>>690092
That must mean Corruptor's logs were added at a different point in the cycle. Or that when the simulation tries to deconstruct him it takes a lot longer to do so? Or maybe they're fake, added during THIS cycle, to make us try to do what he wants.

But yeah, let her do some deep interaction with you while you're doing the same to her. Maybe she can see the real you. Wouldn't that be beautiful? Both of you, looking into eachother's inner essences together.
If you're nervous you could hold hands during it.

>Rulekeeper 9, 10, 11
Dumb question, but if we do something wrong (or maybe even something right) would there even be future Rulekeepers? They're rebuilding Rulekeeper out of the same parts, not building a new one from scratch.

He/She's a prototype that keeps getting upgraded. They don't have the luxury of instanced simultaneous hardware builds.

If she's gone (or jailbroken) they might not be able to do that anymore.

>you'd have to change your name to the Rulebreaker
Or she's still the Rulekeeper, just in a different context. Not just the one who makes sure the rules are followed, but the one who decides what the rules are. Interpreted broadly, one who keeps the rules is as much a Rulemaker.

>I hope you don't mind if I take a look at you while you look at me.
I suppose if you're trusting me, I can't really complain about having to trust you?

Maybe you'll be able to see something I can't? Maybe I'm only empty to me.

Oh, I just had a surge of inspiration.

If she can recreate a previous cycle with your help, then what's stopping this cycle from being a recreation? You, Glitcher? You could be created by having two cycles recreated. One where Savior is corrupted, and then you're in the next one. Alternatively, you're part of the creating cycle, and wiped your own memory somehow.

This would explain the "Ghost". It's the one who recreated these two cycles, and is manipulating events to manufacture a victory condition. Similarly, Historian was created to record the events that led to victory.

Fair's fair, Glitcher.

Actually, can you rig up some sort of information mirror thing, too? Like, if you discover something about her she doesn't know, she automatically gets informed of it as well, and vice versa for what she discovers about you. Make it a full exchange of information about each other. That would be a trust-builder, that you'd be sure neither of you are hiding anything from each other.

You know, the sentience question makes me wonder if Corrupter and Savior are sentient, to begin with. I imagine so, since they start out thinking that they're normal contestants, but maybe? And maybe it's possible for some process to de-sentience you, reduce you back to being just a function. Maybe that happened to Corrupter and that's why he suddenly became so cold.

>>690096
>Or she's still the Rulekeeper, just in a different context. Not just the one who makes sure the rules are followed, but the one who decides what the rules are. Interpreted broadly, one who keeps the rules is as much a Rulemaker.

If jailbroken Shopkeep becomes The Smuggler, I think jailbroken Rulekeeper should be called The Lawgiver. Same degree of similarity to the original job, equivalent heroic connotation. A singular individual, the near-divine voice of primordial power and authority, whose wisdom - whose merest whim, spoken aloud and canonized! - forges constitutional axioms, a conceptual axle around which entire cultures turn.

Hold out your hand and ask her to dance then.



Man if Alison was here we could have her start playing sappy disney songs like "Kiss the girl" in the background.

>>690113

Beauty and the Beast would also be appropriate.

>>690092
Flower in mouth, clothing off, lounge on bed, bob brows suggestively. Or, just sweep everything off the table and use it instead. Or hold hands and go on a lovely st--oh wait she doesn't have hands.

On a slightly more serious side note, maybe look into finding ways to request or implement a data backup or something.

>I hope you don't mind if I take a look at you while you look at me.
If that's a thing you could do, that would actually really help! Being able to become a more stable entity would be useful. No more suffering millions of years in an empty session.

1/8 Glitcher 2015/12/23(Wed)19:43 No. 690137 ID: dd338c
File 145092860021.png - (108.40KB , 800x800 , 26.png )

>Actually, can you rig up some sort of information mirror thing, too? Like, if you discover something about her she doesn't know, she automatically gets informed of it as well, and vice versa for what she discovers about you.
Yeah, actually, that's another ability.

>If she can recreate a previous cycle with your help, then what's stopping this cycle from being a recreation?
Well damn that's trippy.

>Flower in mouth, clothing off, lounge on bed, bob brows suggestively.
I don't have a flower, or a bed, or really eyebrows or clothing for that matter.

... my tank top is part of me. I'm actually completely naked right now and always have been.

Ability Added:
Basic Communication

But really, if we're going to be looking at each other, we'll be finding out what the other finds out automatically.

"Actually just a second, if you can remake a cycle can you bring back other glitchers and saviors and whatever?"
"I'm... not entirely sure. Well, I am sure about you. I can't bring back other glitchers. For Savior and Corruptor, though, it might happen. The recreation might also just be that of standard strings, in which case we'll bring back special entities who are suddenly powerless based on our recreation. Or not. Uh... hm. No, nevermind, let's do this now, we can see what we can do after we see each other."
"Well, okay then! I'm gonna look at your strings, now."
"Okay. I'll look at your chunks."
"Okay!"
"Okay."

....

"Are you nervous?"
"Haha no of course not I'm just trying to think of a way to back up data or something but I got nothing. Are you nervous?"
"Yes."
"Oh okay I'm just excited well I'm gonna shove all this stuff off the table for reasons I don't care about. May I have your hand?"

....

"Oh wait this is a conundrum, where on you would be an appropriate to grab a string from?"
"It doesn't really matter, does it?"
"Okay I guess hair is stringlike already so that'll be the most easy thing to have strings come out of."

2/8 Glitcher 2015/12/23(Wed)19:43 No. 690138 ID: dd338c
File 145092861082.png - (165.17KB , 800x800 , 27.png )

Rulekeepers strings are different, but they follow the same setup, I think? Oh man that is going to be the hugest disappointment in my life after a few other things if Rulekeeper is just perfectly normal and her powers were granted like admin requests to the world.

Oh wait no I'm seeing little spikes on her strings.

3/8 Glitcher 2015/12/23(Wed)19:43 No. 690139 ID: dd338c
File 145092862297.png - (117.54KB , 800x800 , 28.png )

"Ahhhh?!"
"Calm down, glitcher! I'm just dividing a small part of you off to the side. Oh, wait, what is that?"
"That is whatever I am behind my shell of strings! That is kind of a lot?!"
"You feel more stable than anyone would have ever thought, Glitcher. I don't think you're leaking far at all. And you feel fine, I can tell. I think this is okay."
"Okay I guess continue?! Apparently I'm the cautious one now?"
"I just gained confidence about this, is all."
"It feels like I'm in two places at once. Like in a different way than dangling my strings in various places."
"Oh, and you feel really linear. Like one place after the next. I didn't expect that."
"Yeah no kidding? I kept thinking connections to places were sort of strung together like brackets! That's how I move. Is that not how it goes?"

4/8 Glitcher 2015/12/23(Wed)19:44 No. 690140 ID: dd338c
File 145092865371.png - (87.54KB , 800x800 , 29.png )

"Errrr I don't know, that's not normal! I thought everything was like a little bubble, and what you thought were connections were things that envelope everything else! Is that wrong? That's different, one of us has to be wrong! How can we do our functions if it's all like that?!"
"I am calm! You calm down! The historian told me of stuff like this, like all the models we sometimes see are perceptions! Like how all kinds of civilizations had all kinds of models for planetary rotations that were totally wrong but they were actually useable and explained everything anyway somehow. Or speaking of solar systems, how the atomic model is like electrons are planets or something even though they're not!"
"You're rambling a little, but I understand you. So it might be something different?"
"I dunno I mean if anyone can see it right it's you, and I just see it weirdly."
"That makes sense and would explain a thing or two about you."
"Well gee thanks Rulekeeper."
"It just makes you interesting to me, now.
"Oh what I wasn't before?"
"I thought you were a meandering supernatural creature that fucked up everything it touched."
"That's believable."

5/8 Glitcher 2015/12/23(Wed)19:44 No. 690141 ID: dd338c
File 145092866449.png - (29.08KB , 800x800 , 30.png )

"Annnnd I feel like I'm practically omniscient. I am way more aware of everyone at once than maybe I am comfortable with."
"I almost thought so too, but there's limits to me, too. You'll find those, and it'll be - well, I heard from the records, for instance, that when you first peered into past cycles and saw what you could do, you started thinking of yourself like a god - "
"OKAY STOP right there Rulekeeper I get your point! I'll get used to this feeling and be all like 'okay I can see everything at once big whoop now I get to see everyone be shitty to each other and I still can't do anything useful with that alone.'"

I keep looking at her spikes. They point... everywhere. Rulekeeper looks at my chunks, and is able to piece them pointing to... somewhere. Just one place, but it points to the same place as hers that point everywhere?

That's as confusing as I made it sound, but the important thing is that it's new.

I keep studying.

6/8 Glitcher 2015/12/23(Wed)19:45 No. 690142 ID: dd338c
File 145092870540.png - (191.40KB , 800x800 , 31.png )

I find all sorts of connections to the area. Lots of them, and Rulekeeper and I shut our mouths while we look.

We found other cycles.

They're just other connections. They've been cut off, but when other cycles are cut off, they just look like players look without having a direct connection to a stage, be it a safe zone, normal stage, or ghost zone. In other words, they just look like they're in stasis.

"I thought cycles just had their history intact and that you could replicate them or something. But they were never even deconstructed?"
"Not really, but in a sense, the old cycles were just left alone to act as the archive."

7/8 Glitcher 2015/12/23(Wed)19:45 No. 690143 ID: dd338c
File 145092872806.png - (198.00KB , 800x800 , 32.png )

"Nope. Nope, Rulekeep, I can't calm down, this is way too much of a breakthrough! Do you know what we can do if we team up?!"
"A lot, but there's one barrier that keeps us from so much more than a lot. What I can do is largely shackled to stage 8. I can do some nifty things if you bring stage 8 to blank areas, like the quarantine sandbox, or pulling lots of things into it, but we'd need nearly the entire administration team to come together to work out a way to revoke the way I've been put together, and grant me power to affect any stages to do what you're thinking of doing."
"If you could affect any stage, though!"
"Then I could traverse from one to the next and, oh, I'll put it your way. We could Unlock Ability: Rewind Time. Rather than Rewind Stage 8 Time."
"Yeah but if it were really any stage, that means other cycles could work too! And if I can teleport to other cycles, thennnnn"
"Then I could rewind those, too, and ultimately, we could Teleport to Cycle and then I could rewind those. Those, in fact, should have fully active glitchers, corruptors, and so on."
"And then I can go up to myself and be all hey I'm you from the future!"
"Is that not dangerous? Maybe you were hostile in previous iterations."
"Yeah and they probably didn't have thousand year training montages, so I could kick their butts!"
"True, but we still need administrators on our side, and the only remaining administrators are stubborn and not likely to cooperate. They might even try to reconstruct me prematurely if they feel it's worth it."
"So what you're saying is that I gotta try and change their minds?"
"Ugh, glitcher, the way you can change people is so... it's trying to make a jello sculture with a hammer, and you'd have to constantly glitch them to keep them on our side, and that might mess things up more! There has to be a cleaner way."
"So what we need are allied admins liiiiiiike this cycle's Anya slash Sevener or Radmin/Fiver? They're contestants now but they were legit admins, and I'm willing to bet there's some leftover legitimacy!"
"Hardly. Maybe elevating someone to adminship is more justified if they were an admin before, but they would need to be resurrected or elevated back to adminship anyway."
"Liiiike stage admin cards?"
"There are only 2 admin grant cards per stage. God knows where they came from."
"Oh hey that's convenient that means 2 contestants can be admins and then we can get Sevener and Radmin back up there."
"And how do you suggest that we get sevener and.... fiver back up?"

8/8 Glitcher 2015/12/23(Wed)19:46 No. 690144 ID: dd338c
File 145092876017.png - (19.06KB , 800x800 , 33.png )

"Aha, but, Rulekeeper, you already made a way! Administrator Ghost tournament!"
"Glitcher."
"Yeh?"
"Glitcher, I can create the tournaments for contestants, but granting adminship would have to be done with the blessing of the administrator team! Since there are only four admin slots, the existing administrators would have to compete as well or otherwise step down after agreeing to set up such a thing. Between that, and the sheer principle of the matter, they'd never agree."
"Orrrrrrrrrr would they?"
"They wouldn't."
"Buuut they would! See I understand if you don't want me glitching them out constantly to remain on our side, but I'd just have to glitch them out for a single moment for them to assist you in making this legitimate tournament! Then I'd back out, they'd be corrected, and wondering why they ever agreed to such a thing, but it'd be too late!"
"They would retract it. It would look awful for them, but they'd risk playing take-backsies over having to compete in the admin tournament."
"They'd have a tough time retracting anything after being secret assassinated."
"Glitcher! What would Alison say to that?"
"Oh sorry, I mean, they'd have a tough time retracting anything after being gently escorted to the ghost zone!"
"... I guess that might work. But that's also just the first idea that we came up with, seconds after seeing the new things, and you already look intoxicated from this whole experience, and I admit, I'm not my most level headed right now either. Maybe we don't need the admins, and there's another way to undermine them?"
"Oh my god who even cares I haven't felt this much existence in basically forever let's just do anything it'll probably succeed."

>>690144
Hey, did she stabilize you? You're not glitchy in appearance at all.

Hey, if this works, and you find some way to solve everything before the next stage, then you'll have granted the wish of so many previous Alisons: "Stop stage 9."

Maybe you should bring Alison into this, come up with a plan with all three of you conspiring? She's pretty smart, good at working around the rules or outright exploiting them.

Hey, can you find Savior's Sanctuary now?

Well that might work but its good to think up a few plans first and decide on the best one.

1. Maybe you could trick the admins into giving Rulekeeper the power she needs. Like fake a threat that would panic them into action. We know it worked before when Alison made them so scared they sacrificed most everything to reset stuff. Maybe you could work together to make it look like Corruptor's corruption was taking over the admin stage. They call her back and she "investigates" and then comes back and reports that Corruptor is hiding in a previous stage so she can not stop him with her current powers. They might upgrade her to stop the threat.

2. Get all the ghost Alisons up here and plop them all down on the admins. Then leave them for 8 hours and come back to hugged out hippies who will do anything she asks.

3. Do the temp glitching on the Admins to get them to agree to the tournament but have the rules set so if anyone backs out they auto lose there powers. Make it so they have to put there Admin cards on the line and can not take the permissions back. Sevener and Radmin would have to win in a fair fight but they have more experience in contestant stages than the other admins.

Keep exploring things together while you bounce ideas off of her. Whatever it is you do make sure you are both comfortable with it.

Okay, wait wait, simple question: what are Rulekeeper's actual limits? What rules are hard coded into her such that she has no choice but to follow, and which are enforced by her personality decisions, conditioning? (Obviously, not letting you do peek at her inner workings is one of the latter). Where's the line between what she can't do, and chooses not to do?

Can you two work in concert? Like, if Rulekeeper could do something, but the rules won't let her, could you glitch something so the rules don't block her from using her power? Or Corruptor's logs said something about how he thought he needed Savior to legitimize his hacks- could Rulekeeper selectively okay / approve glitches for you?

>what you learned studying each other
Okay, but that's just a pretty basic level of interaction, right? Passive study. You didn't mess with anything, or change anything.

Deliberately hacking / glitching / ruling each other is obviously an order of magnitude more risky, but it might have bigger rewards.

One obvious route is that Rulekeep was intended to be changed / rebuilt / upgraded. If you backdoored into how the admins are supposed to mess with her, you might be able to reconfigure her yourself. For something as simple as changing access rights so the admins can't reset her when the stage ends, or changing her into a Rulekeep Any that can mess with any stage, not just stage 8.

Failing that, there's trying to back her up in some way to survive into future stages.

>what Rulekeep knows about you
Lame thought now, but if they reset her now, could a future Rulekeep use what she learned about how you work against you?

>admin replacement
Actually, we did recruit a full set of 4. Sevener, Radmin, Sixer, and King. (Even if most of them are probably dead right now. Although right now we only have confirmation Sevener died). Replacing all the admins is theoretically possible.

>They might even try to reconstruct me prematurely if they feel it's worth it.
Don't we have a counter to that? She has ultimate power in stage 8, and we could cordon off a custom stage 8 area for her they can't get too.

>Hey, can you find Savior's Sanctuary now?
Can the two of you see Corruptor, or what he's up to either? Before you do anything big, you might want to take stock of the two other people who might be willing or able to interfere or mess things up before you try some crazy plan.

>Oh my god who even cares I haven't felt this much existence in basically forever let's just do anything it'll probably succeed.
No need to rush. Time is basically arbitrary to both of you. You can drag this one meeting out a long time without the stage passing much at all.

>"Glitcher! What would Alison say to that?"
You never looked at how she beat Stage 3, did you? >>/questarch/412986 >>/questarch/413025 (Out of curiosity, would that have worked?)
She also suggested killing off all of the admins and putting in a friendly one as a replacement back in Safe Zone 7, although I wouldn't be surprised about you not knowing that. >>/questarch/455187 >>/questarch/455209

She really can be quite ruthless when her back's to the wall and the friendly options either didn't work or are way too dangerous to attempt. Besides, if this plan works then we'll be in control of basically everything and can just bring the now-dead admins back somewhere where they can't cause any trouble.

Although, with how much progress we're making at the moment and how stable Glitcher's looking, we might be able to get Corruptor and Savior in on this and see what they can add to our shenanigans.

1/2 Glitcher 2015/12/23(Wed)21:22 No. 690155 ID: dd338c
File 145093454609.png - (35.03KB , 800x800 , 34.png )

>Lame thought now, but if they reset her now, could a future Rulekeep use what she learned about how you work against you?
Dang probably. Better save her for sure now.

>Don't we have a counter to that? She has ultimate power in stage 8, and we could cordon off a custom stage 8 area for her they can't get too.
Yeah if worse comes to worse - worst to worst? - we can probably do that, but I dunno if custom areas are actually all that out of admin access if our custom area is still built off stage 8.

"Random question interjection. Take a look at how Alison beat stage 3, would she have been able to use a red glove on the blue NPC?"
>"Sheesh, I hope not. But it would have been up to Shopkeep at that point in time."
"Yeah oh wait a second hey let's go to Savior's place!"

....

"Goddamnit he's so well hidden what the hell?!"
"At least you have your dose of finite power before it completely went to your head."
"At least I'm stable now."
"Did the glitch effects bug you?"
"Wouldn't walking around with giant negative space blocks and jagged shape perimeters flying around your peripherals drive you nuts after awhile?!"
"True. Still, this makes me wonder if the Paradise is even within the cycle itself. What if it isn't, and the reason why people who go to the paradise don't return is because they can't return, at least not until the cycle is at an end, where Savior pushes them all back?"
"Okay there's like a million possibilities for that and we can't find out right now apparently because Savior knows how to hide his shit! Wait lemme find corruptor.... oh my god I can't find him either?! He shouldn't be as hard to find like this, we can see virtually everything in the cycle! Where the hell is he?!"
"Don't panic, Glitcher. Focus on one thing at a time. We may be able to search missing pockets if I can edit all stages instead of just peruse them."
"Okay but I swear to god next time I see either of them I'm gonna gawk at so many strings oh wait no I made a promise I wouldn't be like that. Hey can we talk to Alison again now? She probably has an idea."
"I suppose we may as well."

I flip on the radio.

"Hey Alison?"
>"Hi Glitcher, you sound happy."
"Oh I mean do I I guess that makes sense I'm doing pretty well thank you."
>"Rulekeeper, are you there, too?"
"Yes. Hello, Alison."
>"Hello! Have you two spoken much?"
"We spoke about literally everything we know ever probably. Say if we were able to bring Radmin and Sevener and a couple contestants up to admindom is that a plan you could get behind?"
>"What about the Sixer and King?"
"Who the hell... oh I guess we did have a team of 4 admins. Yeah screw the cards then, we have this."
>"What about the four current admins?
"Oh I'd take 'im to the ghost zone to hang out without being admins."
>"You'd kill them?"
"Wellll I meannnn"
>"Oh, that's okay, of course, I killed Radmin, remember? In fact I debated going through and killing all of them if there weren't big implied ramifications!"
"Wha - oh wait yeah."
>"Just make sure they're comfortable and around their friends."
"Yeah I can check if they got any of those. Got any ideas though?"
>"I'm sorry, but you know what you can do better than I do! Oh, is Rulekeeper okay with this stuff though?"
"I've decided to help after all."
>"Oh, are you okay with not following the rules?"
"The only reason I felt like I had to follow the rules is because I was made to do so, however, there is no internal or external force I'm aware of that prevents me from breaking the rules that my power would allow me to break. I have lied to some contestants saying otherwise, but I found that if saying I cannot do something would lead to less pointless arguments than if I told them I just wouldn't. Now that doesn't mean I'm even a little comfortable with a lot of this, but at the same time... I believe that with Glitcher, I can make rules I'm okay with."
>"Okay then!"

2/2 Glitcher 2015/12/23(Wed)21:22 No. 690156 ID: dd338c
File 145093456471.png - (14.00KB , 800x800 , 35.png )

"Wait I'm getting more ideas. Rulekeeper first off do you actually need to follow rules?"
"What kind of situation would that be?"
"I dunno I start destabilizing a lot of past stages in ways that only you can fix and I start threatening to launch the stages into the admin place or something insane like that. Then they gotta give you the ability to actually fix any arbitrary stage. Or oh how about part of the rules for the admin ghost tournament is to put all their admin cards on the line, giving admin cards to the ghosts or whatever, and there's no backing out of the tourney!"
"Oh, yes, if they have to give up their adminship as soon as the tournament is made and have to retrieve it back, then they won't even be able to take it back no matter what."
"That's sort of what I meant but sounds good still? And I mean my only other idea is to just summon a thousand Alison's and dump them into the admin zone and see if they convince the admins after a few hours."
"Tempting, Glitcher, but the admins can kick out Alisons before they get a chance to speak. It would be known as the Great Alison Purge of Stage 8 followed by de or re constructing me. I suggest the first two ideas."
"Well actually a third idea is what if I learned how to modify you like the admins can call on to do?"
"That is needlessly risky when we have an option. If we could teleport to another cycle and rewind it, then convince the admins there to help, we could have done it that way, but in order to do that, we need the admins to help. It's a catch 22, so currently, we have to deal with our own cycle. Even if we studied how to reprogram me and admin access directly, that's a new field, and it may be like trying to teach contestants how to glitch things."
"We don't know that though!"
"For the time being, I'd like to stick with the first two options, which works most with what we do know."

A) Create Glitch-Stage Meteor Armageddon
B) Create Admin Ghost Contest

>>690156
B is better in the long run, assuming it works. A will give Rulekeep the power she needs, but it will leave uncooperative admins in power, and that is dangerous for Rulekeep. B will let us have at least some allies in the System, which means it will be harder for everything to be ruined.

If it doesn't work, we can always go for option A afterwards.

>I believe that with Glitcher, I can make rules I'm okay with.
That's good! We need good rules. There has to be some kind of framework for the AIs, even if we bust free.

>Okay but I swear to god next time I see either of them I'm gonna gawk at so many strings
The more immediate problem is if we don't know where they are or how they're connected, we can't be sure we won't draw their attention and they might show up and mess up your plan.

How well could either of you handle Corruptor and/or Savior if they stick their noses in what you're doing? Do either of you have any sense how their powers work, or how they might be countered? You might have the edge in there's two of you working together, but that's something to plan for.

>A) Create Glitch-Stage Meteor Armageddon
>I dunno I start destabilizing a lot of past stages in ways that only you can fix and I start threatening to launch the stages into the admin place or something insane like that. Then they gotta give you the ability to actually fix any arbitrary stage.
The problem is the admins aren't stupid. Rulekeeper already expressed her doubts to that one admin before, and witnessed you agreeing to go talk to Glitcher. If they see you going off to talk together, and then Glitcher starts going on a warpath while you beg for power to stop him, they're probably going to be suspicious of collusion.

tl;dr- a good bluff largely depends on your target being in the dark. The admins have already seen too much of the picture for this gambit to be reliable.

Also, an all out Glitch attack is really big and flashy. It's much more likely to catch the attention of Savior or Corruptor, and who knows what they might do.

>B) Create Admin Ghost Contest
More direct, and less likely to be flashy enough to attract third parties.

1/6 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)00:20 No. 690168 ID: dd338c
File 145094519913.png - (16.98KB , 800x800 , 36.png )

>How well could either of you handle Corruptor and/or Savior if they stick their noses in what you're doing? Do either of you have any sense how their powers work, or how they might be countered? You might have the edge in there's two of you working together, but that's something to plan for.
Well considering they've been so weirdly dismissive of me and actively avoiding me looking at their strings, I think all we'd need to do to get them to leave us to our work is for me to wiggle my fingers menacingly at them.

"Gonna upturn the system, let's do it!"
"Alright, Glitcher. What do you need from me?"
"Gather the admins, come up with the best argument you can possibly make to get them to agree to fight for their lives for no reason, and then get them to vote. One by one, preferably."
"That's easy. When should I start?"
"Well now I guess?"
"Alright."
"Okay talk to you in a bit Alison."
>"Good luck!"

2/6 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)00:20 No. 690169 ID: dd338c
File 145094521126.png - (15.26KB , 800x800 , 37.png )

I follow Rulekeeper back to the system bracket I visited, and this time I remember to think to myself and keep myself hidden.

>"Rulekeeper, you're back."
"Yes."
>"Did anything happen with the glitcher?"
"No, he simply tried to appeal to me to let him do whatever it is he wanted to do."
>"And?"
"I had none of it, of course."
>"Good. Are you going back to your stage, then?"
"Soon, but I think we can start the ghost stage soon. The ghosts that are still around in stage 8 are guaranteed some passes through the first phases, so they don't need to be present initially."
>"Alright. You have permission, then."
"Thank you. By the way, although I had none of glitchers appeals for me to leave him to his devices, he did bring up one fair point. The contestants consider us their enemies, and we have their distrust. I would like to propose a new contest."
>"Yes?"
"One involving past administrators. Past contestants got a chance to live again. I think it's only fair that administrators are given the same chance."
>"Except that the ghosts of contestants fight each other first, and the winners are simply thrown into to the pile of contestants next stage."
"Correct, the difference here is that we cannot overload the amount of active admins per system bracket, so instead of admins being revived at stage 9, all admins, current and past, will have to fight at once. However, I propose that this contest has 8 stages, and the admin will begin on the stage that they made it to in the contest. In other words, you and the others will begin on stage 8, and therefore have a highly forgiveable chance of winning."
>"Why would we ever agree to this?"
"I am aware of how little you care about what the contestants think of you, but if they saw the administration go through a similar trial, I honestly do believe that they would be able to empathize more. That will make them less restless and our jobs easier."
>"It would be a nice perk, and not nearly worth the risk and trouble.."
"Well, I merely ask that you set up a vote system for it, but require that the other admins here me out before voting. And what you heard is all I will say."
>"It's worthless, but it's trivial to do, so alright. Let's discuss the details."

He does his admin thing and I really don't pay much attention for the details. Mostly because I can kinda sense where those commands go, now, but it seems to disperse somewhere. Maybe it's like noise, and it just fades out when it gets far enough to be heard? There's really nothing out there at all that I can see.

"Thank you. Please vote, now."
>"We have to immediately resign our cards, too?"
"The tournament will resolve quickly, and the admin seat will not be vacant for long."
>"That's... I'm still going to vote -- "

3/6 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)00:20 No. 690170 ID: dd338c
File 145094522712.png - (149.51KB , 800x800 , 38.png )

And I start flipping all kinds of switches. He pauses for a moment. I've never done that outside of a simulation, but it seems like it's working. He goes and votes.

"Thank you for the change of heart."
>"Yeah, it's only fai - wait. No, no, no! I didn't think right, there!"
"Eh? You should have thought through more, then. But in order to expedite this decision, this poll does not allow changes.

4/6 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)00:20 No. 690171 ID: dd338c
File 145094525807.png - (200.15KB , 800x800 , 39.png )

Rulekeeper starts going to the next stage so I stalk her again.

"Doing alright?"
"Yes, thank you. Part of me wondered if it would feel exhilirating bending and breaking the rules. It does not, after all, but I'm not getting cold feet."
"Ah geebz am I gonna have to listen to your whole lecture again for every administrator?"
>"Minus the part about setting up the poll initially, yes."

5/6 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)00:21 No. 690172 ID: dd338c
File 145094530510.png - (31.35KB , 800x800 , 40.png )

They all go by with bahs and boos and questions and stuff but every time they go to vote I finagle their strings about and they all vote yes.

That last one though, I might've gotten carried away with. He got so far and he was so desperate to live! So I had to flip a lot of switches. He might not have been rebuilt 100% correctly? It'll mostly be fine? I hope so. Probably. Guess I'll keep an eye on this guy to see if there's any adverse effects. He didn't blow up though so that's cool, and he only glitched out just long enough for him to think something might've been up, but not long enough to notice what. So that's cool too. Too late anyway, considering the votes are in.

6/6 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)00:26 No. 690174 ID: dd338c
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"That went mostly perfectly."
"Oh you saw what happened with that last guy?"
"What?"
"I mean what do you mean mostly perfectly?"
Did you not listen to the details of the poll?
"I really didn't."
"Although I didn't propose this, the administrator insisted that it would be difficult to consider currently living administrators to be eligible. After all, it would be like they are simultaneously being given shots as an admin and a contestant, nevermind the logistics of pulling them out of stage 8 to do this contest."
"So uh, King and Radmin? They're not eligible?"
"Not since they're alive, no."
"So what you're saying is that we need to kill Radmin and King before the tournament."
"Or go with a more complicated but workable plan involving the admin cards. Otherwise, yes, I suppose that's what I'm saying. However, if you simply grab a bucket of lava and drop it on them, they will complain to me, and if I do nothing, the other contestants may take issue with this, especially Alison's faction."
"Yeah or I could just drop it on them while explaining what's up."
"I, yes. Nevermind. Deal with it how you like, since we've deposed the current administration."

>>690172
Oh dear, that was probably a mistake. It didn't need to be a unanimous decision, did it?

>>690174
In the interests of full disclosure you should probably tell her about the last guy.

King and Radmin are pretty much fully on our side, so talking to them directly is likely to work. If it doesn't, you can sabotage the battle in secret by handing hints to their opponents. So long as their opponents don't fess up, King and Radmin can't complain.

>>690174
Just tell them they can keep being contestants, or wager their current life for a shot at admindom.

Well I mean, weren't we going to rig the contest to ensure our four got through it?

You need to be more honest, Glitcher. Also less careless. As in less uncaring, not less reckless, although you could maybe do with a bit of that, too.

So, about this whole "all past admins" thing. Does that include Alison? Because she was an admin back in Stage 6, even if she didn't do much. Although I suppose she couldn't do much, either, hmm... Would she get full admin privileges if she won? I want to include her anyway, really, just for the chance to bring her back.

Oh, hey, you can freeze time for her and yourself in order to bring her to the maybe-glitched admin, so she can examine him without him noticing. If anything's wrong, she (and you?) may be able to fix things while time is frozen, as well.

If you two are parting ways, I suppose that means the date is over? Ask if she might want to go out again sometime. Maybe you can call the future experimentation with Time Travel your second date?

Yeah tell her exactly what happened with the last guy and why you are worried about it. No keeping secrets or holding back in this relationship. Do not want any surprises later on. Especially if that guy is desperate enough to live that he manages to get back into the final 4.

For this to work both of you have to work as one so being honest with each other is vital.

Ok also you need to plan a few things with Rulekeeper before we go any farther.

1. How is this Admin contest going to work exactly? We said we wanted it to be fair but we really don't. We need 4 admins that are completely on our side. So need to figure out a hidden way of boosting our prospects. Maybe with the stage design itself or something else. Like cheating horribly. Whatever it is make sure Rulekeeper is ok with the plan.

2. Rulekeeper mentioned the contest would be a good way to reconcile the Admins and the Contestants. Maybe that can be more than just words? Could we broadcast the tournament to everyone so that the Contestants can actually see the results instead of just hearing about them? Breaking the veil of mystery about what the Admins actually do would help people understand them. Plus having millions of people watching them fight it out would probably boost our choices prospects in a fair fight. Cause they are used to it. That being said it would open the contest to interference from Corruptor.

3. Rulekeeper said that she hopes to be able to make rules that she would want with your help. You should discuss what she means by that. Having her in charge of the rules would be better than the current setup but what we really need is a way to break the cycle.

4. If we are going to go have King and Radmin kill themselves you better make sure they are on board with the plan first. Also can't we get Alison into a admin spot? She did occupy a Admin spot for half a hour or so. That being said we do want experienced Admins. Alison is great but she has never used the powers before. So ask if she wants to join the contest.

5. Assuming everything goes according to plan we need to make sure the upgraded Rulekeeper no longer has the personality reset built in. No point in upgrading her to lose her a stage later.

>Ah geebz am I gonna have to listen to your whole lecture again for every administrator?
Hey, she has to give the speech over and over! And the admins have to put up with being brain-hacked. Really, you've got the least inconvenient role here.

>>690172
Um. Well, if you broke him, could you or rulekeeper roll him back to the way he was earlier? I mean, this whole thing is about virtual time travel.

>So uh, King and Radmin? They're not eligible?
So I guess Sixer died at some point already, then.

>However, if you simply grab a bucket of lava and drop it on them, they will complain to me, and if I do nothing, the other contestants may take issue with this, especially Alison's faction.
Um, well that's still easy. These puzzles and stages are already really risky. I don't need to drop lava on their heads, I just need to make it look like they were unlucky. It wouldn't take much bad luck to make sure someone bought it.

(For instance, in the puzzle Alison left, it's less "dump lava on their head" than "make it so someone somewhere finds a switch or puzzle and messes with it, turning on the lava pump". Or "make sure someone gets a bad run of luck summoning several purple ghosts who won't listen to reason").

And other contestants won't complain if they get to kill them, due to circumstances.

>admin contest
Do we need fluff or filler admins, or it just gonna be our four replacements versus the four originals?

>>690199
Why even bother messing with luck? Alison already demonstrated how easy it is to commit suicide via sub-optimal tactical decisions. Just explain that they've got a special opportunity, with a limited time window, and let them figure out which way to go.

1/7 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)13:38 No. 690236 ID: dd338c
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"This whole admin contest is gonna be rigged, right?"
"Yes, it would be pointless otherwise, unless you have absurd amounts of confidence in those four. Let me worry about that."
"Done. Oh by the way I may have tried a little too hard with that last admin? Maybe he's fixed maybe he's not?"
"Argh, Glitcher... do you think it's going to cause issues?"
"Probably not? Did the vote even need to be unanimous?"
"Maybe. Remember that it's just sending a request to higher powers, but there's no guarantee that it will work. The more admins that vote for it, the higher chance it works. The more extreme the proposal is, the less a chance it works, which is why I let limitations stand. Just be more careful in the future and keep an eye on him. I might be able to fix that admin once he ends up in the stage 8 sub contest."
"Well okay I'll try to be careful. By the way does 'past admins' include Alison?"
"It was tempting, really, but no. That was a limitation I mentioned to increase the chances of the proposal being approved. It was approved, by the way. As for Alison, I will rethink including her in the normal contestant bracket."
"Gonna have filler admins come in?"
"Yes. There will be hundreds of admins."
"Oh that sounds like overkill."
"Yes, but I did want it to be set up fairly. Even if it's not going to be fair in the end."
"Cool. Well, uh... are we going to part ways, now?"
"I suppose so, but we aren't going to be more than a metaphorical arm's reach from each other."
"Okay, uh, wanna go on a date again sometime then?"
"Yes, if everything goes smoothly, then we'll be seeing much more of each other. Although it would be less of a date and more of a blasphemous adventure through cycles."
"That's kind of datelike in my experience. What if everything doesn't go smoothly?"
"... I guess no matter what, we're going to be seeing each other."
"Is that okay?"
"Yes, that's okay."
"Oh hey what if we broadcast the admin tourney to the contestants? Break that whole veil of mysteriousness the admins have going on?"
"I think it would end with realizing that Alison's team has command of the administration brackets."
"Is that bad?"
"Yes. I'd like to avoid it."
"Got it. Welp I'm off to kill my allies."
"Be well, glitcher. You're not so bad after all."
"Yep same. To you I mean. You're not so bad. I mean you're good. Good as in goodbye."
"Please stop while I still understand what you're saying."

2/7 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)13:38 No. 690237 ID: dd338c
File 145099313493.png - (93.82KB , 800x800 , 43.png )

>Get King and Radmin on board with the plan first
>Talk to them about being suicidal
That's for ALISON and DIPLOMATS. I have like a million years to take my time but right now there is the biggest, sweetest candy I have ever seen lying before me and it is dangling right behind a glass wall. There is absolutely no way that I want to spend forever talking my way through it delicately so I'm just gonna get this over with and let Rulekeeper do the talking.

Later on, in future sections of Stage 8

Oh would I look at that King and someone I don't give a shit about are crossing a precarious bridge over lava and each one found a button to take out the other person's bridge.

And they gave each other a gentleman's agreement to not press the button, but this guy who isn't King is highly tempted to break that arrangement. But King may just be okay, because it looks like his opponent has just barely made up his mind to honor the agreement.

3/7 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)13:39 No. 690238 ID: dd338c
File 145099319693.png - (166.14KB , 800x800 , 44.png )

It sure would be an unfortunate event if he changed his mind at the last second.

4/7 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)13:40 No. 690239 ID: dd338c
File 145099321581.png - (24.63KB , 800x800 , 45.png )

Later Still

>"Any last words, Radmin?"
"What do you care, you'll be too long dead to hear them!"
>"Give me a break, you're trapped with us 3. Even without our ghosts, we can handle all 3 of your ghosts and you."
"Haha, from my angle, it's more like you've locked yourself in a cage with an overwhelming, hostile power. You think that, but easy thinking simpletons like you..."

5/7 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)13:41 No. 690240 ID: dd338c
File 145099328044.png - (93.97KB , 800x800 , 46.png )

"Can't find the unwritten rules!"
>"Purple ghosts?! How?!"
"Don't ask that! Just realize that this area is freeroam, and mere contact with purple ghosts will lead to your demise!"
>"Goddamnit, this is the kind of bullshit that ex-admins do?"
"No, no! As glorious as being an administrator was, I've found that the ruthlessness and freedom that being a contestant brings has its own perks! Now I can do things like dip my own blue ghosts in a vat of hopelessness so that when I lift them back out, they can cause insta-death! It's this kind of bullshit I can do that let me come to terms with no longer being an admin!"

6/7 Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)13:41 No. 690241 ID: dd338c
File 145099330257.png - (96.98KB , 800x800 , 47.png )

"IRONY SHOVE"

Unnatural Selection - Thread 11 END Glitcher 2015/12/24(Thu)13:41 No. 690242 ID: dd338c
File 145099331748.png - (64.05KB , 800x800 , 48.png )

I like my job again.

>>690239
>>690240
Evil pokemon trainer Radmin, with clothes to match. Dude still has a sense of style.

>>690244
he's my fave <3

>>690244
>>690258
Its really unfortunate that the plan required him to die because after a speech like that I -really- wanted him to live.

I need more Radmin in my life.

Heyyyy Glitcher! Secret offspring construct of you and Rulekeeper! Think about it! You could make it super OP in some way, probably!