Digging Continues (Open, threadjacking encouraged once again!)

[promiselisting]

[ VIP week at Sparks Golsaucia's still going on, true, but it involves a lot of loud noise and people and Futaba ain't here for that without the rest of her friends. So instead she's been working on something else. Something even the people who didn't join in can hopefully appreciate. ]

So. Got a few things for you all and a few questions in return, especially for the newbies.

First of all, I've got some notes for you all. Some of you might remember the post I made a couple months back. Been doing research since then, so I figured I'd follow up with my findings. The more this info is widely spread the better. Also if you've got anything to add from searches on your own, feel free to talk about it here or lemme know and I can add it. We may even want to have like... some kinda meeting to discuss this stuff?

I'm not organizing it though.

[ Nope. Nope. Not a chance. Putting together notes and tossing them out to the wind? That she can do. Organizing a bunch of people and talking to them and all that kind of thing? Nope. ]

Unfortunately this place doesn't have the internet, so I can't just make a website for these notes. Pretty much all I can do is make my files available for download as of right now, so I'll have to post an updated version periodically. Sucks but there's nothing I can do yet.

Anyway here's the file: file:vaikunthanotes

[ And next... ]

On that note, one of the big questions last time was about a strange little girl with blond hair who called herself Ashelia. She only turned up right after the new arrivals, and only spoke to a few people before disappearing again. Anybody happen to see her this time around? Looking at newbies especially for this one.

Also a Moogle that shouted some kind of doomsday prophecies about a "she," I guess.

[ She'll ask more questions if anybody actually happens to volunteer information. No point typing a lot up front if it turns out she wasn't even here.

And... as for the last thing. And the thing she's especially glad she's using text for. ]

Also... back on Earth, a lot of countries around the world happen to celebrate Father's Day on the third Sunday of June (sixth month). Which is... this one, I guess?

So. Happy Father's Day.

[ Especially to her own dad, even if... he isn't here... ]

Comments

[regalblaze]

[That complaint about high school- it somehow reminded him of Noctis and Prompto when they were in high school.]

Even if it is just ten years, an entire world, a planet disappearing, leaves an impact on the universe. A singular planet disappearing could create a massive imbalance in space.

Also, I severely doubt that stopping the Crystallis went quietly. After all, it was absorbing the entire worlds and their magic.

We could be caught in the fallout of the Crystallis and the planets that were destroyed.

[acceptedlife]

Ira here, though I go more by Takeshi now. Got tired of natives squinting at me and asking 'like the lake?', but that's beside the point.

Anyway.

The last thing I remember is saying goodbye to my mother who planned on returning home to her own world with her girlfriend. A couple weeks after the battle with Kalki, the "goddess of death" we believe the Vaikunthian legends talk of.

Our worlds were saved. All others that weren't destroyed by a previous cycle were safe. My father being here should be a testament to that. He was still home on his and my mother's home world while everything in Crystallis was going on.

As for the theory: it would make sense, but there's something that's bothered me for a while. There was only one way for there to be a new Job all could have there, and that was for the Hero who created it to die.

One of the Advanced Jobs on Crystallis, Hacker... I would recognize that face anywhere. My... brother. He must have been a Hero in a cycle previous to mine. Yet I know for a fact that another Riku was a roommate of mine in the world I was in before being summoned to Crystallis. Not to mention a fragment of him from my own World survived in that hell the Dream Width conjured back into being from my memory. Futaba can attest to that one.

I think we aren't just dealing with other worlds, but times and realities.

Also: I don't think I told you, Futaba, but I was there a total of seven years. I believe Sparks was there longer. I only really remember two years there; the other five I was in a sort of stasis.

[regalblaze]

[Ignis' response to all this information is a bit of delayed. An alternate reality? The same world, the same people- but with different lives, decisions and fates. It sounds so unreal and yet- here he is, pondering that maybe- maybe it is. It's not farfetched with what they already went through.

...would that mean that there is another version of himself out there, that has a different life? A life where Crown City didn't fall, where King Regis is still alive and ruling and Noct's fate... not sealed in stone.

Putting his sentimentality aside, this is more worrying than he thought.]

Pleasure to meet you, Takeshi. I would like to confirm something that you just mentioned right now. A Job is created when a person who knows how to perform it dies? Or did I misunderstood you?


The fact that there alternate realities and times mixed into this only makes things sound even more dangerous. Perhaps some worlds were saved, but those that didn't- they would still leave behind damage. The damage that won't be fixed with just stopping the Crystallis from devouring more worlds.

The alternate realities only increase the amount of power that Crystallis had consumed, making things even worse.

[Apparently, all the good things in the world have a price without a measure...]

If I may ask- how long as it been since the Calamity of the Skies? I assume you spent those seven years on Crystallis- 5 in stasis, 2 awake. Between the Calamity and your mother leaving, can you remember how much time has passed?

[acceptedlife]

[Regardless of what alternate realities there may be, at least not all of them involve everyone being fucking dead.]

That is how it worked when one of our own, Zelda, was taken from us. I won't say it's the same here. We can't even make our own Jobs here, and it was her customized job that was suddenly available when she died.

That's what I'm worried about. It happened before in my worlds, though if I say more on that I think a few would take issue with it. Stupid "world order" crap. Even though clearly everyone here knows that there are other worlds and it was tossed out the window like some demon or whatever.

I can't. It's the last thing I remember before waking up on that ship two months ago.

[regalblaze]

[That... is frightening information. Ignis could feel a chill run down his back. So someone before had a job of a Ninja he has right now... as well as a black mage, paladin, astrologian...]

Thank you for confirming it with me. I just wanted to make sure I understood it properly.

I don't know much about 'world order'- I didn't know that the possibility of alternate realities existed until now either.

That is alright. Thank you.

[And, how "fortunately" no sense of time in this weird place. This doesn't sit well with Ignis. At all.]

[acceptedlife]

[It is indeed, and he hates being the bearer of bad news.]

If it helps, a lot of the Jobs were things already on Crystallis. A little different, but still. Guessing I'll have to compile a list sometime on that, too.

It's a concept from my worlds that I never even heard of until I was torn from home. "Don't speak about other worlds to the locals" sort of thing. Again, something that really shouldn't exist here. Different realities was a new thing for me, too. Learned the hard way they exist.

Wish I could tell you, though. I already have a bad feeling that something happened if the ending of that battle is a part of this world's creation myths.

[regalblaze]

Do you mind if I ask just how different these realities are? And- is there a chance that all the worlds can have alternate realities? And how many of them?

Myths don't appear without a base. Something must've happened before the story turned into a myth. That is how things usually work. Perhaps the myth is not completely valid, but the basic premise of it is established on solid facts.

[Most of the times.]

[acceptedlife]

[There is a long pause before he replies. Mostly because this is going to bring up some old wounds again that he would rather not repeat. But, he has to. At least this time, it's of his own volition. Not some Tarutaru woman who figured it'd be a great idea to leave all their files unlocked.]

It depends. We create them every day by the choices we make. A different colored shirt, or speaking instead of fighting. A strike instead of a kick. Or even another force ripping you from home like what happened to me. Each action can cause something different to happen, while another version of yourself could have chosen something else.

I don't know how many people from my worlds I've seen from similar-yet-not slip through the cracks, but the possibilities are as endless as the stars themselves. Each one is a different world in mine, after all.

[There's another pause.]

That's just it though. The version of myth Futaba and I found, it was almost exactly what I remember happening on Crystallis. It's just the last paragraph I can't confirm. No one knows what happened to the four Heroes who stepped forward. Just that they're gone.

[regalblaze]

[Ignis didn't mean to do that, honestly. But it was something he didn't know about and the guy seemed to know. If it was uncomfortable for him to speak of it, then Ignis would've accepted the no for an answer. However...]

I think I understand. I wasn't aware that such thing exists

[A reality where his King doesn't die... it sounds comforting somehow.]

I suppose we will have to dig deeper to find more information. I know that the locals probably won't be happy about it, but I cannot leave things as they are

[He can't leave his King being stuck like this, despite the fact that it's stopping the Prophecy from progressing.]

[acceptedlife]

[He knows. That's why he's glad that this is text because he may have otherwise flipped his lid. It's easier to remind himself when it's just text that no one here really knows, and why he can't afford to remain silent.]

You're right. We will.

I think I remember someone calling it the 'butterfly effect'. It's been years since I heard it though, so could be wrong. The research library or the one at Min'to probably has something on it. Wasn't one of the things I looked into, just experienced.

[He still hopes that there's a world out there, where a version of himself gets to live his own life without suffering like he did. Where their worlds were never destroyed.]

[regalblaze]

Yes, there is a thing called butterfly effect. But I've never seen anyone manage to go back in time to change the decisions.

Thank you for providing me with additional knowledge on the worlds. It will give me something to think about

[Something to exploit given a chance?]

[promiselisting]

... I'll edit your name on the doc.

[ And that'll uh. That'll give her some time to digest all of that. Because what the hell you keep dropping all these huge infobombs, Ira. ]

[acceptedlife]

Thanks. You okay there.

[Casually just does the Aymeric Dance waving these death flags, here.]

[promiselisting]

Are you gonna have to ask me that every time you dump a huge truth bomb on me like this?

[ It's happening a lot okay? ]

[acceptedlife]

Yes. Mostly because my sense of normalcy was gone before I was even made.

Also it's kinda hard to tell over text. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

1/2

[promiselisting]

(๑･`▱´･๑)

2/2

[promiselisting]

ヾ(。◣∀◢。)ﾉ

Anyway for anybody reading along yes, I can confirm all that Ira said but don't ask me any more about it because it's not my business to tell.

[ ANYWAY... ]

So it looks like we may really be dealing with different realities, then. We kinda wondered? Because I'm from months before Ren and Makoto and neither of 'em noticed I was gone.

And how would you say the job system here compares to Crystallis?

[ He got what she meant when she asked about the cycle. He'll probably get what she means here too. ]

[acceptedlife]

[Aww he got her to angry emogi spam at him. ( ´ ▽ ` )ﾉ He'd apologize for being a troll, but he's at least a concerned one?]

It's way more streamlined, that's for sure. We woke up with one or two Jobs already in our Crystal (a red one that took a random shape that held some special meaning for us) and had to rely on a moogle to change between them unless the Job had a skill where you could switch them yourself.

Said crystal would slowly turn blue the longer you remained on Crystallis, but that's another story.

There were a lot more Jobs, too - and something called an Advanced Job that would be available with four more skills depending on what Jobs you had equipped as primary and secondary. It was way complicated.

[promiselisting]

No kidding. Add to list of things to look into: how asterisks are made/developed, I guess.

[ More questions. Always more questions. She doesn't have enough time in the day to do all this, ugh. ]

Do I wanna know why the crystal changed color?

[acceptedlife]

[Pace yourself, Futaba. The coliseum wasn't built in a day.]

Probably not. But then, I wasn't a researcher. So I don't have all the answers on the crystals. I know a group found one of the Archfiend's notes, but... never saw them myself.

[promiselisting]

Wait, whose notes?

[ Because like... otherwise she has no idea why these notes might be important. In the slightest. But it sounds like they should be? ]

[promiselisting]

[ It's very definitely a real possibility. One that has a lot of very uncomfortable implications. ]

This is why need more information. We just... need to keep searching, until we find answers.

We have to.

[regalblaze]

Yes. I do not intend to stop from looking more into this.

[There's too much riding on the line.]

Again, I am very appreciative that you shared this information.

If I find something important, I will let you know.

[It's only fair to return the favor.]

[promiselisting]

Thanks.

Futaba Sakura, in case you need to get in contact.

[regalblaze]

Ignis Scientia. Pleased to meet you.