3/4 Alison 2014/03/08(Sat)17:31 No. 565686 ID: d470e9
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Super gravity is deployed by Alison to affect herself, and uses the supercore as the center point to drag herself and her divisions toward him. The supercore can makes itself immune to the field, but does not prevent other entities from getting pushed or pulled.

Sevener is far enough away that she can keep her distance. The jetal is quick to make evasive maneuvers in return, but one of the displacer missiles gets a lucky trajectory and eradicates the jets, giving Alison time to quickmorph a spike through him and interface. The interface is successful and the lobby takes care of pulling him in, but the supercore initiates a self destruct of its jetalium. Alison quickly absorbs what she can to make up her battery losses.

4/4 Alison 2014/03/08(Sat)17:32 No. 565687 ID: d470e9
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The resulting blow launches guardsman and Duelist out of the building, and Alison's knockback isn't much shorter.

The next supercore's stationary shield goes down as Alison gets back in position, but Sevener's group launches a series of thin beams at him before he moves. Instead, the next jetal creates his own, which seem to hold back Sevener's shots effectively. He isn't causing any energy surges as of yet.

>"That easy?" asks Atlas.
>"He must be testing us. Seeing what modules we have while he wears us down as much as his supercore can." replies Loviro. "That said, it bugs me that he isn't fighting alongside his supercore. I doubt it is advantageous to hide behind them, since he has to fight us now."

Haha, I like how the other administrators have taken to wearing their bracket numbers on little hats. That's kind of cute.

>pulled in through interface
Does that mean we still have that member of the supercore prisoner? We should have some people try talking to him. Loviro was right that it was useless before, but now they don't have much to lose, and are in a very different position.

>>565687
...what if the Emperor has a mod that lets him develop countermeasures to whatever mods he sees in action? Use no new mods until you find out from the captured Jetal what's going on here.

This means not using Shield Breaker on that shield. Instead, just wait for the supercore to come out on his own, and pester him with the AN5 Sniper.

Yeah lets be careful about what mods we use for the moment and interrogate the guy we interfaced with.

Also be careful about Seveners divisions. Everyone who follows us is doing so because they want to. Sevener control over her troops might not be as strong. The other admins were all leaders of there own brackets and once they are in a division by themselves they might try something silly. No idea why she would directly talk to 17 after forming him but it might be a final admonishment to stick to the plan instead of doing something crazy.

As for why Sapphire is running his battle so inefficiently it could be for several reasons. He might have some sort of prediction mod that lets him figure out our attacks if he sees enough of them. Or it could be as simple as he is programed as the final boss of this simulation so the creators had to make him act as such. If he did not have any limits on him the simulation could end up not being able to be won by anyone. If the human/belenosian who wrote the original simulation battles was a fan of old computer games it might just be residual programing.

We've been using the interface and assimilate technique for some time now, we even defeated an emperor with it. Some form of countermeasure must have been put in place by now. Interrogating seems risky, could we just delete or otherwise destroy whatever AI we pulled in?

WAIT A MINUTE.

Sapphire can be seen but not sensed. What if that's not him, but a decoy, and this is a delaying tactic so he can blast us with a superweapon or something? We know he's in this complex, but not where.

Why don't we just rush ahead to Sapphire and use Shield Breaker on his shield? Find out for sure if that's really him.

>>565699
It... the Space Scraper does seem to resemble some sort of giant laser weapon, doesn't it. The one we're standing right on top of.

It's probably nothing.

>>565700
...if he had that big a preplanned surprise twist in his tactics, you'd think it would be in Sevener's logs. Meaning we should be safe, unless she was planning to backstab us. I'm not sure why she'd need to since she's already won, though. Our death doesn't get her side out.

She won due to Corrupter setting off a win flag for her without the objectives being complete. So if we get the killing blow on Sapphire it might reset the system and we could still win. Even if the chance is only 1% we need to be the one to finish off Sapphire. And Sevener knows it could happen.

So she is technically on our side but will be doing anything she can to officially win the contest.

Actually the rules are if it's a cooperative win, the contestants have to try to kill eachother afterwards.

1/3 Alison 2014/03/16(Sun)13:38 No. 566600 ID: d470e9
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Alison pulls back into the lobby and lets Clarence take over Unity for the moment so she can concentrate on one thing at a time.

"Remember that this is a simulation. For its purposes, Sapphire might be treated as being more of a final boss to a game than an actual Emperor."
>"It's a possibility. But keep a close eye on him." Loviro says.
"There's also the possibility that's a decoy, and that he's going to fire a superweapon at us."
>"There isn't much we can do about that aside from finishing off the last supercore away from ground zero." he continues.
>"That's not likely. I don't think that that's the case." says Strongarm. "Sevener's here, right? She should have logs of something on Sapphire, that he wouldn't fire a superweapon here. And if it is a decoy, then Sevener should have logs saying so, and she should be running off to the real place about now."
>"Like I said. We play it as though this is real." answers Loviro.

Alison will take that advice, and hold off on giving away that she has a shield breaker by trying to break through and attack Sapphire.

She goes to see the supercore she interfaced with, since he is already in the lobby.

>"I won't tell you anything. So do your worst, if you mistakenly think that'll change anything."
"What if I had proof this world wasn't real, and the entire belenos world as you know it was a simulation for something else?"
>"I would deny any 'proof' you had."
"Alright. There isn't much here, but make yourself at home."

2/3 Alison 2014/03/16(Sun)13:39 No. 566601 ID: d470e9
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In the brief moments that Alison spent talking, everyone went all out up top. The second supercore didn't appear to think it would have so many opponents, and while his shield was nearly impenetrable, it was directional, and could not withstand a surrounding attack. Clarence interfaces with him, and brings him into Alison's core.

The third supercore was a powerhouse of weaponry, but Seventeen's division leaps in, taking a great deal of damage, but is able to absorb it. Sevener gains whatever weapons it had.

The fourth and last supercore's static shield is lowered and starts coming out.

3/3 Alison 2014/03/16(Sun)13:39 No. 566602 ID: d470e9
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>"Hey." Sevener floats next to Unity, and Alison takes over again. "I got the third supercore's charge weapon. It's like a damn superweapon that's way better in our hands than it was in his hands. I've used it to take out sapphire, but I need a moment to charge it, so it's tough. Do me a favor and keep Sapphire from attacking me or whatever, and I'll blow him apart in a single shot, or close enough that he'll be too wounded to be a threat. It's more powerful than he thinks."

All right. We'll run interference.

Might also help to confirm with Loviro- is he familiar with a module that matches that description?

We also have the shield breaker. If we want to maximize the effects of any attack, we'd break his shield right before she fires.

...there is still the chance this is a trap by Sapphire, but as we just discussed, there's no good way to play that. There's also still the chance Sevener is up to something, but I really don't see how it works to her advantage to take us out right now. And we're still invested in winning her over- acting on paranoia (valid or otherwise) now could screw things up between us for the rest of the cycle.

Remind Sevener that Sapphire probably has that space-time module with him and that killing him means we can't get it. So, you know, try to go for "wounded".

Do be careful, though. We don't want Sevener to "accidentally" hit us, or for Sapphire to redirect the beam into us with that module or something.

>>566602
And this is how she won before. She shoots us with the superweapon too, likely at the same time.

Do as she says, but consider keeping our core-body away from sapphire, distracting him at a distance. Or heck, use it to block his shots with overdrive-Plasma Driver, but keep the core in your tail out of...

I have the best idea. Coil around Sevener and use Plasma Driver to protect her. That way she can't kill us without killing herself, and we can still defend her.

We do not want to kill him until we get his warping module so remind her of that.

So that is what she whispered to her division. It was to interface with the third core no matter what loses it took. This would be a great place for backstabs on either side.

How is this for a strategy. You agree and distract him from close up so she has a easy shot on both you and Sapphire. Leave your divisions next to her to protect her from the last core. But move your core into the division that looks like duelist while she is not looking. Then if she does betray you all you have lost is a division and you can core her while she is weakened from the charge attack.

And if she does not betray you then we will be in a perfect spot to charge in and interface with Sapphire for his mods.

Oh if you do want to move your core around you could disguise doing so by hugging. If you go hug both your divisions before the final battle Sevener will get disgusted with you and not pay close attention.

>>566602
Tell Sevener to try and disable Sapphire
I'd like him in the core because that's probably going to break the sim, causing an infinite loop of game win and game still on flags to happen because the sim doesn't know which is which, and that infinite loop will fight the probable infinite loop Corrupter started and crash the sim, making it do a safety reboot itself, ejecting both you and Sevener from the game or starting all over again, maybe putting you in a new sim entirely with time freeze on.

And with Sapphire and Emerald's still inside our core, the reboot know what the fuck to do and THEN finally eject you both because you got the win condition. Or maybe without Sevener. I don't know.

1/3 Alison 2014/03/16(Sun)19:58 No. 566672 ID: d470e9
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The fourth supercore is taken care of by Oner, Guardsman and Duelist, while Alison gets nearby Sevener. The fourth is weaker than the rest, having no more supercore backup, and Duelist gets nearby Alison as well while Sapphire's shields go down.

"Leave his core. Remember that we want to be able to get his modules."
>"Yeah, yeah." Sevener says. "It fries jetalium better than it fries the core."

MASSIVE ENERGY SURGE X6 DETECTED

"Watch it, everyone! I see what he's doing!" Loviro says. "The space around him and us is bent, and his attacks are going to come out from any direction!

Sevener's energy surge finishes faster. She timed it well, and launches it.

2/3 Alison 2014/03/16(Sun)19:58 No. 566673 ID: d470e9
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Sevener turns at the last split second, and has it blast through Alison, into one of the bent space areas, through Sapphire.

>"Sorry, Naga. I lied. I had the space bending prototypes myself, and I wasn't gonna take any chances." Sevener yells.

3/3 Alison 2014/03/16(Sun)19:59 No. 566674 ID: d470e9
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>"We were trying to earn your trust, Sevener, but we were right to be cautious." says Duelist.
>"The fuck?! Your divisions can still function when your core doesn't have any direct jetalium?"
>"Perhaps not, but you blasted a division, not our core. Alison swapped her core out while you weren't looking, in case you tried what you did."
>".... hrmph. Good. I don't like her putting trust in whoever she hugs. It doesn't matter, I got the killing blow on Sapphire, since I don't trust Corruptor's talk, either."
>"Was Sapphire honestly that easy?"
>"Not when you don't know where to go and what the trick is to reverse the space bends on him. Otherwise, yeah, he's a bitch to kill. Alright, I got Sapphire's core, got what's inside, and crushed the core. Tell Alison to come back on out, cause I did what I wanted to do, which didn't include killing you. And no fucking arguing, we've got to get the fuck out of this spot right now. Preferably off planet. That light behind me isn't just some light show. Here I was playing it all careful, but really, you never had a chance to begin with. Not like that would've stopped you from trying anyway."

...I can't believe it took us this long to make the Alison division not the one with the core. Geeze. I guess we must have been really consistent with not hiding who was real even in other loops if Sevener never even considered we might do that, too.

>That light
I'm going to assume that's Sapphire's deadman switch, blowing everything to hell.

I'd agree we should probably gtfo, right now. Combine supergravity and bend to get away to space?

>not a bitch to kill if...
Explains what she was doing on the satellite. She was getting the bend space module she needed for the final battle.

>not trusting Corruptor's talk
I think we can confirm it wasn't all bullshit or a fake win / lose message now that Sapphire's dead. If the game was still progressing normally, shouldn't the simulation have ended with his death?

>I don't like her putting trust in whoever she hugs
...by that metric, I don't think you've received your hug of trust yet, though. *grin*

>>566678

Don't think we will at this rate either, she's getting to be worse of a threat.

I don't trust her, I mean we all knew she was going to stab us in the back at some point and time but she was ready to kill us and everyone we grabbed as well without the slightest bit of hesitation, I'm not sure she still won't try just to make sure she has won and this simply isn't overtime. Call our contacts and see if they got a ship to get off world yet? If so tell them to launch and we'll join them in orbit. If they did get a ship and can get off world... I'm voting we leave sevener and run, nothing against her but I don't trust her and we have to much left back in the simulation to simple die now.

>>566674
She's wrong. That was a cooperative kill, obviously, which means the game wouldn't be over even if Corruptor hadn't fucked with things. She would not have won if we hadn't been there helping her.

Cooperate, but as soon as she lets her guard down, hit her with a Hand of Death and/or interface with her. We have the numbers advantage with an interface battle.

Actually, don't even reveal which division has the core. Deny her request to have Alison come out to speak with her- there's no need for that anyway.

Honestly we would have had a decent chance if corruptor had not butted in. But that's all in the past now. Lets get out of here and work on escaping before we get stuck here.

Well we gave her a chance to not backstab us and she took it anyway. If that had hit our core we could have been dead and stuck in here until the next reboot. Her talk about not killing us is a lie.

Go with her if you want but remember she will turn on you the second she thinks she does not need you. She thinks you are to weak spirited to make tough decisions. The sad part is she has been spending so much time trying to take us out that could have been spent on figuring how to fight the real enemy.

You need the information she has and the only way to get it is to absorb her at this point. The only question is do we go for it now or later.

>If that had hit our core we could have been dead and stuck in here until the next reboot. Her talk about not killing us is a lie.
Actually, no. She seems to have expected that we would have been helpless, not dead. A core without jetalium. That's what happened to Sapphire, she just picked him up, took what she wanted, and then killed him.

Of course, it's an open question if she would have killed us, let us become mobile again, or just held onto us as a helpless prisoner.

>attack her
Pointless. We waste all the effort we spent trying to get anywhere with her, and now that she has Sapphire's space bending stuff, it would just be a repeat of that boss battle.

She already got waht she wanted out of the betrayal- the killing blow. Which changes nothing. We're still trapped here, and she still has the win flag. We lost nothing. She also has nothing to gain from killing us now (unless we learn that one of our deaths will open an escape for the other from the simulation).

However, there's a good chance we may still need her help if we're going to find a way to break out of the simulation.

That was a cooperative win so would not count for her unless she got us to. Either she forgot that or is planning onfinishing you off shortly. Smile at her and say you will get her to trust you someday. Then have your other division start heading to her while transforming to look like you. Once you both get there you need to blow everything we have to get to her core and interface with her.

Hopefully she will go for your division first and leave you a opening.

>>566695

Attacking her now would not ruin our attempts to get her to trust us. If anything it would prove to her we finally had the guts to not just go around hugging everyone and hopping things worked out.

We might have survived due to our more durable core but seeing as we both worked together for most of the battle to take out Sapphire the simulation will consider it a coop win. If Corruptor had not messed things up we would have to fight each other to end the simulation.

And she knows that or will remember it shortly. I think our only chance is to pretend to go along with her and then take her out with a surprise attack.

Also- one last rational against fighting: we have no idea how long it take to resolve a core to core interface fight with thousands of participants, and there's a giant wall of death exploding this way now.

We should get clear now, and worry about fighting a pointless and gain-less fight later.

>If anything it would prove to her we finally had the guts to not just go around hugging everyone and hopping things worked out.
We already did that. We just did that by not falling for her trap and hedging in case she betrayed us. She was impressed by that.

>We might have survived
She expected us to survive. Her exclamation was "how do your divisions work when your core is naked" not "how do your divisions work when I fried your core". That's the point of the weapon.

She didn't try to kill us, she tried to screw us over. To claim the win just in case Corruptor was lying or bluffing, or just wrong. Which is pointless, since we're still stuck here.

And I would point out that we were planning the exact same thing. People were suggesting we agree to Sevener's plan, but to backstab her by trying to make sure we got the kill at the last minute. She's not guilty of being any bigger of a dick than us.

Killing her is an overreaction.

She could have taken Sapphire out without hitting us. But she chose to aim that blast directly at the portal we were in front of. As long as we are not dead or under her complete control she will not be certain of her victory.

She does not care about us or any of the people we tried to save in this simulation. All she cares about is winning and beating the Naga she thinks betrayed her in a past life.

If she thinks for a second that the simulation will take the fight as a cooperative win she will take us out just to secure her win.

I would love to be able to work together with her to escape but honestly even if we did figure out a way to make a portal home she would probably backstab us there just to make sure we did not make it out.

Oh, this might be a good time to tell her that you have the contents of the harvester sim inside you. So she almost killed thousands of AIs. They were not contestants yet.

>>566706
Actually, no. DON'T say that. That would make her think we have an additional grudge against her. We just have to get in close and Hand of Death her. Space bending has one weakness- you can't bend yourself. Any sustained physical contact means we can fire weapons directly next to her. Sticky Jetalium would make sure she can't get away.

>She does not care about us or any of the people we tried to save in this simulation.
No. She never did. She never tried to export people from the sim herself, and she expected everyone inside to 'die' or reset or whatever when she won (or lost) and the CAI simulation ended. We also have no proof as of yet people we upload from the sim can be saved.

Would you really expect her to put the lives of the people she's leading second to our own just because we vacuumed up a bunch more people? That we could hold a population of people she considers already dead hostage to shield ourself? It's absurd to condemn her for that.

>She could have fired on him without hitting us
At which point Sapphire's core would have been exposed, and we could have gone for it, or possibly killed it before she did. (As we were planning to do, by the way). Yes, she wanted to be in control of the situation. She wanted to hedge, exactly the same as us. And she (tried to) disabled us to make sure she was in control and got what she wanted.

Same game we were playing. She just did it better.

Of course, now Sapphire's dead, and no one got out. Meaning now we can stop trying to backstab each other to steal the kill and get back to working on an escape plan. ...or we could try to kill each other for no gain on either side (or as revenge for her pulling the same trick we wanted).

>All she cares about is winning and beating the Naga she thinks betrayed her in a past life.
She cares about Alison's past betrayal, yes. With good reason. But she also cares about survival, and escape. And all evidence points to the fact that the former is less important to her than the later. If all she wanted was revenge and to win, she could have used the advantage of her logs to get us killed much easier in the CAI battle, before the emperors even got involved or we got out of the harvest.

It may turn out we have no choice but to fight her. However, attacking her here and now is not an appropriate response to her actions, and it does not serve our current purposes. Her death does not get us out. A fight with her puts us at risk of being killed (either by here, or getting caught in Sapphire's kill switch) and may trap us here for the remainder of the cycle (if we need her cooperation or information in order to break free).

>>566706
>>566707
Moot point. Sevener already knows. We told her back here. >>559507

Hey, here's an idea
Hack her
Bring EVERYONE that wants to live inside her
I don't think they'll be able to kick us out. The entire harvester sim.
We'll RULE her core and completely break EVERYTHING

I think I've figured out Sevener's personality, she's basically our opposite.

I mean Alison is far stronger then she acts if you think about it. She was brought into a world that basically told her if she wanted to live she had to kill those around her, if she wanted to progress she to survive while others failed. This simple rule is why so many inside the simulation are so twisted, they have fallen to the system and think of nothing but themselves and how they can survive. All 4 generals in the corrupter's army are like this, The corrupter himself has shown signs of this. But Alison genuinely cares for others, she only fights when she has to and goes out of her way to protect those she considers her friends. She does all she can to save all those she can even if they tried to wrong her. Were others have become hard and bitter Alison become kind and open minded, When others just accept the rules thrust upon them she tried to find ways around them, when she was told to kill she tried to save. Alison has faced all the horrors and unfairness of the simulation like everyone else BUT she strong enough not to let it shape her and since she never asked to be part of the simulation and it's rules, she always looks for any chance to brake a system that cares nothing for the people it rules.

Sevener on the other hand is nothing but a self centered puppet. From what I've got off her in the small amount of time we've worked together is she only really cares for herself and sees her allies as nothing more then a means to further her goals. When the system told her to do something she did it and has become just as cold and jaded as so many others. During this whole CIA battle she has only done what she was told to do. She was told to kill sapphire so she did, never tried to make allies, never tried to save anyone, just did what she was told. I don't think she ever even made a decision herself this hole time, only doing what her logs told her to do.

In short, I don't trust her. If she even thinks that there is a chance that we could still win this thing she will stab us in the back again just to make sure. She said it herself
> "I wasn't gonna take any chances"
if she really wanted us to just leave then why is she asking Alison to come out? Beside's we have THOUSANDS of people with us who joined us because we said we would get them out of the simulation and I'm not talking about the ones we pulled from this CIA battle but the army we built back through all the stages. We're not just risking our head but the head of everyone who we basically promised to do everything we can to get them out of this thing alive. Plus we only have 500 guys back at the stage and one of the Corrupter's generals with a taste for the snake queen's blood and any who serve under her. I don't find it wise to put our faith in "maybe sevener won't betray us" again when she has done so already. And I know it might be hypocritical after saying Alison hasn't fallen to the system but Sevener doesn't like us, she has already proven that she is more then willing to take us out just to make sure she has won. She can not be trusted. Even if she isn't as bad as I think she is she still can not be trusted because she can not trust us for the offence we did in a past life.

Ooh yes how much I want to punch her right now. But we must show restraint, the world is probably about to be scorched to hell and back. We will escape, probably into space, then we shall see.

Seeing as we're still here in the simulation, it's obvious that it hasn't ended yet. Sevener will likely start trying different methods to escape the sim, no doubt leaving us behind if she can. Not to mention one of these methods being defeating us. We will be backstabbed again, so I think it's high time we backstab her.

>>566713
I'm not saying we attack outright but definitely keep an eye on her and like I said here >>566685 call your Allies to see if they got a ship off this rock, because if they did we have somewhere to recharge in space, or at the very least we can conserve energy and let the ship do all the work of flying so we don't drain our battery more then we need to.

>>566711
Oh, that's true. Also she already said that the superweapon doesn't destroy cores, so... she wasn't planning to kill us and endanger the harvest sim's AIs. Maybe she wasn't going to outright betray us after all. On the other hand... You know what, let's hedge our bets even more.

Don't attack Sevener. Ask her if there is any way she could take the harvest sim into her core. If she really wins the CAI Fight then her team will survive. Giving her the harvest sim means they will be on her team and safe, unlike all the contestants in our dream world that will die due to us losing the fight.

Hang on, if she already had spacetime manipulation why did she even BOTHER fighting Sapphire? That was the entire reason we killed him, to get that mod and try using it to crash the CAI Fight. So she got to Sapphire's mods for a different reason. To become powerful enough to defeat us head-on, perhaps? We can't trust her until we find out why.

>why did she fight Sapphire then?
Well, we had also theorized that if we beat him, the game still might end. Or that blowing up the planet might break things. And killing Sapphire does nicely test both those theories at once.

...and actually, rereading our conversation with Sevener, I don't think we actually explicitly mentioned the idea that we might be able to use the bend space module to escape. Just that he had one.

Everything Sevener has done in the simulation up to this point has been to get here. She gave up several good opportunities to take us out along the way because her logs told her to wait for this place and time.

Deep down in her soul she is a admin at heart. Her logs are more important to her than anything else. We are enemies just because her logs told her so. Even though the same logs apparently told her that only working together have we ever found a way out. She could be a great ally but she does not have the right mindset to lead us.

She was expecting to have all of our mods right now and us either crippled or dead. She needs our super gravity mod to escape the planet quickly. This gives us our best opening to take her out.

Tell her that you are going to use super gravity to get us out of here and to hold on to your waist like before. Then once she has grabbed on make yourself sticky and hit her with every close range weapon you have. If we can separate her core from her body we win. If we can not core her we at least need to interface and overwhelm her.

I think we can work together some day but right now we have to much at stake to let her backstab us again. The only control she has over the other admins inside her was her logs about this simulation. Now that she has run out of info and we are still alive the others might not want to follow her lead anymore.

Well, she turned on us first. She has no one to blame but herself for what comes next.

Move over to her and turn on Super Gravity, and then on the way up grab onto her and activate an overdriven Anti-Jetalium Handle E. It won't stun her like the Hands of Death will, but it'll tear through her jetalium a lot faster and has no chance of breaking her core.

>hack her
She presumably got Sapphire's interface module, which means we can't hack her unless she lets us. I guess we can always try, if she didn't grab the PEI S-10 it'll keep her distracted while our weapon does its job, but I don't expect it to work.

Alison 2014/03/17(Mon)18:52 No. 566781 ID: d470e9
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There is a great deal of temptation among Alison and the lobby to attack and backstab Sevener.

Alison reminds everyone that the game monitor has not changed, implying that the corruptor was not bluffing, lying or wrong, and so there is nothing to gain now from either party attacking each other. She also reminds everyone that she was only able to toss her core to guardsman - and only a little bit of jetalium. Unity currently has 2,350 KG versus over Sevener's 12,0000 or more. If Sevener did want her dead, now would be a good time. Super gravity is the most effective way to get off planet, but Sevener isn't dependant on that. Furthermore, Sevener almost certainly has PEI-10, which supposedly prevents other Emperor's PEI's from interacting. So, any fighting would have to be done through normal jetal combat, to which Alison is at a severe disadvantage.

She won't easily trust Sevener again, but she isn't going to rush into hostility either, especially not until she has a favorable chance of not throwing away everything she has left.

>You need the information she has and the only way to get it is to absorb her at this point. The only question is do we go for it now or later.
Alison will figure later. If she ever gets out of this with Sevener, there will be plenty of time to speak, and it won't be any harder to do it later than in here. She does want that information, though, so she doesn't intend on ditching Sevener and escaping by herself, as risky as that might be.

Alison comes up, morphing back into herself.

"You haven't gotten my hug of trust yet."
>".... you're being stupid. Stop."
"You were about to kill everyone for... almost no reason."
>"No, I wasn't. I wasn't lying about the core surviving. Sapphire survived, at least, he survived that blast."
"I would have liked it if you showed me Sapphire's core to prove that to me."
>"Too bad, after my stunt, I would expect a sniper from you to kill Sapphire yourself."
"This would have counted as a cooperative win, anyway."
>"That's why I tried to blow you to smithereens in the same blast."
"I want to stop arguing about things that are done. I'm going to show myself, because I believe you know that there isn't any point in us trying to kill each other now."

The super gravity is turned on, and the both of them start flying out of the atmosphere.

>Call our contacts and see if they got a ship to get off world yet?
"Sevener, I'd like to use your phone."

....

There's no service. From all of the things that appear to be getting shot out of the sky, it's likely that some networks are down.

>"What were our ideas again?" Sevener asks. "Make sure the planet is blown up the entire way?"

"It really is the apocalypse happening down there." says Iso.
"Yes, but that isn't our biggest concern right now. Our other ideas were to form a supercore with sevener, and to try to go so deep into the harvest, if it isn't destroyed, that the simulation runs out of possibilities. We still have to just poke in the dark for something."

>>566781
Ask what was in Sapphire's core, anyway. Has she tried using the spacetime mod in some paradox-inducing manner? Like using it to send things back in time? Being able to bend space like that...

Well. Regardless, blowing up the entire planet would require an energy source far beyond even our combined capabilities would provide. However, the supercore thing might give us enough power to find EIN by burrowing into the planet or something.

Come to think of it, if we can find the EIN servers and destroy them, wouldn't that throw the simulation out of whack? I mean, EIN was supposed to be some sort of unassailable god entity, and we can barely even communicate with it. If we were to somehow either force the sim to allow us to destroy it or convince it that this world is a simulation...

Oh. Talk to the captured supercore dude. Ask him what he knows about Sapphire's activities, since it doesn't matter anymore.

I thought our primary idea at this point was to use the space-time module to break our way back into the contest.

well fuck I'm out of ideas. We need something game braking right now so we can try and brake reality and escape back into our simulation, THEN we have to find OUR stage where OUR army is and this is assuming we even have a body left once we get back... The only thing I can think of that might have enough power to brake the game is currently blowing apart below us and if we could supercharge it that MIGHT make have enough power to get us out of here but if we could make a blast that powerful I highly doubt we'd be able to survive it ourselves rendering it moot.

Seriously at this point I have no idea on what the hell we can do to get the fuck out of here and it's starting to piss me off. Don't get me wrong I don't think we should give up, I mean after all the crap we want through just to get here and now because of someone we called friend Stabbed us in the fucking back (it gets old quick let me tell you) it all means nothing?! I'll be damn if I just lay down now and give up but I can't come up with a single thing we can do physically to get out of here. I mean we need some way to get into the code of this thing or something and even sevener doesn't have a damn clue on how to do that and she and her people put these damn stages together.

Find out more about the space manipulation mod she got from Sapphire. While she explains things lets see if we can find a intact space station to land on.

If she is willing to trust us "ha ha" we could interface with her and have Loviro take a look at her mods. Or just ask his advice without having a look.

If the space mod lets you make instant portals we could try something like making a ring of the portals and then accelerating our super gravity through it at ever increasing speeds. If you set the portals up right the gravity of the next portal could continually accelerate the gravity ball until it reached light speed. Might get some interesting effects then.

I think our first stop should be to refuel at any station we can find intact. Testing stuff will burn a lot of jetalium and we have no real way to resupply right now.

Honestly I think the only reason she has not taken the chance to finish us off is her lack of logs going forward. She has followed those stupid things forever and now she has to decide stuff herself instead of following the advice of a long dead incarnation. Might be able to prove to her our ways are the best but do not let her get into a position where she can take you out again.

Find a safe place to plot first preferably where you can restore mass. Then inventory all your mods. Then survey the destruction and see if there are any holdouts that are avoiding the apocalypse. Technology and resources are about to be scarce so stock up now.

While we move see if Sevener has a engineer of her own in there. Letting them and Loviro chat might get us some ideas.

>>"What were our ideas again?" Sevener asks. "Make sure the planet is blown up the entire way?"
Well, there's that, the harvest sim maybe, if any of that survived, or trying to find a way to break the simulation with the space-time module.

...if we could locate or communicate with our native allies who made it into orbit, they might be able to help, actually. There's no Empire holding them back, now. We certainly found enough ways to break the rules of our situation, maybe if all the surviving science here puts it's mind to it, they can do.

1/3 Alison 2014/03/17(Mon)21:45 No. 566816 ID: d470e9
File 139511792235.png - (25.75KB , 800x800 , 663.png )

"Sevener, you're asking me for ideas, which makes me think that you aren't holding much hope for the space module to be of much help."
>"It's a disappointment. All it does is create wormholes for short distances. Theoretically it can do more, but there's a million to one chance we'll just collapse in on ourselves, so, no."
"Another idea is to try to get past the speed of light by using my gravity for an extended period of time, using that wormhole."
>"Yeah if we're curious how accurately this place treats relativity. It'll cost a lot of your energy anyway."
"I don't know of many ideas."
>"Fat help."
"I'm trying."
>"Like you even have reason to! You're done, Naga, we won, and you're out! It's use who's stuck here, as far as I can tell, you just have more reason to stick around here than stick around dead!"
"Don't talk like that. I'm still trying. If we could destroy EIN, too, that may be enough to tell the simulation that it's done and over."
>"Yeah, now how do we blow up the planet?"
"All the superweapons we would've been able to use seem to be getting blown up."
>"Yeah. Except for our wormhole. You stick a chunk of jetalium - no, just a ship or something - between two wormholes. You speed it up to the planet for a few minutes, and it'll be going.... well, fast, right? Then I take out the wormholes, and that thing flies down to the planet. That should hurt, right?"
"Probably. Do you have an engineer or some equivalent?"
>"No, I don't. Unlike you contestants, we don't get breaks. We're at work, either administrating the safe zones or the stages. We don't have time to read books."
"You really do want to blow up the planet?"
>"You got any better ideas?!"
"We can go somewhere else and plot. There's a couple of terraformed planets planets that would have taken a long time to get to, but I can super gravity us there in some decent time, energy permitting."
>"Well whatever we do here, we do it here now, before we start going! You better start working your ass, Naga, because I'm only keeping you alive under the assumption you might be useful."
"Please don't take your anger out on me, I want to get out of here as much as --"
>"Alison. Get back in the lobby. Duelist, take over Unity." Recluse says.
"Hold on, please, Sevener."

2/3 Alison 2014/03/17(Mon)21:45 No. 566817 ID: d470e9
File 139511793413.png - (22.27KB , 800x800 , 664.png )

"Recluse, what are you doing?"
>"After our lobby computer turned worthless, we've placed all of our focus on how to break the belenosian world. If I am not underestimating him, then we have had the capacity to break the world inside of us all along."

3/3 Alison 2014/03/17(Mon)21:45 No. 566818 ID: d470e9
File 139511795365.png - (13.80KB , 800x800 , 665.png )

>"Over four thousand of us, and we only now checked to see if his glitched inventory would persist with us. We know how unpredictable glitcher's items are supposed to be when used outside of their parameters. This button started the simulation. We can't know what it would do now."

>>566818
...it's been so long since we used that thing I forgot it existed.

PUSH BUTAN.

Well, there's one way we could lower the risk. Sevener and the admins built their own switch(es) to activate CAI battles. Ask how they work. If we assume Glitcher's button and their switches work on the same principle...

Of course, pushing the button could kill us. Or it could implode the whole sim. Or it could get us out. We don't know.

We'd probably need to link cores to take Sevener with us.

First up though: there's something we need to clear up. Sevener, nevermind who's to blame or who has more to gain. What happens if we do get out. Both of us, not one or the other. That puts all of us and all of you together again in one system bracket. What happens then? Do we start trying to kill each other again, or are you willing to let us walk away, or to cooperate to try and end all this? How far does this truce go?

After we get that out of the way, we can tell her we might have a way out. It might kill us or break the simulation but... we still have Glitcher's item in inventory. We might be able to just switch it off.

Safe practice says we should try to interface or supercore in case the button only lets one group out. Don't try to backstab her and leave without her unless she tries to kill us and take it or something crazy (mostly because we'll look really stupid if we try to leave her behind and the button turns the sim off, letting everyone out. Then we'd be right back to a bloodbath).

...also, I don't know if we have time (or Sevener would let us) but it might be nice to try and rescue more people before we bail. The Slither and other guys should be in orbit- we might be able to take them too.

well the worst case scenario would be that it just kills us, but seeing how the alternative is just waiting in this sim until we run out of battery power or the system restarts all it would do is speed up the inevitable and let us avoid a few weeks or however long it takes for the restart without all the angst.

So the way I see it is it will either
A) give us a way out
B) make things in the simulation worst or maybe just restart it but not really to big a deal seeing as we're kinda screwed now anyways
or C) flat out kills us but again, we're already kinda screwed so not that big of a deal.

The only reason I'm seeing to not push the button is maybe see if we could find the slither guys and take them with us. Just tell sevener you might know where to find a ship. If we find it we can fill Sevener in then because if she finds out we can do this now she'll probably just try and make us leave now instead of trying to save more people. Also be wary of backstabs.

Ask Sevener if she's feeling lucky today.

Explain the situation and propose to merge. No harm in it anyway and it'll probably only affect you both if you do.

Do it Do it Do it Do it Do it Do it Do it Do it

Suggestion 2014/03/18(Tue)06:46 No. 566835 ID: f44ca3

She just said she is only keeping us alive because we might be useful. The second she knows she has a advantage she starts trying to bully you.

We can hit that button almost instantly so lets talk to Sevener. She might have the upper hand in jetalium but this might only bring out everyone in our core.

So propose that she joins us in our core and we all get out of here. If she tries anything we hit it and whatever happens happens. Assuming she does go for it and does not try something stupid we might be able to blackmail her logs out of her while she is in with us. Could always threaten to put her back in her core alone after everyone moves over.

Do not just go for joining cores and hoping for the best. We have the possible way out so if she wants to join us its on our terms. Never mind the fact hitting that thing might do any number of things.

Tell her that your team just got on the line with Glitcher and he is ready to pull your team back out. So if she wants out she has to join you in your core. But seeing as she is not trustworthy the only way you are letting her in is if she ejects her core so you can pull her in. Tell her you would rather not leave her but if she makes a move you can leave instantly.

Second option is we tell her our "useless" engineering team has a plan but we will need lots of power. Find a place that looks safe where we can get back up to Seveners level of jetalium and then we have our final climactic fight. You win and force absorb her then hit the button.

Hitting it might do any number of things but if it ends up just knocking us both out of the sim we need to do it on our terms. If she leaves without us getting the info we want from her we might never get it or get it to late to make any difference.

Honestly I do not think she will react well to surrendering to us so might be best to make the offer after we restock our supplies. If she tries anything just hit the button and see what happens.

Alison 2014/03/18(Tue)18:18 No. 566894 ID: d470e9
File 139519189709.png - (21.86KB , 800x800 , 666.png )

"I might have a way out."
>"Don't just say that."
"I have the button that triggered the CAI fight to begin with. I can press it, but it's in the lobby. I don't know if it would affect you."
>"... you want me to get in your core, don't you."
"Yes."
>"Why don't you get in me?"
"Because I can push the button at any time. I don't need to do it with you, but I would like to."

Sevener sits still for a minute, while Alison assumes she is taking place in some internal dialogue.

>"I'm willing. I don't think you'd backstab me so blatantly. Not here. Some of the other admins, though? They aren't so keen on it. We'll split. Some of us'll join your core, and the others will take our body and go our seperate ways."
"I was going to ask you to shed your core."
>"No will do. We just interface. Last I figured, you've got the advantage there, so fuck if I know what problem you'd have with that. So we interface, and the people who move to your core, move."
"I'm going to want to stay around for a little while anyway, just to save who I can."
>"Whatever, long as we get back with some time to spare. No longer than midnight, belenos time. You ready?"

The current time is 18:91.

Yeah. Let's head to Cloud Slither and pick up anyone notable. We can split up to gather as many real AIs as possible, then try to meet back here at 22:00.

huh, I'm surprised she's actually willing to work with us. But yeah we did tell the slither guys to run so if they did manage to get off world they'll probably be in orbit but if not then I have no clue where'd they be since they did scatter after the bombs drop.

>admins will split up
Fair enough. They might be left behind if it works, or they might still be able to look for a way out if the button glitch-kills us. ...Or maybe it'll still take everyone. There's no way to know.

>who rescue
We can make an appeal to slither, and Emerald's guys who bailed from the ship. ...actually, does Emerald want to come, or us to keep our promise to let him go?

I'm all for saving some more people, but here's a little something for everyone to consider. Judging by the fact that we're merging with Obliterator's and Swordsbane's brackets next stage, there's probably only going to be 4 contest and administration brackets. If we leave as soon as possible, then we might have time to take over the Upper Echelon this stage and do whatever that lets us do before those 16 administrations die.

Oh, and maaaybe we should warn the administrators that the Corruptor invaded their brackets. You know, just so they know what they can look forward to when they get out.

>maybe we should warn them
We don't actually know that Corruptor acted on that, do we? And in any event, maybe we should wait until it's clear we're not all killing each other when we get out.

I guess this is about as close as we can get to a compromise. Just keep a eye out for anything suspicious. Right now she is unhackable and could disconnect from us at any moment during the process. Even if she does go along with it the people staying here might decide to do something crazy after they get control of the body.

As for rescuing people I would say try Cloud slither and the harvester sim first. We may have pulled most of the simulation into us but the people running it seem like they are a fairly decent group and that place might be full of refugees by now. With a large protected area they might be a prime disaster recovery area now that all the emperors are dead.

Ask her if she wants to help out. Gives her something to do while we wait and might be interesting for her to watch us work. We either have eventually convince her that our way works or end up locking her up somewhere she can not get in our way later on.

Be honest that you can't be 100% sure this will work. Or that it won't blow up horribly.

>"Why don't you get in me?"
I can think of one reason that might actually be a good idea: her core is the one with the win flag. (Although migrating everyone over to her core, including all the what, millions?, of frozen people we took from the harvest probably makes moving the system side to us a lot easier).

>>566923
I doubt we can move the dreamworld over to her.

I doubt she would try anything funny during our interface... you have the numbers anyway, and she seems truthful about her group's intentions. The risk is that without Sevener the other admins left would be... less friendly to us, relatively speaking. We could just stand on guard, have divisions watch over us, or...

It may sound a bit grim but... does anyone want to... stay? Anyone tired of the stages, tired of fighting, or just wish to remain here in the sim? There's a higher chance that the other group won't find a way out, and best case scenario is that we fail, the cycle repeats, and they get to live here forever. And if we succeed then maybe the sim just... keeps going? Runs alongside the stages or something like that. I remember there being a small minority within us that wish to screw the stages and live in the sim, although they may have changed their minds by now. Ask if anyone would like to transfer to the other core instead. The true purpose is twofold, one to watch the other admins and make sure they don't turn on us, and two to have a higher chance of staying here in the simulation forever, if that's what they wish.

1/5 Alison 2014/03/19(Wed)19:29 No. 567014 ID: d470e9
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"I'd like to ask our lobby something, first. Some of you had the idea to stay here. I wasn't going to do that at the time, but now that we have Sevener's core, if you want to stay here, then you have a chance to. I know that this idea came up before the apocalypse, and there's no guarantee my button won't destroy the simulation and everything inside of it. That, and I don't know how good of company the admins keep. But if anyone wants to absolutely refuse to go back into the stages even though they can die and live on in the dreamworld, and risk what's going on here, there is the option."

There are only 7 takers. Alison didn't make a compelling case for staying, but she also didn't think there is much compelling around here anymore.

"Yes, I agree with that. I also have another request."
>"What."
"7 of my friends would like to move into your core. If the admins can't find a way out by the time the stages continue, they'd like to live here."
>".... yeah. That's fine with us. Enough of us, anyway."
"Alright."

The interface starts. Sevener and the admins don't try to do anything tricky, and neither does Alison.

2/5 Alison 2014/03/19(Wed)19:29 No. 567015 ID: d470e9
File 139528258605.png - (318.67KB , 800x800 , 668.png )

The remainder of the belenosian day is spend scouring the planet for survivors. Unfortunately, most of the survivors have become thralls of EIN, which has treated Alison as a hostile entity. She still interfaces with them and is able to forcibly save them one at a time, but it gets difficult to do so when it doesn't appear that the thralls regain their sanity, and must be restrained.

A great deal of ships have also gone well out of orbit, and Mathematician is relatively certain that they're heading for colonized planets.

3/5 Alison 2014/03/19(Wed)19:30 No. 567016 ID: d470e9
File 139528260632.png - (240.09KB , 800x800 , 669.png )

It would be a tragedy if everyone got this far, just to get blown up by a stray EIN bot, so Alison hits the button.

>ERROR - SYSTEM CORRUPTED. RESTART INTERRUPTED. REGENERATING SIMULATION. EXTRACTING FOREIGN ENTITIES. PLEASE TRY AGAIN MOMENTARILY.

>"This had better be a good thing, Naga!"

>"DUPLICATES FOUND. LOVIRO/UNKNOWN. FELIX/UNKNOWN. VINYL/UNKNOWN. EMERALD EMPEROR/SWORDSBANE. UNKNOWN/UNKNOWN X 8. UNKNOWN/HEALER. TEMPORARY PLACEHOLDERS CREATED UNTIL NEW CYCLE."
>1,572,241 UNREGISTERED CAI CONTESTANTS FOUND. DUMPING TO SOURCE: STAGE SEVEN SAFE ZONE. NEW ENTRANT ESTIMATION COUNT: 1,600,000 -- EXITS: 10

4/5 Alison 2014/03/19(Wed)19:30 No. 567017 ID: d470e9
File 139528263564.png - (25.64KB , 800x800 , SYS7-6.png )

Alison is out.

Back at the spot where she hit the button.

It takes her a moment to recall where this spot is. And what she was doing here, for that matter.

It was for Arbiter's keycard.

5/5 Alison 2014/03/19(Wed)19:30 No. 567018 ID: d470e9
File 139528264981.png - (31.64KB , 800x800 , SYS7-7.png )

That may not be happening.

So Healer was another extracted simulation AI, as well as Emerald. Swordsbane is his alternate...

Anyway, see if you can contact Arbiter. Tell him to claim to be the Diamond Emperor so that he can recruit the influx of contestants. Also apologize, because you failed.

So um are we stuck here until the next cycle or are we getting transported again?

Well wherever we end up we have a lot of harvester people who are going to be very confused shortly. We still have Corruptor being silly somewhere and it would be nice to tell him we have no hard feelings but he really needs to start ignoring those logs. Dang things are causing more problems than they are helping. I am betting Seveners probably have little use by this point and are mostly full of stupid plans to kill us.

If we get the chance it might be best to absorb most of the harvester people before its to late. Rescuing them from a somewhat normal life just to force them through a giant death maze seems cruel. Having them live in our dream world might lesson the transition shock.

Looks like one of the people we pulled out has 8 duplicates somewhere. Seems to be someone we have not got the name of but they might turn out to be important. Will want to find out what the system means by Temporary placeholders.

so how much time do we have left before the stage starts? Because I think the best thing we could do with non-combatants of the CIA battle would to be to dump them off at our house and it's a good thing we have a city around because we just picked upped a city's worth of people.

We should also check back in with the guys we left behind back in the stage and we should just get out of here in general. I mean with everything that happened with the corrupter and what not we really don't have a reason to be here anymore. Plus with, what, how many hours we have left, and all the new people we picked upped which have NO IDEA what's going on as we've had them frozen this whole time... yeah we have a lot of things to do and almost no time to do them. I think for now we should just get them back to our base/city and just tell them that they are in a temporarily simulation (not totally untrue) for the time being. I mean most of them knew they where in a simulation they just never said anything about it. And if they buy it then we can wait till after we finish the next stage to deal with all that.

>>567021
Personally I think it's time we stopped giving Corruptor second chances. He cannot be allowed to backstab us again.

Its not like we can do much right now about him. As one of the "special" contestants we might need his help later on. He is doing the same thing Sevener has been. Mistrusting us because a log told him to. Just because we had issues with each other once long ago does not mean we have to now.

Like Sevener we just do not give him any direct chances to back stab us if we can avoid it.

1/4 Alison 2014/03/19(Wed)20:53 No. 567028 ID: d470e9
File 139528761433.png - (18.71KB , 800x800 , SYS7-8.png )

Alison is not sure what's going on with her death animation now. However, she notes that Sevener and the administration units that came back are not dissipating, indicating that she did, in fact, lose, and is in the middle of actual death.

Despite being in that state, she uses ghost talk on Corruptor and Arbiter.

Corruptor does not reply.

Arbiter shows up. His expression quickly turns into dismay. Alison tells him that he's the Diamond Emperor. If he hurries up and claims that name in Stage 7, he may have an unfathomable amount of allies. Or 1.6 million, depending on his fathoming capabilities.

Arbiter asks why she looks like she's dying. All Alison does is apologize, but despite that she's been getting backstabbed recently, she still has faith in Chief, Arbiter, and everyone. She requests that he pass that info along, and not to worry. She reminds Arbiter that there are still 3 resurrections for each person that clears stage 7, so just make sure everyone tries their best. And to be wary about the Corruptor, not just was he able to intervene in the CAI fight, he made Alison automatically lose. She hopes he had good reasons for this.

2/4 Alison 2014/03/19(Wed)20:53 No. 567029 ID: d470e9
File 139528763062.png - (19.45KB , 800x800 , SYS7-9.png )

Just before her death process is finished, and before Arbiter has a chance to say any more, Sevener comes by and yanks the stage keycard that drops from Alison.

>"Thanks. And thanks for telling me Arbiter was the Diamond Emperor. I think I'll invite him over, now, and check out his logs too. I heard that's what you came here for, so hey, everyone wins."

3/4 Alison 2014/03/19(Wed)20:54 No. 567030 ID: d470e9
File 139528767936.png - (27.67KB , 800x800 , SSF7-40.png )

Alison wakes up some time later. She knows that time has passed, but she isn't sure how much.

Iso runs up to Alison. He thought he was dead, because he is.

Alison gives him a hug, as he asks where they are. Alison suspects within Sevener's dream, as she senses her approaching fast, and all of her friends she senses around her are also dead.

Unnatural Selection - Belenosian Interlude 3 (Thread 9) END Alison 2014/03/19(Wed)20:55 No. 567031 ID: d470e9
File 139528771397.png - (42.36KB , 800x800 , SSF7-41.png )

Sevener comes to a fast halt in front of her.

>"Alison." She catches up, grabbing Alison's shoulders. "Arbiter accepted my invitation to check his logs."

She pauses another moment, enough for Alison to notice that there is the slightest hint that she's shaking.

>"I may have made a mistake."

OH that was her death animation? I just thought that was some side effect from using glitcher's device... What? don't look at me like that. Alison only died once way the hell back in the, what 2nd 3rd thread

well, shit

We got tons of info about the different simulations and people that have been pulled out of them over the cycles. And honestly dying is well worth it to make Sevener realize how misguided she has been. We really need everyone we can get on our side to find a way out of the loops.

While Corruptor threw a wrench into the works I think we came out way ahead. If we had won who knows how long it might have taken to get Sevener out of her funk over loosing and work with us again.

>>567035
kinda think it's a little to early to say that. I mean it really comes down to how useful we can be from beyond the grave.

>"Alison"
>grabbing someone's shoulders is kind of like a hug
>Sevener's hugging Alison and is actually using her name
Just what do those logs say?

>>567037
>it really comes down to how useful we can be from beyond the grave.
Pretty much everything Alison can do can also be done either by other people or by Alison through Ghost Talk.

Hug her quick before its to late!

>>567039
yeah but until sevener showed up we're kinda in a hibernation were we couldn't do anything, kinda like how it was for the people we absorbed into our dreamscape before we turned it into an empire in the middle of the city. I'm mostly just kinda worried that we'll only be able to act whenever Sevener finds the time to come and see us more then anything. But again really to soon to say

 

>>567031
>I've may have made a terrible mistake
Cue Iso playing this song

Now kiss.

I hope the next chapter starts relatively quickly. Edge of my seat here.

...I don't suppose their Invincible traits let the former Chompers survive that?

>millions of new CAI entreats
Well, at least the people we rescued didn't die with us. That's something. Poor Polatt, though. He chose Alison only to be separated.

>Duplicates: LOVIRO, FELIX, VINYL, EMERALD/SWORDSBANE, HEALER
Huh. Someone busted Loviro, Vinyl, Felix and Emerald out before. And healer was a CAI battle native too. I guess she was a jetal? (I wonder if she was ever in a background shot somewhere and we missed her. ...great, Now I've got a reason to double check 3 threads worth of images).

I hope the doubles didn't just get obliterated. (It would be really cruel to save Felix and Vinyl only for them to not make it out because their spot was taken already). It would be really interesting if the doubles combined. Our prospects of actually working with Swordsbane go way up if he remembers his time as Emerald, and working together as a (reluctant) ally.

Easiest way to check it out would be to talk to Healer first chance we get. She should be here with us as a ghost. (Although her jetal double might still be alive in stage 7?).

>Alison suspects within Sevener's dream
Is Severer absorbed us, and didn't rend, that would at least mean we're available to our allies via dream as well.

>Alison
You're using my name. Does that mean you not mad at me, anymore?

>she's shaking
...do you, do you need a hug?

>>567054
>Chompers
Oh, geeze, I just realized their invincibility means we couldn't have got the Chompers backed up via glove duels. I hope a couple people thought to absorb them.

>doubles obliterated
>doubles combined
It said there were temporary placeholders generated for the doubles we were bringing out, meaning that at the start of the next cycle there'll be one contestant generated from each of their baselines, but that at the moment each of those baselines has two people associated with it.

By the way, if anyone was wondering, Swordbane looks nothing like Emerald. >>/questarch/423005 It wouldn't at all surprise me at this point if the other house lords were other emperors that the Corruptor picked up because he instinctively recognized them.

It kind of wasn't very specific as to the nature of the temporary placeholder, though. I'm not 100% trusting that means they're up and walking around.

>Swordbane looks nothing like Emerald
An interesting standout, when everyone else's self image seems to be something that survives every reset- that comes to them every cycle in their very first moments of sentience. Of course, it could be a great number (even a majority) of the contestants have more malleable 'selves'. If they look different, or have different personalities, in different loops, no one would connect them. You're only going to get noticed in logs if you're consistent, and you frequently survive long enough.

>It wouldn't at all surprise me at this point if the other house lords were other emperor
The fact that there was no duplicate Ruby made me sad. As an Emperor, he'd be a good target for someone to try and take with them. That very likely means Ruby didn't use his secret backup to upload himself to the harvest, and we didn't save him. (Or if we did save him, no one else has ever done so before).

>another thing to check next thread, wherever that happens
Did the people who tried to stay inside the CAI-sim stay behind, or were they brought along? (The fact we brought the refugees in our core with us suggests we left everyone outside our core behind, but we should confirm).

>[Corruptor] made Alison automatically lose. She hopes he had good reasons for this.
...he did. He knew we had the button. He rigged it so if we chose to leave the CAI sim, we'd die. We wouldn't be trapped if he made us the winner. He probably didn't expect us to sacrifice ourself to get Sevener out, though. And we still don't know why he turned on us.

>I hope a couple people thought to absorb [the Chompers]
I would assume the amassed system forces absorbed (or rended) everyone they could. Of course, we don't know how many of the system people stayed behind (if any), so it's impossible if there were enough absorbers to go around, or the odds of them targeting those specific people in the crowd (I suppose they had unique shapes amid a lot of our forces we had assume uniform builds? You'd think they'd target unique people first. More likely to have useful ghost information or abilities / boons to take).

>>567060
We didn't capture Ruby. He self-destructed and uploaded himself into a secret location we had no leads on.

>>567061
Yes, but we hypothesized that secret location might have been in the harvest, since we already knew he had a backdoor, there. And we scooped up the whole harvest. Unfortunately, we could never confirm or deny that hypothesis because we had millions of frozen rescues from the harvest to check and only thousands of contestants with which to search (and now that I think of it, there's no guarantee Ruby's emergency backup looks like Ruby).

>Pretty much everything Alison can do can also be done either by other people or by Alison through Ghost Talk.
The big loss is the dream house. Our allies can't now come and go out of the safe zone at will. Although if they can reach Glitcher via their own dreams, they might still have access to teleporters.