon as we entered this place, it would be impossible for us to be here for a longer amount of time. What we don't know however is whether it's possible to enter the chatroom invisible. But even so, if we suddenly switched our status to visible, how would they know that we were new? Anyway, by pointing this out to him, he may or may not provide some valid explanation. The added bonus here is that if he sees that we were unaware of this one thing, it may occur to him that we really are new.
>>
No. 132130 ID: 7ae67b

The last person, abcb03, has a yellowish green color ██████████.
>>
No. 132131 ID: b07f1c

>>/quest/957001
>Hope you're satisfied..
I would only be satisfied if he vocalized his uwu

>not long after they were just gone
The question here is, how long is "not long after"? A few hours? Days?

>you had no choice but to make yourself known
So what they're saying is that there's no difference when a new person joins this space and when an invisible one becomes visible?

>That means the killer probably never goes invis, because if they did, they could miss information
And then they say that the killer is always visible... These two facts are at odds with one another. Either the killer is always visible, or, as in Penny's case, they just became visible and made a splash. Which one is it? Hmm. I suppose they could claim that we were visible the whole time but then only became invisible for a second to be able to do this.

>stuff that happens while you're invis doesn't show up in your logs.
How unfortunate :p

>sixty-seven people
That's a very specific number. I thought that their ability to track the people would invalidate their claim about Penny hiding, but I suppose it's possible for them to track only the people that revealed their location and went missing. Still, this number is much larger than I expected. That is, I would expect that people would become wary of the disappearances at around 10. Because if your friend that you talk with daily suddenly doesn't show up anymore, you'd immediately know that something's up. It might be explained if the so-called killer collected the locations for a long time before making a move. However, the person does mention people being picked off soon after revealing their location.

>She's definitely lying about being new
I thought they said they liked us QQ

>perhaps she's trying to trick our pursuer, and lure them out of hiding
It might be that the pursuer they're talking about is Omen, in which case we don't really have anything to be afraid of. And if it's not, well, we weren't given any specific timeframe in which to expect this person so who knows when they might show up. I mean, we already know that some people are after us, so adding another one on top doesn't change much.

>don't let anyone on the outside catch you using your talent, whatever it is
Interesting. This implies that everyone in this space has a talent of sorts, so Penny might not be special in this regard. Is having a blade a way to say that one has a talent? Or are blades just one of the types of talents? Or is it that the blades and talents are completely separate?

>Typhoon seems to mostly want us to be at each other's necks
They're doing a good job then.

>sleeper agents
This sounds like a very important piece of info. That one is able to produce agents. And then there's also a question of whether these agents were able to enter the chatroom due to their talents, or because they were created/invited there by Typhon.

>next phase of evolution
But still a human!

Nice butt.

>>/quest/957002
>global-space local-space public-space
The only space I'm interested in is Penny's private space.

>INC VOICE LOC RED
Haha, Penny's expression; tfw you accidentally leave your mic on

>>/quest/957003
>embarrassed yourself in your sleep
We may never know what Omen did with Penny's real body while we were busy in dreams.

>You're completely certain that you're wide awake now.
[X] Doubt

>Something doesn't feel right.
Now, we do see that our surroundings are unusually sharp. Some of the possibilities that I can come up for this would be:
- Our senses need some time to adapt back to the non-recursive topology
- We're still in dreams since waking up only woke us out of the chatroom
- This is normal after unlocking our talent
- Our/surrounding rhythm needs some time to normalize after the reformation
- The blade of illusion is causing it
- Someone else is causing it

Alas, it's hard to pinpoint the cause. Well, the fact that there's no one around suggests that... the last two options are the most likely.
>>
No. 132132 ID: b1b4f3

Personally I think the killer is the one that keeps accusing Penny of being the killer.
>>
No. 132142 ID: a0dfd2

>>132132

But what if the killer is the one who claims to wish to die and has been luring others to them?
>>
No. 132143 ID: 4286b4

>>/quest/957121
>the effect is almost calming, mesmerizing; some part of you wants to relax and immerse in it
Roz, is that you?!

>You don't know what exactly you can do with this ability
The power of illusion allows Penny to start daydreaming at any time.

>you don't want to be caught in the act of using it
I... I can quit at any time!

>>/quest/957122
>flexing it
Sadly, it looks like using this blade doesn't stimulate Penny in any way.

>>/quest/957123
>you feel something change
Did something change? Penny's chest is still the same size.

>>/quest/957133
>you realize that it was only your mental perception of your body
No, I'm pretty sure they didn't get larger.

So, Penny's able to become invisible. That's quite useful. We'd still need to test it a bit further, to see what sort of security measures this would fool (unless we're optimistic), but I think it would be enough to allow us to get to the uwu guy once we're free to roam. It's also useful knowing that we can escape most forms of danger this way, provided that we expect them. What I wonder is if there are some limits or drawbacks in using this power. I would expect that we aren't able to stay invisible for extended periods of time.
>>
No. 132144 ID: 4286b4

>>132132
Personally I think the killer is the one that went quiet as soon as Penny revealed her location. You know, them having to get to work :B

But that would be too obvious, wouldn't it? haha
>>
No. 132148 ID: b07f1c

>>/quest/957241
>tuning out of the mind realm
Did muting the connected cause us to become invisible there? No? Then muting is another new mechanic. Altho it makes sense that changing your notification settings and changing your online status would be separate features hehe.

>your body, although invisible, is definitely still blocking part of your towel
Yeah, that did bother me. But now that it became clear that this is something unavoidable (or we've yet to find a way to hide anything other than ourselves), I should put more thought into it. It means Penny cannot perfectly hide items touching her. Well, touching her outside skin at least... smirk. Why is this? It's quite simple. She forgot to turn off "occlusion culling" haha...
Anyway, even if it was possible to see the occluded parts of the objects touching her, it wouldn't make the invisibility more useful because it would still be pretty obvious to anyone that objects shouldn't be floating in mid-air by themselves.
Hmm. Actually, maybe this isn't so bad. It just means that if Penny wants to hide an item from someone, she needs to hold it behind herself, out of that person's direct line of sight. Or if the item is small enough, holding it inside her fist would be fine.

>your best guess is
After the last panel, it's clear. Items wobble because we are turning into them!

>>/quest/957242
>something unexpected happens
This almost made me spit out my lunch. Like... what?! I got completely bamboozled lol
But at least we now know that it's possible for Penny to take on any object's appearance. It's quite interesting, albeit a bit unfortunate that the towel is anthropomorphized, because if the form of an object is morphed to this degree, it decreases the chance of being able to use it as a disguise.
I do wonder tho if this only changes our appearance, or does that mean we actually took on physical properties of a towel... heh. Probably not. Or at least it doesn't make much sense to me for Penny to be able to turn into a machine and be able to do the things that only a machine could.
Now, the important thing to note here is that we should be able to take on appearances of other people, which would definitely be more useful than objects, altho it might be harder to achieve. And there's also the question of whether the entity disappears, because I don't think anyone would want to change the appearance if it meant killing that person.
Lastly, I'd like to know whether this was a result of the power of illusion, or the blade of blades. It's most likely the illusion, but we don't know anything about how the blade of blades works.
>>
No. 132154 ID: b1b4f3

I strongly urge everyone to go through chapter 0 and ctrl+f "rhythm" to see what's what. I think Penny's thing with Omen likely caused something called a "Rhythmic Disturbance" which when severe can cause mass unrecoverable deaths. It's kinda like an earthquake, so you could say the sex was so good the earth literally moved and scared everyone away.
>>
No. 132156 ID: e51896

>>132154
Yikes, then we might need to sneak out of the building unseen as to not get in trouble for causing that.
>>
No. 132157 ID: 4286b4

>>/quest/957304
>You don't want to be a towel!
Penny clearly hasn't though this through. I mean, she forgot to consider how nice it would feel being rubbed all over various bodies hehe.

>you feel is your fingertips touching your fur
Confirming that it's all an illusion was quite important to do so that we don't wander in the wrong direction with our theories.

>>/quest/957305
>apparently it slipped off while you were surprised.
Now we know why Penny was wearing only the jumpsuit when she woke up! It was because she lost her other clothes due to being startled beforehand.

>you're able to locate it and feel it out a bit
Penny's mental masturbation is getting out of hand now haha

>inside them
While the list of tags going through my head is too long to include in this post, I would assume that, based on what happened with Omen, some sort of rhythmic connection would be required to achieve our goals.

>>/quest/957306
>You try to render your illusory towel form invisible, but nothing seems to happen.
This does make sense because, well, an invisible illusion isn't an illusion.

>it took significantly more effort
This may imply that taking on a different form has different limitations than the invisibility. However, I wouldn't be surprised if the amount of time we can stay invisible would be shorter than keeping up an illusion, where the illusion simply had a higher initial cost.

And yes, Penny's tits are as cute as ever :p

>>/quest/957308
>which makes your invisibility slightly less effective
While Penny's fur might obscure the water in it, I'm not sure how noticeable the droplets running down her body would be. Fortunately, Penny finding herself wet should be a pretty rare event... heh.

>towels and bathing paraphernalia are scattered all over
It doesn't seem like there was an explosion or anything devastating happening, but it was urgent enough for everyone to leave in a hurry, as evident by the puddles of water on the ground. Whether the people were able to notice (or otherwise feel) the undulations that we see we cannot tell, but they're undoubtedly either the cause or the consequence of the event itself. And while they do seem harmless to us, we might still want to remain careful considering the place is perceived as a danger zone to the others
>>
No. 132166 ID: b07f1c

>>/quest/957443
>Almost like there was a big rhythm spike
We don't know much about rhythm spikes other than that in the past they caused massive casualties and property damage. This differs significantly from the current situation where it looks like everyone escaped unharmed and without any visible damage to the building. So if we only consider what we know, the chance that what happened was a rhythm spike seems low. Of course, if it was a rhythm spike, a reason why the effects of this spike differ could be:
- Those spikes were natural while Penny's was man-made
- The effects depend on the person (intention, state of mind, talent...)
- The spike caused by Penny was too small
- Penny was in the dreamland

>Rhythm Quake
I don't know who coined this term, but it's not mentioned anywhere in the story. So it makes zero sense to use it.

>you assume you probably could use this power as an artifical means of knocker enhancement
Hmm. What we currently know about creating illusions is that:
- We saw what the target looked like
- We were touching it
- It needed to be a full-body illusion
The question is, how many of these conditions hold true and to what degree? I mean, it's possible that we don't need to be touching (or looking at) an object to be able to copy its visuals. And it may be possible that the illusion can be partial. But I highly doubt we'd be able to create an illusion of something we've never seen before, such as a busty Penny haha.

>>/quest/957444
>you aren't sure how to feel about it
I'll tell you how you should feel about it.

>you assume that sex with other blade holders would get you close enough
Of course. What could possibly go wrong?

>You don't recall seeing her with a locker key, anyway.
This is very strange indeed. I feel that it's important that we discuss all the possible theories as to why this could be. For instance, it be that:
A. Roz doesn't care because:
- her clothes are worthless
- she can always make new ones
- she's got another 100 copies of the same set
B. Roz wants her clothes to get stolen because:
- she likes to share
- that would validate her design and tailoring skills
- she needs space in her wardrobe
- she has a tracking device in it and she loves visiting the thieves' houses and extorting them in various ways in return for staying quiet about their crime

>>/quest/957446
>You hate how much sense this makes
I'm afraid that if nudity becomes too common for Penny, that I wouldn't be able to enjoy it as much anymore when it does happen haha
In any case, I think it would be out of character for her to suddenly feel totally fine with it so, it's likely she'll need a lot of practice walking around invisible first.

>This voice, however, does sound vaguely familiar.
Indeed. Matteo came to our rescue! What a hero!

>no one's going to think you're a pervert
A perverted hero then.

>Aye-yema
That is the word Matteo used when referring to Cider. It's probably another one of the Vesper words. I would assume it means something like a "leader", or a "respectful mother".

>everyone else is checking the rest of the shelf
This does give is a bit of a clue into what's going on. Because if people are evenly spread in checking the shelf, it would imply that the spa itself isn't considered special. So I would assume that a general alarm was sound which caused everyone to gather and deal with the problem in an organized fashion. However, I doubt that people would leave the spa in such a hurry if it was only because of Penny's disappearance. So I think it's likely that something like a rhythmic disturbance was reported and that it's the primary thing people would be checking for.

>how to work the equipment
Equipment? Some sort of dust or rhythmic sensors? Or rhythmic stabilizers? Shrug.
>>
No. 132167 ID: 10c408

Hoo boy, this update.

I believe Cinder is one of the blade wielders and she's prepared for the eventuality where a newly-minted wielder crops up on her island. (The silhouette in the middle of the big group shot we were shown looks exactly like her)

Mint might also be another one, or more in tune with rhythm. No idea which.

I think there's only three worthwhile midterm approaches to the current situation. (not accounting to the very short term while we still remain in the spa)

option 1: track down and find Mint, try and get information about what the frig is happening so that we can sell a proper cover story.

option 2: use the opportunity to find Cinder and acquire her blade.

option 3: hide and wait for Omen/Nemo to inevitably try and contact us again. They knew our exact location, and if they wants us to collect all of the blades they'll have to extract us from red shelf, so I'm putting good odds that Nemo is organizing some form of effort on that end.
>>
No. 132169 ID: b1b4f3

If Omen is Nemo, and the killer isn't actually killing people, that means the "killer" is stealing blades, and victims of blade-theft vanish from the "group chat" as if they had died. But something doesn't add up. It'd make the most sense if Penny was the one stealing blades, but she only has one. MANY blade-users have vanished. Does Penny have a rival? Or did she lose access to most of the blades when she went zombie?
>>
No. 132173 ID: 10c408

>>132169
I think if penny's previous incarnation had acquired other blades, Omen would have told us as such.

Also while I'm sure it could make narrative sense for not starting off at level one with nothing, the tradition has been upheld.

As for how many blade users have disappeared....

Honestly, I think the only person we can ask is Nemo. Asking the other blade wielders kinda gives up the idea.
>>
No. 132174 ID: 4286b4

>>132167
>Mint might also be another one, or more in tune with rhythm. No idea which.
It was implied in the story that everyone that was in that chatroom had "a talent". And considering that there used to be a large amount of people in there, I think it's likely that Mint is one of the people with a talent as well. On the other hand, I would find it extremely unlikely that Mint would be one of the blade wielders. This is because Mint was only born a few days ago, like us. While Omen implied that the blades have been around for a while.

>option 1: track down and find Mint, try and get information about what the frig is happening so that we can sell a proper cover story.
I think the most likely question that we'll need to answer is, "Where were we when Roz returned to the tub and found us missing.". As such, I'm not sure if Mint would be able to help us here. I mean, either she's evacuated like the rest of people, or she doesn't know what's going on either. If she does know, then the kind of information that she would possess, we could probably get by asking anyone, not just her.

>option 2: use the opportunity to find Cinder and acquire her blade.
Acquiring the blades is a long term plan and I don't see how this situation makes it an opportunity. If anything, it would be a bad time because Cider would be alert and hard to find. Also, she wouldn't want to sleep with us right now hehe.

>option 3: hide and wait for Omen/Nemo to inevitably try and contact us again. They knew our exact location, and if they wants us to collect all of the blades they'll have to extract us from red shelf, so I'm putting good odds that Nemo is organizing some form of effort on that end.
Omen was only able to find us when we were asleep, which implies that they don't know our location when we're awake. So we also can't assume that Omen knows what's going on on the Red Shelf, or that they would know that we're in any sort of trouble. Lastly, we know that outsiders aren't allowed on the Red Shelf, so anyone approaching would be met with hostility.
Btw, we're free to move around so, we're not actually in any trouble?

>>132169
>If Omen is Nemo, and the killer isn't actually killing people, that means the "killer" is stealing blades
There were two things that we were told Nemo rambled about. That the killer isn't a killer, and that they were bringing people to the next phase of evolution. If you assume that Nemo's ramblings are true, then you must assume that both of these facts are true. In this case, can you explain how you made the logical jump from "bringing people to the next phase of evolution" to "stealing blades"? How exactly does "evolution" imply "blade stealing" (or vice versa)?
>>
No. 132176 ID: b1b4f3

>>132174
Next phase of evolution for WHO? "bringing us to the next stage of evolution", not "bringing them to the next stage of evolution". The "us" could very well refer to the group overall.
Also, getting one's blade stolen could in fact involve some sort of improvement in other areas.

There is no direct, clear explanation, obviously. You're implying I need to give one. I don't.
>>
No. 132177 ID: 10c408

>>132174
Acquiring all of the blades from their wielders is a long term goal, yes.

Cinder's on the same shelf as us, however. And though she seems prepared to deal with another blade wielder on her turf, she is clearly not expecting one that can be virtually invisible.

That advantage isn't going to last forever, and the more time we spend faffing about the less likely we're going to get another shot at taking cinder's blade from her.

Might as well go for it now and worry about things afterwards.
>>
No. 132205 ID: b07f1c

>>/quest/957536
>with someone coming to actively search the area, you just can't risk it
It looks like fate really isn't on Penny side here.

>it's that Matteo guy
I would expect his expression to be a bit more painful considering how reluctant he was to enter this place a bit earlier.

>some kind of pistol
I have a theory. I believe that this pistol can kill people. At least as a melee weapon.

>nondescript metal cylinders
His instructions were to pop a can, which is strange considering he has a gun - why not just use the gun then? Perhaps guns are banned on the Red Shelf and the gun is just a prop meant to scare any foes. So the canisters are the real weapons, where I suppose they're meant to disable the person in a way.

>>/quest/957537
>he pauses to stare at your corner
It's strange how he lowered his gun. It's as if he was distracted by something. Something profound. I wonder what the expression on his face here was haha

>you can't take it anymore
It must be tough keeping one's raging exhibitionism in check.

>he moves on, apparently satisfied
I dunno if I'd equate popping a random boner to being satisfied

Overall a very entertaining scene haha

>>/quest/957538
>a cross between a donkey and an aardvark
Would that be a donvark or an aardkey?

>ping
It looks like Penny forgot to turn off her XCMP Echo responses as well.

>he presses a couple of fingers to his cheekbone
This might be a useful dust mod for Penny to get. Of course, it depends on which other mods would be available and their costs, because it depends which one would carry the most utility value for the situations Penny will be facing.

>not Aye-yema's
Hmm. If Cider is giving off a signal... it implies a lot of things.
- Cider is a blade-wielder
- Cider is the only blade-wielder on the shelf
- Vesper leadership is aware of Cider's power
- Cider has her power activated right now

>No, it's active, scanner keeps going off
The way this is worded implies that the question was, "Is it passive?". Which means that there exist active and passive contacts. The scanner picks up active contacts through pinging, and passive contacts... well, we don't know how it would pick up passive contacts then, but it seems it could. Maybe passive simply means that the contact isn't moving, and the ping goes off if movement happens.
Or maybe active means the contact's power is active, and passive means it's inactive. In which case, it's possible that Cider's power is currently not active. But then, when Penny goes visible, shouldn't it be picking her up anyway? Probably not. There is some indication that her power protects her from being detected when not in use.

>>/quest/957585
>some way you could form an alliance of sorts with her
I'd imagine that if we were to do such a thing, we should refrain from pre-emptively mentioning our own intentions. Well, we may not even have to do anything due to further reasoning provided below.

>Red Shelf's safety net
Based on what we've seen, the fact that the whole shelf will work together to fight any intruders, this would be an excellent advantage to Penny until she learns more about the world and her powers.

>maybe she's just playing a game of kill or be killed
The one thing that I would point out is that Triple-F called bullshit on Penny being a zombie. However, unlike Triple-F, Cider can confirm that this is true. If Cider knows that Penny really is without memories, then it's much less likely that Cider would perceive Penny as a threat (or the killer) and would more likely want to use her to her own and her shelf's (or ward's? hmm... is that what wards are?) advantage. Even in a game of kill or be killed, the one with multiple blades under their disposal would come out on top, so it doesn't make much sense for Cider to not see this as an opportunity. It's certainly implied that Cider knows how to work with people.

>The pinging sound stops.
Penny flatlined. RIP.
Well, it's quite relieving that this happened. I'm not sure how useful Penny's skill would be if she could be detected at all times.

>>/quest/957586
>a piercing siren starts blaring
It would've been useful to know if the sound of the siren was coming from inside the building or the outside.

>The emergency exit
Hmm, how does he know that the siren is due to the emergency exit being accessed? In either case, the timing of this is just right haha. Now, as for who triggered this alarm, there are many possibilities.
- It was someone that was after Penny
- It was someone trying to help Penny
- It was a random person
- It was Matteo
So, in the off chance that Matteo didn't know about the emergency exit siren and triggered it, the best choice here would be to take the main exit due to the fact that they'd be returning to the scanner soon.

--

We now have some pretty good info to be able to figure out what happened while Penny was sleeping. It's most likely that Vesper detected or was informed of an intruder on the shelf and the people are now searching for this intruder. So what triggered this could be:
1. Penny's usage of her power tripped a wide-area sensor
2. Roz informing Cider of Penny going missing
3. A talent-holder in the chatroom who's either a part of Vesper or an informant
4. Someone else infiltrated the Red Shelf, triggering an intruder alert

One important thing that I'd ask is, if Cider was in the chatroom, and she recognized Penny's voice, would she have ordered this search? The answer is... no, she would not. Because Cider knows who Penny is, she could simply inform a person closest to Penny to go fetch her. Or not even that - just casually bring Penny to Cider once their spa session was over. It makes no sense to inform everyone and create panic, as that itself could cause Penny to panic and do something unexpected.
Of course, it could still be that once Roz returned to the tub and found Penny missing, that she'd inform Cider, who then ordered the search. But the evidence is mixed. On one hand, the aardkey guy says that "there shouldn't be anyone in there", which implies that the spa was already searched, which makes sense as the place needed to be searched first. But on the other hand, he says "if you do see someone", which implies that they don't know who they're searching for, which shouldn't be the case if they knew it was Penny they're looking for.
>>
No. 132206 ID: e51896

I must say, even though a lot of people are voting to escape through the main entrance, I am really nervous about going out that way and still think the skylight in the male's locker room would be safer.

I think I'll think of it this way: using the skylight window will leave some kind of trance of us using it like fingerprints since not many people touch it, and I'd imagine it would be hard to wipe that off. and using the emergency exit might be troublesome since they already believe someone escaped that way and will prepare accordingly to chase someone going that direction, so the main entrance would be the least suspected area someone would escape from... we'll have to be quick though.
>>
No. 132208 ID: 10c408

>>132206
Personally, I believe the skylight is more work than reward. Getting up there means that we'd have to just get down somehow and disregarding noise and trace evidence, it'll make us stand out since we're so high up.

And sure, we could be invisible while going this route but that's just going to set off the scanner again.

Meanwhile... The door's right there, an alarm is masking our footsteps and the search team assigned to the bath house is busy elsewhere.
>>
No. 132217 ID: a0dfd2

>>132208

It's almost like teegee hung a big sign that just says "get on with it," you know?
>>
No. 132237 ID: 891b91
File 158327366801.png - (2.24MB , 2387x2972 , Penny_Roz.png )
132237

What if Penny turned into mini-Roz?
>>
No. 132239 ID: d98875

>>132237
Lol, thats funny. But the question is... why? and how?

Also, I'd like to imagine Roz having tiny beady eyes on the left and right side of her face for some reason. I'd imagine it would look silly
>>
No. 132240 ID: b07f1c

>>132237
It would be a shame because it would all be an illusion D:
But if it wasn't an illusion... then Penny might soon find herself in the wrong circles lol

A very fun-looking idea. Thanks for sharing!
>>
No. 132243 ID: 48ce40

>>132237
What if Roz turned into a giant Penny? Aside from batman references.
>>
No. 132244 ID: e51896

>>132243
I support this idea.
>>
No. 132274 ID: 3bac2f

Hey, a thought came to mind

Could it be possible that one of those signals came from when we went into group chat which isn't from UNKNOWN01? Like maybe UNKNWN02? Not that I want to test and see at this moment if there are new messages as the device(s) could detect us.
>>
No. 132276 ID: b07f1c

>>/quest/958263
Nothing much to mention here. I think that it was a good idea to not leave any evidence of tampering.

>>/quest/958264
>The screen
I'm getting such C64 vibes from this haha

>some kind of statistics
Some of these are easier to guess than others. My guess, in column order:
1. Contact name
2. A count, a level, or a mode of something?
3. Action taken on any stats or signal change of the contact
4. Signal or waveform type or origin? However, I can't guess what POIN refers to, point or point-like? Discrete?
5. Timer. These numbers seem kinda low. Oh, it's because he only turned on the scanned a minute ago. But, why isn't the CUSTOM01's timer increasing?
6. Signature

>BACKGRND ... the subtle rippling you've noticed around people's bodies.
So, it's classified as the background noise. Heh, it might've been a mistake on the part of whoever made the machine.
>WRLDSTAT is... vaguely familiar
World... state? Hmm. Would this one be the one that detects rhythm spikes? It's interesting how its timer keeps resetting every 12 seconds. That number might come to play an important role later on. Anyway, I guess the resetting is related to the REPT value.
>CUSTOM01 corresponds in some way to the calming distortion
This tells us that the distortion is of rhythmic origin. But we still can't tell who's the one behind it - it's equally possible that it's Penny, or Cider, or someone else. Nor can we tell what its effect is - would that be an illusion field, a form of mind control, a scrying field, a dreamscape control, a chatroom entry point, etc? Without further evidence, we can't go much further with any theories. What I think is very important tho is the number 01 changing into 02 which... also tells us practically nothing heh.
>UNKNWN01 ... you guess this is what the scanner detected when it went off earlier.
Hmm. So this is the signal that we give off when we're using invisibility? The fact that the UNKNWN02 timer increases but our one does not proves that our current timer isn't increasing. This means that, if we were concerned about not leaving any evidence, we could still use invisibility for about 30 seconds before our timer would increase to 02m.
>UNKNWN02 is completely unfamiliar and unknown to you.
This is an important hint. Because if it's entirely unfamiliar to us, it means it's definitely not Omen's. Heh, Omen's is probably one we'd be the most familiar with. We also met Cider earlier, so she'd be recognizable as well. No, this isn't true. Considering this machine detects us only when we're using our power, it's possible that Cider wasn't using her power when we visited her earlier, so if she's using it now, Penny wouldn't recognize the signal.
Another thing that I thought about here is, if this signal is a power-user signal, does that mean the CUSTOM01 signal is not due to the blade usage? Well, it's inconclusive. We don't know enough about the blades to be able to tell whether they're able to create separate signals or not.

>you feel a wave of... something indescribable wash over you
Does this have anything to do with the number 01 turning into 02? Or was that just a coincidence?

>conforming to its cadence
Heh, I'm certain that sooner or later, Penny's going to experience this feeling again.

Now, I wonder how all of this ties to what aardkey said previously. We now know that the words "signal" and "signature" mean two different things. The signal meaning the contact, and the signature meaning the waveform picture. So when he said "New signature, not Aye-yema's" it meant that he does not recognize Penny's signal's signature.
Another thing to note is that he said "signature" and not "signatures". There's two UNKNWN contacts, but he was mostly concerned with one. Does that prove that UNKNWN02 is Cider? Well, no, haha. It does imply that he knew about UNKNWN02 from before, but we don't know whether he recognizes UNKNWN02 or not, only that he doesn't recognize UNKNWN01. If he doesn't recognize this signal either, it could be that this one is the origin of the investigation...
Could it be that Omen's connection to Penny's dream was the cause of this event? Hmm, I dunno. It could be, but I think that UNKNWN02 is definitely not Omen. Not only does Penny not recognize it, but Omen was also never physically here, and their signal should have ended upon waking up. Yet UNKNWN02's timer keeps increasing.
Anyway, aardkey also said that he "lost the signal", which is strange considering our own signal is still listed. I guess that's just another way for him to say that the signal became passive, but I feel like I'm missing something.

Eh, I'm tired of thinking about this for now hehe.

>>/quest/958265
>the reality of what you're doing
The reality that Roz is actually the only one that ever walked those streets naked and tricked Penny into thinking it's a common thing? :P

>Hey Matteo, you down there?
Well, well, well. Could this be the person the aardkey guy talked to besides Matteo? I didn't think they'd show up here so fast but, well, if this is the case, they'll likely be coming down the stairs momentarily.
>>
No. 132277 ID: b17082

I think the time column (column 5) resets to zero every time a given signal is detected, and column 4 is a signal type or something.

BACKGRND and CUSTOM01 has type CONT, which stands for continuous, and the are constantly (continuously) being detected, keeping the count at zero.

WRLDSTAT has a type of REPT, or repeating/repetition, meaning the signal occurs at regular intervals, as seems to be the case with the timer resenting every 12 seconds.

Your signal, UNKNWN01, was also continous while you were invisible, but now that you aren't it hasn't been detected in ~1 minute.

UNKNWN02 has type POIN, which may mean "point". Possibly, it means that the signal only occurred once. Since the counter advances to 2 minutes before yours does, it means that whatever it was occurred before you turned off your invisibility, however I don't recall anything different happening except the emergency exit alarm which happened slightly after you became visible again.
>>
No. 132284 ID: b07f1c

>>132277
Yeah, you're probably right and I was wrong in assuming that the timer measured the amount of time a signal is active, rather than the amount of time it's been inactive.

It does make sense that, when Owen made the first report, he only said there was one new signal because that's all there was on the scanner at the time.

But, as you noticed, there's a problem. UNK2 signal disappeared about 30s before Penny turned off invisibility, without anything flashy happening. This, by itself, isn't really strange. It's likely that whatever UNK2 did, they did out of Penny's sight and without making any noise. No, the problem is something else.

Owen did not report the appearance of UNK2 signal to anyone. Discuss.
>>
No. 132285 ID: b1b4f3

Theory: Owen is Omen/Nemo. Just flip the m upside down.
>>
No. 132286 ID: e51896

>>132285
Makes sense. But also, if that is the case, Owen chose a pretty obvious name to become easily suspected as Omen or Nemo if he wanted to remain anonymous
>>
No. 132295 ID: b1b4f3

>>132286
It might not be obvious to anyone who knows them as Nemo. Could be that only Penny knows she likes messing with her name.
>>
No. 132300 ID: b07f1c

>>/quest/958408
>You flatten yourself
Oh, I didn't know it was 4pm.

>Matteo! Where the hell are you?
If Owen was the guy who called this person, why is this person asking for Matteo instead of Owen?
>Another pause. "Hey -- if Matteo's down here, he ain't answerin'.
Oh, Owen called someone else, who then told this person to go check up on Matteo and Owen.

>Got two unknowns. Owen only said one?
Yeah, why didn't Owen report the second unknown signal to anyone? Them conspiracy theories haha.
One explanation would be that Owen knew who UNK2 was. But if he knew, why did he leave so eagerly for the emergency exit? I mean, if UNK2 was his ally, why would Owen help capture UNK2? Strange. Unless... Owen knew that the person who went for the emergency exit definitely wasn't UNK2, so Owen went there because he was after UNK1. But this also doesn't make much sense, because we know that UNK1 is Penny and she didn't go there. If UNK2 didn't go there either, then... who was it? Hmm. Well, it could still be that it was UNK2, and Owen left because he wanted to get them out of trouble. But it could be some third party as well so, nothing was logic'd here lol

>says it picked up Aye-yema's signal twice
So the second number represents the amount of times a signal was picked up. But, does "picked up" mean the number of times the signal started, or a number of maximum concurrent signals with this signature?
>did she let up on it
Owen implied that it was the former, but, if the number increased because of Penny, it should've been the latter. Well, I wouldn't fault him for making this mistake. Or perhaps the scanner simply doesn't differentiate between the two.

>for a minute or something?
A minute? If we assume that the 5th column is a "Timeout Timer", and Cider let go on her power, then this timer should've started increasing, but it didn't. So either Cider let up for less than a second, or... she performed a binary fission :p

>another click and the whine of the scanner starting up again
How does Penny know it's the scanner? What if the guy's just really good at beatboxing?

>Alright, yeah, now it's just showing one.
I'm assuming there should be no unknown signals showing up on the scanner tho.

>In Funtana
I can't guess the context here. Funtana is a dar, so saying that something is in this dar... would that mean that Funtana is also a location? Or is he referring to a person that's in this dar?

>somethin' don't add up about all this
He's right. The ears of the girl in the first hologram were too long to be Cider's.

>>/quest/958609
>you meet significant resistance against opening it
Penny better be careful opening those zippers in the future!

>you don't know how much noise it'll make.
The answer is: maximum amount of noise.

>It isn't clear where it leads
If the emergency exit taught us anything, to an alarm trap.

>you think it coincided with the counter changing, rather than coming afterwards
...
Ok then. There's a good chance that the increase was a result of Penny doing something. Altho for now, we're not sure what exactly she did that caused that. It certainly complicates things.
>>
No. 132301 ID: b1b4f3

>>132300
Owen may have headed to the emergency exit to HELP whoever it was.
>>
No. 132306 ID: b07f1c

>>132301
Yes, that's what I wrote:
>Owen left because he wanted to get them out of trouble

>>/quest/958797
>It feels strongest down the Central/Underhang path
It has been confirmed that Cider's the one causing these distortions. But I wonder if that's because Cider is there, or it's just where her efforts are the most concentrated at. I mean, if her power if effective at such distance, then I wouldn't be surprised if she could target a specific area at long range with her talent.

>if you can imitate the CUSTOM01 signal... why couldn't you imitate that?
I did think about it but, I feel there's a difference between the two. Specifically, Cider's signal's the result of the usage of her power. So maybe Penny could only imitate it because of this.

>you're emitting background rhythm at this very moment, after all, so you just have to... keep doing it when you're putting up an illusion
There may be a big difference in doing that while and while not using invisibility. If the blade's strong enough to emit its own signal, it's questionable whether Penny would be able to change that.

>If the scanner you encountered earlier is any indication, they probably can't distinguish between separate background contacts
Maybe that's because each of those contacts had a different background rhythm of their own. But if Penny copied them, they suddenly wouldn't be different anymore, and would add up instead.

Hmm, I wonder if any of this gives us any insight into why Mint couldn't detect anything about Penny... nope, I can't think of anything new.
>>
No. 132498 ID: b07f1c

>>/quest/961112
>you're still unable to conjure up a mental image of what a human should look like
The number of fingers that humans have depends entirely on the drawing style hehe.

>what if someone sees?
I don't blame Penny for getting excited.

>>/quest/961113
>they're mostly facing away from you
Does this mean that they're facing in a direction mostly away from us, or are most of them facing away, while some of them still facing towards the trapdoor?

>you've only got a view of their ankles
I mean, aren't feet the most important body part?
Besides, Penny shouldn't be looking up higher anyway, lest she wants to see that all character faces look... the same - large grin, huge nose, tiny eyes, antennae...

>chanting in unison
Tsk. I was expecting Vesper to not be a cult but, this indicates that they may really be one. Vesper's goal was supposed to simply be the rehabilitation of taffa syndrome sufferers, but the words used in this chant don't really fit this goal as they sound much more religious, irrational.

Hmm. Nah, we shouldn't just cross them out as a cult. This is because it's highly likely that this chanting event is something rare and unusual, either a result of Cider's power usage, or something meant to assist this power itself. In other words, something with a very technical non-religious purpose.

>...and we shall see the lights before dawn, open, open
They're telling Penny to open and peek out of the trapdoor.
>break through the barrier, show what lies past the edge
They're telling Penny to move out of the tunnels and past the edge of the trapdoor.
>Never tell the lock what opened the key
They're telling Penny to do it quietly.

Eerie :p. But I wonder if this chant is related to Penny in any way. It sounds way too abstract to attach any meaning to it, tho the key and the lock do sound vaguely similar to the blade and the knot.

>Eighty-three! Nine hundred seventeen, two thousand!"
The numbers 83 and 917 do add up to 1000. Hmm. Are they trying to say that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts?
>>
No. 132525 ID: b07f1c

>>/quest/962249
>A large gathering is arrayed ahead of you, spaced out at regular intervals.
If they're spaced out like that, then it would be pretty hard to mingle without standing out. Perhaps the whole purpose of this control is just that - to find anyone standing out. So if we did try this, we'd basically be falling into their trap. Not that it matters, but still.

>why is she here?
Roz is here for the same reason everyone else is. For the free cookware.

>chants
These would make good song lyrics heh.

Well, that's quite a variety of people, most of whom we haven't seen yet. Of the ones present, the one I like the most is... the bird-like one in the middle.

>>/quest/962380
>It just looks like grass, to you.
Some people use black censor bars. Others, grass.

>eventually you'll need a breather
I wonder how long Penny can go without breathing.

>Something about the lizard-taur guy's nuts catches your eye
You knew this was gonna happen, didn't you?

>Even if you'd like to feel how heavy they are.
I like how Penny's mind works. Alas, the time is not right. I'm sure an opportunity will arise again some other... hour. Strange that this fantasizing didn't break Penny's concentration.

>You're concerned about Mint, and think maybe you should find her before something happens to her
I still don't know why suggesters are so concerned about Mint. Like, what's so special about her? Sure, we met her early on and she seems to have some special ability, but other than that she's just like any other resident of the Red Shelf. In that case, shouldn't we be concerned about everyone here, and not just her? What's with this preferential treatment heh. If it's about the fact that the killer could be after her, I think the chance of that is low because... the killer shouldn't know about her. The fact that Mint told us about her talent suggests that she doesn't have access to the chat room, because if she did, she'd know that she shouldn't be revealing her power unless she wanted to get killed. Also, the way people in the chat room reacted when we first showed up implied that there haven't been any new faces there for a while.
So yeah, I don't think it makes any sense for us to be worried about her. If anything, given her talent, we should be wary of her. Because it was implied that sleeper agents had talents. And her nightmares indicate that she might be in contact with one. So there is some chance that she could've been taken over. Therefore, looking for Mint may very well be the worst choice here.

>That'll also lead you past the balcony ahead
Hmm, I thought the Sanctuary was the source of the distortions, but it looks like it was only in the direction, that is, the balcony, that is between the Commons and the Sanctuary, is the source.

>>/quest/962381
>You're pretty sure you saw Millie's head across the way, but you didn't see any sign of Mint.
I'm unsurprised about Millie but, I did think there was a small chance Mint would be here. Perhaps another sweep to make sure she's not here would be in order. Then again, this probably isn't the only group of people on the shelf, so it wouldn't be surprising either if she was a part of some other group.

>you see Cider standing at the edge
A bit strange to see her exposing herself like this. Wouldn't this make it easy for someone looking for the blade-wielders to confirm that she's one herself? Well, I suppose this area is pretty safe and that scanners and extra guards are simply out of sight. Maybe she used to be inside before, but as her fatigue grew, she had to come outside to make control easier.

>>/quest/962382
>one fucking person
So they're looking for a single person and not two or more.

>take control of nearly every god damned person on the shelf
Now we know. Her power is the power of mind control. This also means that the chanting that we saw isn't due the Vesper being a cult, but simply due to Cider's power. Still, I wonder what's the purpose of bringing everyone here. Does that make it easier for her to control a larger number of people? Does it help in finding the killer in any way? And what's the purpose of the people chanting then? Why does she need to keep everyone under control at all instead of simply sending them all to some shelter?

>if the killer gets to her
So, the one person that they're looking for is the one they think is the killer. This also implies that the whole event was triggered when they learned that a killer might be on the Red Shelf. It's most likely they learned of this from the chat room considering they're absolutely sure that the killer is on the shelf. I mean, they wouldn't trigger the search of this magnitude if they weren't sure about it. I really wanna know what was going on in the spa while Penny was busy chatting in the chat room haha.

>paradise
Sounds like an interesting topic to bring up at a later time heh.

>>/quest/962383
>Don't -- don't kill them.
I'm actually unsure whether it's Penny that they suspect or not. If they were referring to the killer with female pronouns, then it would be simple. But since they're using neutral ones... I dunno. Considering that Cider's against killing, it feels like she knows that it could be Penny, and that Penny could be innocent. In other words, she's willing to give Penny a chance.

Penny sure made a mess this time. I don't think prolonging it would be a good idea due to the grief it's causing every single person on the shelf.
>>
No. 132534 ID: fb820f

>>/quest/962836
>The door is closed
A door. Suggesters' greatest enemy. Besides their own mind.

Nothing much to say here. It's almost strange to see a DD panel that isn't animated hehe.

>>/quest/962937
>Whoever was crying has gone silent. You poke your head through the door, but you don't see anyone.
We do see a slight wiggle behind the bed, which seems like a logical position for a person that's crying and afraid to reside at. It would've been funny if the wiggle wasn't there and the mind games that would ensue. Is the room haunted? Well, I suppose a closed door was an obstacle enough.

From the panel one might think that the undulations near the bed are stronger than elsewhere, but I'd say that it's just a coincidence where undulation strength varies from second to second.

>>/quest/962995
>Casknell (cc45d0): noooo i need her
We need you too, Ellis. Btw, you should've used their names instead of IDs.

>CALL OFF YOUR FUC;KING ATTACK DOG YOU ARE NOT HELPING
It looks like abcb03 and Typhon know each other. But I'm not sure if abcb03 is sarcastic here or not. The main question that I have is, is abcb03 on the Red Shelf? If they're not, then these messages hold very little info. But if they are, we could form a few theories around them. That said, it seems there's an agent of Typhon's on the Red Shelf right now who was supposed to be after the killer, but as a result they're throwing off the search teams. Either because they're occasionally spotted, or because UNK2 was this agent's signal.

>WE LOOKED THE OTHER WAY WHEN YOU PLANTED A FUCKING MOLE IN OUR HOUSE; WE LET IT HAPPEN
A mole? Heh, paranoia fuel. There's three people that come to mind.
- Mint: Her nightmares could indicate that something's going on in her subconsciousness.
- Owen: He didn't report the UNK2 signal to anyone. Perhaps he knew what it was.
- Millie: Left the shelf and came back a different person.
But, no use pointing fingers around. I mean, technically it could be anyone, even the owl that we saw. If we want to know who it actually is, we know who to ask.

>SO MUCH FOR GRATITUDE
An act of goodwill to not get rid of the mole? Hmm. I think it's more likely that they couldn't kill the person because they were important to them. Or they just don't like killing people.

>But they never answer you, do they?
The paranoia kept Triple-F alive, but it also made them quite clueless, didn't it?

>>/quest/962996
>Mint nearly bawls as she tackles your side
So Penny saying that she's naked is all it took for Mint to jump on her. Interesting...

Penny thought she'd have enough worries with Roz hugging her, but it looks like she'll have to deal with Mint as well now, haha; that startled look on Penny~

>>/quest/962997
>Y-you're spiky...?
And then Penny looked down on Mint with an evil grin and with a deadly stare of a blade-wielder in her eyes.
Also, did she just call Penny a hedgehog?

But yeah, this is quite interesting. It looks like Mint has the ability to spot blade holders. How convenient heh. Altho I do find it strange that undulations from Cider's power look fuzzy to her instead of spiky as well. Maybe it's only the blade holders that look spiky or it simply depends on the person. Anyway, this talent of hers may be of use to us later.

One thing that's bothering me is... why is Mint here? There are search parties going around. They should've checked the dorms and found Mint not being affected by Cider's power, which should've caused them to drag her off. There's three possibilities that I can think of.
- They haven't searched the dorms yet.
- They searched the dorms but didn't find her because she was hiding.
- They searched the dorms and found her, but left her for some reason.
If the first option is true then we have a decision to make on whether we want to hide her or not.
>>
No. 132543 ID: 891b91

>>132534
>We need you too, Ellis. Btw, you should've used their names instead of IDs.
Yeah, that was a bit of a major oversight on my part. The chat stuff was a last-minute addition to the update and had just copied whatever I had for names from the last chatlog posted in the thread.
>>
No. 132544 ID: b1b4f3

It occurred to me that the overall interplay between the various blade-wielders is extremely similar to a game of Mafia with optional roles.
>>
No. 132545 ID: 10c408

>>132544
That's very apt, given what we've learned about Caskell, Triple-F and... Screamy (abcd03)

That said... ah crapbaskets. Either Mint is a plant, Cider is now aware of us or the thing in the window is allowing someone else to mess with our head.
>>
No. 132546 ID: b34040

So we've seen the two-left-eyes thing before, including this owl specifically:
>>888872
>>933785

And for those that missed it, "lights before dawn" was a part of this chant:
>>961113

Did I miss any?

The left-eyes in particular appear to be following Penny around specifically, and no-one else has yet noticed them. In the case of the foxes, they disappeared without a trace when Penny had her back turned. Maybe they just snuck off, but I have the feeling there's something otherworldly or dreamlike about them.
>>
No. 132547 ID: b34040

>>132546
Urgh, how do I link posts from another thread?
>>
No. 132548 ID: 891b91

>>132547
When the post is on another board, you have to include the board name:

>>/quest/888872
>>/quest/933785
>>/quest/961113
>>
No. 132549 ID: 891b91

>>132548
Whoops, that first one should be >>/questarch/888872, I think
>>
No. 132551 ID: 015bf2

>>132545
Considering how the owl seemed to pop into being at the window, you may be onto something. Then again that could be dramatic license.
>>
No. 132553 ID: 10c408

>>132551
Pretty sure dramatic license is Mint seemingly taking her glasses off and having the same nightmare face as the owl we saw earlier. The 'animal' outside the window feels more like an important clue to this rather distressing turn of events, given that it wasn't there a second ago.
>>
No. 132556 ID: fb820f

>>/quest/963357
>while she's latched onto your leg
I guess spikiness isn't really scary to her considering it hasn't made her let go of Penny's leg. Or maybe she just really likes Penny's soft fur. Haha, I don't blame Penny for explaining stuff to Mint just to get her off of her.

>>/quest/963358
>Y-yeah... I-I mean no, you aren't...
There's her compliant personality again.

>What was that, Penny
Did she actually see something? Did our spikiness stop for a moment? It might have since changing our signal requires our blade's power.

>a couple people looked in here for a minute earlier
The second option then, unsurprisingly. They might come looking again if they decide they want to double-check everything, but I think the chance of that would be low.

>>/quest/963359
>she's using it to make almost everyone on the shelf line up outside so they can find the killer
I do still wonder what the exact reason was for Cider to take control of almost everyone on the shelf. Was it just to prevent panic? To line people up to more easily catch the intruder? To protect them in some way? If it was to protect them, well, the search parties clearly weren't protected, so this theory doesn't make too much sense.

>tattoo
The tattoo looks similar, but not the same. It's got one extra dot and a number. A limited-edition of something? Perhaps it's related to the thing that we stole. We'll need to talk with Millie to find out more.

>>/quest/963360
>despite being topless, you appear to be wearing a red shirt
Hehehe... I wasn't sure if partial illusion was possible, but this proves it is. Well, one thing that we still need to find out is if we need to see ourselves wearing the clothes before we can illusion them, or would touching them be enough. Even the red shirt that we see, it's possible that our front appears to be dressed, but our behind remains naked, so seeing ourselves in the mirror may be important.
Anyway, I guess that's the last time we'll see Penny naked. How sad.

>>/quest/963361
>Mint stares at you for a long moment.
This long moment may have been the turning point for Mint heh.

>>/quest/963362
Ugh, my heart...

Sigh, how did this happen? Oh right, people wanted to visit Mint haha. Well, here we are.
So, we got two new entities here. The Owl and MintV2. And it's possible either of them is the killer, Typhon, or Typhon's agent (or mole? are the two one and the same?). Or... someone else I suppose, but that wouldn't be very fun now, would it? Anyway, one might suspect Cider or the blade of control as well, but I think that's impossible because, when Penny saw faces of others that were under control, they didn't have eyes on the sides. Also, when we found Mint, she was crying, which wouldn't make sense for someone that was already under someone else's control at that point.
Were both of Mint's eyes always on one side, we don't know. Based on the fact that her tears were running down both sides of her face, one might assume that they weren't, but that could simply be explained that the tear ducts are present on both sides, just like her eyebrows. And just like we saw them on the owl. Of course, this could all be an illusion. Or something happening in Penny's head so we can't go too far with our assumptions.

>" H A V E Y O U S E E N T H E L I G H T S B E F O R E D A W N ? "
Assuming that this is a genuine question and that it isn't some cryptic message or signal or some mindbending attempt, the question is asking us if we have seen something at a certain point in the past. There's three moments that ring a bell. In case the time "before dawn" is quite literal, then
> >>/questarch/888233 >Glancing at the lights across the water
would be the time when we saw the lights. In fact, we also saw some same-eyes foxes there, so perhaps they saw us looking in the direction of the lights, so they would know we're one and the same person.
If we're a bit less literal, then "before dawn" could mean when we were knocked out, before waking up in the bed, which would be referring to
> >>/questarch/909256 >A thousand swarming lights are arrayed before you
If we're not literal at all, then "before dawn" might be before we woke up in the spa, so the time we spent in our dreams with Omen. In this case, "seeing the lights" might mean our ascension, or simply the meeting with Omen itself.
So yeah, we've seen the lights lol, but not sure which lights MintV2 is referring to.

The color of the room changed. A change in perception? And Mint's rhythm is... hard to describe. It's nothing that we've ever seen before. Not to mention how abruptly it changed, or the fact that Penny's own rhythm didn't change at all after her own awakening.

Quite an event this is turning out to be. Is Penny right now in danger? I think that if she was, we wouldn't have gotten an opportunity to react, so perhaps things aren't as bad as they may seem.
>>
No. 132557 ID: e51896

that substance that came out of Penny's mouth, it reminds me of that substance she had in her mouth that the very start of the quest. I do not think this was the first time Penny had this issue before she lost her memory.

Also, the colors around us seem to be faded brownish tone like it was at the start of the quest.

I feel so sad for Mint right now and worried about both her and Penny's circumstances, but despite everything, I'm glad we decided to check up on her, and I am also pretty excited to see where the story will go from here now once Penny awakens again.
>>
No. 132558 ID: b34040

Congratulations, teegee. I am immensely excited to see where all this is going.
>>
No. 132559 ID: b9f243

Prediction: chapter 2 will have Mint be the protagonist.
>>
No. 132561 ID: e7c7d3

Hmm, now I'm further curious if those two woofs at the beginning are related to the owl. They've got the same eyes, and were found near abandoned clothing with a bunch of red liquid, if I'm remembering correctly, which might be the same stuff that Penny is choking up. (Blood, liquid dust, I dunno)

On the other hand, if they were the killer, Wouldnt've they recognize we were blade by our wiggle signature?
>>
No. 132562 ID: e7c7d3

>>132561
Actually, maybe Penny used to be the former detective? Got killed and dust bended, then tossed into a dust den.
>>
No. 132563 ID: 015bf2

Penny's probably expelling Dead Dust, which means that whatever did her in was equal to taking an overdose of raw Taffa, which is what (supposedly) would have left her a complete amnesiac in the first place. There's a fair chance she's lost her memories again and the Penny we return to next chapter won't be Penny at all. The fact that it took nothing but a key phrase/rhythm to trigger the seizure suggests... something. Possibly on how the killer operates. Possibly on how Typhon operates. Possibly on the nature of a blade-user being attacked by another blade-user.

What's for sure is that we DONE GOOFED when we trusted Mint. She or whoever pulls her strings poison pilled our Dust or said or did something that triggered a literal kill switch in-built in Penny, no Raw Taffa necessary. We know that Dust can have exploitable weaknesses like that, since it was what allowed the Vespers to capture her in the first place.

There's a chance Penny's 'safe' and that this whole thing was just an in-built defense to prevent, say, possession or hacking of Penny's Dust (by literally clearing away affected Dust). Or that what Mint knows is something the Dust itself literally won't allow anyone to know, so it cleared itself right the fuck out to remove the memories.

All of that said, this is a tense as fuck finish and I'm looking forward to where even the heck the next chapter will go from here, teegee! I also love how we manage to stay on the tightrope of caution until we plop ourselves into an excessively unwise decision like staring at a highly suspicious paper or trusting a near-complete and also highly suspicious stranger with our most dangerous secret.

Makes for good dramatic chapter ends, don't it?
>>
No. 132564 ID: 49e4d4

>>132563
I disagree with the whole 'Mint was a bad guy the entire time' thing if only because- and I'm being a bit extreme here, I'm aware- I hate the idea of 'trust no one' in quests like this simply because I find it mentally exhausting and if that's the message of the day (which I don't think it is, honestly, I think Mint just got some bad luck in terms of possession, and even then, she's clearly remorseful so I'm willing to give her a second shot if we retain our memories' note the IF), then I might just drop the quest entirely despite it being very well written. I'm just not the sort to be mentally distrustful of everything all the time; if I think something is suspect, I just avoid said thing entirely. That's too much work for casual entertainment, for me.
>>
No. 132565 ID: 710d90

Based of the what Mint said at the end of this chapter im guessing she not as innocent as she seems at at least she seem remorseful about what happened. That said looking back on it someone in the chatroom was screaming about a Mole being put in thier home. I think the person screaming is Cider and she yelling because TYPHON was the person to call the assassin.
>>
No. 132567 ID: fb820f

Prediction: We now get an interlude that's a sitcom that revolves around Penny's dead body
>>
No. 132568 ID: 10c408

"Ohh yeah let's have some spiritual congress! what could possibly go wrong!"

*slow clap*
>>
No. 132569 ID: 015bf2

>>132564
Oh, Mint’s clearly more than a bad guy, but trusting her has definitely put Penny in a seemingly very bad spot at a bad time! That said, I think this event had good odds of happening sooner or later as long as we planned to keep associating with Mint and leaned towards bringing them into Penny’s confidence. Our choice to be relatively open just led us to trigger a particular story beat that happens to emphasize that Penny’s caution thus far has been super warranted and that she’s still a lamb among wolves.

Trust is definitely a valuable resource in this mafia-like situation - with Omen it panned out, but also created a crisis. With Mint we got immediate fail feedback, but we don’t know the consequences in the long run. The next Chapter will tell!
>>
No. 132570 ID: fd5772

>>132569
We didn't even know how to get away from Omen, but we had a chance to run out of the room and away from Mint. I think this mess could've been avoided, at least until something else caught us in this very chaotic situation with the killer, the mole, the chanting people, and the side eyed things belong presumably to Typhon, and the people working for Vespers.
>>
No. 132571 ID: c58093

Hey i just realized that if chapter -1 takes place in the past, we might get to learn Penny's real name

Unless she lost her memories at the start of this chapter as well somehow.
>>
No. 132578 ID: e51896

>>132571
She is gonna be named "Jenny"
>>
No. 132579 ID: b1b4f3

Yeah, Jenny Farthing.
>>
No. 132584 ID: e51896

Well, considering the person she is talking to is named Mike, it looks like our main character was a part of Delaney in some way after all, and even implied to have a close relationship with Mike too.
>>
No. 132585 ID: b1b4f3

Well, if Penny was the killer, having Delaney's help certainly would've made hunting blades easier.
>>
No. 132586 ID: c84ff4

so, wild idea, given we are getting a negative chapter, the end of chapter one could be us, violently, removing things that were blocking our memory and chapter negative one is us remembering.
>>
No. 132588 ID: e51896

An interesting detail is that in chapter 0 and 1, the story was told in a 2nd person narrative (you, your, you're) but now chapter -1 is told in the first person perspective (I, I'm, me, my).
I wonder if that means that when chapter 0 began after whatever happened to her happened to make her lose her memories, Penny is not in total control of her own actions and instead we the participators of this quest are in more control of her decisions and personality while in chapter -1, she has more control of her decisions and personality (such as refusing the suggestion to go back to sleep and instead check on Mike)
>>
No. 132589 ID: a0dfd2
File 158792307966.png - (79.79KB , 1023x1028 , brightened.png )
132589

>>132584
>>132585
>>132588

All told, I've a suspicion that we will indeed learn WHY Penny, as we've known her, ended up in a Taffa den this side of zombie'd, and why Omen would claim what it did, of how this isn't the first time we had done so.

While I somehow doubt Penny was part of Delaney (recall that Preston only freaked at seeing Moira's card / holo-ID) I suspect that this Mike person is going to be what sends her to O-Town and her eventual suicide.

What would be more troubling is a counter-theory: we were supposed to be working with Preston, or a similar group that wished to see Moira dead. Us reappearing without our memories of who he is, and bearing what looks suspiciously like evidence of malfeasance -- and then the ID of the woman he or his bosses may have wanted dead -- leads him to believe either we were compromised, or not actually who we seemed (remember: dust benders and Taffa salons exist, and in theory body alteration could be achieved, however illegally, to "dupe" a person).

"Mint" appearing to turn on Penny, and her coughing up dust again in response to whatever the hell happened in those closing scenes suddenly makes a lot more sense if we assume that Penny isn't who she believes herself to be, and someone else knows of her -- as per Omen's intimations and the decision to reveal her own powers, thus identifying herself.

There's also the fact that the very last image posted is weirdly similar to Brownie / the Set Beast guy's silhouette, albeit like some weird Doobie eyes going on. Keep in mind that their inverse sclera are identical to those that "Mint" had as well. I've uploaded a brightened version of the image to illustrate this. To compare: >>/quest/957538

If so, it will be fascinating to see ourselves become entangled in the very situation that places us at the canonical start of the quest.
>>
No. 132590 ID: 5877dc

>>132589
>I suspect that this Mike person is going to be what sends her to O-Town
I think it's more likely that whatever Penny's worried about (the reason why she woke up sweaty) is what eventually caused her to go there on her own volition. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if Mike's death is involved.

>There's also the fact that the very last image posted is weirdly similar to Brownie
Owen? Ignoring the eyes (because we confirmed that's an illusion), I think the ears, the nose, and the nose bridge look too different for this to be Owen. On the other hand, I think the windowlicker (>>/questarch/902043) looks relatively similar. Well, even then I think there's enough difference to just call it a coincidence. Perhaps it's not even a person, but an animal, like those foxes, that's portrayed. Heh, maybe this is Penny's "higher" form.
>>
No. 132594 ID: e51896

I can't shake the feeling that this chapter is going to have many moments of dread, and sadness in it, especially since we know the fate of Penny ending up in the Taffa den with no memory. Does anyone else feel the same?
We should probably look for and appreciate moments of light in the dark fated path Penny will go through until the end of this chapter to get by.
>>
No. 132602 ID: eae185

>>132594
Can’t help but agree with you. Try to enjoy the moment we have so we can understand the weight and impact of what was lost.
>>
No. 132614 ID: 9b0a61

It's probably going to be one of those situations where we retroactively get really invested in a fluffy individual that we *know* will die due to pre-existing canon. Hopefully, some of our knowledge will be able to carry over to the present-day in some form, even if Penny's a different person now.
>>
No. 132624 ID: e51896

With all this in mind, fighting fate will probably make things worse for our protagonist may experience, since she in the end destined to end up where she will by the end of this chapter.

Though at the same time, trying to fight it will most likely also make the story more suspenseful, so I'd be all for it within reason.
>>
No. 132630 ID: b24d69

Well judging from the end of the chapter Penny is either dead or in a world of even more trouble.
>>
No. 132639 ID: 695467

I'm really hoping the Penny we know will be alright, and that the attack by whoever that was didn't just wipe her memories all over again. Same with Roz too, she's cool and was hoping she and Penny would end up friends.

I'm not sure what we missed that could've clued us into what's going on, or if there was anything we could've done to avoid Penny's current fate, but that point has passed now.
>>
No. 132640 ID: 5877dc

>>/quest/963603
Chapter -1 huh? Penny's past? Or... a future that was not meant to be? Actually, it would be quite easy to get an answer to this. If only someone asked Penny what the current year is~
Well, for now I'll just assume it's Penny's past.

Haha, Penny using her own ear as a pillow, that's so cute!

>>/quest/963778
>I wasn't always such a light sleeper.
What sort of an event happened that would cause her to worry about noises at night? Has someone been after her?

>>/quest/963779
>watching for signs of danger.
Hmm. We know that certain entities are after the new Penny, but does this mean the old Penny was also aware of someone being after her? Or was this simply due to some other traumatic event? Still, this might explain why she's with Mike - for protection. Heh, if she left Mike, would that mean he was no longer able to protect her?

>that big ol' rat tail
Do humans have rat tails?

>>/quest/963780
>I check the time. 3:27. He doesn't have to be up for another four hours.
I'm more interested in why Penny has an alarm set to 10:30. If she sleeps for 8 hours, does that mean she went to sleep at 2:30am? And woke up after an hour of sleep? It might explain why she looks so sleepy. Well, one would certainly need to be a light sleeper to wake up at all in this case.

>the temptation to call him something else
My guess is that Penny wanted to use a term of endearment. But why she's holding herself back, as I read this, I'm not sure. Either she's trying to keep her distance, or it's because Mike doesn't want it.

>that's his I-don't-wanna-talk-about-it voice; that's just the way he is; These days, his problems are my problems.
Penny makes it sounds like Mike's restlessness isn't because of her. But then, what else could it be? Something work-related perhaps?

>>/quest/964245
>Around the time I'd realized I bit off more than I could chew and decided to quit scrapping... so maybe a year and change.
Does this mean she did something during the scrapping, or did she do something outside of scrapping work which then made her unfit for it? Or too afraid? Also, it's hard to tell but, it seems she's got a horizontal scar on her stomach? Or am I just seeing things?

>A friend of a friend knew someone
I think she just described half of the world's population.

>>/quest/964246
>Siobhan
Quite an unusual name. It almost feels wrong, in a way. Maybe I'm just used to Penny too much. Anyway, I'm pronouncing it as [ziofan], which is probably incorrect.

>I want to hold him
So, the old Penny was attracted to Mike. That's sad. Cider was right in telling her to forget about her past self.

>my indecision
What sort of indecision could lead to hurting someone? It sounds complicated. Perhaps Mike proposed to Penny in the past, but she turned him down, and since then Mike's been cold to her. But who knows.

>the excuse that we need to look the part
Hmm. For some reason, they have to pretend that they're a couple? Oh, yeah, it would make sense if it was for her protection, as a bodyguard. Well, it could also be something else. Maybe work-related.
>>
No. 132646 ID: e51896

I'm half expecting Mike to turn around and have those freaky vertical eyes for some reason.
>>
No. 132647 ID: b24d69

I'm calling it now this is a memory from the past that was supposedly "lost" forever resurfacing somehow. Why the past is coming back now, I'm not sure but if I had to guess it might have something to do with Penny awakening her powers. another idea is it has something to do with The attack that left Penny coughing up dust on the floor. the only real question is what happens at the end of the Memory? Is this the mind reliving the past as it slowly fails or Does Penny somehow managed to survive whatever attack hit her?
>>
No. 132648 ID: b24d69

As I was looking at the title card image of "chapter -1" I noticed that Penny is static, moreover not in a single image of "-1" has her outline moved. At the end of chapter 1 on the floor dying her outline was still moving. In fact, iirc the only other being that had a static outline we have seen so far is Omen. Maybe it means nothing, I don't know.
>>
No. 132649 ID: b34040

>>132648
Oh, I'm certain it means something. I just don't know what.
>>
No. 132650 ID: 5877dc

>>132648 >>132649
The wiggles that we saw in the previous chapters have been confirmed to be the result of the rhythm. And we saw them because Penny alone was able to see them.

As for why we cannot see them in chapter -1, I can think of three possibilities:
1. These are just memories and memories don't contain info about wiggling
2. Penny doesn't have the talent to see the wiggling yet
3. This is an unclear projection (Omen was also not wiggling when we met them at first), or what we see is not a true reality
>>
No. 132651 ID: 2d9a71

I hope that this isn't some fake memory implanted in our head by that owl or Mint.
>>
No. 132692 ID: 49e4d4

I doubt it. Feels like a 'how we got here' kinda thing. Maybe a memory, maybe just something for the players' sake. Either way, probably not smart to try and rock the boat too much.

Also, I'm officially going under the impression that 'human' in this world is being used not as the name of a specific species, but as the name of a type of being, like how we use 'mortal'. All humans are mortals, but not all mortals are humans- in OUR world.

In this case, all these different species are 'human', because in THIS world, human = mortal. At least, that's my guess.
>>
No. 132705 ID: fd5772

>>132640
>My guess is that Penny wanted to use a term of endearment.
Or it could be that Mike is/was her boss at Delaney Security. That would make this relationship a little weird.
>>
No. 132723 ID: 891b91

I originally asked this in the Discord, but I figure it'd be worth it to post this here as well:

I'm curious about people's opinions on an aspect of Dead Dust's writing that is a bit different in this chapter compared to other chapters.

So normally, when I'm writing things from Penny's perspective, I tend to stick very closely to the content of suggestions -- unless I have a good reason not to, Penny mostly does exactly what suggesters say to do, because I treat the suggesters as a part of her mind. I feel like that has worked out really well so far, because it allows suggesters to play a large role in determining what Penny's personality is like and who she is as a person.

Now that I'm writing from Siobhan's perspective, though, I feel a strong temptation to give her more... initiative, I guess. (And so far I've given in to that temptation.) In my mind she already has an established personality, attitude, set of beliefs, etc., so it feels natural to let those play a large role in how she reacts to suggestions and how she carries those suggestions out. I don't intend on taking it to the point of railroading, of course -- the suggesters still run the show, so to speak, save for cases where they tell Siobhan to do something she is strongly inclined not to do.

The way this seems to work in practice is that writing Siobhan seems to result in fewer decision points. Suggesters will tell Siobhan to do action X, and she'll do action X, as well as follow-up actions Y and Z because they're natural follow-ups to X. With Penny, on the other hand, my tendency is to have Penny explicitly do X, and then include a follow-up decision point where suggesters can decide to do Y/Z/etc. (The exception to this rule is when Y and Z are such obvious actions to do that it seems pointless to waste a decision point on them.)

I feel like this should work well so long as I'm not having Siobhan going off and doing major actions that have little to do with any of the suggestions, but I'm wondering what other people think about it.
>>
No. 132724 ID: e51896

I like this idea you're going for mainly because this was before she lost her memories and in an extent most of who she was, so she had more control of her actions before she became a "zombie"
>>
No. 132725 ID: 49e4d4

>>132723
Yeah, this honestly works better if only because whenever players get to weigh in on 'past' events, they'll always invariably try to change the timeline or otherwise spoil stuff that will happen later in the future. Best to do what you can to ignore that and keep kicking.
>>
No. 132726 ID: 35cc17

>>132723
The way you've been doing it is working well to show-don't-tell that Siobhan is not different from the Penny we're used to, without bashing us over the head with it. Good work!
>>
No. 132728 ID: 5877dc

>>132723
Tbh, I like it more when a character has more personality and acts more in accordance to their own worldview. As long as the character replies to suggestions, telling them what they think of the ideas or in case they refuse them, the reason for refusal, it comes through as perfectly reasonable and not railroading at all.
>>
No. 132729 ID: 5877dc

Also, I've been writing this review all day long on and off so I should just post it already.

>>/quest/964751
Striped... I wonder what Anon44's reaction was.

>big patches of mold?
So my previous prediction (>>126053) that they're a separate slime-like species turned out to be mostly correct. Altho this seems like the kind of general info I'd rather ask an information kiosk about rather than Siobhan herself.

>plasmodians are still the only source of raw taffa
I was wondering where that stuff came from. I thought it was either extracted from some special plants or grown in labs, but to think it was from an intelligent creature... yeah, it does make sense why it's so rare then.

>they aren't dependent on dust like the rest of us are
For a moment I thought that Penny might also not be dependant on dust but, there's too much evidence against that. Anyway, this also seems like a very important piece of info because it implies that intelligence does not require dust and that dust isn't all-important to living things. I feel that this could be evidence against theories of this world being a simulation, if we'd assume that simulated entities require dust to exist, but I'm sure there could be plenty of exceptions that would explain this. We certainly don't know enough about plasmodians.

Hmm. If plasmodians make raw taffa, which is a substance that neutralizes dust, then does this mean they're some sort of a negative dust entity? Or do they simply use raw taffa as a defense mechanism? Dangerous...

>Humans look like a lot of things.
Yet for some reason, Penny was aware that humans have at least one specific feature:
> >>/questarch/890051 >rather than the five found on human feet.

>a simple job, but it didn't exactly go that way
This does add more weight to Omen's words when they said that we stole something.

Theory time!
Siobhan went scrapping, her target being the Taunton Microdynamics labs. She went in there and stole a bottle. This bottle contained the dust for the blade prototype. She then either drank from this bottle, or did some dust modding to have the dust therein installed, we don't know the details, but the end result was that Siobhan obtained the blade of blades. How she obtained the blade of illusion as well, we also don't know - perhaps it came with the bottle. However, since she was the holder of the blade, Omen was talking to her. And people were now after her, prompting her to seek security. Either she hired Mike, or Mike was hiring an assistant, it's how the two ended together. But this security isn't enough, and Siobhan has to run away. She's hopeless and drinks taffa as a last resort to escape the people after her.

Or something like that.

>August 20th
August... say, that's a date that's awfully close to the one Penny saw in the shuttle, (>>/questarch/890360) August 22nd. Could it be that what we're seeing here is exactly two days prior? Even though we don't know the year, I don't think this is a coincidence, so I'd give it around 80% chance that the year is in fact 92C and this is indeed happening just a couple of days before Penny finds herself in the Old City.

>Bliy Pylon -- they're pretty much the catch-all
This does match my theory that wards are clans, altho it seems that Bliy Pylon is, as she says, what you get by default.

>they're askin' for a lot; holdin' things up on closin' the case
I understand. Mike is an artist and the commissioner is asking him to make changes after the drawing was already fully rendered.

>He always did take client confidentiality seriously
Or maybe he's been doing it for Siobhan's sake. Retina searing commissions and all.

Hmm, a lot of information in this update part. Way more than meets the eye.

>>/quest/964752
>it's not like he's gonna punch a hole through me
It's good to hear Siobhan knows her limits. So once we see what Mike's hiding, we'll also know what she can take haha.
Or at least the lower limit.

>You tryin' to start somethin
Yeah. The washing machine. He hasn't done laundry in days!

Let's see if this turns into another segment where we're getting lore through sex lol. Actually, I wish we'd just enjoy the scene for what it's supposed to be, but I suppose some suggesters will get bored with that.
>>
No. 132730 ID: fd5772

>>132729
sexy times are boring if they happen too often, agreed. A bit of kiss and cuddle would be nice, though.
>>
No. 132731 ID: b1b4f3

I wouldn't call this too often. Also, we haven't gotten any DICK yet.
>>
No. 132732 ID: 891b91

As always, if and when sex happens in this quest, there will be an element of plot significance. It probably won't always be an explicit lore dump as it was with Omen, but at the very least there will be something that I want readers to get out of it, beyond enjoying it for lewd purposes.
>>
No. 132734 ID: 5b93d3

>>132705
Isn't 'Mike' 'Mike Delaney' himself? >>/questarch/890053
>>
No. 132745 ID: 9b0a61

>>132734
Yup, with a mild redesign (though this is just an artistic decision). That's why she was teasing him about the cheesy commercial.
>>
No. 132755 ID: 5877dc

>>/quest/965085
>Thinking about her will definitely spoil the mood
Given that Moira and Mike both work at Delaney, the chance of Siobhan knowing one and not the other was quite minuscule given the circumstances.
Heh, I think Siobhan sees Moira as a rival here because she'd like to keep Mike all to herself. And I can see why! Well, I also think it's possible that Moira and Mike used to sleep together, which might fuel Siobhan's jealousy.

>being with Mike is my cover story to ward off suspicion
While this is some very important info, it also confuses me. What's the point of a cover story?
If the goons saw Siobhan, then all they would have to do is see her again to recognize her. So whether she's holding hands with Mike in public or not, it makes no difference.
If the goons didn't see Siobhan, but they knew they were after a scrapper, then the cover story also doesn't make any sense, because she would only need to stop scrapping until the coast was clear then.
If the goons knew that they were after a Delaney employee, then it would make more sense for Siobhan to distance herself from Delaney rather than stay close to them.
If Siobhan needed an alibi, then having Delaney vouch for her would be enough, without her needed to stay at Mike's place.

I can't think of a logical scenario. What am I missing here?

>I was the one looting ruins for his clients
What I'm assuming here is that Mike got a client who needed something retrieved, and then Mike contacted Siobhan for the job. What I don't know is whether Siobhan was Delaney's employee at the time, or simply a phone number to be called in this case.

>took some old-ass dust samples
Dust samples... this is probably what the vial with the faded label was but, I wonder if this is in any way related to the evidence case with twelve empty vials as well.

I suppose we could ask Siobhan what exactly the dust samples looked like.

>I guess the place was bugged
One theory that comes to mind is that Siobhan got somehow bugged and followed. And she's now being observed. If Siobhan knew that she was being observed, then it would kinda make sense for her to pretend to be a normal person. No, that's not right. If someone knew she was the one that did it, then the kind of life she lives wouldn't make a difference. However, following this line of thought, we can assume with high confidence that the people that are after her don't know where she is or what she looks like.

>The client
You know, I'm really curious to know more about this client lol
Of course, Mike won't tell us anything due to client confidentiality, but did this client know what was down there? And how important it was? Their all-clear signal, is it really something that Mike and Siobhan ought to trust?

>things to go back to normal
Same as before, I wonder if "business as usual" would mean Siobhan becoming a solo scrapper again, or a normal Delaney employee. Or something else.

>the Itch does a pretty good job of keeping it under control
Mysterious. Quincy did say a few things about the itch (>>/questarch/905834) - that it was bad luck. But if it's a phenomenon that holds rhythmic phantasms at bay, whatever they are, then it seems like a good thing. Did Quincy not know about those?

-

>He gets so vulnerable and needy when I start taking liberties.
Mike sure is a good sport haha, I guess he knows what to expect from his previous ventures with Siobhan.

>the compliments it got when I threw those shots up on holo
lmao, so was >>127706 actually canon?
I'm feeling pressured to ask Siobhan to look at some of those.

>He loves this kind of treatment even more than he hates it
Mike confirm for a sub. Also, he's my kind of guy haha
Or would that mean that Siobhan is my type of girl?

>You know I hate that stupid commercial
We've seen quite a few other commercials with a similar style around. I guess it's a thing. Siobhan sure likes it, so I guess the market research isn't wrong...
But in case it wasn't obvious already, this confirms that Mike is Mike Delaney.

>>/quest/965086
>That's kinky.
I suppose it is, if one's into orgasm denial.

>don't get a preg mod then
Or pregnancy.

>talking about having kids
So children don't exist in this world. Interesting...
But then, technically, the words such as "children", "mother", "father" and all sorts of relatives... they shouldn't exist, and Siobhan shouldn't know about them at all. No one should. Going further, "marriage", and "family", they shouldn't exist either, since the whole point of family is to raise kids together. It's actually curious that they exist even in the context of kinks that people may have in this world. I guess someone read some ancient text and got a wrong idea or something.
Personally, I'm allergic to kids and therefore I'm biased when I say that I like this development :P

-
>I oughta look into buying him a flavor mod...
Yes, she should.

>how cruel I'm about to be
Is it really cruel if he's into it?

>>/quest/965087
>this bad boy can make a real mess if he gets too excited
Imagining Mike's expression of disappointment is a gift that keeps on giving.

>>/quest/965088
Nothing much to say here. Except that Siobhan ought to get spanked for being such a bad girl. In fact, showing off her butt like that is just asking for it.

>>/quest/965089
>He chases after me, attempting to back me into the corner
I have a feeling that he wants something. I wonder what it could be.

Also, I love Siobhan's expression here.
>>
No. 132758 ID: e7c7d3

So it looks like we're dealing with trans-humanism not just on a physical level, but also on a spiritual one. A sort of "upload your conscious" kind of deal. But instead of a server somewhere like in a lot of sci-fi, the 'upload' is instead related to Dust. Perhaps Dust is just for physical stuff, but taking it raw Which is how Siobhan likes it, apparently :v seems to mess you up mentally, not physically.

So with the idea of personality being transferable via Dust, perhaps Dust is actual some sort of nanomachines. (Nanogoo doesn't need to be grey, after all.) Though since plasmodians can produce it, perhaps nanomachines that organic in nature. Which I do realize I'm actually just describing bacterium and viruses, but perhaps not natural ones. Manufactured cells and protein machines, with personality and the 'self' coded into DNA/RNA instead of binary. Which is why eating raw taffa completely wipes a person. You're essentially overwriting your personality with chaotic and unrelated chunks of various coding.

I dunno, just a thought or two. I do find the idea of the trans-human consciousnesses being stored in a decentralized fashion to be nifty
>>
No. 132759 ID: 9b0a61

Hmm. From the recent panels, it's confirmed that Sio's still got the tattoo under the ears. Makes me wonder if *everyone* has one of them, or if it's just specific people.
>>
No. 132760 ID: b34040

>>132759
Well-spotted. That's very, very interesting.
>>
No. 132764 ID: 5877dc

>>/quest/965570
>I have a job, y'know. >at the club
I wonder what kind of job it is. And if it's legal.

>with enough chits you can put things off for a real long time
But what happens if you don't have enough chits? I doubt that the government would just let you die if it was such a trivial thing. Especially considering we learned that there exist places that serve free food as well. So my guess is that, if you die of old age, your dust is still recovered, and you get a new body, altho you get some random cheap one. Then again, salon treatments probably aren't that expensive themselves.

>now it's time for your punishment
If he was really cruel, he would tie Siobhan up and make her look at him wanking alone haha.

>>/quest/965571
>I just drink it
I'm not sure if this makes her modest or not.

>>/quest/965572
>nice, hard smack
You know what they say. The way into a girl's heart is... actually I'm not sure if this is the right way, but I'm sure is a way into something. And Siobhan looks like she's enjoying herself immensely.

>which hole's first
>FIRST
If he's gonna fill all of them, does the order really matter?
This is a question that has no answer. Literally, since most suggesters didn't answer it at all lol

We can see the hologram again. But it's so tiny we can't see the number. Hmm.
>>
No. 132766 ID: fd5772

siobhan is a bit cheeky
>>
No. 132770 ID: 10c408

>>132766
What good are friends, even the ones with benefits, that don't take the absolute piss out of each other?
>>
No. 132778 ID: fd5772

>>132770
wasn't saying it like it's a bad thing. Lot more proactive than penny, and got a personality unlike her. Really a different person, no wonder they call taffa victims zombies.
>>
No. 132827 ID: 5877dc

>>/quest/966316
>Where do you work now?
>I'm a bartender at a shitty underhang club
Isn't Siobhan a bit too small to be a bartender? Also, I wonder if she gets people hitting on her there and how she'd deal with such people.
I also wonder if she already had this job before the whole stuff with Mike happened.

>It's a manufacturing label or something.
37... ok, the number is the same as before, so that eliminates a few possibilities of what it could be.

>Eating lunch at some diner.
That only raises more questions lol
Did everyone become aware of themselves at the same time or was it spread over a time period? And did it happen in the same way taffa users find themselves, or was it different? Because if it was at the same time and everyone started with no memories, I think society would instantly fall into chaos, with no one knowing how to do anything.

>>/quest/966317
>your pussy's off-limits tonight
lmao, sometimes he's a bit too obedient

>tossing me on the bed
And thus Siobhan was trapped in a prison of her own design.

>Ain't exactly punishment if I give ya what you want.
How could he have seen through Siobhan so easily!

Man, that pose and shading came together perfectly.

>>/quest/966318
>make ya earn it
Considering how nice Mike's been to Siobhan, I don't think he'll ask anything particularly surprising of her. But let's see what he's capable of hehe.
>>
No. 133136 ID: fd5772

I knew the mixed drink pun was a good idea
>>
No. 133151 ID: 4286b4

>>/quest/969449
>They've got [my old body] in storage, somewhere.
So this means her old body was not lost during that heist. This implies that Siobhan managed to safely escape the lab and contact to Mike.
Also, who's "them"? Some sort of a body storage service?

>Anyone with a fast hop and a modded transponder can go root around
I wonder what transponder she's talking about. Or why it would have to be modded.

>something most scrappers couldn't get at
It sounds like Siobhan was a pro.

>I'm supposed to say I won it in a contest.
That does seem to fit with the theory that this body is rare and/or custom-made. But then, why would Mike's client provide Siobhan with such a rare body? Still, it does tell us that Siobhan had to swap bodies right after that one job. For safety reasons, I'd assume.

>Almost a decade ago
That seems like a rather short amount of time. Hmm.

>the earliest thing I told the salon I wanted to hold on to
Pff, she made us think that people actually found themselves in this world in banal situations like eating food at a diner. This does make much more sense now. Ok, so Siobhan had memories older than a decade erased at a memory salon. And she implied that most people do the same, throwing away their memories for one reason or another. It seems a bit unusual, but it makes me wonder if had this ability in real life, how often would we choose to use it.

Anyway, this also implies there could exist people with extremely old memories. Perhaps there's even someone who'd remember their actual beginning in this world... as human.

Also, altho there's a limited amount of people, there had to be a way for people to get here somehow. Either a starting point, or a time period when the population was still increasing. There probably doesn't exist any records of this time, but maybe this could be related to Penny's goal.

-
>Funny how it never came up when he was actually my boss.
Maybe that's because Siobhan never called him her boss before that mission. The one thing Mike always wanted hehe.

>I'm delegatin' here
He's not very good at this delegating job of his~

I like that tent of his, but the critique I'd give here is that the fabric looks a bit too loose and deflated. A hard-on that large would usually stretch the shorts to create a bit more firm-looking tent.


>>/quest/969450
>...special glass
I like where she's going with this. I also like the pose.

>>/quest/969451
Haha, really well written dialogue. And of course, I love the art here. Siobhan's expression and is on point and exactly how I'd imagine her to be in this situation, that is, very alluring.

>>/quest/969452
>I might need your help, ah, coaxin' the cream out
Eh, he already got a blowjob before, what more does he want!

>some good suction goes a long way
It's all about the sound effects.

>What do you think?
I think that the foreplay should've been over 3 updates ago :p

>maybe we should do something about that door
Linus has something to say about that.


As always, an enjoyable read. Thanks for updating!
>>
No. 133260 ID: 7d9195

>>/quest/970106
>>So i assume this is the year 92C
>The "C" in 92C just means "current", it's the current era.
But what is the name of the current era? Hmm. She didn't object to the assumption so... did she just confirm that the year is 92C? And these events are happening just two days in the past?

>the biggest wards signed a peace treaty
Is that what the purpose of Tripartite Detente Committee was? To de-escalate hostilities between the wards and sign a peace treaty? But then, why wasn't the committee disbanded after the signing? Maybe Tripartite means that the de-escalation is made of three phases, where the signing of the treaty was the first phase. But to this day the third phase never materialized and this committee is stuck in limbo.

>I think 568-something was the last year in Elm?
Siobhan makes it sound like the current era came right after the Elm era. In >>/questarch/890052 it is mentioned that after Elm era, Ash era began. So does that mean the current era is the Ash era? No, that's impossible.
It's mentioned that "RDEC fell into total disrepair over the following few centuries", so at least a few centuries had to pass. But the current era is only 92 years old. This means that the current era is definitely not Ash era. In other words, we don't know how many eras and total years passed between the Elm era and the "current" era, but it had to be at least a few centuries worth.

>they put in a block that makes my memories of the old body look like this one
It's hard to imagine what the purpose of such a block would be. Perhaps just to make her feel more comfortable in her new body.

I'm still amazed at how I was right in my guess that Sibohan swapped her body.

>I think maybe I didn't have fur
Or maybe she only had it on certain parts of her body. Maybe she looked like Roz!

>Just a bunch of tiny vials with black powder in them
Well, this means that the vials in the evidence case had nothing in them. Probably. And neither did the dustbender.

>I assume Mike's client has them now.
Ah, I had a theory that Siobhan had hidden the samples in the Old City because they were slowing her down and she had to escape, where the upcoming mission was to retrieve those samples. But it looks like this wasn't the case. Oh well. In that case, I have no evidence based on which I could make a prediction as to why Siobhan returns to the Old City in the future.

>I'm not really sure how it works, but they don't copy anything
At some point, Quincy did say that a dustbender could "extract" and "inject" a person's dust, but I suppose a dustbender can only do it in some specific cases.

>>what's the point of semen
>Swallowing it
This in-canon fact amuses me. I mean, it makes sense that it wouldn't be used for milkshakes.

>>/quest/970107
>big silly thing
Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.

This is probably my favorite panel as far as the art in this update goes.

>>/quest/970108
>I take a moment to admire the thing
Her job really grew on her, huh?

>>/quest/970109
The raunchy paragraphs I'd rather not ruin with my comments hehe.

>>/quest/970110
>I'm just followin' yer lead.
I swear it sounded like he demanded that Siobhan sucks his dick.

>>/quest/970111
>It has to be something about this body
Hmm. So this body is somehow causing Siobhan to crave sex a lot more than usual. Why is this?
We know that Siobhan obtained this body from Mike's client. We also know that it's some sort of a limited edition series. Lastly, we know that Chasers are able to afford expensive custom-made bodies. So it's possible that this body was originally commissioned by a member of the Chaser Fleet ward. It would make sense considering Chaser's are pretty open about sex (as mentioned in a following paragraph). But even so, how did Mike's client come to possess this body is anyone's guess. Either the client is a Chaser themselves, they got it in a trade or payment of sorts, or there's some other reason why one wanted to rid themselves of this body. Perhaps even intentionally.

>but now I get damp and needy at the drop of a hat
The irony is rich.

>So far I've had the strength not to give in to it
It's good thing we're here to fix that~

>So I'd assume that naked people are a pretty common sight up on the Fleet
Sounds like a place we should be visiting soon then!

>Somethin' buggin' you
Why does a round pizza come in a square box?
>>
No. 133268 ID: b13dfe

>Why does a round pizza come in a square box?

I assume this is because it's easier to fold cardboard into a square shape than a round one, it packs just fine, and there's no significant enough reason to put up with what would doubtlessly be more expensive boxes.
>>
No. 133269 ID: aed8e2

Sorry but, i'm really not liking this lastest chapter. This prequel chapter came out left field after the cliffhanger of chapter 1 and imo has been ruining major plot points that should have been revealed later on in the story. Its just been nothing but Exposition dumps over a out of place sex scene with a character we just met. I liked the permanent amnesia plot point from the beginning because it it allowed readers to discover and explore the world along with the protagonist. I don't mean to hate but this has been on my mind for awhile.
>>
No. 133270 ID: 3994a2

>>133269
I appreciate the feedback, and I'm sorry that this chapter isn't doing it for you -- I see where you're coming from. I don't know whether this will be satisfying or reassuring for you, but I'm going to try to address what you've said point-by-point.

>This prequel chapter came out left field after the cliffhanger of chapter 1
I meant for it to come out of left field, actually, and that's been part of my plans since very early on in the quest. That's not to say you're wrong for disliking it -- that's a matter of personal taste and I'm in no position to fault you for it.

>and imo has been ruining major plot points that should have been revealed later on in the story. Its just been nothing but Exposition dumps over a out of place sex scene with a character we just met.
All I can say in response to this is that I think the plot points you think are being ruined are in no way as major as you think they are. It might help here if I add that this is only the beginning of the chapter, and that the rest of it will not take the form of interrogation-style exposition.

Perhaps I've leaned too heavily into the sexual aspects of the quest, and admittedly I feel some pressure to deliver on that front, especially since sex scenes will become increasingly unlikely later on. Answering questions in the meantime was meant to be a way to add an expositional "hook" for anyone who isn't terribly interested in the sex, but I recognize that it's not the most compelling way to present plot details. I hope that once this scene is over (which won't be long from now), things will become more interesting for you and anyone else who feels the same way.

>I liked the permanent amnesia plot point from the beginning because it it allowed readers to discover and explore the world along with the protagonist.
I see your point, but I think by the end of this chapter it'll be apparent why and how the quest is deviating from that initial premise. I can assure you that we are still only scratching the surface of what is going on, though.

>I don't mean to hate but this has been on my mind for awhile.
It's always difficult to hear negative criticism, but you're entitled to your opinion and you've been fair in expressing it, so I'm in no position to complain.
>>
No. 133273 ID: adb916

>I liked the permanent amnesia plot point from the beginning because it it allowed readers to discover and explore the world along with the protagonist.
I think we still are. My understanding is that the end of the last thread broke the mental block (and probably other things) and we are (again among other things possibly) passing out from the information overload that is chapter -1.
>>
No. 133274 ID: 0e57d8

>>133273
I agree, but I also agree in that this chapter was...disappointing. I was greatly looking forward to going through the quest discovering who she was in the past, especially since that was a major reason for a lot of our planning. As things stand now however, we pretty much lost an entire reason, and now we don't really have much of a motivating factor aside from escape because someone wants to do something to us. I have to admit, I much preferred the quest when we were essentially setting our own goals and doing things on our own volition. Now it seems like we're being forced in given directions simply due to fate and plot, and the last major independent motivation we had was just taken away from us. Nothing else to do but follow the dotted line. It's becoming less of a QUEST and more of a STORY. If that makes sense. We've lost a meta-reason to forge our own future as Penny instead of Siobahn, since now we know who we were, which means that every decision we make will subconscious be affected by that knowledge, whether it's to consciously avoid going towards our past or intentionally going towards it. It just feels like a lot of the mystery and intrigue is dead or dying. The mysterious individuals we communed with are still a factor, but I can't say they were particularly enticing in terms of primary motivation. Now they're all that's left and it just feels like a stock Fibd the MacGuffin quest. I think you broke the cardinal rule of 'show, don't tell' in your yearning to expand on Siobahn/Penny's world. I'm not as interested in the quest anymore.
>>
No. 133278 ID: 3994a2

>>133274
I think I understand where you're coming from, but ultimately I think what it comes down to is that Dead Dust simply isn't (and never was going to be) the quest you hoped it would be. It seems like you wanted Penny's identity to be the headline mystery of the quest -- in which case I should have jealously guarded any details about it and saved most of them for the climax. Your disappointment is understandable, then, because the way I've planned this quest from the very start treats the question of Penny's identity as only one (albeit significant) detail in a fairly large web of mysteries. Revealing Siobhan's identity and fleshing it out slightly in a flashback chapter is one of my earliest plans for the quest, and so much of the rest of the quest's design relies on Penny gaining some knowledge of who her past self was.

I agree that this necessarily affects decisions suggesters will make going forward, but wouldn't that be true about any information gained about Penny's past, unless Penny's past self was such a total nobody that there'd be no point in exploring said past? I imagine that part of your disappointment comes from the style of exposition used in this chapter, which admittedly is a bit of a compromise to keep things interesting for anyone who doesn't care about sex scenes. (Although, to be fair, the sex scene itself does have relevance to the plot, in multiple ways.) Rest assured that there will be significant and important exposition later in the chapter that doesn't take the form of Siobhan answering questions.

I get that you feel like the quest is being railroaded at the moment, too. I think that's mostly due to this chapter being a flashback chapter, which naturally lends to a more linear progression. My plans for the quest involve it becoming more open-ended as the quest progresses (outside of any flashbacks, should more occur), so it is only going to become increasingly more feasible for suggesters to forge ahead and direct Penny's future how they please. I understand that you'd prefer for that to be done in the absence of any hard information about Penny's past, but hopefully that future non-linearity will make things more satisfying for you.

The one aspect of your criticism that I don't really understand at all is the idea that the mystery or intrigue is dead or dying. I'm not saying you're wrong to feel that way, of course, since it's a matter of personal opinion; but frankly there are a lot of plot threads hanging around (and more that haven't been revealed) that are at I at least intended to add to the mystery. I guess those things have failed to hit the mark for you, but I have trouble imagining how the various unresolved details I've sprinkled throughout the quest could fail to present a web of mysteries that's at least somewhat intriguing. But perhaps that's a blind spot of mine and I can't see things how my audience sees them.

I guess the only conclusion I can come to here is that there's no way to make Dead Dust into the quest I believe you want it to be, not without redesigning it from the ground up and scrapping the majority of my plans for it. And if I were to do that, at that point I might as well just either reboot the quest entirely or abandon it to make a completely new quest. I won't say that I would never go that route; but it's a fairly drastic option to take and I could really only consider it if I was convinced that many other suggesters share your sentiments, especially suggesters who have contributed a lot to the quest.

Anyway, I'm sorry that the current thread has been a disappointment for you, I wish it wasn't. I hope that I can regain your interest in the future, but I understand if the damage is permanent.
>>
No. 133279 ID: e24163
File 159352128535.png - (630.70KB , 1024x1024 , eatfresh.png )
133279

The latest update has come with a particularly fresh opportunity, if I do say so myself.
>>
No. 133280 ID: e51896

I think siobhan doesnt feel like she has complete control of her body because we suggestors are the ones who control her by giving her suggestions for actions of what she should do, we are the ones partly controlling her actions and to blame for making her think she doesnt have complete control over her actions. If that is the case, i wonder who or what are we suggestors are supposed to be that is inside siobhan's body/mind and giving her suggestions, and who put us suggestors in her mind in the first place.
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No. 133281 ID: 0e57d8

>>133278
Thanks for being even handed about it. I'm not so sure if I can keep that interest either, and honestly am just leaning towards tapping out. Plenty of other things to do. And what I mean by how it seems like a lot of the mystery is dead or dying I suppose really does reflect more on the character themselves, as it had seemed to be a core element. You say that it's not, but it was the thing that seemed to be most front and center up until now. The way I had interpreted everything, it was all more of side issues that woukd influence that. Since it's not, it all feels like a sudden jar.

I also admit that part of my umbrage is due to it being a flashback, yes. I'll admit I'm biased against them in stories in general- what something was and has already happened is never as interesting to me as what is or could happen, even without supposed context. I'd rather focus on the now and the future, instead of the past. I have the same issue with flashbacks and whatnot in books and film/animation, too.

At any rate, the quest really doesn't seem like it's what I was hoping for- that being a mystery of the self and what makes people people, combined with a central concept of 'discarding your past to create your future.' This is apparently going in another direction, so. I guess my interest is reset to nil, so maybe when you get back to present day and get more into current events I might get back interested in it.

But to me, Penny was far more interesting than Siobahn will ever be simply by default.
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No. 133285 ID: a0dfd2

>>133278

Skipping what preamble I wanted to write, and going to play counterpoints, now.

>Revealing Siobhan's identity
>Quest relies on gaining some knowledge

I understand why you wanted to do this, but as the other anon says, you've taken away a choice from the questers; one of our possible actions was to independently attempt to research who or what we were -- and was something very, very strongly hinted by Millie, then cautioned against by Roz, essentially baiting the questers.

Thus, when suddenly we, as the questers (and not yet Siobhan / Penny), know this identity without any involvement beyond simply reading -- and hence why the anon refers to it as an exposition dump -- it sort of ... well, frankly, it completely removes any sense of triumph or reward we might have gotten, had we instead snuck onto a Holo terminal and pulled up information -- such as from that vial.

On the topic of the vial, that was our very first hint at who we were, and a major point for some time that was discussed at some length, before mysteriously disappearing shortly before the bathing interlude.

Now it's presence and function in the quest are inherently moot, at least topically, lest you're planning to have some residue or serial code that can be used at a salon to recreate it, though I cannot imagine what good that would do beyond place us in a very bad situation, given what Siobhan confesses to with that one job.

>Q&A vs Sex Scenes

Moving onto this one, rather than the brushing off of subliminal manipulation of responses.

It's rather hard, personally, to even read the updates when nigh everything after the first ... 8 updates is porn. Yes, Siobhan is answering our questions, and yes, some questers are horny, but ...

... the only way I can describe it is being disjointed. Siobhan is having an inner dialogue with voices in her head and dealing with a situation that is growing progressively outside of her comfort and control (and has in the past, according to a piece of exposition that feels contrary to former actions) -- all whilst engaging with Mike sexually. It reminds me heavily of the earlier situation with Omen, and what disparate opinions that raised.

The result is cognitive and emotional dissonance, and it starts eroding the suspension of disbelief, whilst making it simultaneously harder for the reader to filter out what's in the events of the scene, and what's Siobhan's response -- or her reactions to our suggestions.

>Things will be different, but in the future

Discounting that we have to eventually reach Chapter 0 to remain cohesive, before moving on to Chapter 2, this is not terribly reassuring. To explain, and sort of frame why I'm even doing this, it is largely because such has been your general statement throughout. The majority of your responses have been some effect of "Dead Dust isn't what you expected it to be," or "it will be different in future chapters" -- so I suppose I lied earlier, and I am going to address that it feels as though many of your responses have disregarded quester concerns, even if such was not your intention.

As for why I and others have voiced these concerns, I can only speak for myself, but I will say this: if expectations are being failed repeatedly, then perhaps Dead Dust is not presenting itself sincerely -- that is to say, the quest, from its beginning to where we are now, has not followed what some of us have taken as clues, hints, overtones, or other suggestions as to Penny's situation, Red Shelf, dust, and, again, the mysterious vial upon her person.

I'll go back and refer to one of the earliest comments in this thread:

>>123380

Many of us equally took Dead Dust to be a mystery as you've stated, and provided suggestions based on the details we were thus given -- including the actions and reactions of characters, such as the divide between those wishing to stay with the Vesper Society (who sought to establish ourselves and make contact with Q) and those pushing to escape (who felt Cider was too cultish).

And splits like that have occurred repeatedly since Dead Dust began.

>Is the mystery gone?

Here's where I'll agree with you, and say the other anon was too heavily focused on Penny's former identity (as Siobhan) -- however, I think that, from what I've already outlined, it's very understandable how they would have reached this conclusion. Nigh everything we've encountered insofar has been a question of who we were -- from the usage of taffa as literally opens the quest, to the Vespers and Cider, to our discussions with Roz over Millie's change in personality after learning about her former self. Even we the questers insisted that we wished to find out, regardless of the outcome and despite Roz's warnings against doing so.

Thus we were given, and listened to, Omen.

And when suddenly everything in Chapter -1 takes away one of the central pillars of our motivation -- the learning of Penny's former identity -- it can be very hard to mentally reorient ourselves and our expectations.

To put it into perspective, imagine playing a game where the central plot and most interactions were about finding The Artifact. If suddenly halfway through we're given the thing we've struggled for after days and days of playing this game ... it becomes hollow. There's no sense of achievement or progress, or even a victory over having accomplished what we set out to do, and it sours all that time spent working toward something. Similarly with games where a character you've heavily invested in is removed later on, quite abruptly; all that work vanishes, and the player is left with nothing and little recourse.

I understand that this is only as it appears on the surface, and there is a much deeper mystery with the so-called Blades and Omen's existence, but that it appears at all should be of concern.

>Numerous unresolved threads

This is where I'm going to segue back through several former points again, as you've rather hit the proverbial nail, here.

I think what the other anon is trying to say is that, as I'd laid out, a vast portion of our interactions later on focused on who Penny ultimately was before using the raw taffa. Not her situation, not what she was doing in O-Town (or how she got there), nor the zombies or even the situation on Red Shelf; all these had become a given, immutable.

Even when other topics were brought up or oddities became available, there was almost always an overriding concern -- be they the shadow monsters, the strange false sun, Preston's bizarre reaction to Moira's card, the tentacle twins and the drugs, the Vespers sigil, our mysterious coma thereafter, Cider's level-headed matronly nature, Roz's bubbling personality and bosom, Mint's doldrums, Millie's crypticism, Penny's unresolved sexuality, the sudden presence of Omen, the Gordian Knot, the need for escaping from the bathhouse, or the chanting before we got mind-stabbed.

Yes, there were countless bits of unresolved plot and so much that I'm leaving out in even that list, but each time was there always something else driving us, or characters who did not present the necessary hook to "catch" questers with.

And I'll go ahead and admit: I was wrong when I said Penny likely wasn't part of Delaney. We've learned now that she was intimately involved with Mike -- literally, and figuratively. More, Preston might have been her neighbor -- who probably freaked out because he thought Mike would know he'd been going down to O-Town for shady dealings.

But that's just it -- all of these appearances were played as either being perfectly normal, or we the questers had very little reason to actively question matters. We hadn't the basis to do so, beyond what pieces we had to work with.

Going back to the topic of the mystery: there's no sense of revelation or epiphany, here. Instead of being amazed that we now know who llama-guy was, or that this isn't our body, or why we presume ourself "human" -- yet cannot rationalize why others do, too -- there's only that sense of hollowness I'd spoken of.

It becomes just a detail. Something now divorced from the moment.

Hence why the anon called it an exposition dump.

>Reboots?

Contrary to everything I've said, I sincerely and earnestly hope that you don't. Dead Dust is salvageable, and you've shown yourself immensely talented both in art and storytelling in the prior chapters. Withholding my own criticisms of sex as a distraction or even discomfiting, we're still gaining information critical to the world, to Siobhan, and ultimately to Penny, once Chapter 2 starts.

But I think, personally, that equally critical will be ensuring that what knowledge we will then hold must not be able to be used with any immediacy. Let it build character drama, friction between ourselves and the Vespers, and a situation that places us in even more dire jeopardy; let Penny/Siobhan be faced with her actions and her past, as much as her revelation.

There is still discovery to be had in this quest.
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No. 133287 ID: 3994a2

>>133285
I guess the best place to start is to state outright what I think my mistakes have been.

The sex is starting to become a significant regret of mine. As time goes on I've started to increasingly regret incorporating sexual content into the quest. I really thought that I could keep a good balance going and keep the story compelling, but it seems like I was overly optimistic about that. I think if I could do it over I wouldn't have tried it in the first place. But then again, I know people on Discord who state outright that they aren't interested in smut, but then tell me that they like the way I've tried to balance things, so I feel lost as to whether it's actually a major problem or not.

Pacing has also been a consistent demon I've wrestled with when running this quest. There have been various points where I've gotten hasty about introducing new plot points, because I felt like I'd let certain scenes drag on too long. I think I probably should have planned those segments better, so that I wouldn't feel like things were getting long in the tooth and that I need to introduce the next big plot point to keep things interesting.

I've probably also failed at considering about the meta-aspects of the quest -- for example, you mentioned the quest failing expectations, or perhaps presenting false expectations. If I'm to be completely honest, when planning this quest I haven't though much about what expectations I'm creating, because so much of my planning and writing goes through the lens of trying to "simulate" the people and powers in Penny's world. This means that, for example, when Millie tries to entice Penny into thinking about who she once was, while Roz says it's a bad idea, there isn't an intentional subtext of "this is the primary mystery and you guys need to hyper-focus on this"; instead what's going through my head as I write it is along the lines of, "Millie really really wants Penny to do ____" or "Roz is terrified of what learning about the past can do to people." That's not an excuse for neglecting the metatexual aspects of the quest, but instead just an admission that I have neglected them to a fairly extreme degree. So I ended up being pretty surprised by the degree to which people objected to the Siobhan reveal, because from my perspective I always viewed the question of who Penny was prior to taffa poisoning as a springboard into bigger, deeper aspects of the quest -- I saw it as the starting point, not the goal. I've done a bad job of communicating that, though.

>The majority of your responses have been some effect of "Dead Dust isn't what you expected it to be," or "it will be different in future chapters" -- so I suppose I lied earlier, and I am going to address that it feels as though many of your responses have disregarded quester concerns, even if such was not your intention.
It wasn't my intention, no, but I don't really know what else to say in response to some of these concerns. If someone tells me, essentially, that what they want out of the quest contradicts the core of what I've been aiming for since the quest began, then maybe this quest really isn't what they're looking for. As I said in another post, the alternative is to scrap the majority of what I have planned, at which point it makes more sense to just reboot the quest or start a new one entirely. When I've tried to reassure people about the future of the quest, my intention was to point out that as the quest is currently planned, their concerns will be alleviated, or at least I think they will.

>Dead Dust is salvageable, and you've shown yourself immensely talented both in art and storytelling in the prior chapters.
I appreciate the compliment, but I'm beginning to have a lot of trouble seeing how to salvage the quest, if I take all these criticisms to heart.
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No. 133288 ID: 3994a2

I guess all of this has left me feeling like I'm at an impasse. If it's not too much to ask, I'd appreciate it if everybody who either is or has been interested in Dead Dust would weigh in on how I should proceed. The way I see it, I have four options:

>1) Stay the course and keep pursuing the quest the way I have been, so far.
>2) Attempt to make significant changes to the quest's design to accommodate the concerns that have been voiced so far (as well as any other concerns that might come up), without rebooting it.
>3) Completely redesign the quest and reboot it.
>4) Shelf the quest indefinitely and move on to another project.

To be clear, this isn't a vote to decide the quest's future, at least not directly; but I want to get an idea of where general opinion stands before I commmit to any particular plan of action.
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No. 133289 ID: b5fb67

>>133288

I need to catch up! I'm interested, but I just haven't had the time.
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No. 133290 ID: c82427

>>133288
1
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No. 133291 ID: 0fae41

>>133288
1. "Salvageable" implies something is already broken, and DD is not.
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No. 133292 ID: e7c7d3

>1)

I wish I could engage with >>133285
more directly, but I think it pretty much comes down to what I feel the driving force and mystery of the quest is. Differences of opinion, really. Nothing more.
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No. 133293 ID: e51896

1.
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No. 133294 ID: e24163

Part of the problem is that solutions 3 and 4 are basically nuclear options that would obliterate all of the work you've done up to this point AND the reader's participation.

I'm leaning 1 and 2, but a more 'nerfed' version of two, because while some people have legitimate concerns, attempting to shift gears when you've already talked about how this whole chapter was planned from the start still seems quite drastic to me. We haven't even *gotten* to the parts in this chapter that are the real nitty gritty - Siobhan's 'death', what the hell happened to everyone in the suicide room, that kind of thing. But I trust in teegee's own writing direction, and there are still plenty of mysteries worth examining and pursuing. There's no need to restructure things when we haven't gotten to the best part of this chapter yet.
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No. 133295 ID: e24163

To follow up - I don't think there needs to be a retcon, necessarily. By 'nerfed version of 2', there's always stuff and new mysteries to be added in the future rather than the past.
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No. 133299 ID: 1da365

1
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No. 133300 ID: b1b4f3

>>133288
1. I thought a few things were brought to light in a way that "spoiled the hunt" so to speak, but most of those just led to more questions. Like, we found out where her body came from but not why it's tagged, and now we're wondering why it makes her horny. We found out a lot of "common knowledge" stuff but also found out that it's not normal to think "human" implies a specific shape, so that raises questions. It's a lot of the same kinds of give and take that we would find by pursuing questions on our own.
It's mostly her previous identity and its connection to Delaney that got blown wide open. Plus... we're not really capable of doing much of anything in the intermission aside from interrogating Siobahn and watching her fuck Delaney. The porn is nice, of course.
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No. 133304 ID: 4286b4

1

I'm quite pleased with the recent developments. I believe that Siobhan's reveal was well-placed and that, while giving us good understanding of Siobhan's personality and relationship with Mike, it keeps the rest of the circumstances involving the transition to Penny well-hidden, so there's much yet to be discovered about the past.
The recent sex scene has been tasteful and enjoyable, and it's interesting to see the passion Siobhan used to share with Mike.

Keep up the good work!
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No. 133305 ID: 882d70

1. I don't see any apparent faults in what has been laid out so far, outside of what We, the readers/suggesters, have chosen to do. We're a fractured base with different goals in mind, yet seemingly united with a tendency to chase after shiny rocks. There have been several decisions in which we seem to have panicked or forgotten the goal of which our previous decision intended to follow; thus leaving loose threads.

As for the sex: I think it best to get through these scenes with 100% focus. It satisfies the horny-minded while getting through the scene quicker. This, and preserving any exposition/story for after, should make this easier for the non-horny.
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No. 133306 ID: f56a2b

>>133288
1
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No. 133308 ID: e2f5cc

Alrighty. Just gonna put my two cents into this because why not.

First thing is that I pretty much completely agree with >>133285, at least in conclusions if not reasonings.

I guess I'll follow that up with my own primary issue with Dead Dust, and that's the utterly borked mystery element.

I know you believe that the mystery is fine, and honestly I'm sure it is on your end, but listen. Dead Dust has been running for two years now and what exactly are the mysteries we more or less have a handle on right now?

We know what Taffa is and does.

We know what happened to our memory and why we woke up where we did.

We know who/what Delaney and Vesper are.

We (more or less) know why the llama guy was spooked by Penny.

We know about Penny's past life which is... Something I'll get to as well.

I’m certain there are some minor mysteries we’ve solved that I’m forgetting, but compare the five things I outlined, with two of them being more worldbuilding than anything, and look at the immense amount of shit we have absolutely no idea about.

Let’s go over another big mystery that I feel is a microcosm of Dead Dust’s whole issue, that mystery being: What the hell is up with the Vesper society?

At the start of thread two (chapter 1) we know that something isn’t quite right with the group, and I at least got very light cult vibes which proved to be more or less accurate as is revealed later, but that mild revelation raises many far, far bigger questions than it answers.

And that’s about it, if memory serves.

So what I’m trying to say here is that you give us so many enormous mysteries that I’ll freely admit are highly interesting with absolutely no fucking clue how to solve any of it.

Again going back to the Vesper society, what conclusions other than it being some sort of cult can we draw using actual facts in regards to what’s going on behind the scenes? None. Because we spent the majority of a large thread and got absolutely nothing than more questions.

That’s all Dead Dust is frankly, a whole load of questions with about three relevant answers in two years of running.

While that’s my primary grievance out of the way I definitely still have more to say, like about Omen.

I’m not going to mince my words here, handling Omen the way you did was fucking stupid.

Taking things from the top, lewds honestly just don’t have a place in Dead Dust. I’m not going to lie to you and say I dislike the lewds (except Omen) but it’s frankly silly to believe that /quest/ won’t try to bang anything that will consent especially when you lean into that angle so hard.

Which is something that comes at the major expense of entirely halting the primary mystery element, and I’d say it outright hinders the mystery since instead of giving us any time at all to property think things over with Penny (which is a major issue with the pacing, but is also the only real problem with it) we instead put all our attention of banging someone.

And that brings us back to Omen, who primarily is a complete cop-out in terms of what she does in the narrative along with being a completely out of place sex scene with an eyeless monster clone of Penny instead of Roz, and I, with all the legitimate sincerity I can muster, will be well and truly amazed if a single person would honestly say they wanted to fuck Omen before Roz, so completely cucking us out of screwinging the hot sharkish thing is a bit of a dick move, but I’m also willing to believe we’ll see her again on friendly terms.

But getting back on track, I’m frankly baffled you didn’t back out of/delay the sex scene with Omen after the level of debate the idea of sexing her for information sparked, and I’m honestly just confused on how and why you thought people would focus on both the lewds and the information at the same time, since sex and complex info dumps are basically polar opposites along with losing an amount of suggestors (including myself) that were highly likely to be some of the ones attempting to make sense of the entirely of the miniscule amount of currently usable clues.

Now to be fair, I like the pacing of what I saw after the Omening and the foreshadowing of the dude from the beginning of the thread was legitimately excellent, and the scenario made it reasonable to not have time to think about what just happened along with providing a good mystery of “who are these people?” while also giving enough clues to have something to go off of (or at least more than the other mysteries), but it’s all unfortunately wrapped in a decision I honestly just cannot wrap my head around: The Blades.

Giving your protagonist actual superpowers a year and a half into your story is a bold move, especially when the existence of superpowers much less Penny having them wasn’t hinted at in the slightest, and even more so when said superpower is absurdly useful in the story.

Like, I am legitimately curious as to why you thought giving Penny invisibility was a good idea. It obviously opens up a lot of possibilities both lewd and story wise but it goes completely against the normal and downright vulnerable Penny we’d known for a year and a half, and again even if you planned this all along I don’t recall any sort of real foreshadowing to this.

I also dislike what Blades existing seems to imply for the world, but I’ll be honest and say I skipped most of that particular spiel.

You know what I hate as well? Leaving off the cliffhanger of Penny basically kicking the bucket to go into a flashback chapter that reveals the only mystery that had any substantial clues to it!

Chapter -1 was a mistake through and through (except mike, I’m straight and I know that ratto is hot as hell.) basically from minute 1. I know that Siobahn (I’m calling her Penny from now on) is supposed to be a bitch, but saying the suggestors are stupid basically every time, even if it’s in character, just feels like it’s you, Teegee, doing the insulting. Especially when it comes to the characters thinking they’re human, cause that joke got grating real fast.

There’s also the issue of taking exactly four updates until they started fucking, and don’t say “Oh, but you had the choice of not having sex” since as sated before, /quest/ can and will attempt to fuck everything that consents.

And then you go and do the exact same thing you did with Omen and try to mix (really good this time, i’ll admit) sex with a ham-fisted info dump mixed in. I already went over my main problems with this strategy before so I won’t repeat myself, but I do honestly wonder why you tried this again after it went so poorly with Omen.

And while this is really tiny, the way you write Mike and Penny makes it seem like you’re trying to force the impression of a long relationship, and even though it takes me out of the lewd bits I have no suggestions on how to fix that.

So, in the end, my personal take on matters is that you should drop chapter -1 since it’s rotten from its core and pick up from where thread 2 left off and provide hints and clues rather than more god damn questions. And while I’ll personally say you should drop the lewd element, you’re the one who decides that sort of thing. What I mean by that is to not poll lewd or not lewd since you know the answer you’ll get.

But before I go, I just hope you realize that continuing exactly as is won't work no matter how many people vote 1, since eventually you are going to have another kerfuffle on your hands if you don’t make changes, so I guess this is a vote for 2.

And please remember I do this out of love for what I saw in early thread 2 (which was Roz. Mike/Roz porn when?) and because I know Dead Dust is both something special and can most certainly be fixed.
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No. 133309 ID: 5fc3a0

1, I like the quest a lot and see no reason for it to change!
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No. 133310 ID: adb916

1.
I saw reference to 'this quest has been running for two years' which I feel is an irrelevant point. I do not know how far out Teegee's plans go, but it doesn't make much sense to get 3 chapters into a 15+ chapter book, see that the basics of the world have been explained, and conclude that nothing else interesting can be presented/happen in the later chapters.
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No. 133311 ID: cdabe3

>>133285
>>133308
jesus christ
>>
No. 133312 ID: cdabe3

oh, and 1
>>
No. 133313 ID: 4a4205

>>133288
1!
>>
No. 133314 ID: d63ea8

I'm just stopping by to wish teegee well.

I don't keep up with Dead Dust, but from what I've seen you are both a talented writer and artist. I hope you hear this, and I hope that whatever choice is made, it can help you out.
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No. 133315 ID: e7c7d3

Going to try my very best to not start drama, (Or continue drama?) Just going to try to point out something that I think is a bit of miscommunication.

This kind of highlighted it for me:
>I know that Siobhan (I’m calling her Penny from now on)
Trying to infer from some of the other posts as well, it seems like the problem is arising from chapter -1 is Siobhan's connection to Penny. Mainly, seeing them as the same person. Primarily that Siobhan is answering Penny's past, and thus ruining the amnesia mystery.

Thing is, Siobhan and Penny are NOT the same person. Trans-humanism is a pretty big theme going on here, what with people being able to change up bodies with dust and transfer to different bodies. Us looking at Siobhan's life here is more akin to us seeing what Penny's mother did rather than Penny's direct past. The only real connection between the two people is the body, which as Siobhan answered fairly early on can fairly easily be transferred to different people. She didn't even have that body for most of her career.

So there's still a lot of mystery as to Penny's background. Was she formed When Siobhan OD'd on taffa? Was she transferred in and Siobhan transferred out? Is Siobhan dead? I feel that the mystery of Penny is still ongoing, with further twists thrown in through exploring some of the grittier aspects of trans-humanism. Mainly, what is the self, and what does that mean for someone with no memories.
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No. 133316 ID: e7c7d3

Also, fan theory here, I'd guess this is why everyone calls themselves humans. At some point humans got the ability to start changing forms up with dust. Now ages later, this became such the norm that society as a whole has forgotten what the original human form looks like. But the label "human" stuck around cause the change was gradual enough that coming up with a new label just really wasn't brought up.
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No. 133317 ID: 470289

1
>>
No. 133319 ID: baed16

I honestly feel like a lot of people are trying to be overly nice about the issue as to spare feelings, but I may also be wrong and just not who this quest is for. I'm voting for 2 as a practical choice, but I feel like (and I suspect others as well) it'd be rude to demand changes to your artistic vision despite my disagreement with it, so there's a part of me leaning towards 1 and just letting the chips fall where they may.
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No. 133320 ID: 864e49

>>133288
Big 1 from me dawg.
Truth for me was that what got me in was the art and what kept me was the world and characters. The world you created is very unique and I'm looking forward to learning more about it and that characters are interesting and hopefully get even more fleshed out.
As far as I'm concerned finding out about Siobhan's identity didn't remove that much mystery and has actually added some, there are dozens of quests that start off with amnesia (it's a site trope), and many of them do have the "find out about your past" thing so doing something different with it is actually kind of welcome.
And as for the sex, it's fine. I can see why people don't like sex and exposition at the same time and it is hard to do right but you're not doing a bad job of it at all. It's not that different then exposition during a giant gun fight and it's immensely better than exposition and nothing else.
And besides its not like Sio's thinking about war atrocities while blowing Mike.




All that said I would also like you and everybody to remember two thing.

One:
This site is full of people with different ideas, view points, interests, expectations and understandings about what a good story is and how stories should be told. Critiquing a author for bad or lazy story telling is one thing but complaining to the author that you don't like their story or method of story telling (or worse making demands) just annoys all of us that are enjoying it and stresses out the author.
If you end up not enjoying a quest then yes it is sad and frustrating but if everybody else seems to be enjoying themselves then maybe just accept it and move on to another quest.

Point the second:
YOU ARE DOING THIS FOR FREE, PRESUMABLY IN YOUR FREE TIME, PRESUMABLY FOR FUN, YOU OWE US NOTHING!
If this is the story you want to tell and how you want to tell it then do it.
Getting engagement is nice and feedback is good but if people start making demands you are within your right to ignore them.
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No. 133321 ID: 8fab7a

I have no big problems with the quest as-is.

First of all, whoever said this was Penny's only past life that needed investigating? :P

(Cripes, just the body itself seems to be a potential plot point!)

Secondly, a quest might be collaborative storytelling, but every quest author has a significant investment in their quest and all rights to set the pacing and plot, as well as any and all world building details. They don't have to be tyrants about it and giving agency to your participants is a big part of questin', but, uh, this is free entertainment, so maybe try to take what enjoyment/influence you can get from it? I mean, yeah, if you really don't like the direction of a quest and want something different, A) offer feedback to that effect (as happened here), B) don't be pushy about it (eeeh on what happened here) and C) move on and pay someone else to give it to you cuz' you probably ain't ever getting exact specifications otherwise. Optional: D) make it yourself.

And when offering feedback, focus on what you feel will improve the experience. Do not hammer the author. Trying to dissect what 'went wrong' is a surefire way to give creatives heartburn. Go with 'I think this could improve the experience' and do respect that they might disagree (and would not be wrong to, this being their creative project). Good critiquing's hard.

Thirdly, a fair amount of 'tell' goes with the Quest format because of the glacial pace imageboard/forum games suffer, particularly in lore and story-heavy quests like DD. We were always meant to pursue (or be pursued) by the mystery, even if we had no clue yet as to what the mystery was, and to that end a bare minimum of relevant information (and the occasional red herring) will always be aimed at us. Compare and contrast these moments to the 'Core Clue' game mechanic in RPGs like Trail of Cthulhu.

There's also a separate point to be made here: We're often only 'told' about stuff we actively ask about. So our access to Siobhan's brain right now is a bit like the info kiosk from Chapter 1 - a time-limited offer to peruse, and you gotta ask the right things to get her thunkin' about lore nuggets that can potentially be used to inform later interactions. I know not everyone pays close attention to all these nuggets, but I personally treasure these 'infodump moments' as chances to explore the world and gather information. They're in no way jarring to me, cuz' it's always on us to be clever with our questions. Good/interesting questions gives us good/interesting information, yeah?

If someone disengages because of the sex (fair) or just bein' discouraged by a sudden gear shift or revelations that didn't fit their conceptions of the quest (sort of fair), then yeah, this game/story might not be for them or have taken a disappointing dip. At least right now! Who knows if it'll hit a better rhythm or story mood in 2, 5 or 10 months' time. Quests always have high points and low points and those points can be at different times for different people.

Frankly, imo, you're fine, teegee. Your production values are ridiculously high. The quest is fine, your approach is and has been fine, the sex is fine, the art is more than fine, the plot remains interesting and so forth. You don't seem to suffer for active questers, so while you might be losing a few to prequel blues and can chew on the above feedback all you want, don't take sour grapes as sheer truths. You can't please everyone and interest will always wax and wane. I don't always comment on every update myself.

But I have no intention to abandon reading your quest(s) any time soon and don't see a need for revamps or redos or whatever the heck. Put me down for 1.
>>
No. 133322 ID: 7d9195

>>133308
>at least in conclusions if not reasonings
Which conclusions?
>Dead Dust has been running for two years now
The amount of time a quest has been running for is irrelevant to the story plot and pacing.
>look at the immense amount of shit we have absolutely no idea about
I'm looking at it. What I see are opportunities to learn about this world and our current circumstances. I see this as a positive thing.
>What the hell is up with the Vesper society?
We already learned plenty about this non-profit organization, its goals, its structure, etc.
>far, far bigger questions
Which questions?
>absolutely no fucking clue how to solve any of it
You'll have to be more specific about which mystery you need help with.
>it being some sort of cult
Define a cult.
>what’s going on behind the scenes [of Vesper]
We know that Cider is one of the blade-wielders and that she leads Vesper together with her friends. For more details, we'd have to ask her about it.
>Dead Dust is frankly, a whole load of questions with about three relevant answers
This is normal, since Penny only woke up a short while ago, and the world is vast and complex. As time passes, we'll eventually get to the bottom of it. Of course, this requires patience.
>handling Omen the way you did was fucking stupid
This doesn't sound like objective criticism.
>lewds honestly just don’t have a place in Dead Dust
So you don't want Roz lewds then? Btw, didn't you suggest an Omen-Roz-Penny threesome?
>expense of entirely halting the primary mystery element
I disagree. Even during lewds, the plot has progressed because we were able to get answers to important questions. And even if we didn't, it wouldn't be an expense in any way but valuable quest content.
>instead of giving us any time at all to property think things over with Penny
I'm pretty sure that over the past two years we've had plenty of time to think things over and discuss them in this thread. Do you expect Penny to do the thinking for you?
>a completely out of place sex scene with an eyeless monster clone of Penny instead of Roz
So if it was Roz, then it wouldn't be an out-of-place sex scene?
>I will be well and truly amazed if a single person would honestly say they wanted to fuck Omen before Roz
I honestly wanted to fuck Omen before Roz. Couldn't say no to that tongue :p
>cucking us out of screwing the hot sharkish thing
I'm sorry to hear that you feel you got cucked. On the bright side, the rewarding information and access to power that we obtained were well worth it.
>I’m frankly baffled you didn’t back out of/delay the sex scene with Omen
The choice won the vote. It would be railroading to disregard it.
>sex and complex info dumps are basically polar opposites
I've re-read the segment with Omen and I failed to find these "complex info dumps" that you speak of.
>along with losing an amount of suggestors (including myself)
This is a very interesting claim that you made. Shall we back it up with data?
https://i.imgur.com/5kRKLC2.png
Here, I made a graph with update dates on the X-axis and the number of suggesters (ignoring the single post suggesters) on the Y-axis. So from this graph we can see that the number of participants during Omen's sex scene was pretty much in line with the quest average. And a bit lower participation later on being attributed to the speed of updating catching a few suggesters off guard. In other words, it would seem that the data does not support your claim.
>the existence of superpowers much less Penny having them wasn’t hinted at in the slightest
There were at least two hints. The first one was when Cider hinted that there's something special about Penny's dust structure. The second one when Mint said that Penny wasn't fuzzy.

Sorry I'm only replying to half of your post, but I don't wanna spam too much.
>>
No. 133323 ID: ac70ae

1
>>
No. 133325 ID: ac70ae

What I wonder about folk that express a aversion to "exposition dumps" is whether they've thought how all or most of the info in those "dumps" could be worked into the quest in a way "natural" to them and just how much longer the author would have to make the quest to do that.

>>133322
>Btw, didn't you suggest an Omen-Roz-Penny threesome?
Did they suggest that in-quest or here, in the quest discussion? Because all I'm finding here is them wanting Roz-Penny sex over Omen-Penny and expressing a desire to see Mike-Roz porn.
>>
No. 133330 ID: 0fae41

>>133325
>Mike-Roz
It's a dirty job, but someone's got to do it.
>>
No. 133331 ID: 3994a2

>>133308
>look at the immense amount of shit we have absolutely no idea about.
There's a lot of mystery in Dead Dust, so there's a lot of territory to cover; and a lot of groundwork to lay before said territory can *be* covered. It's a long quest and I knew it was going to be a long one when I first started it. That isn't to excuse instances where I've gone a long time without updating, and various points where I could've handled the pacing better, but at the same time, your principal frustration here seems to be that so many mysteries haven't been figured out yet. The only thing I can really say to that is that it's by design and that these things won't remain unresolved forever. (I suppose your response to that might be that it's poor design, but even if that's the case it's a design we're locked into unless I drastically revamp my plans for the quest.)

>That’s all Dead Dust is frankly, a whole load of questions with about three relevant answers in two years of running.
I'm sorry, but I think the length of time the quest has been running is kind of an irrelevant point -- we all know questing is a notoriously slow medium, which is exacerbated by the fact that none (or at least most) of us are doing this as a career or even as a side gig. Questing is my hobby, and as such it gets pushed to the backburner when I'm busy with real-life concerns, as well as when I simply need a break from it. That's going to mess with the pacing, unfortunately.

>Taking things from the top, lewds honestly just don’t have a place in Dead Dust
As I stated in an earlier post, I'm sympathetic to this view, and for a good while have felt some unease or worry about including lewd content. However, I've received so much positive feedback about the sex scenes (and the exposition done during them), including from people who have stated outright that they don't have any interest in lewd content, that it convinced me to stay the course in terms of delivering that kind of content.

>completely cucking us out of screwinging the hot sharkish thing is a bit of a dick move
It's unfair to call the lack of sex with Roz a dick move on my part, considering that I didn't take any steps to prevent it from happening. (I also take umbrage with the notion that any narrative decision a quest author makes can fairly be considered a dick move.) From what I recall, there was very little in the way of suggestions to get intimate with Roz, despite there being ample opportunity to do so. I don't think that means people didn't want to get down and dirty with her, but it does mean that, for whatever reason, they chose not to do it. (Perhaps because of Penny's reluctance? But even that was influenced by suggesters.)

>But getting back on track, I’m frankly baffled you didn’t back out of/delay the sex scene with Omen after the level of debate the idea of sexing her for information sparked
That was because the strong majority of feedback I received in response to that controversy basically said, "hell yeah, go for it". Granted, I recall most of that was in discussions on the Discord server, rather than here, but since you're on the server you might be able to look it up if you'd like (I believe most of it was in the quest discussion channel, although some might have been in DMs as well).

>and I’m honestly just confused on how and why you thought people would focus on both the lewds and the information at the same time
Similarly, I received a lot of feedback saying that this strategy worked well, including from people who have no interest in sex scenes (as I stated earlier). I was skeptical as well, but when I have a majority of people saying that it works great, I'm apt to listen to them. (Maybe there's a discussion worth having about how much I should listen to feedback about these things?)

>Giving your protagonist actual superpowers a year and a half into your story is a bold move, especially when the existence of superpowers much less Penny having them wasn’t hinted at in the slightest, and even more so when said superpower is absurdly useful in the story.
>Like, I am legitimately curious as to why you thought giving Penny invisibility was a good idea. It obviously opens up a lot of possibilities both lewd and story wise but it goes completely against the normal and downright vulnerable Penny we’d known for a year and a half, and again even if you planned this all along I don’t recall any sort of real foreshadowing to this.
As >>133322 pointed out, there have been some (admittedly subtle) hints, at least in the sense of suggesting that Penny is special in some way. I suppose you're right, though, that there wasn't any major foreshadowing (that I recall, anyway) hinting at the existence of the blades. Maybe there should've been, but I had always intended it to be a surprise, both for Penny and for the audience; significant plot/backstory details required for it to be thrust upon her unexpectedly, rather than being something she gradually discovers about herself. (Granted, there are ways to both foreshadow something and still maintain surprise, but in this case I simply didn't even think to do it, and I'm not sure how I would have done it.)

>I also dislike what Blades existing seems to imply for the world, but I’ll be honest and say I skipped most of that particular spiel.
I don't mean to be dismissive, but if you dislike that aspect of the quest, I don't think you're going to be happy with the quest long term no matter what I do, short of redesigning the quest on such a fundamental level that it'd become a new quest entirely. I guess to use a crude analogy, your complaint here is akin to saying you liked Clark Kent more before you found out he was Superman. (Not that this is a superhero quest per se, but hopefully you get what I mean.) The blades are an integral part of the quest's concept itself and can't be divorced from it without completely changing the quest in terms of its core concepts and themes, and wiping out an enormous chunk of the backstory and setting.

>You know what I hate as well? Leaving off the cliffhanger of Penny basically kicking the bucket to go into a flashback chapter that reveals the only mystery that had any substantial clues to it!
Are you sure it revealed that mystery? I suppose I can't blame you for disliking the cliffhanger aspect, though, since that's a matter of personal taste.

>I know that Siobahn (I’m calling her Penny from now on) is supposed to be a bitch, but saying the suggestors are stupid basically every time, even if it’s in character, just feels like it’s you, Teegee, doing the insulting.
This surprises me, honestly, because that really wasn't the feeling I was going for, for the most part. Maybe a few curt responses here and there, but as far as I remember I never had Siobhan call suggesters stupid outright, so I suspect you're reading too much into it. Regardless, I'm sorry that you got the impression that I'm insulting suggesters. I don't believe that bad or stupid suggestions really exist, and I certainly don't want anyone to feel bad about any suggestion they posted. That being said, I don't really know how to resolve that issue, since the only alternative is to stop writing in-character, or I guess to never write protagonists with snarky attitudes.

>Especially when it comes to the characters thinking they’re human, cause that joke got grating real fast.
While I've made jokes about it on Discord, the whole "characters believe they're human" thing isn't itself a joke, it's an important plot detail. I'm sorry if it got grating.

>And then you go and do the exact same thing you did with Omen and try to mix (really good this time, i’ll admit) sex with a ham-fisted info dump mixed in. I already went over my main problems with this strategy before so I won’t repeat myself, but I do honestly wonder why you tried this again after it went so poorly with Omen.
Again, I've had a lot more people tell me they thought it was fine, or even worked great, than I've seen people complain about it. It was enough that I ended up ignoring my own doubts about it multiple times (which maybe I shouldn't have done).

>So, in the end, my personal take on matters is that you should drop chapter -1 since it’s rotten from its core and pick up from where thread 2 left off
To do what you're asking, I'd have to scrap Chapter -1 AND declare Chapter 1 non-canon, and start over from where Chapter 0 left off. I have no way of explaining why without delving into a shitton of spoilers, though.

>and provide hints and clues rather than more god damn questions.
I've been providing hints and clues at pretty much every opportunity to do so, but maybe they're too subtle. As for avoiding more questions, do you really think that's possible without doing a flat-out lore dump? I could explicitly spell out the meaning of every event as they occur, but that'd leave people with very little to speculate and theorize about.

>I know Dead Dust is both something special and can most certainly be fixed.
You say that, but you've also spent the majority of your post telling me, in effect, that the core of the quest and everything I have planned for it is bad, and that really only the initial premise is worthwhile. To be clear, I'm not putting words in your mouth, but that conclusion is the logical consequence of many of your complaints, when considered in the context of what I have planned. So, fixing it according to your complaints would mean scrapping the majority of my plans and ideas for the quest and making it into, effectively, a totally different quest -- one I'm not sure I would actually have much interest in running.
>>
No. 133332 ID: 3994a2

>>133314
Thank you!

>>133319
>I honestly feel like a lot of people are trying to be overly nice about the issue as to spare feelings
I hope they aren't, because that doesn't really help anything. I'd rather be told straight-up about problems, even if it hurts to hear them. That being said, I'm not sure what gives you that impression, since a lot of the negative criticisms voiced recently have been pretty incisive.


>>133320
>Critiquing a author for bad or lazy story telling is one thing but complaining to the author that you don't like their story or method of story telling (or worse making demands) just annoys all of us that are enjoying it and stresses out the author.
I agree, but I think there can be a pretty fuzzy distinction between objective criticism and complaining about something not meeting one's preferences.

>YOU ARE DOING THIS FOR FREE, PRESUMABLY IN YOUR FREE TIME, PRESUMABLY FOR FUN, YOU OWE US NOTHING!
>If this is the story you want to tell and how you want to tell it then do it.
>Getting engagement is nice and feedback is good but if people start making demands you are within your right to ignore them.
All true, but the flipside of that coin is that this is an audience-focused medium, so I'd say that makes me obliged, to some degree, to try to produce something they find compelling and worth their time.



>>133321
>advice on giving critique
These are all good, but there are a couple more I would add: First, be organized. Some of the criticism I've received lately is organized in a somewhat jumbled manner, to the point that it becomes difficult to parse the salient points. It's much more useful if related issues are grouped together.

Brevity is also helpful -- I know it's tempting to express criticism in an organic, poetic manner, but it's so much easier to work with criticism roughly along the lines of, "I think X is a problem because of Y; I suggest you do Z instead."

>You can't please everyone and interest will always wax and wane. I don't always comment on every update myself.
You're right, and sometimes the number of suggestions can be a poor measure of audience engagement.
>>
No. 133333 ID: 3994a2

To everyone who voted: thank you, it's really helpful to get an idea of where the general sentiment lies. I've read all of the criticism that's been posted so far (both positive and negative) and given it all serious consideration. I think I've reached a decision on what I'm going to do:

1. I won't make any fundamental changes to the quest. The biggest reason for this, frankly, is because I simply don't want to change what this quest is at its core. I understand there are some people who want Dead Dust to be something different from what I envisioned, but my core vision of the quest is one of the aspects I'm happiest with and I want to keep it that way. It seems that most people following the quest are happy with it as well, so that further solidifies my decision.

2. I won't change my approach to introducing mysteries and dropping hints. This largely goes hand-in-hand with 1), because the quest concept is tied pretty tightly to the various mysteries present in the quest and when/how clues get introduced.

3. Chapter -1 will continue. There are major plot events that depend on Chapter -1, to the point that they would not make sense if this chapter didn't exist. (This largely pertains to events in Chapter -1 that we haven't gotten to yet.)

4. I will scale back sexual content. I expect the majority of the audience either thinks this isn't necessary or will be sad to hear about this change, but my main reason for doing this is for a while my gut feeling has been that I've been making a mistake to include so much emphasis on lewd content. Until now I've ignored this gut feeling, simply because so many people had overwhelmingly positive things to say about it (including people who told me right out that they weren't interested in porn in quests.) However, that feeling has persisted, so I'm going to listen to it more often, if only to silence it.

In practice, this mostly means that extended sex scenes like the one currently ongoing and the one with Omen must justify their own existence within the context of plot, if they are to happen at all. That's not including the "do exposition alongside a sex scene" strategy I've used in the past, which I intend to mostly abandon (unless, again, I'm convinced that it really is a justified approach for a particular situation.) Lewd suggestions will still be welcome, but if or when sex occurs in-quest I don't intend on spending more than 1 or 2 updates on it, and there is a chance that it may even only get one panel or just an offscreen mention, depending on the situation.

I will, however, finish out the ongoing sex scene in Chapter -1, especially since it was already nearly finished anyway.
>>
No. 133334 ID: 03269b

If the physical form can be manipulated so effectively that crafting them is an art form, then is mind/memory alteration also a thing? is it as accessible as body augments?
>>
No. 133335 ID: 4286b4

>>133333
>I will scale back sexual content
Hard mode? Challenge accepted!
>>
No. 133336 ID: 8fab7a

Glad to hear it, teegee.

>>133334
Some answers can be found in the thread. Mind wipes - selective enough to state the date after which you want memories kept - are available legally through the salons, as Siobhan described earlier.

(And illegally through raw taffa.)

Outright memory alteration seems either non-existent or cutting edge / the purview of Blade powers from what we can tell so far.
>>
No. 133339 ID: 7d9195

>>133334 >>133336
>is mind/memory alteration also a thing?

>>/questarch/920579
>We seek to help you create genuine memories, rather than the soulless, artifically-constructed ones they force on our kind in hospitals.

>>/quest/970106
>they put in a block that makes my memories of the old body look like this one
>>
No. 133340 ID: 8fab7a

>>133339
Er, well there you go. Seems like I have memory issues of my own.
>>
No. 133341 ID: 4f51b2

>>133333
Do some of this apply to flora and other of your quests?
>>
No. 133343 ID: 864e49

>>133333
Aw but you do sex scenes so well.
Oh well at least there's still Arzfayz.

>>133341
If Arzfayz doesn't get the D I will be a very sad Asshat.
>>
No. 133344 ID: 3994a2

>>133341
I'd say it applies on a quest-by-quest basis, but going forward in general I'm going to put more thought into whether lewd content (and what degree of lewd content) belongs in a given quest. In a quest like Arzfayz, which is explicitly meant to be lewd from the outset, I think extended sex scenes are fine. For other quests, such as Flora and Null and Void, I'll probably follow the same standard I set in >>133333 -- lewd content may occur, but it will be brief and limited unless there is some clear justification for drawing it out.

That being said, I think a big part of why I chose to include sex scenes in the first place was temptation on my part. It's common for me to feel some desire to lewd the fuck out of characters I've created, and so there's a fairly significant temptation to let that bleed into my quests. In the future I'm going to try to channel that temptation into art outside of the quest proper, which is really what I should've done all along.

>>133343
>Aw but you do sex scenes so well.
Thank you, but unfortunately I need to follow my gut feeling on this one, if only because I get discouraged when I receive negative feedback that seems to confirm that gut feeling was right.
>>
No. 133346 ID: 4854ef

Aw man I missed that there was a vote in the first place.
>>
No. 133572 ID: db51d2

>>133344
my take on this: write opportunities that tie sex into the story and character dynamics more. For example, the scene with us fucking the spooky brain ghost adds a lot to the dynamism of that scene. the sex with our boyfriend helps sell some chemistry between the characters.

however, some of the tiddy stuff with roz felt excessive, possibly even a bit pushy on her part, which I don't think you intended.

the sex in the quest works best when it's purposeful, so lets lean into that.
>>
No. 133573 ID: e51896

I'm thinking of possible future planning here, but I have a feeling that after Siobhan and Mike is done, Mike might be open to talk about what was bothering him earlier and his problem client.

That said, I feel it will be a very bad idea at that point to have him talk about work and what was bothering him after they're finished. The reason being is that we know that we woke up the llama with that loud noise, and he is probably curious about what Siobhan and Mike is up to and could be listening in with his ear against the wall, especially considering their bed is resting against the wall that is connected to the llama's room. If after sex Mike is willing to talk, we need to tell him he doesn't have to worry about talking about work, because otherwise he could reveal some confidential secrets that the llama could get his hands on, especially since we don't know if he could be a spy or not. I have a feeling that he has a huge role as to how Siobhan got to losing her memory, and we should try to be careful to make it so that it wasn't because of Mike unintentionally revealing secrets at work to the person on the other side of the wall.
>>
No. 133768 ID: dccdd0

Wow teegee killed off a lot of quest. I think this is the only one they're still doing.
>>
No. 133769 ID: e7c7d3

>>133768
I mean, a lot of people have inactive quests going on. I'm always happy to see this one to update though
>>
No. 133774 ID: 9aaeef

>>133768
Teegee said the rest are on hiatus, after this DD thread Flora is going to get updated, maybe WAA WAA is death though, shame we need more quest about Kobolds.
>>
No. 133867 ID: dccdd0

>>133774
According to the wiki Flora is a dead quest.
>>
No. 133875 ID: f8fa51

>>133867
"Dead" has a specific definition on that wiki, applying to quests that hit the graveyard in while in their first thread. Meanwhile, if they hit the graveyard one post into their second thread, they're "on hiatus," even if there's no realistic chance they'll ever be restarted.
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No. 133921 ID: 3994a2

I just made a new catch-all disthread for all my quests: >>133919

>>133768
>>133769
>>133774
>>133867
>>133875
See this post for a status update on all my quests: >>133920
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