alkalische · 6 months ago
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theresis and ascalon
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theresis and theresa (pre succession) making soup
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haha... haha...
[ch 14 spoiler under cut]
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aliceoverzero · 12 days ago
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Arknights lore continues to be insane
Babel event spoilers below . . .
What a mess. Finding out that the Originium project is human instrumentality via contagious protomatter is interesting. What threat was so horribly insurmountable to Doctor's people that the best solution they had was to create a grey goo scenario that also subsumes everyone into a simulated reality? It does explain the alternate version of events glimpsed through the dialogue in Kal'tsit's Remnant skin, as Originium has become more successful at its original purpose in that outcome.
This means Dorothy unwittingly reinvented a crude imitation of Originium via the transmitter fluid, which so far is only mildly less terrifying as I don't think it's been established to be capable of self-replicating. My favorite Warcrimes Jerboa has been made to look even more insane by an event she has nothing to do with, because holy shit girl.
Speaking of alternate means of making the many into one, is Terra operating under some passive rule of carcinization but for human instrumentality? Between Originium, Dorothy's transmitter and the Seaborn we're already at three different methods/interpretations of the same goal that are/were trying to unite all people on a fundamental level.
All those "if I met original Doctor I would be filled with the strength needed to beat them to death with my bare hands" types of posts are right. It's not that this fucker was unempathetic, they actually cared for people deeply, it's that they did care but ultimately twisted that caring towards serving their original goals. "It's fucked up that people are suffering right now, but I can end all suffering by having Originium consume the universe and integrate everyone into the Minecraft server that is running on it."
Fuck, every time we're shown Kazdel culture it's fucking bleak. The only way to be notable as a Sarkaz is to be a successful mercenary, and they perpetuate a habit of using toxic-masculinity bravado to cover up and downplay the fact that they were deprived of education. Literacy and just general wider knowledge of the world is a luxury to have in Kazdel.
This event has really made it feel like the Victoria arc is what the current writers want people to consider to be Arknights' real main story. The Lungmen arc can't be outright dismissed because of how much it's used to characterize so much of the main cast, but I do get the impression it's something that we're being further encouraged not to linger on. I get the sentiment. Those first few main story chapters are a rough read, made even rougher depending on when you started playing and what event stories you can contrast against it. I talk pretty regularly about arknights with my sister who started playing just before Lone Trail originally dropped, and comparing that writing against the Lungmen arc is an abyssal power gap that does make the main story harder to trudge through.
That said I do wish Babel was positioned better from a narrative perspective. I've spent the Victoria arc up to this point sitting on a lot of questions of "who the fuck is this guy" that were only answered just now. I'd probably have appreciated what's going on with Theresis, Theresa, Manfred and Ascalon a lot more in my original reading if I had been given the context for the baggage between them and why they're all this way.
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