Some weeks ago I read a post, comentary on the SI trope and how is the poster opinion these people (being inserted) seemed to have knowledge the average person would not possess. Such as the process of making Romen concrete, alcohol, or the archimedes screw. I didn’t have time to read the comments so I don’t know if people agreed or not but the isn’t really what this is about.
I just wanted to ask, without judgement, do neurotypical people really not look these things up? I (Autistic and dyslexic) will be reading a Regency Era novel in which a tenant farmer rails against the implementation of a Seed drill, and how he believes it will rob his sons of their livelihood, and than proceed to send the next hour or so researching, when, how, and by whom the Seed drill was made. That doesn’t even cover the fact the ‘How is it Made’ documentary series made frequent appearances in my Primary (elementary) school science classes.

I’ve been working on a tetralogy novel series ‘The Empire’ this is the first chapter of the first book ‘The Prince of Avak’. This is my first ever time writing something so big I would love your critiques on my work so I can improve it. Attaching the first Chapter
(P.s the non sensical words are in the fictional language of Shalingtrik which I created)
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"Draw Your bows!” said a fairly young man standing on top of a wall which seemed of a very old castle, the wall was made up of wood and had very little space to stand on. “Check your Aim!” he screamed again, pulling out a long silver sword from the sheath on the left side of his waist, it was a deep red velvet sheath, he pointed his sword straight in front of him, he took a step forward his sword gripped tight and he screamed yet again “Shoot!”. An army of arrows went swooshing above his head as he jumped down from the wall onto some hay.
He jumped up onto a horse and rode in with a lot of other men, “My brothers!, My friends! All these days we’ve spent in the barracks shall be tested today! Your resiliency toward this reckless hate shall be tested today! It is either Victory! Or Demise my battle partners!” he screamed while riding the white horse into battle.
The entire army went quite as the approached the hill of Shrungti, they got of their horses and pulled out their weapon ready for battle, there was blood spilled on the soil from the arrow cloud.
The ambushed the army at once and held the swords above their head, jumping high up from the hill towards the enemy high above their head grunting, as they fall on the army killing them.
28 Years Before:
In the east of Hastha, An Empire streached it’s boundries across the entire continent of Likhtrun, The Gynkhara Empire or the localized name, The Avak Empire named after the first ever king of Himkhint, Avaktrinkhu Gynkhara.
Though that was 242 years ago, and the king of Avak currently was, King Baidyant Gynkhara Avak, or Baidyant Avak.
Baidyant was 59 and had no heir, he feared what he had done in the past might again to him.
Being in his late 50s the king had enough energy to trek the Grindhal mountains up the east and reach the temple of the holy spirit of Vrinkhnand, and Baidyanth was blessed, with a child, the news spread of Avantiksh the Royal Queen is going to be the Royal Mother soon. The empire was overjoyed.
Months passed and the child was born a beautiful white baby boy, very healthy and even beautiful eyes, but a tragedy struck, Avantiksh, the mother of the child, died during childbirth, and the king’s family was shortened to just two, forever.
The son, Vedauni Gynkhara Avak was raised with extreme care and sensitive parenting, he was given what he demanded, no matter what the demand was. The ministers and secretaries, hungry for power and wealth became the teachers of Vedauni. The young boy with no sense of right or wrong was now, in the worst company humanly possible.
Vedauni was given his education by the Chief Strategist of Avak, Rikshit. Tall though not very tall but at least 5 and a half feet, Deep brown eyes and dark hair on his head, wrinkled eyes, and a very visible cheekbone and his cheek pressed in. A very light beard and a moustache seemed like he had just shaved a day ago. He had very bushy eyebrows, to the point if you focus on his eyebrows his face just faded away.
Rikshit too, had a past of his own with the Avak empire, which he wanted Avak to repay, with blood.
Rikshit began teaching Vedauni the weak points of the castle, there were 4, The northwest corner, because of the canal underneath supplying sewage outside the kingdom. The eastern gate is because of the Hill of Akhintrin sitting right next to the gate, the Western corner is again because of the Sewage canal and the weakest spot, the Main entrance to Himkhint.
Everyone knew there was a flaw there, but no one ever got to know what it was except the king, and he was relatively good at keeping secrets. Vedauni was trained to use these entrances and to exploit them if ever needed.
As Rikshit began teaching Vedauni, Vedauni was filled with thoughts against his father, teachings from Rikshit that he was a tyrant and that Vedauni’s heritage was supposed to be donated to the Shabn, Rakhlam, and the Krakhsitra empire.
Vedauni’s babysitter got to know of this ideological subversion being done on Vedauni and informed the King. That night was a troubled one, King Baidyanth wanted to keep Vedauni his only offspring as humanly close to him as possible but wanted to keep him away from his Ministers as far away as possible and only one choice could be fulfilled.
The king in his late fifties trusted his wisdom and sent Vedauni away to learn on the Battlefield rather than to become an alcoholic young man living his entire life on his father’s riches. The date was chosen; 2nd Full moon of Krishthind month, Vedauni’s birthday.
Time passed Vedauni was forced to stay in his room away from his so-called teacher. In contrast, Rikshit was locked up for his entire life.
When the youngs in the courtroom asked why Rikshit was not executed Baidyanth quoted “Death is not a punishment, instead it is the end of all.” The young folk trusted the word of the old man and left Rikshit to rot.
Baidyanth himself began teaching Vedauni and was actively reconsidering his choice of sending Vedauni away from him for years to soon come. Vedauni unknown to the evil of the outside world Refused to study from Baidyanth and demanded Rikshit teach him.
The mighty king, the most powerful person on Hastha fell to his knees on the demand of a young boy merely 10 years in age. Rikshit was sent back to teach Vedauni but on a condition Baidyanth will always be present there.
But the king had not known the manipulative and self obsessed nature of Rikshit. Rikshit knew that until the time Baidyanth was present and was guarding Vedauni, he would not be able to change the mind of this young child and make him go against his father. Rikshit knew what was to do but did not know how.
But soon one day, Rikshit’s lucky bloomed.
“I heard the news, how tragic the young boy is going in the army” said a soldier, another replied “He will see the atrocities and brutalities of war at the age of what? 9? 10? This is madness” another soldier commented. Rikshit overheard this. “Who is sending who in the army?” The soldiers looked at Rikshit and bowed down and apologised for talking behind the backs of the king.
“Speak now, or your heads shall be diced and fed to Ukhruns.” enquired Rikshit. A soldier responded in trembling fear “The King is sending the prince, Vedauni to the army to learn war tactics and strategies,”
Rikshit had a weird habit, to be in his deep-thinking state, he pinched his right eyebrow and pulled it, he did the same here pinching and pulling his bushy eyebrow, surprisingly no strand of hair was plucked. He walked off and the soldiers saluted then looked relived.
He walked into a dimly lit courtyard amongst the torches on the walls made of gold, they were shining off the golden pillars of the castle, and the moonlight being reflected on his face from the central pond where he was sitting on top of a boulder large enough for him to sit on.
“Rikshittt...” a feeble voice whispered, an eerie one, a mortal could hear it and say it was not one of a man. Rikshit looked confused, it whispered again “I have come in your assistance...” Rikshit screamed “Who is it?” there was no one. “Show yourself!” he enquired. He ran into the courtyard trying to find who it was, who was behind the voice. He saw every single soldier missing as if they never existed, none were in the entire corridor.
Rikshit started to get scared, and he pulled his dagger out, a medium-sized dagger with a very uniquely straight heft and a blade bent towards the right. The blade glimmered in the moonlight. Rikshit kept it forward protecting him from virtually everything, the voice laughed “Will it not be riotous if I appear behind you?” He turned with a jerk, now his body was slowly starting to shake, the torches slowly dimming, and he saw a woman, at the very far end of the corridor standing still lifeless, her face was not visible at all neither was her body yet one could make it out it was a woman standing.
Rikshit grasped his dagger and was ready for a fight “Come forward! Walk! I fear no man.” The voice laughed hysterically “You have spoken up the reason I have presented myself as a very prepossessing woman.” It answered. Rikshit emphasized “It is no time for humor now, a horrific humor, today is the day it shall be decide if you live or die.” The lady walked forward, her right leg stepped up front, her shoes looked new as if brought immediately, then her left leg, again the same shoe same shine, her right hand came forward, the dim torch lighting clarified that she had relatively fair skin, and her fingers long and slender, then came her right hand forward, identical to her left hand.
She walked in the glimmering light her clothes, glimmering as if new, there was a shine on her ring finger something shining, a weird glow, a ring and finally, she walked in the light, and then the face came into visibility.
“You want the throne? Don’t you?” she whispered. Rikshit heard the whisper better than a scream. “What are you talking about” questioned Rikshit, she replied “I know everything about you Rikshit. Everything.” The smile turned into a smirk, Rikshit enquired “Who are you.”
The lady cleverly avoiding the question said “I know how you, can have control over Vedauni, over his upbringing and eventually the empire of Avak.” Rikshit’s eyebrows rose in suspicion, “How?” he asked. “It is now that Vedauni is going to train, and his upbringing is with the Minister of War, Kumunksh.” He replied in affirmative nodding his head.
“You need to quench my thirst, if you want the throne.” Said the lady looking up beneath her perfectly trimmed eyebrows
“What?” Replied Rikshit.
Rikshit walked into a room from the corridor, the room had 3 doors one after the other he walked in through the first door with ease and through the second door as well, but on the third one, two soldiers stood. They moved their spears in the way, Rikshit pressed his teeth and turned to his right then took a step, his face lit on only one side that he came close to the soldier on his right and just whispered “How much does the empire provide you?” The soldier clenched his spear and took a deep breath, replied with his voice breaking “20 Shinkriht” Rikshit smiled and turned towards the soldier on his left and asked “You too? 20 Shrinkhit? You can’t even buy a rice for that.” Both looked down while Rikshit scoffed. He searched the pocket of his Rimankh He pulled at 10 coins made up of pure gold, he looked at both and said: “I have ten more”.
Rikshit walked in through the 3rd door with a breeze, he looked to his right and found some apples and a knife, he glanced at the knife and smiled.
Moments later he knocked on a door. The majestic wooden door opened. A rather fat man opened the door he was not very tall but not a dwarf either he was shorter than Rikshit. He looked at Rikshit rubbing his black eyes trying to focus on him “Rikshit? You? At this time what happened?” said the man, Rikshit replied “Something very…devastating” Rikshit walked in and closed the door, he reached for the lock below his rib, and slowly locked it “What happened, why are you locking the door? Is everything all right?” The man asked
Rikshit replied, “Sir, you are the minister of war, and Vedauni is being sent to train on the battlefield, so that means you will be upbringing him.” The man’s hand touches his lips and his eyebrows are lowered “Yeah?” Rikshit’s teeth locked tight and fist clenched, he dipped his hand in his pocket again and said “Let me clarify this to you then, no one has the right to upbring Vedauni” He walked closer to the man “No one” he continued “Not a single soul” The man stepped back, Rikshit’s shadow took over the room as if he grew bigger “No one other than me.” The man started to fidget with his fingers which were shaking he started to breathe heavily, he screamed “What do you want to speak Rikshit”. Kumunksh started to go pale until Rikshit screamed “Me, Me, and Myself Rikshit Shaktrik! The Son of Gringhal Shaktrik!” He held the knife up above his head and stabbed the man right through his brain, he pulled the knife out, and the body fell on the floor lifeless, he knelled and started to and then stabbed him again
Blood splattered on his face, he touched the blood and started to laugh louder then he stabbed him repeatedly it was like Rikshit had no control over him each stab turned him more maniacal than the last his laughter getting more psychotic.
And then suddenly he looked at what he had done, he touched his face and saw the blood then the knife immediately stood up and stopped he threw the knife away and ran back, he went in the corner sat, his head on the knees and began to sob, tears rolling down the cheeks he looked guilty and vulnerable.
The same eerie voice whispered again “We have objectives to achieve of, leave him alone Rijkhint, let Rikshit rule” The facial expression of Rikshit changed completely, even his personality, he seemed a completely new person now.
He got up on his feet and looked straight at the body with his chin-up looking at the body. “I did exactly what you asked me to do.” Said Rikshit.
Some Moments ago;
“You need to quench my thirst” Said the lady looking up through her eyebrows “What?” Replied Rikshit “Kill Kumunksh, quench my thirst for his blood.” Said the lady. “Why?” Asked Rikshit “If he dies you shall become the Minister of War and if that happens, you shall be responsible for Vedauni’s Upbringing” Rikshit thought a little, again pinching and pulling his eyebrow.
Present;
“I did exactly what you asked me to do.” Said Rikshit, “I can see that” emphasized the Lady “But we need to dispose the corpse, burn it, and throw it out the window into the dam” Rikshit agreed he walked closer to a torch and held it it in his hand, he took a deep breath and walked closer to the body, he turned his head towards the Lady who gave a very beautiful smile and signaled him to go ahead.
He took a deep breath in but did not take it out, he started to murmur a mantra to call the god of death and take Kumunshk’s soul away.
Ayy si, aikintra
Osiktra Aik Trinkh
Iykrati Shikhra,
Iykrati Shikhra.
The lady smiled at him chanting the mantra she closed her eyes and looked up, Rikshit went ahead and held the robe, he pulled a corner of it up and brought the torch closer to the robe, the red robe started to become black, and soon bright red that is when it caught fire, it started to burn bright, Rikshit held the opposite side of the cadaver which was not burning but it still was hot, he pulled the dead body towards a window behind him.
The Castle of Himkhint was at a staggering height of 50 feet and there was a hill which it was built upon making its height around 400 feet there were small windows with safety features built into them but in this room, those railings could be opened easily, and Rikshit did the same thing, he opened the grill. He looked down the long golden walls of the castle and saw 2 torches below.
2 Soldiers were on their midnight observation march around the castle, as they were tasked with observing everything happening outside the castle, and according to their protocol 2 soldiers would be observing the floor Rikshit was on as well, he had to do it quickly.
Rikshit pulled the body with all his energy, dragged it towards the window and glanced down, 2 bright orange balls of light walking down, possibly soldiers, Rikshit turned away from the window not to be seen by the soldiers.
He waited, for the soldiers to pass and the loud talks to end.
He checked again and it was empty, the pathway was empty, he saw the body, the fire was nowhere to be found the body stopped burning, though it was beyond recognition, the face completely burned to ash, the left side was detached away from the body and the right side somehow remained in one piece.
He brought the torch to the body again but this time, he tied the torch using Kumunksh’s belt. He tied the torch at such a place that no matter what his robe would catch fire, under his palm a free-flowing area of the robe.
The torch slowly started to heat the robe and it caught fire again. Because of the last time now the body was drier it caught a way devastating fire, enough to get people’s attention. Rikshit thanked the gods here because almost everyone was asleep.
He held the extra portions of the belt, though they were hot he held it and pulled the dead body to dispose it away, he pulled the body closer and closer to the window, and tiredness was visible on his face. Kumunksh had such a gigantic stomach even the man who manipulated the biggest empire on Hastha had a hard time disposing of him.
Rikshit finally with all of his strength pulled Kumunksh. Now a burning cadaver was hanging from a window 400 feet up, Though miraculously it caught no one’s attention maybe because of the height.
The fire started to spread and the leather belt started to melt, Rikshit tried catching the part that was about to break in this commotion he pushed the body further away and the belt broke and the body fell. It fell 50 feet and hit the edge of the hill Himkhit Castle was on.
The impact pushed the body into the Khinjit River flowing in the back of the castle.
The sight was beautifully frightening, the burning body of Avak’s most respected minister flowing away in the brutal currents of Khinjit. The white waters directed the body away from Himkhint and towards a place, no one knew.
The fire was so strong the body was splashed with water twice yet it kept burning, but in the shadow of the moon reflected by the Golden Walls of the castle, the body slowly cooled down, the angry fires calming and fading away, forever, to the horizon.
Rikshit saw all of this from up above “What is next, lady?” He turned and his eyebrows rose the entire room was empty. There was no lady. No one anywhere. Rikshit ran across the room in search of her, He flipped the curtain, searched behind the pillars, walked out of the bedroom and in the living room no one was there either, in fact, it was so silent it felt as if no one ever came with him.
Rikshit was confused more than he had ever been, he saw the large oval mirror kept in the living room, he saw his face not very pretty but, drenching in blood, completely covered with it, small fragments of flesh and skin stuck to his body, he removed them and washed his face with a bowl of water kept nearby it didn’t seem to have been kept for what it was used for.
Rikshit dried his face using a piece of Kumunksh’s clothing. He walked out as he was exiting the premises he turned to the two men standing outside guarding the now-dead Minister of War. Rikshit asked them “Did you two by any chance see a young lady walk in?” Both of them nodded side to side and replied with a negative answer of ‘No’
Rikshit was surprised as he walked back to the main corridor and said to himself “Who was she?”
The Next Morning:
The entire empire was shocked after the news of Kumunksh’s mysterious missing case was told out. Vedauni was supposed to go to war today but he had no one to foster him.
The King called an immediate assembly of everyone to do something about the situation, and Rikshit was also present there.
The Minister of Wealth and Finance suggested that Vedauni be sent to study Justice in the brutal Jails of Grindhal.
The minister of Education suggested the Idea of sending the King’s son to a school near the mysterious Tantra Van
The King immediately rejected these 2 suggestions, by saying “What if Vedauni becomes a complete bloodthirsty maniac by visiting the Jails? That too Grindhal? No one is left alive there even infants are chopped in half. They house the most notorious and evil criminals of Avak.”
While this was a satisfying reply to the Minister of Wealth and Finance, the Education Minister wanted Vedauni to study in the School of Arts near Tantra Van. The King rose in anger his eyebrows furrowed “Eshtkar Trishank! The son of Shinkal Trishank! Have you lost your mind? You want the Heir of the Avak Empire to be sent away to a school? That too one near the Tantra Van? A school that is not even run by humans but Ikshantrus? One more word and the name Eshtkar Trishank shall never exist in the jurisdiction of Avak or my empire. You fool.”
Rikshit, his voice measured and persuasive, began, "Your Majesty, as we deliberate on the future of Avak's defence, I propose not only a worthy successor to Kumunksh but also a strategic solution for the upbringing of the royal heir, Vedauni. Vedauni, as the scion of Avak, deserves an upbringing that benefits this esteemed lineage. My suggestion, which bears both practicality and wisdom, is to send him where my journey to understanding the intricacies of our world began – the formidable Grindhal mountains."
A subtle gasp swept through the court, but Rikshit continued, his voice unwavering. "I propose that Vedauni, under the guidance of the esteemed teachers in Grindhal, learns not just the art of war but gains a profound understanding of our history, culture, and the challenges that shape our empire. Grindhal, with its rich experiences, will forge him into a leader who not only commands armies but comprehends the essence of Avak from its very roots."
He turned to Vedauni, his expression earnest. "Your Highness, this is not just about preparing for battle; it is about crafting a leader who will embody the spirit of Avak. Grindhal's harsh terrain and uncompromising teachings will moued Vedauni into a ruler who understands the intricacies of every challenge our empire faces."
Rikshit then looked back at the king, his eyes conveying sincerity. "Your Majesty, sending Vedauni to Grindhal is not just a tactical decision; it is a choice that will ensure he becomes a sovereign who leads with both strength and wisdom, capable of steering Avak through the turbulent waters of time."
The court, swayed by Rikshit's persuasive rhetoric, began to nod in agreement. The notion of Vedauni following in Rikshit's footsteps to Grindhal seemed to resonate with a sense of tradition and practicality. Little did they perceive the subtle layers of manipulation woven into Rikshit's seemingly sagacious proposal.
The king manipulated the word of Rikshit and so did the court Rikshit said with a smile “So, shall we vote for you majesty?” The king accepting Rikshit rose up and so did the entire fleet of ministers said “Ministers, People and esteemed delegates of various townships and villages. Today I Baidyanth Avak the emperor of the Avak Empire announce Rikshit Shaktrik! The Son of Gringhal Shaktrik as the Minister of War without voting. My decision can not be overridden by anyone, to or will have ever existed, present or future.”
Rikshit smiled looking at his masterstroke of a speech. The entire assembly started to clap and the Royal Priest immediately announced the date of the coronation, The final day of the month Krishthind, which was in 2 days. Overjoyed Rikshit ran and fell in the King’s feet and gave an oath, that he shall never use his power for personal gain. The poor king little did he know that he is changing the future and present of not just a few years but centuries to come.
Days passed and finally, the date came. Rikshit came in new clothes, shining and glimmering. The entire city of Himkhint was decorated with flowers, The man came and sat in front of an Idol, the Idol of Eyikrata, the God of creation and who created the entire world.
The rituals began and mantras started to fill the silence, alongside horns, flutes and drums.
Sakbyi Ban Kaayeh
Kak Kai Kyi Kan
Sakbyi Ban Krinkh
Vyidaavak Vinkho
Sakyi Ban Nyankrikha
Aikkabyibaa
Bibaayeh Lintrunk
The entire castle was filled with many mantras like these, even the servants of the gods living up south in the Kingdom of Gods were invited, as the rituals were finished Rikshit rose his face covered with turmeric, was washed, his entire body was washed, he was given new clothes by the king and asked to change, Rikshit changed into the new Red colored Rimankh made up of royal fabrics and had a shine, with this he was given a lot of ornaments and such.
The man’s internal monologue whispered “Now Avak Forever Changes” These words echoed louder than a scream in Rikshit’s head as he walked on the red carpet behind the King.
The king sat on the royal throne made of gold and allowed Rikshit to be seated after everyone else as a ritual.
One by one all the 23 ministers sat and Rikshit, looking filled with ego sat on the chair where Kumunksh used to sit once.
This moment. I, History, change forever.

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TLDR: What if the Engineers were just a faction of their race that stumbled upon the derelict on LV-426 and tried to copy the tech of the Space Jockeys that had died out aeons before them, rose to power because of the biomechanical technology, became religious, trying to recreate the xenomorph, and in the process destroyed themselves before they could wipe out humanity?

Bare with me, this might be long-winded. I make many references here that might not be known to people unfamiliar with the Alien RPG, so sorry if it is obscure. It is full of spoilers for Alien, Prometheus, Covenant, the Alien RPG and many others, hence the Spoiler tag.

Background

So, I am running the Alien RPG Frontier War campaign from the Colonial Marines Operation Manual. However, I've always had an issue with Alien canon, being from the camp that both enjoyed the Dark Horse comics and considered anything after Aliens to be... a cryo-sleep nightmare. Most of my players agree with this perspective, and we agreed we would establish what would be canon in our game, and I basically said that Alien³ doesn't happen. We also kind of initially settled on making only Alien, Alien: Isolation and Aliens the only canon in our game, but I always planned to fish for 'expanded universe' content like Disney mining Legacy Star Wars for ideas.
Initially, things started very well! I wrote an introductory scenario for our campaign which immediately followed the events of Aliens, with our heroic marines boarding the USS Sulaco as it rapidly decelerated towards Anchorpoint Station, picking up plot hooks from the William Gibson script for Alien 3 (the graphic novel version). The UPP got some queen DNA samples off of Bishop's torso, but otherwise the marines diverted the ship before it could pull into Anchorpoint and piloted it back to Ariarcus.
Consequently, Newt, Hicks, Bishop and Ripley all survived, and then we move on towards the main content of the campaign (intending to integrate Destroyer of Worlds, a cinematic scenario, partway through the campaign).
This has created many complications for me as a Game MU/TH/UR, as most of the Frontier War campaign focuses centres around elements tied to the Engineers and the black goo in addition to XX121 xenomorphs. After initially rejecting Prometheus and Covenant in our canon, I had an idea to re-integrate them, even if there are still one or two plot holes that bother me.
I have to admit, while I mostly enjoyed Prometheus (aside from the absolutely inept crew), there are a few plot points that annoyed me, like the Engineers being humanoid giants that supposedly piloted the Derelict, that we never see a XX121 xenomorph, and how LV-223 is supposedly the next moon over from LV-426 in the same planetary system.
The Engineers bothered me in particular, for the following reasons:

• Appearance and Origins: Human giants in biomechanical suits takes away the mystique and alienness of the Space Jockey.
• Ship Differences: The ships shown in Prometheus feel a little more mechanical in the film compared to the Derelict.
• Overreacting Violently: The Engineers being violent towards humanity with the intention of wiping them out seemed entirely over the top for an interstellar species who likely seeded many worlds (including Arcturus, according to the Alien RPG Core Rulebook). Even if you put into consideration the deleted script beat from Prometheus that implies that they were going to wipe out humanity basically for killing Jesus, this seems incredibly fanatical. Oh! Humans are too violent, let's teach them by wiping them out!
• Problematic Size: The Engineers as portrayed in Prometheus are half the size of the Space Jockey, who was clearly biomechanically integrated into the ship. Furthermore Dallas mentions the remains being fossilised, a process that takes far longer than 2000 years (10,000 plus according to a quick google), which is the approximate time at which the disaster on LV-223 would have taken place, at least according to earlier versions of the Prometheus script.
• Location and Access: LV-223 is just the next moon over from LV-426. Why would the Prometheus not detect the signal? Why did the Engineers not have actual xenomorph eggs if they clearly knew about the ship in some way since their entire tech seemed based off of it? Why would the Space Jockey put out a warning if they created the xenomorphs? Could they not have asked for help from the colony literally just the next moon over?

There are other points I am sure that are not presently coming to mind, but today I fleshed out what I am doing with my campaign regarding the Engineers and Space Jockey, and I realised that I've found a way for Prometheus (and to a lesser extent Covenant) into my head canon in such a way that the films no longer offend my love of Alien, by far my favourite film.

Hypothesis

I've dug around in the various non-canon lore from before Prometheus as well as the semi-canon lore of the Alien RPG, and this is what I have come up with:
The Engineers and Space Jockeys are two distinct and separate species, and in fact, the Engineers are just a faction of their species that rose to dominance over their kind. The xenomorphs are either natural or created, but far, far older than the Engineers (and no, David did not create the xenomorphs, he was trying to recreate them), and possibly even the Space Jockeys.
The Engineers
The Engineers are actually a faction of a species called Ossians (referenced as possible Engineer name in the Alien RPG Core Rulebook, p.284), a race of humanoid giants who seeded many worlds with life, possibly even Earth (it is implied, but is it ever actually stated that the sacrificial Engineer is on Earth). I am going to refer to the species as Ossians, and the Engineers as a faction of that species.
At some point in their history after becoming an interstellar species, a group of Ossians arrived in Zeta Reticuli system and followed the transmission of the derelict on LV-426 (which had been there for millions of years). Predictably, this led to the retrieval of an egg and an infestation, and while the xenomorph outbreak was prevented from spreading, some kind of account of what was encountered survived. The world was probably considered off-limits at the time. There could be some other explanation, but the key point is that after first encountering the derelict, the Ossians should leave it undisturbed to later be found by the Nostromo in Alien.
However, the Ossians recovered enough information from the encounter to attempt to reverse engineer and emulate the biomechanical technology of the derelict ship and its pilot (explaining why the ships and suits in Prometheus look strikingly similar but feel a bit off). The ensuing breakthroughs were disruptive to Ossian society, and the Engineers rose to power due to the adoptions of these breakthroughs and in turn were in a position to influence the direction of Ossian society.
Assuming the Space Jockeys had died out long ago, the Engineers styled themselves as their heirs and successors, and probably considered the pilot species to be the progenitors of the xenomorph, the perfect organism. They may not have actually known exactly what the Xenomorph was, working with limited data. The Engineers built approximations of Space Jockey vessels and modelled their biosuits after the assumed appearance.
Ossian civilization became powerful under Engineer influence and for a time maybe were idealistic creators, becoming bio-engineers, developing the black goo in order to augment the evolutionary process to vastly accelerated levels. Initially they seeded primordial worlds with this technology, along the way creating many subspecies in their own image, such as humankind and Arcturians (first mentioned in Aliens, in the Alien RPG they are considered humans with translucent skin and black eyes and a Mesoamerican-like culture and reverence for "Star Teachers").
Note: Even if they used the black goo to jump start life on Earth, they must have more directly created us if we share so much DNA in common. Also if they did use the black goo, the version uncovered in the ampules might have been a weaponised version.
However, the Engineers, or groups within the Engineer faction, grew ever more fanatical, and they came to worship the xenomorph species (or their concept of it), much as the xenomorph worshiping cults that have featured in many of the Alien novels and comic books. They might have led with a theocracy which led to a dark age where the Engineers were masters of technology, but the Ossians devolved into a primitive state, with the Engineers visiting Ossian worlds to deliver edicts and laws or what not, one explanation for why the Engineers on Planet 4 in Covenant were primitives.
They began to wage war amongst themselves, bringing their species to the edge of extinction. Bioweapons labs were set up on LV-223 where the black goo was weaponised, although this ultimately led to disaster before their contents could be unleashed upon Earth and other Ossian colonies (like the one on the Engineer Planet in Covenant).
With the Engineer factions either hibernating or destroyed, Ossian cultures devolved into more primitive ways of life (if they were not already as above), many of them themselves losing knowledge of their own past as they eschewed Engineer ways. The Engineer that is revived in Prometheus belongs to this extreme faction, which might explain his extreme violence and intent to unleash the black goo on earth.

The Space Jockey

The Space Jockey is from an alien species I am referring to as the Mala'kak (also mentioned referenced as an alternative Engineer name, specifically found the decoded contents of the warning transmission from the derelict on LV-426, Alien RPG Core Rulebook, p.284). I imagine the Mala'kak as benign space explorers hailing from a part of the galaxy far beyond the Frontier. The Mala’kak had mastered biomechanical technology, fusing flesh and machine together, and the Space Jockey itself and the ship were one and the same entity in a sense (although there might have also been a crew).
It is unknown if the Mala’kak are an extant species but live so far away as not to have otherwise been encountered, or if they became extinct aeons ago. However, for unknown reasons, maybe 10 million years ago, the Derelict crash landed (at least partially) atop an ancient temple with strikingly similar structure to Mala’kak biomechanical ships, although the origin is unknown.
Somehow, the pilot (or a crew we don't know about) activated an egg in stasis and was infected. What became of its alien offspring is unknown, but it either it or perhaps other crew aboard the derelict managed to send out the warning transmission for others to stay away.

Final Thoughts

I like this version because it means that Prometheus and Alien can coexist without diminishing the uniqueness and mystique of the Space Jockey. I've used statements made by the Alien creators about the derelict being above a temple complex in early drafts of the script to make sense of the size discrepancy. Either the derelict is much larger underground (meaning the Engineers copied just the above ground part of the design), or the egg chamber is a separate location.
Does it makes sense to you? What do you think? Alien species are often presented as societal monoliths, but here on Earth we have so many different faiths and nations with differing ideologies and viewpoints, it stands to reason that it should be the same for any other alien culture unless they are living in some sort of dystopia. I'm keen to discuss.

The Holy Spirit
Status: Kindle only
My first “official” book. I was in a dark place when I wrote this. Oh, and I tried to keep things as biblically accurate as possible. And as respectful to the Christian faith as possible. The story itself is incredible! It is a retelling of the rebellion in Heaven. I felt the reasons why the fallen angels rebelled have been kind of glossed over. It’s more than a story about wickedness. It’s a story about love and faith.
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Prodigy Vampire
Status: Discontinued.
I “remastered” this novel and posted it here on Reddit. Whenever I think about this story, I can’t help but feel a sense of nostalgia. Oh, and I used a ton of ideas from this novel to create the “Angel Hunters Series.” This is basically the unofficial prequal.
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Angel Hunters: Part 1: Demon Order
Status: Available
I wrote this as a rough draft and could not get it published to save my soul. Sadly, the manuscript sat on my shelf for a while, collecting dust, as I spiraled into depression. When I finally came out of my malaise, I went back and combined the idea of fallen angels & vampires, tweaked a bunch of stuff, and viola.
Note: “Chapter 6” is available as a free sample.
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Angel Hunters: Part 2: The Ritual
Status: Available
Part 2 to the Angel Hunters Series.
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Jake Winters: Part 1: Blood Gang
Status: Available
This is a two-part prequel that basically explains how he became a vampire. All the usual suspects are here, but the story primarily focuses on him and his crazy lifestyle. Note: The short story series “The Revenant” closely mirrors Jake’s saga. Since Terrance Walker used to work closely with his criminal organization as a middleman before he was set up.
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Jake Winters: Part 2: Resurrection
Status: Available
Part 2 of the prequel.
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Illumination
Status: Not released yet.
I would consider this book to be a lighthearted affair with no major plot developments. Except for the fact that the experience was a bit terrifying. I swear on the bible bad stuff kept happening to me every time I reached “Chapter 4: Dinner Party.” The chapter in question revolves around narrating this dark Ritual of Fortune William & Marie partook in.
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Forbidden
Status: TBA
Something I’ve always wanted to write. A romance prequel explaining how William and Marie met and how they fell in love. There will be all the hallmarks of darkness and wickedness involved, but with a focus on their tumultuous relationship.
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The Holy Spirit: Part 2
Status: unknown
Only God knows. I have the general idea done, but I can’t lie, just thinking about writing this monster works up my anxiety. The toll the first one took on my mental was savage. And what’s worse, this one will delve deeper into the mind of Lyrael the Devil. The only “bad guy” who scares me. Someone who is the true definition of evil. His views on humanity strike a psychological blow for me because they open a sort of “philosophical” Pandora’s box into hell.
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Pricing
Think of it more as a donation. Could my books be more polished? Yes. Will there be some punctual and grammatical concerns? Yes. Are they strangely beautiful but evil? Idk. But what I do know is that we are nothing without our dreams. As always, thank you for the amazing support! PS Make sure you follow your dreams no matter how impossible they seem.
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Sincerely,
Ringo Cross

Yes Let's be completely honest, Kamachi made a huge mistake by giving too much screen time to 《Misaka》 because in the end she unnecessarily wasted the potential of 90 of the characters in the plot !
In NT 3 I can understand that the emphasis is on the fact that she is pitifully weak despite the fact that she was glorified as being the level which was classified as being the number 3 of the 《 Academic City 》, and that she is powerless against low-level professional mages like Cinderella and Soronia who made her understand that there is a huge difference between inexperienced beginners that she had to fight at the (city academic) and the real world where there are professional mercenaries who are sometimes espers or seasoned mages who are specialized not only in their mastery of their supernatural power, but who are also specialized in the combat sports that they requires developing physical altitude.
For example we had the confirmation thanks or NT and the OT that 90% of the magical cabal or organizations like the seal of the Roman church who train their mage who is sent to the battlefield, almost all of us followed military training and this means that they can easily beat ordinary people who clearly do not know how to defend themselves because they cannot beat experienced fighters. We have a character like tsuchimikado who is a first-rate mage who specializes in 1 vs 1 fights and has easily defeated several street fighters like enraged demonstrators in France ! Mikoto paid the price, at the beginning it was interesting to see that she questioned herself because she had become so useless that he insisted on becoming more powerful. but in 《NT 6》 she did the same thing to us again by doing the same thing again with her confrontation with Brunhild but except that at that moment it worked cue it fit with the plot, even if it was demolish the face quite easily.
But NT 8 was too much, she wanted to go to Tokyo with index and birdway to support Touma despite the fact that she would have been of no use, apart from having given her usual dialogue with her useless railgun which didn't even have scratched Freya's magical pets ! In the end it was Index who was much more useful than her while she had less screen time than her who is very annoying.
Index and Touma we were much more in symbiosis than with Misaka during a large part of the NT, He on top of that she appeared too much in the light Romen while characters that we clearly cannot see cannot even stand out while They received better story development than Misaka in the plot ! For example, secondary characters like Stiyl or even Carissa and Oriana as well as central characters of the novel like Hamazura or Mugino and Kazakiri, especially Kakine who was forcibly kidnapped by Othinus could have played a better role in bringing down the gremlin at that moment- there if we do not take into account othinus.
But no instead we had Misaka who wasted a lot of screen time because of her lack of use in the scene ! and in 10 she didn't fix that situation she gave us the same situation as in Ot 3 where she wanted to attack Touma when the poor guy had just been chased by an army of professional killers !
Kamachi had to ruin the NT novel by emphasizing Misaka too much, she was clearly the black point of the 《New Testament》 for sure, fortunately he had introduced characters who had a remarkable evolution in the plot like (Othinus, thor, Olleru, Nigtheye, Kihara kagun, kihara Yuitsu with Noukan, Mina mather, conronzon, samuel mather that he gave a huge impact in the NT positive in the plot ! I hope for the future Kamachi focused more on the development of certain characters that we didn't have time to shine and that have great potential.
She has nothing better to do with electrocuting Touma when he was about to die shit that moment, it's that he made it very detestable since she shows us that she is much more immature than the majority of the characters in the novel. Luckily for her, Touma didn't hit her because she would have ended up in a hospital ! And in NT 13 she literally ruined the appearance time of Aleister and Fiamma which was reduced unnecessarily when he faced the 《high priest》! And I won't even talk about 《NT 15》 where she only served as a punching bag for Salome and Kihara Yu until 《NT17》!
Oh what are Kamachi thinking by making Misaka appear so much except that she unnecessarily wastes the screen time of many characters... Because of that unpleasant personality and her blatant lack of development in the plot.

Hili so i've never posted on here or anything but i'm currently in the process of writing a novel and i decided to be bold and make one of the main character's russian And the sentence is "How about you go and fuck yourself?" (don'ttttt even ask-)
But I'm a little conflicted on whether I should use the cyrillic alphabet or the romanized version?:
A: "Как насчет того, чтобы пойти и трахнуть себя?"
or
B: "Kak naschet togo, chtoby poyti i trakhnut sebya?"
Also so sorry if the russian is wrong, i've been trying to work it through some different translators to make it as accurate as possible so tips are appreciated ☺️
edit: The person their conversing with ends up saying something along the lines of “no I will not go fuck myself” in english because the woman wasn’t aware the person could understand her
So I was going to make sure the meaning was implied so there wouldn’t be a translation issue, I just didn’t know the proper way to write it. Should’ve made that known the first time, sorry!

https://c4ss.org/content/55953
C4SS Mutual Exchange Symposium
Anarchism and Egoism: The Only Authority Is Yourself
Anarchism and egoism are, ironically, kindred spirits. Both share roots in 19th century radical philosophic and political thought — though the ideas and practices associated with each surely predate their first explicit articulations. Both have been considered, at best, taboo and, at worst, dangerous. Both have been misunderstood, but also mischaracterized. Both ultimately found refuge during the 20th and 21st centuries within broader libertarian undercurrents, where their adherents were fractured and ideas were sharpened. Most importantly, both consider themselves on the side of life and freedom. The essays compiled here explore the complex relationship between these two traditions.
Some might take anarchism and egoism to be polar opposites. Anarchists are united in their opposition to all forms of interpersonal domination, whether that domination takes the form of statism, capitalism, cisheteropatriachy, racism, ableism, or ageism. Anarchism is a principled commitment to dignity and autonomy for all. How can such a commitment to universalism be reconciled with egoism, a term derived from the French égoïsme meaning “to think of oneself”? Aren’t “thinking of oneself” and “thinking of everyone” opposites? This Mutual Exchange Symposium is a collective effort aimed at exploring these and related tensions.
Egoists have, fittingly, defended their emphasis on the self in a variety of ways. The egoist tradition most strongly associated with anarchism is, in the tradition of Max Stirner (Johann Kaspar Schmidt’s pseudonym), nihilistic. Benjamin Tucker, founder and editor of the most prominent 19th century anarchist periodical Liberty, translated Stirner’s The Unique and Its Property (sometimes translated as The Ego and Its Own) from German to English and incorporated Stirner’s egoism into his own Proudhon-influenced individualist anarchism. This ideological shift was happily embraced by some Liberty authors, such as Tak Kak (James L. Walker’s pseudonym), but fervently rejected by others, particularly those more inclined towards the ideas of human nature and human rights, such as Gertrude B. Kelley.
Stirner rejected morality as yet another archaic tool of control to be abandoned along with statism, capitalism, nationalism, slavery, patriarchy, religion, and all forms of collectivism, which elevate illusory abstractions above the concrete individual. To submit oneself to any kind of externally imposed restraint is to betray oneself. Whether the self is to be discovered or created, it is, most of all, to be upheld. Morals, states, bosses, nations, races, genders, and gods are to be thought of like Casper the Ghost, as mere “spooks.” Nihilist egoists ground anarchism, not in pretenses to nature or justice, but in their simple and straightforward commitment to the inviolability of the individual, to the sacredness of the self, to the ego and its own.
Another strand of egoism is ethical egoism — though neither strand much likes to grant the legitimacy of the “egoist” title to the other. Ethical egoism doesn’t view morality as an externally imposed restraint, but as a necessary component of a flourishing life. On this view, morality (including the demands of justice) is considered internal to one’s flourishing; facts about morality ultimately relate back to facts about flourishing. Morality straightforwardly emerges from one’s life, relationships, and projects. The most popular proponent of this view is Ayn Rand, who was herself a fervent critic of anarchism, but who influenced many thinkers that took her radical individualism in a decidedly anarchist direction, such as Murray N. Rothbard, Jeff Riggenbach, Roy A. Childs, and Roderick T. Long.
Rand formulated a colorful combination of Ancient Greek virtue ethics, proto-existentialist (and sometimes Stirner-reminiscent) Nietzscheanism, and classical liberal individualism. By grounding her egoism in Aristotelian ideas about human flourishing, Rand argued living well is not a project independent of, let alone threatened by, living morally. Part of living a good life is being a virtuous person, acting in accordance with justice, and respecting the rights of others. Where Stirner’s nihilist egoism has lived on as an undercurrent of individualist anarchism more broadly, the 20th century U.S. libertarians that drew on the individualist anarchists of old largely preferred the natural law of Lysander Spooner to the nihilism of Benjamin Tucker. Rand offered the natural law and anti-nihilism of the former, but without sacrificing the egoism of the latter.
Despite their historical affinity, anarchism and egoism also share many areas of tension. These questions are meant to help spur inquiry into those areas for the conversation that follows.

• Is the universalism of anarchism reconcilable with the individualism of egoism?
• Does egoism provide firmer grounding for anarchism than alternative theories that emphasize consequences or duties?
• How is egoism related to different branches of anarchism, e.g. market anarchism, social anarchism, primitivism, transhumanism, etc.?
• Are the multiple branches of egoism as disparate as they are sometimes treated?
• Should egoists abandon notions of human nature and objective morality or embrace them?
• How should egoists relate to collective identities such as race, gender, sexuality, class, religion, nationality, and/or species (possessed by themselves and/or others) when those categories are treated as significant by nearly everyone? Can egoists acknowledge “spooks” without entrenching them?
• Is egoism compatible with historical anarchist praxis such as mutual aid and community organizing?
• What does egoism have to say about intersectional approaches in which oppression is understood as mutually interlocking phenomena, like the bars of a birdcage?
• Does egoism ignore the insights offered by the dialectical methodology usually associated with Hegel and Marx? Or are John Welsh and Chris Matthew Sciabarra (who respectively interpret Stirner and Rand through dialectical lenses) on to something?
• Can egoism survive Marxist critiques that say true liberation requires some kind of collective consciousness and solidarity?
• Can egoism survive postmodern critiques that say the “individual” and the “self” are constructs as illusory as the collective abstractions egoists oppose?
• What can egoism offer us concerning the issues of modernity, such as alienation, environmental destruction, secularism, neoliberalism, and resurgent fascism?
• Is egoism harmful in the face of collective action problems and negative externalities such as those associated with climate change?

I hope this Mutual Exchange provides a space for anarchists and egoists to collaboratively reflect on these tensions and maybe even stumble onto some solutions together.
Egoism, like anarchism, is a much richer tradition of thought than it’s often given credit for. While historically unconventional and unpopular, egoism offers a variety of novel, thought-provoking, and sometimes even beautiful, insights into the human condition. After all, every insight has its origins in the mind of some individual and every philosophical problem is related in some way to the individual, whether it concerns a society which consists in individuals or a cosmos which spawns them. If “egoism” literally means “to think of oneself,” then surely we are all egoists at least some of the time. Maybe we should confront that ego every now and then. There might be more there than we realize.
Background Readings:
The Unique and Its Property – Max Stirner
Stirner’s Critics – Max Stirner
The Philosophy of Egoism – James L. Walker
Just and Moral – Dora Marsden
Why We Are Moral – Dora Marsden
Relation of the State to the Individual – Benjamin Tucker
The Revolt of The Unique – Renzo Novatore
Toward the Creative Nothing – Renzo Novatore
My Anarchism – Sidney Parker
Anarchism versus Socialism – Sidney Parker
Morality vs. Egoism – Robert LeFevre and Sidney E. Parker
Politics of the Ego: Stirner’s Critique of Liberalism – Saul Newman
The Relevance of Max Stirner to Anarcho-Communists – Matty Thomas
Egoist Agorism – Vikky Storm
The Right To Be Greedy – For Ourselves
The Buddha and Max Stirner – David D’Amato
James L. Walker, Philosopher of Egoism – David D’Amato
Sidney Parker, Egoist: Against All Systems – David D’Amato
Dora Marsden, Free Woman – David D’Amato
Avowals of Selfhood: Review of Egoism – David D’Amato
Egoism In Rand and Stirner – David D’Amato
Galt’s Speech – Ayn Rand
The Objectivist Ethics – Ayn Rand
Objectivism and the State – Roy A. Childs Jr.
An Objectivist Case For Libertarianism – Neera Badhwar
Ayn Rand’s Contribution to Philosophy – Neera Badhwar
Virtues, Vices, and Egoism – Neera Badhwar
The Winnowing of Ayn Rand – Roderick T. Long
Egoism and Anarchy – Roderick T. Long

EDIT: I didnt get to reply to your comments below kahapon kc busy preparing for new NYE but THANK YOU for your insights about my questions. Isasama ko yung suggestions nyo sa paggawa ko ng plan for 2022. I will continue tracking my expenses, i will start exploring stocks (actually matagal ko ng gusto bumili ng stock sa SPNEC, ICT and JCT through COL Financial). Pagdating naman sa house hunting, iniisip ko baka mas ok tumingin ng mga laguna or cavite area kc baka may mga mura doon na malapit sa employment hubs kc hindi naman na totally probinsya doon. Salamat din sa nagshare nung info about VA, I might try this next yr kahit part time and I also started reading na din about copywriting sa Coursera, etc. 🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳
I've been lurking a lot in this subreddit and watching videos of Vince Rapisura on YT and I realized that my 58k might be small para makaipon ako to buy a house na ipaparent and save for retirement. I live sa South and the houses in my area are 15M pataas. Matagal ko ng gusto bumili ng bahay para iparent kc good source of extra income sya para makaipon for retirement and para minsan may pangluho for travel pero nalulula talaga ako sa prices.
Matipid naman po ako and I've been tracking my expenses for 3 yrs na which is very helpful pero I feel like I need an extra source of income talaga. I think dapat I should be earning atleast 80k to 100k sa edad ko ngayon and I am looking for ways to increase my income or have my money work for me.
QUESTION: I am reading about copywriting, being a virtual assistant and web design and maybe sell food. Pero hindi ko alam if realistic ba kc I work night shift....pero willing to try naman ako HAHAHAH. Is copywriting and being a VA profitable at worth it ba ang pagod sa income?
I tried selling baked goods pero napapansin ko binabarat ako ng mga neighbors and kamaganak kc ube cheese pandesal, food for the gods, etc. is NOT a novel item but I get consistent feedback na masarap naman pero parang they are not willing to spend. What do I need to learn to gain confidence to sell my products sa mga hindi kamaganak? I know how to do costing pero hindi ako masocial media. Should I just pay someone to take pics of my product and manage my social media platform? For those who started their business nitong pandemic, how did you do it?
About me: 32 F, single, living with parents, currently employed at a multi private company with hmo, 58k monthly salary, 14k monthly expenses for utilities, 4k per month paying insurance
CURRENT Savings: 500k emergency fund, 500k for house i'm planning to buy para iparent
CURRENT Investments: 1M Pagibig MP2 (for retirement), 40k Pagibig MP2 (for travel) 40k Pagibig MP2, 10k SEDPI Joint venture investment, 40k SEDPI COOP investment
BIGGEST mga gastos of my life since I started working in 2010: paid half of SUV when we moved here kc malayo yung subdivision namin so mahirap pag emergency like when my mom couldnt walk for sometime, 90k for MBA i didnt finished kc I wasnt interested talaga, international travel to 3 countries @50k each, batanes travel @30k, 7 other domestic travels @15k each

Hi All!
I'm very new to this "typing out my thoughts for internet strangers to read" thing, so please pardon the errors in formatting I'm about to inflict upon you. Here goes nothing!
​
Brewing Method:
Started with a 250ml bottle of Kombucha (couldn’t even find GT’s and had to settle for an expensive local brand). Added 500ml of sweet tea (recipe below). Waited a week or so. Shifted to a 5 litre continuous brew jar with a spigot. Added a litre of sweet tea. Waited a week. Added another litre of sweet tea. By now everything looked and smelled exactly like kombucha sans the pellicle (which was still comprised of a bunch of tiny jellyfish floating on the surface. I have a couple ideas why it didn’t form a professional pellicle, and I’ll note these down below in case they help someone.).
Continuous Brewing Process:
1F: 2 days (I trust that people on here already know basic brewing good-practices like hygiene, no direct sunlight, keeping away vinegar flies, stirring their brew before bottling, loving their neighbors, so on and so forth.) After 2 days, remove about a litre of kombucha and move into 2F. Add back a litre of sweet tea for 1F (2 days). This way I always leave 4 litres of starter liquid in the 5 litre jar and, since I live in the desert (albeit with air conditioning), 2 days is a sufficient amount of time for the brew to re-ferment. 2F: 2 days at room temperature and then refrigerate.
U-No-Pellicle:
Possible Reason 1: The kombucha I used as a starter is brewed using agave nectar as opposed to cane sugar. I read somewhere that the pellicle is composed of cellulose that grows with the help of the gluconacetobacter which occurs naturally on the cane plant. So, I started feeding my brew with lumps of jaggery (raw cane sugar). This helped greatly with jellyfish-formation.
Possible Reason 2: This is a stupid one. My CB jar lives on a stand with spindly metal legs. I’m afraid that everytime my brew started to form a congruous pellicle, the stand picked up on stray vibrations in the area (probably from me clomping about) and just shook the poor dear apart.
Sweet Tea Recipe: 1 litre boiled (and cooled) tap water + 60 ml sugar + 2 black tea bags
2F Favorites So Far:
Lazy Person Recipes:
(which does not mean the other recipes are hi-fi sophisticated beasts. By definition, any recipe put together by me MUST be a lazy person recipe. If you lose more than a single mg of fat off that beautiful, bounteous ass making any of these recipes, you write to me and I will mail you that single mg of fat. Anyway what was I writing about?)
900 ml Kombucha + Good-sized hunk of pounded fresh ginger (or ginger bug) + 1 pinch of black pepper + 1 pinch of turmeric + 1 tsp of jaggery
I play around with pinches of this-and-that spice all the time, and past successes have included red chilli powder, cumin powder, and coriander powder. Jaggery gives things a nice caramel flavor, so I use it a lot.
I’ll also throw in whatever is in the kitchen or the garden as the whim strikes me. This includes but is not limited to: a couple of dates / a bunch of mint sprigs / a mango pit (after I ate the mango) / a handful of mixed berries / a bit of basil. They all worked well to some degree or the other.
The Fizziest Ones:
For obvious reasons, all my ultra-carbonated experiments have included ginger bits from my ginger bug. The other ingredients that, in my case, have led to the best fizz are pineapple juice (makes sense since pineapples are used to make tepache) and raw turmeric root (but I’m not in love with the flavor of raw turmeric, so I’m sticking with ginger and pineapple juice for now).
Basic Pineapple-Ginger Fizzy:
700 ml Kombucha + 200 ml Pineapple Juice + Hunka-chunka ginger bug (can use fresh if no bug)
Pineapple-Turmeric Fizzy:
700 ml Kombucha + 200 ml Pineapple Juice + 1-inch piece of turmeric root chopped finely + 3 Black Peppercorns (to make the turmeric more bioavailable and also because I feel like the pepper tones down the acetic acid and makes the brew taste sweeter)
Pineapple-Ginger-Turmeric Fizzy:
I’m not typing this one out. Please extrapolate by yourselves. I will note that I often reuse the ginger bits from previous brews, and feel like they make the 2F quicker and fizzier.
Other Awesome Ones:
Accidental GT’s Gingerade Copycat:
400 ml ginger bug liquid + 500 ml Kombucha + 1 tsp sugar / sweetener of choice
Bonus Orange-Ginger Beer Recipe:
200 ml good quality orange juice (or home-squeezed if you are so inclined) + 700 ml ginger bug liquid. Pop in the fridge for 3 days. So good!
Bonus Bonus Hard Cranberry-Cocoa Ginger Beer:
Started out boiling 200g of dried cranberries (they were taking up space in the closet) + 100 ml jaggery + 20ish gms of cocoa powder + 2 cloves + 2 black peppercorns + 1 stick of cassia bark (or cinnamon) + 2 tsp nutmeg (the grand old Malcolm X tea) + 1/2 tsp coriander seeds + 1/2 tsp caraway seeds + 3 large dates + enough tap water to bring the volume up to 3.5 litres. I let it boil for 20 min, then left it to cool.
Once the mix came to room temperature, I dumped it in a gallon jar with 500 ml of ginger bug liquid (I’ve read that ginger bugs can go as high as 17% abv given the right conditions). I then let it ferment anaerobically for 2 weeks, burping once every 2 days. At the end of the 2 weeks, I filtered out the used-up solids, and left the liquid to ferment another 3 days with 200 ml of mixed-berry juice to intensify the berry-ness.
After refrigerating and sampling, I realized I had accidentally created a pretty hard brew. I don’t really feel my old hankering for beer and vodka-sodas since I started drinking kombucha, so maybe I just got buzzed off of a 5-6% abv brew. Not sure, but it made for a pleasant evening playing the SNES…..
Other Points of Note:
I have a fermentation corner in my kitchen, and I must note that pretty much everything brews well and super-fast. Maybe they feed off of each other? Although I haven’t read about Kombucha containing lactobacillus….
Current ferments include:
Kombucha (duh)
Ginger bug
Turmeric bug (wasn’t one of my favorites; I tried to convert it into a ginger-turmeric bug, but then it just smelled like vegetable curry)
Beetroot Kvass
Wholegrain Bread Kvass
Carrot Kanji
Beetroot Kanji (my favorite lacto-fermented drink; just beetroots, boiled water, non-iodised salt, and mustard powder left to stew in the sun for 7-ish days)
Tepache (good but not worth the effort of buying and skinning an organic pineapple)
​
Just realized I accidentally typed out an entire novel. Advance apologies to all the poor saps who read all the way through. Hope I put down something that will be of some help to some fellow bit of stardust somewhere.
​
While I have you here, was wondering whether anyone ever tried one of these methods and developed their own “wild” kombucha culture:
https://groups.google.com/g/kefir-kombucha/c/nS-PnnlHHm4
​
https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=ru&u=https://pro-chay.ru/kak-vyirastit-chaynyiy-grib-s-nulya-doma/&prev=search&pto=aue
​
https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=ru&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fjlady.ru%2Fhealth%2Fmy-health%2Fkak-vyrastit-chajnyj-grib-s-nulya.html&prev=search

^{I sure hope I titled the post usefully}
Language and its research is an amazing tool that allows us understand a lot about a culture that speaks it. For example, Khajiit's known "May your roads lead to warm sands" already tells us about the homeland of the said race (which is indeed a desert), their views on good things (warm sands being a good destination wished upon you) and their very nature (khajiit literally being translated to desert-walker). But sheer scale of TES world makes it harder for developers to describe every little detail like this, so it is indeed a canvas for our imagination.Due to limits of our knowledge on everyday life of Mer, I'd like to take a liberty and propose you a pair of Russian epithets that, in my humble opinion, would blend into named cultures seamlessly.
Two epithets I'm talking about are "Со́кол я́сный" and "Свет оче́й (мои́х)", both commonly used in folklore and poetry as terms of endearment.
Little note - in Russian adjectives can be used both before and after the noun it describes, meaning mostly doesn't change so don't mind the changes of word order.
"Со́кол я́сный" (transcription: [sˈokəlˈæsnᵻj], transliteration: sokol yasniy) literally translates to "Clear falcon" or "Bright falcon", but for reasons explained later I'll bring it down to "Fair falcon".
Word я́сный has multiple meanings¹. This way clear sky is ясное небо, bright moon is ясный месяц, logical mind is ясный ум. But the epithet "Ясный сокол" is used only as a term of endearmant addressing a man, and in folclore the most notable case of using of this epithet is addressed towards a very handsome young man (fairytale about the Phynnist the Falcon, *"Пёрышко Финниста Ясна сокола"*²). Therefore I believe using "Fair falcon" is allowed.
As I already said, "Fair falcon" and its forms like "Сокол / Falcon" and "Соко́лик / Little falcon" are used as a term of endearment addressed to men and, in some cases, horses (though it is considered obsolete in this regard). Examples being:
"Ты мой ясный сокол" - "You (are) my fair falcon", the most simple example of using this epithet.
"Приезжай ты к нам, соколик мой ясный, (..)" - "Come to us, my fair falcon", from Pushkin's novel Dubrovsky (Дубровский)³.
"(..) дай время мне // Задушить грусть, печаль выплакать, // На тебя, на ясна сокола… (..) " - "Give me time to strangle sadness, to cry out grief onto you, onto fair falcon" from Koltsov's poem Separation (Разлука).
I feel like an analogue to this epithet would blend in nicely into Mer cultures due to symbolic meaning and a certain fascination with Eagles specific to those nations. During my research I couldn't find information on possible counterparts of this epithet in other languages.
"Свет оче́й (мои́х)" (transcription: [svʲˈet ɐt͡ɕˈej mɐˈix], transliteration: svet ochey (moikh) ) - translates to "Light of (my) eyes".
Unlike "Fair falcon", "Light of my eyes" has its counterparts in other languages - Italian Luce dei miei occhi and Spanish Luz de mis ojos. Word "очи", plural to "око", comes from old Russian. Everyday word for eyes is "глаза", word "око/очи" on the other hand has gained a poetic tone to it, therefore its usage is kinda limited. For example, in Russian adaptation of Skyrim The Eye of Magnus was translated as "Око Магнуса"⁴.
"Light of eyes" is a bit tricky in its usage, because it can be used to describe someone's sight or just eyes. So, while searching for an example of using "Light of my eyes", I've seen examples like "Очей горящих" or "Burning eyes" in Lomonosov's work, "Полулукавый свет очей" or "Halfsly light of eyes" - in Tyutchev's and "Туман (..) // И омрачает свет очей" or "Fog darkens light of eyes" in already mentioned Koltsov's.
As term of endearment, I found an example of its using in Zhukovsky's poem Svetlana (Светлана): "Радость, свет моих очей, // Нет для нас разлуки." - "Joy, light of my eyes, // There's no separation for us."
Other forms of "Light of (my) eyes" include "(мой) Свет" or"(my) Light", "Светик" or "Little light", both used, for example, in Krylov's The Crow and The Fox.
Regarding this one, I feel like it can be applied not only to Mer cultures, but it is often used as counterpart to "Fair falcon" when looking for information for both metioned epithets, so it did stick to me. Those sources also claim that "Light of my eyes" is addressed only to men because Man is light of life for women while cases of actually using it state different thing so I would not recommend believing this idea. Second most popular idea on usage of both epithets claims "Fair falcon" addresses only men while "Light of my eyes" only women, but I couldn't find any proof to that in trustworthy sources.
What do you think? I'd be happy to hear your opinions on this! Maybe you too have some real life epithets that could blend nicely into different TES nations' culture?
Notes: There's also third epithet I believe could blend into TES societies well, that being "Душа (моя)" and its variation *"Душенька"*⁵, which translates to "(my) Soul" and "Little soul". It feels appropriate to believe that inhabitants of Tamriel could call their significant others "my soul" due to the importance of one's soul in TES universe, but I feel like it might have been already used ingame, so I left it out.
¹ - Here's a compilation of the word ясный meanings from different dictionaries and here's a list of different translations of it
² - I find simmilarity between names Phynnist and Phynaster amusing so if you are interested in learning more - here's a wiki page about this fairytale containing synopsis, here's text of it in English (though it's not literal translation and more of an adaptation, from the first look I notice a lot of additional dialogue), here's the text of it in Russian and here's a bit more on Phynnist's character.
³ - If for any reason you're interested in checking out sources of examples I mentioned, here they are: Pushkin's Дубровский, Koltsov's Разлука, Lomonosov's Ода... на взятие Хотина, Tyutchev's Как летней иногда порою, Koltsov's Осень, Zhukovsky's Светлана, [Krylov's Ворона и Лисица](https://онлайн-читать.рф/крылов-ворона-и-лисица/).
⁴ - Idk why but yeah Eye of Magnus is Око Магнуса)
⁵ - little offtopic note but Russian "little soul" is funny because "душенька" means good thing, like "little cute soul", while "душонка", which also means "little soul", means a bad thing, more like "petty soul".
TL;DR: Russian terms of endearment "Fair falcon" and "Light of my eyes" would blend nicely into our interpretation of Mer cultulers imo. Might also add "My soul" to the list but it might've been used already.
Edit: regarding 5th note, I got interested and went to search for mentions of "My soul" used in TES as a term of endearment. I started with searching in Russian sources to lighten the process. So far I found one and only one mention of it - in Russian version of Letter from a Vampire in Dawnguard. Here's the Russian text. So, logically, I went to check the original, hoping for an overlap. But nope, that's just an adaptation.

Light Measurement, LED Grow Light Systems, and Spectral Characteristics
last update: March 2021
main papers link page
SAG's Plant Lighting Guide main page
light meters and measurement

• Measuring Daily Light Integral in a Greenhouse-- Torres, Lopez
  
• Using a Simple Leaf Color Chart to Estimate Leaf and Canopy Chlorophyll a Content in Maize (Zeamays) -discussion on a low cost calibration standard.
  
• Maximum Spectral Luminous Efficacy of White Light-- Murphy 2013 -efficiency, efficacy, and how CRI and CCT plays a role
  
• Light Meter for Measuring Photosynthetically Active Radiation-- Kutschera, Lamb 2018
  
• Accuracy of quantum sensors measuring yield photon flux and photosynthetic photon flux-- Barnes et al 1993
  
• Sources of errors in measurements of PAR-- Ross, Sulev 1999
  
• Accurate PAR Measurement: Comparison of Eight Quantum Sensor Models
  
• Effects of radiation quality, intensity, and duration on photosynthesis and growth
  
• An easy estimate of the PPFD for a plant illuminated with white LEDs: 1000 lx = 15 μmol/s/m2-- Sharakshane ‎2018
  
• Design of Photosynthetically Active Radiation Sensor-- Dilip et al 2018
  
• Construction and Testing of an Inexpensive PAR Sensor-- Fielder, Comeau 2000
  
• Comparison of Quantum Sensors with Different Spectral Sensitivities
  
• Light Meter for Measuring Photosynthetically Active Radiation Arduino
  
• Development of Simple Band-Spectral Pyranometer and Quantum Meter Using Photovoltaic Cells and Bandpass Filters
  
• Instruments for the Measurement of Photosynthetically Active Radiation and Red, Far-Red and Blue Light
  
• A cheap quantum sensor using a gallium arsenide photodiode
  
• Photometric, Radiometric, and Quantum Light Units of Measure A Review of Procedures for Interconversion
  

LED grow lights and systems

• From physics to fixtures to food: current and potential LED efficacy
  
• LED Lighting Systems for Horticulture: Business Growth and Global Distribution PhD thesis
  
• Exploration on Using Light-Emitting Diode Spectra to Improve the Quality and Yield of Micro greens in Controlled Environments PhD thesis
  
• Influence of Light-Emitting Diodes (LEDs) on Light Sensing and Signaling Networks in Plants
  
• Light-Emitting Diodes for Horticulture
  
• Current status and recent achievements in the field of horticulture with the use of light-emitting diodes (LEDs) 2018
  
• Comparison and perspective of conventional and LED lighting for photobiology and industry applications
  
• A Numerical and Experimental Study of a Novel Heat Sink Design for Natural Convection Cooling of LED Grow Lights
  
• Design of a Scalable and Optimized LED Grow-light System Driven by a High Efficiency DC-DC Power Converter master thesis
  
• Polychromatic Supplemental Lighting from underneath Canopy Is More Effective to Enhance Tomato Plant Development by Improving Leaf Photosynthesis and Stomatal Regulation
  
• Plant Productivity in Response to LED Lighting
  
• Efficiency of an alternative LED-based grow light system
  
• Design and Implementation of Artificial Grow Light for Germination and Vegetative Growth six channel wireless
  
• A whole-plant chamber system for parallel gas exchange measurements of Arabidopsis and other herbaceous species
  
• Analysis of the Uniformity of Light in a Plant Growth Chamber
  
• Analyses of multi-color plant-growth light sources in achieving maximum photosynthesis efficiencies with enhanced color qualities
  
• Improving “color rendering” of LED lighting for the growth of lettuce
  
• Optimization of LED Lighting and Quality Evaluation of Romaine Lettuce Grown in An Innovative Indoor Cultivation System
  
• Vertical Production of ‘Konstancin’ Rose Cuttings in the Growth Chamber Under Led Light
  
• Effects of HPS and LED lighting on cucumber leaf photosynthesis, light quality penetration and temperature in the canopy, plant morphology and yield
  
• Impacts of LED spectral quality on leafy vegetables: Productivity closely linked to photosynthetic performance or associated with leaf traits?
  
• Leaf Morphology, Photosynthetic Performance, Chlorophyll Fluorescence, Stomatal Development of Lettuce (Lactuca sativa L.) Exposed to Different Ratios of Red Light to Blue Light
  
• Nighttime Supplemental LED Inter-lighting Improves Growth and Yield of Single-Truss Tomatoes by Enhancing Photosynthesis in Both Winter and Summer
  
• LED lighting efficacy: Status and directions
  
• Photosynthetic and growth responses of green and purple basil plants under different spectral compositions
  
• Morphological and physiological response in green and purple basil plants (Ocimum basilicum) under different proportions of red, green, and blue LED lightings
  
• Reaching Natural Growth: Light Quality Effects on Plant Performance in Indoor Growth Facilities
  
• Optimizing LED lighting for space plant growth unit: Joint effects of photon flux density, red to white ratios and intermittent light pulses
  
• White, blue and red LED lighting on growth, morphology and accumulation of flavonoid compounds in leafy greens
  
• Alternating Red and Blue Light-Emitting Diodes Allows for Injury-Free Tomato Production With Continuous Lighting
  
• Combination of Red and Blue Lights Improved the Growth and Development of Eggplant (Solanum melongena L.) Seedlings by Regulating Photosynthesis
  
• Supplemental LED inter-lighting compensates for a shortage of light for plant growth and yield under the lack of sunshine
  
• Uncovering LED light effects on plant growth: new angles and perspectives – LED light for improving plant growth, nutrition and energy-use efficiency
  
• Light-emitting Diode Light Transmission through Leaf Tissue of Seven Different Crops
  
• Continuous white LED lighting increases chlorophyll content (SPAD), green LED light reduces the infection rate of lettuce during storage and shelf-life conditions
  
• Effect of the Spectral Quality and Intensity of Light-emitting Diodes on Several Horticultural Crops
  
• Improving Winter Growth in the Citrus Nursery with LED and HPS Supplemental Lighting
  
• Analysis of Environmental Effects on Leaf Temperature under Sunlight, High Pressure Sodium and Light Emitting Diodes
  
• Comparison and perspective of conventional and LED lighting for photobiology and industry applications
  
• Effect of the Intensity and Spectral Quality of LED Light on Yield and Nitrate Accumulation in Vegetables
  
• Almost everything you want to know about LEDs
  
• LED and HID Horticultural Luminaire Testing Report
  
• Horticultural lighting system optimalization: A review
  
• Artificial-Light Culture in Protected Ground Plant Growing: Photosynthesis, Photomorphogenesis, and Prospects of LED Application
  
• Seeing the lights for leafy greens in indoor vertical farming
  
• Modelling Environmental Burdens of Indoor-Grown Vegetables and Herbs as Affected by Red and Blue LED Lighting
  
• Optimal light intensity for sustainable water and energy use in indoor cultivation of lettuce and basil under red and blue LEDs
  
• Energy savings in greenhouses by transition from high-pressure sodium to LED lighting
  
• Estimating the quantum requirements for plant growth and related electricity demand for LED lighting systems
  
• UV Lighting in Horticulture: A Sustainable Tool for Improving Production Quality and Food Safety
  
• Minimizing Electricity Cost through Smart Lighting Control for Indoor Plant Factories
  
• 2014 Paper analyzing the cost benefit of LED horticultural lighting
  

Spectral measurements and characteristics

• Spectral Effects of Artificial Light on Plant Physiology and Secondary Metabolism: A Review
  
• Application of a low-cost RGB sensor to detect basil (Ocimum basilicum L.) nutritional status at pilot scale level Arduino
  
• Nitrogen Deficiency Level Assessment Device for Rice (Oryza sativa L.) and Maize (Zea mays L.) using Classification Algorithm-based Spectrophotometry Arduino
  
• The Photochemical Reflectance Index (PRI) – a measure of photosynthetic light-use efficiency
  
• Photochemical reflectance index (PRI) and remote sensing of plant CO2 uptake
  
• Radiation measurement for plant ecophysiology
  
• Relationships between leaf pigment content and spectral reflectance across a wide range of species, leaf structures and developmental stages
  
• Application of Spectral Remote Sensing for Agronomic Decisions
  
• Neural-network model for estimating leaf chlorophyll concentration in rice under stress from heavy metals using four spectral indices
  
• Biophysical & physicochemical methods for analyzing plants in vivo and in situ
  
• Chlorophyll a: b Ratio Increases Under Low-light in ‘Shade-tolerant’ Euglena gracilis
  
• Nondestructive Estimation of Anthocyanin Content in Grapevine Leaves
  
• Reflectance spectral features and non-destructive estimation of chlorophyll, carotenoid and anthocyanin content in apple fruit
  
• In situ measurement of leaf chlorophyll concentration: analysis of the optical/absolute relationship
  
• Spectral signatures of photosynthesis I: Review of Earth organisms
  
• The Secret Beauty of Ultraviolet Radiation in Plants
  
• Higher plants and UV-B radiation: balancing damage, repair and acclimation
  

The Legacy of Man: Empire Rising

Chapter Thirty Two

First Prev
With the screaming and sounds of combat steadily growing distant, Splinter, Saecar and Derek continued to run towards safety. They originally tried to make their way to a pre-designated shadow-path, a carefully constructed link through shadows that allows rapid travel, but the wamel descended upon that.
With one part of Splinter's mind constantly keeping vigil, the other part was already at work deciphering what was going on. Out of all of the possible scenarios he thought of and planned for, this one was considered extremely unlikely. Perna hadn't given him any clues or hints that the wamel were involved. It was more probable that it was either a redrak individual or group at work, possibly political, possibly personal.
That could only mean that there was something else that was a part of this situation, something that Perna and he didn't spot. The hidden piece of information that could reveal the entire story here. He needs to investigate it as soon as possible. The faster that he pushes through this mystery, the faster the threat can be eliminated and Derek's safety secure.
"Over here looks good, yeah?" Saecar said as he pointed at a building. The wooden sign hanging above the door indicated it was a bookshop.
"For now." Splinter replied. "We'll catch our breath, and once that's done, we need to get moving again."
Saecar gave him a curious look. When Splinter noticed and returned a look of his own, Saecar shrugged, "I've noticed you're more than a mere attendant, Splinter. You didn't freeze or falter, you knew exactly what to do. And I can tell from your eyes you're no stranger to a fight."
"In my younger days, I may or may not have found work similar to right now." He answered, maintaining eye contact. "Felt as though I was a little slow, to be honest."
"That just means I won't have to deal with them by myself." Saecar chuckled. "Also means the sooner we find weapons, the harder it will be to get past us. But we'll worry about it later, come, into the shop."
"Derek, you okay so far?" Splinter asked softly, gently gripping the gray-fur's arm.
"Yeah, yeah...things just happened pretty fast is all." Derek nodded with a slight huff. "I'm just going with what you guys think is best."
"Don't worry, love." Saecar said reassuringly with a smile. "If they want you, they'll have to get through to me, and I can promise that as long as I breathe, those wamel rekis have to work for it."
"Assuming they even get to you in the first place." Splinter gave a prideful chuckle just before the trio entered the shop.
Just as Derek originally assumed, it looked like your standard bookstore. The only major differences is the lack of modern technology he's grown up with. No overhead lights, no cash registers or anything. Just one big room with rows and rows of display cabinets filled with books.
"I'll keep watch." Saecar stated, already pressing himself against the wall and carefully peeking out through the window.
"I'll look around, see if there are other ways in or out." Splinter nodded and then looked to Derek. "Sir? Please stay with me or Saecar, you need at least one of us beside you."
"I, uh..." Derek hesitated, glancing around a bit before something caught his eye. "I'll stay here, within sight of Saecar. In case we're here for a while, these books will help pass the time, yeah?"
"Understood." The black-fur nodded, then looking to Saecar. "I'll be back shortly." And after that, he took a low stance and navigated through the store.
Derek made his way over to the other side of the room and started looking at the books behind the glass of the cabinets. As he did, blurry squiggles of what must be magic energy vibrated into existence and then shaped themselves. After staring for a moment, wondering if more would happen, Derek quickly realized that, most likely, it was displaying the name of the book he looked at. Which also revealed a massive problem.
Derek can't read.
Whatever language this is, it's not English. But...if that's the case, how has he been able to communicate with the other redraks? With that ormel? Well, he didn't exactly communicate with the ormel, but he understood it. The point is, how is he able to carry conversation with people thus far and yet not be able to read the redrak language?
Just to confirm it, Derek went down the array of books, letting himself get curious at what gets his attention. And, almost like it was some magic-based programming, it displayed what must be the name of the book in the redrak language upon the glass. He went through almost a dozen books before he accepted the conclusion.
Derek can't read the redrak language, despite comprehending the spoken form. And considering this is within a store inside a highly populated city of the redraks, there's no way this was some antique specialty store, or a foreign shop, it's mainstream.
And as he accepted that, Derek felt both red-hot shame and worry boil up inside of him. Nobody outside Albert, Splinter and Scarface can know about this. If any of the patricians, or hell, any noble hears about this, he'll be an absolute embarrassment. Fuck, maybe nobody at all period. He'll just be treated like a drooling idiot who needs to be coddled. Spoken to like everything is beyond his understanding. And if everybody expects him to not understand a thing, then anything he puts forward as Emperor will either be laughed at or dismissed without adding "corrections" to it.
"Sir, you okay?" Derek practically launched himself into the roof when Splinter's voice came out of nowhere.
"Y-Yeah, absolutely." Derek nodded rapidly, stepping away from the cabinet to make the words disappear. "Just, uh...just let myself start thinking about the worst from this. You know, like, if the wamel succeeds and all that shit."
Splinter stared at him for several moments. That caused Derek to grow highly anxious, unsure if he should maintain his act or not.
"Derek, just so you'll know." Splinter began with a slight sigh, eliciting a sharp pang of dread in Derek. "I've been doing what I did for over a thousand years. I've learned all there is about people. Especially when they're lying. So, Derek...why are you lying to me?"
"U-Uh...y-you sure I'm lying?" Derek questioned with a nervous smile. "I mean, yeah I won't fight that you did this for a millenia and shit, but I mean, maybe you just saw something on me and misunderstood it or whatever."
"If I'm to protect you the best way I know how, I need to know everything." Splinter continued, completely neutral despite expectations otherwise. "Your feelings to Jurn, what foods you like most, what you're planning, everything. I know what I smelled, something was bothering you. I need to know what."
Derek knew. There's no possible way out. Splinter's got him, and got him dead to rights practically. Looking behind him, the gray-fur than approached the Nightlord and kept his voice as a whisper, "I...I-I just...learned that I, uh...can't read."
"...you can't?" Splinter questioned after a moment, clearly surprised. After a nod from Derek, he then approached one of the cabinets and brought forth a book name. "What's this?"
"Dude...what did I just say?" Derek sighed in frustration.
"Just try and read it, please." Splinter insisted.
With a minor groan of resignation, Derek then studied the redrak words carefully, despite having zero idea on what it says, or even how it's pronounced. Right as his embarrassment reached a crescendo, he went with what came to mind first. "Flowers: I Like Them?"
Splinter snorted before rapidly rebuilding his neutral expression. "No...the book I was looking at is called: A Night at Barofel's Castle. A horror novel from Swebia."
"And your fucking point?" Derek sneered before deciding he wasn't going to have it, already walking away.
"Uh! D-Derek, wait!" Splinter rushed forward, gripping his shoulder. "I-I'm sorry I did that, I just...it was hard to believe, especially when noting we're speaking Vemai Maxima right now, so it's...I just found it difficult to comprehend you can understand it spoken but not written."
"Well, here, I thought you guys still spoke English." Derek shrugged with a sigh. "I mean, sounds like it to me. I think the closest I heard to foreign was that ormel attacking Parnax. But he just sounded like he needed to take some more English lessons."
"If that particular ormel favors attacking us, it's possible he's picked up a very crude understanding of Vemai." Splinter stated. "But, that's besides the point. I'm sorry for making you feel worse, and I promise, as soon as things settle down, I'll teach you how to read Vemai. In the meantime, I also promise to make sure nobody else knows about this."
"I...I guess it wouldn't hurt if Scarface and Albert knew..." Derek shrugged before crossing his arms. "But only them, alright?"
"Understood." Splinter nodded with a soft voice as well as giving a reassuring back rub.
"Well...since you're here." Derek sighed and walked over to the first book he looked at, bringing forth its name. "Can you read this for me?"
As soon as the words solidified and became readable, Splinter happily provided. "Applied Pyromancy, Seventh Edition by Hinax Palirius."
"Pyromancy?" Derek seemed surprise. If it was a spell book, wouldn't it be more obvious in terms of looks? He thought it would have some ornate design or some kind of magic glowing off of it, but here, it just looks like any other textbook. "How do you...uh, open this?"
"Like this." Splinter merely touched the name, and, encased in a barely visible cloud of arcane energy, the book was pulled out and presented itself before the black-fur, who casually grabbed it and then held it up for Derek. "Here you go."
"Thanks." Derek replied, his tone containing both genuine politeness and embarassment. Opening it up, he knew it was expected as soon as he laid eyes on it.
More Vemai, the language he can't read. But the upside is there's actually illustrations as well. Maybe he can figure it out from there?
"Whatever you two are doing, keep it quiet." Saecar gave a loud whisper alongside motioning with his hand. "Saw movement across the street."
"Where?" Splinter asked, already beside him and scanning.
As the two talked amongst themselves, Derek found himself a nice spot and sat down, reading through the magic textbook. Turns out there were quite a few illustrations. If he looks through enough of them, he could possibly glean some kind of concepts from those illustrations alone. Already seems miles better than the engineering textbooks he suffered through back when he still went to college before the apocalypse.
A few in particular stood out to him. They were in the beginning of the book, no doubt introducing some fundamentals concepts. But what they were depicting is what has his attention. One, specifically, seemed to be a hand snapping its fingers, yet there were precise step-by-step drawings not of the snapping, but the fire magic that resulted.
Studying it, alongside subsequent illustrations, he's starting to see what they're getting at. It seems like they're using friction. That would make sense. In a closed system, some portion of energy on its way to the output is lost as heat. And in the physical world, that heat is generated by friction. Moving a couch on the floor, rubbing hands together, whatever energy is introduced changes into thermal energy, or heat, via friction of the two surfaces.
Still, with some excited hope, Derek pressed his middle finger and thumb together, following along the steps. Until he actually learns Vemai, he has no idea if it's as simple as that or there's some underlying concept he needs to understand first. Keeping his pointing finger out, seeing that the spawned fire is transferred to that finger, and with mental concentration, he made the snap.
There, something happened. The human portion of his mind fully expected for nothing to happen, having grown up in a science-centric world. But there, it was undeniable. A spark. Completely impossible back in human civilization, but here? Whatever that apocalypse did, it brought out magic. Lasidius' demonstration back when he was recovering from the wamel poison proved it.
Deciding that it was focus, and not more intense snapping, might do it, Derek then adjusted his posture and then poured even more concentration to his fingers. He made another snap.
Now, fire erupted and clung to his pointer finger. His instinct kicking in, he let out a surprised yelp and feverishly shook his hand about, snuffing out the flame.
"Tarac?!" Saecar gave a hushed shout, rapidly twisting his body to face him. "What's wrong?!"
"Oh...s-sorry, just..." Derek gave a nervous laugh and held up the book. "Practice, you know..."
"Going for the Emperor's Crown and an aspiring mage?" Saecar said in mild amazement. "You're full of surprises, aren't you?"
"I mean, you have no idea, Saecar." Derek let out a grin, though he grew somewhat nervous after remembering his origin.
Saecar, after letting out a relieved chuckle, returned his gaze back to the street, obsessively watching over every possible way the wamel could appear in. Splinter, in the meanwhile, gave an approving grin and nod before rejoining Saecar.
Feeling rather proud of himself, Derek recreated his effort and brought forth the flame once more. Now knowing what to expect, his instinct didn't take over this time. And despite his human mind screaming at him that his finger's on fire, he's not feeling any pain whatsoever.
Warmth. A comforting warmth on his finger. And there, Derek fell into a kind of trance. Watching the flame stand tall and proud upon his finger, projecting brilliant light around it. The moment it entered its mind, somehow intuitively, he coaxed the flame into spreading. Down his finger, towards the middle and thumb, encasing his palm...soon, his entire hand was now a bright ball of flame. Moving his palm to face upward, he felt a sense of peace...tranquility within him as he kept watching it dance and flicker about high above his palm.
"Tarac!" Saecar's voice broke his trance alongside the harsh nudge on his shoulder. "Put that out, now!"
Startled, Derek shook his hand like he did before, extinguishing the flame, before nervously looking back at the guard captain. "I-I wasn't going to burn anything, promise!"
"What? No, you were making a light visible enough that anyone can see!" Saecar was confused for a moment but went back to his concerned expression. "We've tried to tell you a couple times!"
"I...I didn't hear, sorry." Derek muttered, closing the book before fully facing the two black-furs.
"It's no problem, sir." Splinter reassured in a soft voice. "We're just about to get moving again. Ready?"
"Y-Yeah, ready." Derek nodded, glad that they weren't going to ride his ass over playing with fire. As much as he wanted to take the book, he didn't have money on hand with him, so, after finding the main desk where people would do the actual purchase, he set the book down there, if reluctantly, and rejoined his protectors.
Passing through the side-entrance that led into an alleyway between the bookshop and a different building, Saecar and Splinter took several moments to confirm the area is clear before making their move. With Saecar in the front, Derek in the middle and Splinter the rear, they quickly but carefully continued their way towards the emergency shadow-path. The moment they passed through that one, they're in the clear. Until then, nothing and nowhere is safe.
"Where's Sfin in all this...?" Saecar muttered after the group rounded a corner onto a new street. "Last time I saw him, he was explaining the shadow-paths to me and the plan I should take when the worst happens."
"I'm sure he's keeping watch over us." Derek said, casting a glance to Splinter. "I mean...he's all about working from the shadows, right? I'd say, as long as nobody knows where you are, that's a pretty big advantage, yeah?"
"But it also means we don't know where he is." Saecar countered. "And right now, I don't know if he's here or off in that fight back in the plaza."
"I can assure you, for someone as powerful as Sfin is, that plaza fight would be over in an instant." Splinter said. "My guess? He's waiting for an opportunity to trail any survivors so that he may find their true leader and end the threat once and for all."
"I sure hope that's what he's doing." Saecar sighed in a perturbed manner. "Otherwise, I don't give two kaks if he's a Hero-God. He and I are having some words about not being here for Tarac when he was sworn to his service."
"I'm sure he has a good reason, so just assume that's what it is until you do talk to him." Derek said, growing somewhat nervous due to the fact that Splinter is right next to him.
"You're right, I know, it's just..." Saecar trailed off before looking back at Derek. "You almost died back there. If your capable attendant hadn't done what he did..."
"Me? I thought it was you the wamel were going after." Derek gave a surprised, confused expression.
"I felt the arrow as it flew by." Saecar explained, his voice growing grim. "It was far too close for me to be the target. Thankfully it just ripped a bit of the back of my clothes here, but, that's besides the point. Every time one of my siblings died, it wasn't because the wamel attacked. It was your standard assassination jobs. Poison, accidents, those acts."
"So then...shit..." Derek felt his throat tighten up, then looking to Splinter. Without saying a word, he nodded, confirming Saecar's point. "Then...why me? Is it because I'm trying to be Emperor, or because I'm gray, or what?"
"It'll only be a matter of time before the Nightlord, Sfin, finds out." Splinter said firmly. "When he does, then we'll know."
Just a few more streets to go. The trio continued their careful advance through the city. The pandemonium that resulted from the carnage travelled fast. Derek recognized this place. Last time he saw it, it was choking with redrak pedestrians and bicyclists, or gliders as he heard before. Now it was deserted, with a few guardsmen rapidly making their way towards the scene the moment they heard. Derek had thought that there would be more activity here, a few curious people standing around and waiting for anything or anybody that could shed light on what's going on. But so far, nothing. It's like the entire city has gone on complete lockdown. Could it be because they've heard it was wamel?
A sudden grunt tore Derek out of his thoughts. As soon as he registered, he felt numb with dread. A wamel tried to ambush Saecar, who already gripped the other wrist and tried to wrestle the blade out of the wood elf's hand. Before he could say or do anything, he felt something shove him on the back, followed by an ear-piercing thwip.
As soon as he looked up, Splinter too was engaged with another wamel. And upon his side, he felt something tap him. It was an arrow, most likely what Splinter saved him from, again. Standing up, he looked to both of them, desperately figuring out what it is he could do to help.
It was then that he had his own problems. In one graceful move, another wamel stepped onto the first that attacked Saecar and launched herself high in the air, arrow nocked, drawn and ready for the kill. Saecar and Splinter were too far away to do anything and were kept in place by the wamel.
The moment Derek saw the cold murder in her eyes, something compelled him. Something instinctual. Something that told him that, if nothing's done right at this instant, he will die here.
Terrorized, and in one swift motion, Derek snapped his fingers to conjure flame and thrust his palm out towards her. Without it ever being a rational thought, he begged for the flame to save him.
Out from his palm exploded forth a great gout of fire, a thick jet that shot out like a cannon, or more accurately, a flamethrower. The wamel, who once had cold murder in her eyes, now broke into terrorized panic, desperately trying to maneuver herself out of the way. But there was nothing she could do in the air. The flames immediately washed over her body, encapsulating her. And when it did, she let out an ear-piercing scream, all the way towards crashing to the ground, where she then writhed and spasmed, trying anything to snuff out the fire that engulfed her.
"Damnit, he's a mage!" The first wamel shouted out in shocked surprise.
"Fall back and regroup!" The third ordered, already dashing away from Splinter. The first immediately complied, delivering a surprise strike at Saecar's face to daze him, then immediately sprinting away, both of them not even trying to rescue their burning comrade.
On the verge of hyperventilating, Derek collapsed to his knees, trembling with terror and adrenaline.
"Tarac!" Saecar shouted, rushing over to him the moment he got to his feet.
"Sir, are you alright?!" Splinter asked, already beside him. "Did she hurt you?!"
"I...I...I-I think...f-fine..." Derek barely pushed out the words. As one would expect, getting right on the edge of death is still existentially terrifying as ever.
"Th...that was too close." Saecar huffed out, just now starting to calm down. "Splinter, we need to move, now."
"Agreed. I'll help Derek, you lead the way." Splinter nodded, already lifting up the shaking gray-fur.
"Before we do, grab her weapons." Saecar ordered, jogging over to the steaming corpse. "We can't keep getting caught defenseless. I'll take her spatha."
"Then hand me her bow." Splinter demanded, walking over to him. "May not be a repeater-bow, but, as you've said, better than nothing."
Derek, upon seeing the blackened, crackling flesh of the wamel, tore himself away from Splinter and gagged, nearly vomiting his breakfast. No, he's seen enough death that it didn't affect him as severely. This time, it was the fact that he was the killer. By his own hand, through magic, he ended the life of another, the reason behind it excluded.
"Smells bad, I know." Saecar chuckled a bit, giving the wamel blade a few swings to get its feel. "But don't worry, let us handle the fighting."
"...that was your first magic book, right?" Splinter asked the gray-fur some time after the group got back to their journey. "And yet...you casted a spell with little practice?"
"I...don't want to talk right now." Derek stated with his arms crossed. "Can we please just get the fuck out already?"
Splinter drew in a worried breath before speaking, "That was your first kill, wasn't it?"
"...y-yeah..." Derek nodded after hesitating. "And...I know, it was me or her, I get that...just...doesn't make it any easier, you know...?"
"I know." Splinter nodded, wrapping an arm around the gray-fur. "Scarface and I...when we drew first blood...we both felt...affected. I can't speak for Scarface, but...for me? All I can say is, do it enough times, and, well, it loses its impact."
"Yeah..." Derek sighed, not wanting to continue this conversation.
Splinter picked up on that and changed topics. "Derek, forgive me if this is odd, but...during your life, have you...played with fire?"
"A few times, yeah." Derek shrugged, no longer caring if it was an issue or not. "Sometimes...I'd sneak down and just...turn on the lighter. I remember one time...I hated this class so much, back when I was in college...and when I learned I passed, I felt the only way to properly celebrate was to burn my graded exam...so, I got a plastic trash can, took out my Zippo and set that shit alight. And that was when I learned some paper prefers to smoke rather than burn, heh..."
"...that explains it then." Splinter muttered, his eyes lost in thought.
"What, that I'm just...some arsonist in the making?" Derek asked with a shrug.
"No...your magic." Splinter shook his head. "More specifically, I saw how easy it was for you to make the flame spread on your hand. Normally, if I remember correctly back in the Imperial Academy, that's a basic lesson for new pyromancers. Learning to control fire. Point I'm getting to is this: It's been discovered that, for those who have some attraction towards an element, such as you with fire, those people intuitively have far greater control over the said element than any other. What that means is, when it comes to pyromancy, you require less practice and study since it comes intuitively to you."
"It's...not a big deal." Derek said with a little confusion. "You can get fire by the friction you make when snapping your fingers. Normally you can never perceive the heat that's generated, but this magic? However it does it, it amplifies that heat to the point it becomes an actual flame."
Splinter seemed to be lost in thought for some time before he responded. "I wonder...perhaps it's both your attraction to fire as well as your perception by having been a promel. Whatever knowledge your people had, maybe it offers you a way of seeing things that can only enhance your ability to practice magic?"
"Well, so far...it seems like magic, at least the one we know of, has some scientific foundation." Derek shrugged once more. "That book I had? The pictures I was looking at focused on snapping your fingers. I thought they were, I don't know, talking about how friction is the best way to get fire on your hands."
"Albert would be the best one to talk to on this." Splinter stated with a sigh, apparently realizing this is beyond him. "If anyone can figure out or understand how anything works, it's him."
"Every day, we seem to keep getting more and more reason to head to Ironpeaks." Derek let out an amused laugh. "What do you think, Splinter? Should we just beeline straight for Ironpeaks? Not make any more stops to play future-politics or whatever?"
"That would be best, yes." Splinter nodded. "With our proclamation to Perna, as well as what'll happen from this, I have no doubt that word will spread rapidly now."
"Stop!" Saecar shouted, holding his hand out towards the two. Readying himself, Derek was prepared for the worst. In front of Saecar, down the street, a wamel was running out into the open. On closer inspection, Derek saw that the wamel was clutching his side, shambling as fast as he could away from something.
Before he could think any more, he saw some object flung from behind the building. It smashed hard into the wamel's back, piercing through his body and causing the wood elf to crash into the street, where he then lay there motionless.
On cue, the attacker revealed themselves. It was Scarface, huffing and furious as ever.
"Sca-...Skafin, hey!" Derek shouted, waving after stepping to the side. Surprised, the huge, armored brown-fur looked over to them and gave off a triumphant grin, jogging over to them.
"I knew you'd be okay!" Scarface laughed once he reached conversation distance. "Is everyone alright?"
"Barely." Saecar sighed, resting the blade-tip on the ground. "Wamel almost got us, good thing Tarac here knows magic."
Scarface reacted as if someone slapped him on the face before looking to the gray-fur. "Magic? Since when?!"
"Just now." Splinter explained. "He found an old Academy book on pyromancy in a bookshop we rested in. It turns out Derek has a natural inclination towards that school of magic."
Scarface initially looked proud, but then grew grim. "And...you found that out...how?"
Derek hesitated before he gave his answer. "I...I killed one of the wamel attacking us."
Scarface's anger-scent, present when he arrived, now became suffocating. Yet, he didn't let out a shout or anything, just drew in a sharp breath before looking away, no doubt having some internal war with himself.
"Skafin?" Saecar questioned in confusion. "Why...why are you mad at Tarac? Shouldn't you be proud he's defended himself?"
"Shut your mouth." Scarface snarled before snapping his attention to Derek. "Derek? You. Me. Later."
"...ah, fuck..." Derek sighed.
"There's a smithy nearby, and I need a weapon." Scarface said simply, already turning around. "Let's go."
"Wait...Splinter, isn't the shadow-path nearby?" Saecar interjected.
"If it's the same one I'm thinking of, it's on the way." Splinter nodded. "Probably a good thing too, we're better than stooping to using mel weapons."
"...are they...like, badly made or something?" Derek questioned, confused at the sentiment.
"Stop talking and move. Now." Scarface snarled once more. Immediately, the trio fell in line and followed the simmering giant, not wanting to provoke his ire even further.
Some time after they got moving, Saecar moved beside Splinter and, keeping quiet, he asked, "Something's been bothering me."
"What's that?" Splinter said.
"The gray-fur. His name is Tarac, right?" Saecar questioned, giving a quick glance to the redrak. "But...I hear you call him Derek. I thought it was some, accent, but...no, Skafin calls him that too. Considering how ancient Skafin and Sfin are, the only way they'd know him is if Tarac was around in their time. So, that means...is he truly the Tarac? Not some patrician deluding himself into thinking he is, but...the real, live and ancient Tarac?"
"I...I'm just as surprised as you are, sir." Splinter replied, caught off guard and realizing a potential loophole he needs to fix. "I...was feeling ill one day and, somehow, I ended up..."
"Wait." Saecar interrupted, backing away a bit with a suspicious eye before realization swept him. "Sfin. You've been with us the entire time, haven't you?"
Damn, today was not a good day. It's been quite a while since he had to put on an act. Clearly he's gotten rusty. With a sigh, Splinter nodded, "I am. Misdirection is an excellent tool when applied properly."
"Here it is." Scarface announced, interrupting their conversation. "Drop the filthy mel weapons and get yourself some real steel here. Derek? Come with me."
"When you said later, I imagined it would take longer." Derek sighed with a shrug.
Scarface glared at him intensely. With another sigh, Derek nodded and followed the towering legionnaire.
Next Chapter

Where to begin?! So I got into vim about 5 years ago, a year later I discovered plugins (and about two months to get a few installed) another year went by and I switched to neovim.
My usage for vim was mostly configs editing path/to/file and getting more complicated into rclone upload/download scripts triggered by crontab.
Recently I started a novel (fiction) and on occasion search for stupid idea for a plug in that probably doesn't exist and would only save me 6 milliseconds a month then tinker with init.vim for a few days before I get back to actually writing .
A few weeks ago I stumbled across an Aaron Bieber video bout Emacs. I gave it a try but after two weeks I just could not get into it.
Two days ago I searched for best terminal editors dunno why I bothered, usually the top 5 are vi, vim, neovim, emacs, nano
But what came up was 19 best terminal editors of 2020 - slant
Nineteen!? So I dove in, there were of course the usual suspects, vi forks, (spac)emacs, and a few others I never heard of.
I even went to each one (that I haven't already tried) GitHub/bitbucket page and checked the last commit. I kept coming back to mcedit, tilde, kakoune
Mcedit is basically midnight Commander that can edit text.
Tilde is like a TUI version of word perfect.
And we all know what kakoune is like, to me at least, it's like a better spacevim- like WAY better
But I have one complaint, or perhaps I am too dense in the head to figure out how to do it. Is there a way to make/toggle kak into a distraction free mode like Goyo? I saw that u/alexherbo2 had made a post here about a distraction free plugin/.kak but it no longer exists on GitHub. Am I missing something?