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██████ ＇ｎｕｍｂｅｒ ８＇🖤

She's not a Wis. Don't worry about her.

...or do. After all, she's the only one in the entire world that has any answers about the clones and why they exist...

What's her name? It's not Wisteria. She'd rather not say...at least not now. But out of 8 clones, 7 of them being Wisterias, we've taken to calling her "#8".

🧬 Occupation: ???

🧬 Birthday: Winter 21

🧬 Age (at the start of MTAP/MTAS): 448 (45 biologically)

🧬 Height: 5'10"/178 cm

Story

The short version: Remaining fragments:

#8 originates from a country that no longer exists. In modern times, it's somewhere out in what is now the Peripheries. While the Wisterias were never removed from their tank when they were grown, and found as babies, #8 was sealed in suspended animation as an adult. As a result, she has plenty of memories on the clones' facility, who worked there, and what they did...but she would much rather forget it all.

Who released her? Not the same researcher that found the Wisterias. Unfortunately, you won't be able to find them to ask...they're dead. #8 made sure of that.

She's been wandering out in the wilderness for several decades now, living off of the land and trying to make sense of this new world. She tries not to stray close to any modern settlements, not wanting to deal with humanity or society any longer...but some have probably caught a glimpse of her. That hair is unmistakable. If they were real lucky, they might have spotted her with...a child? A child of some sort, but the paper-white skin and the reptilian tail say soundly that it isn't a human child.

You might meet her in Sandrock after the end of act 3...but do approach with caution. And more importantly, approach with kindness.

She needs it.

The (very, very) long version [LOCKED]

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poor Xu is second to last on the returning character poll 😭 it’s okay tho bc I’m porting him with his wife p!wis to evershine anyways 😂

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P/E!Wis's story - the long version 🩵

🌵 The Lonely Sands

Wis's mother Clara died while she was very young, from a brutal infection stemming from an injury she sustained when she and Wis's father Maurice were out on a wildlife expedition. It shook Wis and her father, and eventually he would leave entirely, to live out the adventures that Clara always wanted, and because he was lost and terrified of having to raise Wis on his own.

Wis was left in the care of her Aunt Kendra, and neither was particularly pleased with Maurice's actions. His endless thirst for adventure and thrill came at the expense of his own damn daughter. He didn't even pass on the story of Wis's origins on as he was instructed to by V5!Wis and the researcher that found the clones.

At the very least, Kendra was a kind and understanding guardian for Wis. She was also the one that told Wis about her origin story, from what she heard from Wis's pa. Wis often thinks that without Kendra's guidance and gentle but firm sense of discipline, she would've been much worse off.

Throughout her teenage years, she drifted along without much of a direction. Her only true motivation was to not turn out like her father was. But anything more specific than that, she had no idea. Kendra suggested that Wis try out building, and without much else to do, she agreed and started receiving some basic training from the sole builder in her village, who was delighted to take an apprentice.

However, mere months into her training, there came sudden news. Maurice had written to her after nearly a decade, with barely an apology, and news that he had bequeathed an old workshop in Portia to her. Wis was hesitant to take it at first, but both her mentor and Kendra encouraged her to do it. She could learn on the job, and there were other builders in Portia. Sure, her pa might've been the one to give it to her, but she could make it truly her own.

🌳 Greener Pastures

That was what ultimately had Wis on a boat to Portia, uncertain but thrumming with anticipation for a place other than Barnarock. She initially isolated herself when she first came to Portia, putting 110% into learning building pretty much all by herself and not knowing who to trust.

Perhaps to everyone's surprise, including her own, the person who got Wis to open up a little bit in those first few weeks...was Higgins. Wis thought that he could potentially teach her to help fill in the gaps in her training, but he immediately called her a twerp and thought that she was only sitting pretty on inheritance...despite her house clearly being a worn-out shack. But instead of being completely offended, Wis found it...a little funny, if she was being honest. If Higgins thought she was a twerp, then she'd be a twerp, alright. They'd constantly jabber with each other when they saw each other on the street. They'd always run into the Commerce Guild first thing in the morning, pushing and shoving to get the best commissions. They'd spar all the time, and sometimes it'd go a bit too far.

Gradually though, as they come to learn about each other's poor lots in life, they become less and less vitriolic, and by the end, their friendship is nigh-inseparable.

Through her efforts to help develop the little town of Portia, and the encouragement and kindness of the locals, Wis gradually opens herself up a lot more to trusting and bonding with people. She'd hardly had anyone quite like the Portian community at all in her life, but it was welcome after years of drifting in self-imposed isolation.

🪻 On the Other Side

When Mint first arrived in town, he couldn't stop looking at Wis suspiciously. He already seemed to know who she was before she even introduced herself too. He'd just come from Sandrock...and wasn't she just over there??

As it turned out, there was another clone in Sandrock, Wisteria Cyprens! A builder, just like her, albeit far more experienced. Mint sent a letter to his Sandrocker friend Qi about the mysterious second Wis, and both clones were delighted at their absolute bewilderment. They quickly got in touch, and P!Wis took a break for a week or two to visit Sandrock.

She and S!Wis hit it off fairly quickly, with S!Wis jumping at the opportunity to teach P!Wis some tips and tricks of the trade. While she had a lot of fun, P!Wis couldn't help but feel a sense of jealousy as she talked more with her clone sister. S!Wis seemed to have everything she didn't. Both parents still alive and present in her life, an extended family back in Highwind, a determined direction for her life in building, a proper education, and plenty of prior experience. She did her best to sympathize with P!Wis, but from the very start, P!Wis sensed that there would always be a gap between them, even if it was incredibly small.

Regardless, she remained in regular contact with S!Wis, even after she went home. It was nice, having a penpal and arguably a whole new sister.

The Rogue Knight's attack on Portia took place only a week or so after Duvos's Invasion of Sandrock. She was one of the first to reach out to S!Wis and ask if she was truly okay. She eventually paid Sandrock another visit for them to talk over their experiences, joined by D!Wis and later interrupted by T!Wis. Once again, it seemed like P!Wis and S!Wis deviated. While S!Wis's experiences solidified her resolve to stick to her original objective of settling down in Sandrock without much fuss, P!Wis's experiences stirred her in a strange way.

Somehow...she found herself craving something with the magnitude of the Rogue Knight and the subsequent aftermath again. Rising up to the challenge. Proving her name. Out of respect for S!Wis though, she said none of this out loud. Once again, she felt that gap between them. Would it ever truly close?

🩺 The Doctor is In

While Higgins might have been the first to bring Wis out of her shell, the mild-mannered Dr. Xu ended up being the one who do so the most. Being as inexperienced a builder as she was, Wis found herself getting injured a fair amount from machines and fatigue and combat. Mostly minor, but still enough to warrant a doctor's look.

She was generally very aloof during the first several meetings with Xu and Phyllis. Just there to do her business. In and out. Xu wasn't a very nosy man. Patient confidentiality and all. But when he met P!Wis, and heard the rumblings of her stoic, solitary nature from others around town, he couldn't help but be curious. And when he learned about what happened with her pa and why she was in Portia to begin with, he saw someone in need of healing. Unfortunately, maybe not the kind of healing he could do. He was only a physician, not a psychologist.

Even so, he made efforts to make her feel safe and welcome whenever she had to come into the clinic, and gradually, she responded positively, much to his delight. Slowly, Wis developed light-hearted, bantering friendships with Xu and Phyllis, and soon she found herself visiting them just because.

Xu eventually started catching feelings...though he probably at least had a hint of a crush on Wis from the very beginning. It never really hit him until one day, Phyllis came to him with a cheeky look and what would've been a simple piece of news: Wis switched her primary doctor to Phyllis. She said that she'd be more comfortable with Phyllis...partly because she was growing closer with Xu. She didn't want the doctor-patient relationship to interfere with their personal one.

With such a large restriction suddenly removed...everything kind of slid into place all at once. In an ideal world, he'd be able to heal her completely, but even if he can't, he'll still bandage all her physical wounds with care...and help her be happy. Comfortable. To see her smile and laugh and truly be at ease from whatever was eating at her from the inside.

Wis had never felt as safe as she did around Xu. He was grounded, just the right amount of silly, and he truly cared for people even outside his profession. She felt comfortable telling him just about anything. Soon enough, she didn't just see him as a friend anymore. One afternoon, they hung out on Amber Island the whole afternoon, walking and talking, staying far longer than either of them had intended. As the sun set over the horizon and the stars peeked out, they fell silent.

Until Xu took the first step, nervously confessing how he felt for her. Wis suddenly felt her mind freeze up. She felt strongly for him too...but a part of her instinctively wanted to push that away. Self-defense. If he got too close, it'd only be worse if he left her. She was honest; telling him about that conflict. He assured her that they could take things as slowly as they needed to, and that he had no plans on leaving anytime soon, not her, not Portia. And so began their relationship, shy and tenuous, but filled with understanding and warmth.

The true test of their bond would come when Xu expressed a desire for going to Seesai for a while to further his medical studies. How long? Neither of them knew. Wis was immediately nervous. This was it, wasn't it?! This was the part where he'd leave her and never come back. He very adamantly assured her that a) he wasn't leaving right away, b) he would NOT be away forever (he'd miss her and Portia too much for that), and c) they could always write to each other in the meantime!

Over the next several months before Xu planned to take his trip, the couple did the best they could to prepare themselves emotionally to be away from each other for an indefinite amount of time. They still had their dates, of course. But they also started making and doing more things for each other. Wis built Xu some equipment that he might need, and gave him diagrams for bigger things that he couldn't carry. Xu prepared more herbs and medicines for Wis and taught her some recipes so she could treat her own injuries more. They practiced being alone in smaller doses, with one of them heading out to another city for a while to work with colleagues or to sightsee. And finally, Xu planted a small garden for Wis, filled with beautiful herbal flowers that blossomed under the light of the full moon: moonlight primrose. Even while they were apart, they could always go out at night and look at the same moon, its soft light uniting them indirectly. With their thorough preparation and their constant, unwavering care for one another...they made it through the entire time just fine.

🌵 "Dear" Old Dad

One day, a while after the Rogue Knight's attack and Wis and Xu's marriage, Xu rose early for work, kissing his still sleeping wife on the cheek as he left. He opened the door...and was greeted by a man asking for his daughter. With a jolt, Xu realized right away that this was Wis's estranged father. He did his best to be civil with him, but Wis was definitely not feeling the same. As soon as she got up and went outside, she was just shy of throwing hands, had it not been for Xu standing right next to her, and the scrap of restraint that she had.

Maurice was on a break from his adventures in the Peripheries, and he wanted to check in on his daughter, pleased to find both her and her old workshop flourishing. Wis was only able to bite out an obligatory thank you for giving the property to her, though she made it incredibly clear that it was barely a gift at all by itself. When she got it, it was overgrown, dilapidated, and she had to fix everything herself.

Their subsequent build-off was no less strained. Wis only agreed to get Maurice out of her hair. With how he never contacted her more than one in over a decade, this competition was nowhere near friendly. The gift of the pig automation that Maurice created was hardly a decent prize, either. It seemed like the only thing that Maurice could offer his own daughter in recompense was a few material goods. Soon after, he departed Portia without a word, seeing as he was no longer welcome, nor was Wis ever willing to forgive him. But not before catching Wis's stony expression from the fields one final time as he boarded his ship.

Wis never ended up using the robopig for its intended purpose. It could never really fly that far anyways. It gathered dust for a while behind her house, before she and S!Wis would team up to repurpose it into a gardening bot to help her out with her new postgame hobby. Once again, carving out her own mark, in spite of it originally being handed to her by her father.

🌅 What's next?

Wis's call to adventure will lead her to becoming the governor of Evershine! Despite the doubts of a bunch of her clone sisters, who could all see the Alliance's ulterior motives of creating a new city state near the hostile border, she decided that this was truly what she wanted. Just like her workshop in Portia, just like her robopig, she'd make her new office as governor and her new home her own.

It took some persuasion to get Xu to come along. He was planning on spending the rest of his life in Portia, and thought that Wis would do the same. By this time, I think that Portia would have grown a bit population wise, and Phyllis becomes a fully realized doctor and takes students of her own. So Portia's in good hands, while this new settlement could use another skilled doctor to help people out. That's what convinces him eventually.

What will Wis get up to in MTAE? We'll have to see. Since she's going to be the player character, she has the least amount of things set in stone right now for what her future story is going to be. I want to see how things play out in the game and craft a narrative around that as best I can.

Although...one thing that I can say is that Wis will definitely have to contend with the fact that she left Portia behind, possibly for good. Even if she's staying in contact with everyone there, doesn't that make her just like her father? Always seeking out thrills, at the expense of her loved ones.

But she's better than that...right?

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Wisteria Birck 🩵

a.k.a. Portia/Evershine!Wis or P/E!Wis

[you can also just call her P!Wis or E!Wis by themselves lol. most likely once i get her plot for MTAE developed I'll shift to just calling her E!Wis]

Technically the very first clone I made, but she wasn't anywhere near as developed when I played MTAP dkrjdkjrjjf Since Portia's story is comparatively a lot milder in terms of stakes, I think she'd make the best clone to take part in MTAE's story, whatever that ends up being! I'm planning to make another portrait of her for what she looks like going into MTAE, though that'll have to come later.....idk what exactly she'll look like down the line 😂

🌅 Occupation: Builder -> Governor

🌅 Birthday: Fall 4

🌅 Age (at the start of MTAP/MTAS): 23

🌅 Height: 5'5"/165 cm

Story:

The short version:

Wis’s absent father bequeathed his old Portian workshop to her, while she was being raised by her Aunt Kendra in Barnarock. All throughout her teenage years, her resentment for her father festered. She was hesitant to take up an inheritance from her father of all people, but her desire to be somewhere other than Barnarock outweighed her grudge against him. Just for a moment.

While outwardly polite and helpful, her lingering bitterness leads her to be quite isolated from the rest of the townsfolk for a while, even though they were truly grateful for her help in developing the town, and were curious to know her better.

Surprisingly, it was the antics of Higgins that first drew her out of her shell a little bit. He was just so comically disdainful of her that it was funny to talk to him just to prod him a little bit. They would eventually become the most steadfast of friends.

The other person that helped her open up was the mild and somewhat meek Dr. Xu. He saw Wis and right away saw someone in need of help. With her inexperience in building, Wis found herself at the clinic a lot, getting patched up for injuries. They formed a tenuous friendship that way, helped along by Phyllis and the Civil Corps crew, and that gradually blossomed into a soft, cautious, but very fulfilling romance.

Now, she sets her sights on Settlement 2, the events of lategame MTAP spurring a sudden thirst for adventure (perhaps supplemented by a hidden hint of jealousy...?). She and Xu move out to seek yet another horizon, keeping in touch with all the friends they made in Portia, proving that you don't need to abandon your loved ones just for the sake of adventure.

The (very) long version (contains spoilers for MTAP and MTAS)

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⚙️Kythera Marinos

My NPC OC for MTAE! She's not the governor, that'll be my Portia builder/P!Wis, but honestly I'm tempted to make an AU where she is 😂 She's sweet, a lil dreamy and ditzy, and just a little bit brutally petty. Just a smidge.

⚙️ Name: Kythera (kih-THEER-ra) - she/her ⚙️ Birthday: 1/6 ⚙️ Age: 24 ⚙️ Height: 5'8" ⚙️ Occupation: Engineer, tinkerer ⚙️ Place of origin: Vega 5

Bio: Kythera is a talented engineer from Vega 5, who studied mechanical engineering and graduated with top honors. However, she has no interest in the lofty, over-ambitious, and often reckless developments that Vega 5 prioritizes in every scientific discipline. Even less so considering how much of their attention is turned towards making instruments of war, or at least things that could supplement it. Her true passion lies in analog technology--clockwork, steam power, pre-power-stone electricity… She loves crafting little machines, toys, and automatons to delight and lift the spirit. Unfortunately, in the results-demanding, progress-hungry Vega 5, hardly anyone appreciated her work, some even going as far to say that it was worthless. She doesn't know why she lingered on Vega 5 for so long, without colleagues and only appreciated by the children of the island, but once she heard of the establishment of Settlement 2, and the accelerated sinking of Vega 5, she finally decided enough was enough. Without much of a second glance, she left for the burgeoning Evershine, to help out in her own way, and hopefully to have her true passions given the acknowledgement they deserve.

...She's a bit vindictive about how she was treated in Vega 5... Not especially concerned about the whole island sinking and everything...

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"He's picks his customers clean, much like a desert vulture does it's meals." Meet and Greet the deadliest man in the desert~ Monsieur Eloi

He's your local desert merchant and the official accountant of Sandrock~ Come to him if you have any troubles, he can fix them all... for a price~

This is my lil evil OC teehee, I thought I would finally get around to posting him on here!

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From The Tumbleweed Standard...

A Desert Ghost???

Even after bandits and Geeglers and talkin' Boxing Jacks, Sandrock's still got its fair share of weird prowlers 'round these sands. This time around, rumblings have started about a ghost! The sandstorms don't happen all too often anymore, but when they do, some say you can see a beautiful lady wandering about the outskirts of town, with the longest hair and a tattered dress and sandhat... No one knows who she is; after all, the blastin' sands make it hard to get a good look at her. Even more of a mystery is why she's wanderin' all alone out there when it's so dangerous. Now we here at the Tumbleweed Standard don't typically like to report on hearsay, but according to local teacher and kid wrangler Jane, she had a first-hand-up-close-and-personal encounter with this so-called ghost! "I made the mistake of putting off some errands for the last minute...and before I knew it, a sandstorm had kicked up! I thought I could still make it to the saloon, but I must have wandered out way too far, because I suddenly couldn't see any buildings... And then I tripped! It must have been a rock I didn't see. I was...scared... I was almost panicking a little... But then someone found me! It was a woman with these long, tattered robes...and an old sandhat! I almost screamed, but she just knelt down and asked if I was okay... And then she helped me back up and led me back to town by the arm... We reached the saloon, and I was just about to thank her, but then she just darted away! She...saved my life..." So it seems this "ghost" is a kindly one! Y'know, if they even ARE a ghost, bein' corporeal and all that. One more thing: Miss Jane also claimed that she managed to get a glimpse of the mystery woman's face! "I thought I was dreaming...and maybe it was all the sand...but she looked just like Wisteria!" It's an emerging fact that our resident builder extraordinaire Wisteria Cyprens has a couple of rather similar lookin' sisters...but at the time of writing, she couldn't be reached for comment. But kindly ghost or not, folks, please try to STAY INSIDE whenever a sandstorm kicks up! We might not get a lot of them anymore, but they're still mighty dangerous! We don't know if our mystery friend will be able to save you every time. Report written by Heidi Pictured: An artist's impression of the mystery woman from townsfolk descriptions

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S!Wis's story - the long version 🧡

[MTAS spoilers below]

🌲 Before Sandrock

Wis knew that she wanted to be a builder from a young age, when she discovered how much she liked working with her hands. From doing chores on her father's berry farm, to watching her mother on her sewing machine, she was always driven to making and moving. She graduated from Highwind's Builder Academy with decent grades, nothing too special.

Soon after, she bought a small building on the north edge of Highwind West, next to a sprawling pine forest. The region's famous winds would blow the refreshing scent of pine down the street everyday, and so Wis named her new workshop with that as her inspiration: Fresh Pines.

However, increasing corruption in the Commerce Guild eventually led to smaller or newer workshop owners like her being pushed out of the business with the lack of significant commissions, instead funneling most of the work to the wealthiest and those most in favor of the Commerce Guild's administration. Without any work, Wis was forced to close her workshop's doors after just over a year, and to find work as a contractor for one of those larger workshops.

Unrest amongst the disenfranchised builders began to stir, Wis included. A movement began to gain momentum for the Highwind government to investigate and eliminate the corruption and the suspicious practices of the Commerce Guild, and for tighter regulations to be passed on how it could distribute work across all its members. Unfortunately, the Highwind government was only moved to do very little, like conduct internal reviews of the Commerce Guild, which obviously turned up no wrongdoing. Discouraged, the builders' movement began to lose members, and those remaining could not sustain the same kind of attitude or momentum they used to have with greater numbers.

🌵 A Fresh Start in Sandrock

One day, several years after she lost her workshop, Wis was on her way to work when she saw an ad in the paper: Sandrock was looking for builders. And they'd provide workshops! With barely an ounce of hesitation, she applied, got accepted, and packed her bags to move out to Sandrock. Aside from Nia and her family, no one knew what she was doing or where she was going. Eventually, after enough time, Wis would wonder if she betrayed the builders' movement by suddenly vanishing and seizing an opportunity for herself, even if was in a completely different place, and she wasn't deeply involved with organizing the movement's efforts.

Aside from the heat, she took to Sandrock immediately, what with its constant need to upkeep its vital infrastructure and its sparse amount of staffing. She grit her teeth against the machinations of Yan, who was very clearly trying to exploit her building experience to get more work out of her, and built up rapport with the townsfolk. In no time at all, she found herself a part of this toughskinned, but warm little community.

🌠 Wis and Qi 🌙

In particular, she found herself forming an unexpected bond with Qi. Despite their initial general apathy towards each other (and Wis's annoyance towards Qi), the construction of the mobile suit marked a sudden shift. By that point, they'd already seen their mutual interest in Old World relics, and the quality of each other's work, and from that point on, they began to grow closer as friends. It certainly helped that learning Wis was a clone only sparked Qi's interest in spending more time with her, under the guise of studying.

Their objectives in life were more or less on opposite ends of the spectrum. Wis wanted a life where she could perform fulfilling work and figure out what else made her happy on the side, like her hobbies and interests in gardening and history. What Qi wanted more than anything else was for his work (and by proxy, himself) to be recognized by his peers in Vega 5, after having a key piece of his work stolen and taken credit for, and no one coming to his aid in the aftermath. Wis was planning on staying in Sandrock for good. Qi saw Sandrock as a stepping stone for his eventual return to Vega 5.

In spite (or perhaps because?) of the contrast, they grew closer. Their curiosity for each other grew, they grew to enjoy each other’s company more, and soon the first hints of romantic thoughts crept into their heads. Wis more readily accepted her growing feelings, though Qi...could not at all say the same for his own. If anything, he tried to pretend that it was some sort of ailment, someone else's thoughts interfering with his own, or just some...thing that couldn't possibly be a part of him.

When tensions began to rise with the water theft and the infiltration of Duvos gradually coming to light, with Wis gradually being inserted into a pivotal role of keeping Sandrock safe, somewhat against her own will, and Qi wrestling with increasing internal conflict about his feelings, his work, and his life's goals, so too did their feelings.

It wasn't until Wis fell over a cliff per Logan's plans that things finally began to spill over.

In this newly-revealed scheme with Duvos, keeping some of the heaviest secrets, suddenly being asked to fight well outside her capacity as a builder with dozens of lives she cared about on the line, Wis needed some form of stability. Everything was changing so quickly and she had nothing to anchor herself with.

Despite fighting his own mind and heart for so long, trying to convince himself that he wanted and needed nothing outside his work success, trying to drown himself in work to try and numb himself with things he could understand and explain away with pure empiricism and logic, Qi couldn't deny the sudden wave of agony that had taken hold soon after Wis was reported to have fallen.

And so, one starry night when they both finally had a moment of calm after Wis came "back from the dead", alone together out in the sandy outskirts, they talked. They fell silent. There was a wordless moment of understanding. And then their lips gently met.

⚔️ The Invasion and the Aftermath

The invasion was stressful, to say the very least. Wis really didn’t appreciate quite literally falling into the role of one of the town’s only defenders, particularly when it came to Grace, not only who she thought was a trusted friend, but also who she trusted to do better than a scheme like Logan’s weird little Secret Test of Character (tm). On the other side, the rest of the town was recovering surprisingly well after being witness to an act of war. So while the rest of the Alliance sings Wis’s praises and calls her a hero, she still has to endure nightmares and basophobia, and she feels like she’s being left behind.

It takes a while for her to be able to work through the trauma to get it down to a level to where it doesn't bother her on a near constant basis, and to send the message out to others that her being a fabled hero was the last thing she wanted. She was just a builder. A person. Push came to shove and she had to step outside that box, and she succeeded, but the fact remained that she was shoved.

Gradually though, with time and the help of some of her clone sisters, her friends, and her new partner, she heals. And she helps Sandrock heal in the process, helping become the Jewel of the Eufaula that it always deserved to be.

🌄 What’s next?

Hard to say! I think later on into MTAS Act 3 she and the other builders in the region organize into a rough little union. Considering Wei is generally pretty agreeable and actually has some concern for his employees, they probably use it as a pilot and a template for other commerce guilds around the Alliance and encourage the builders there to follow suit. And Wis takes advantage of her reputation to sway that into happening. Especially in Highwind, which started this entire business in the first place!

She does eventually get married and way later down the line she builds a robochild, but with the events of MTAE, we’ll have to see. When she received word that P!Wis was planning on going to Settlement 2, she was immediately skeptical. She knew the true motivation behind the Northern Development Plan, and even though P!Wis would be the governor, she could see that the military would just as easily flick her aside if they saw fit. Worse, she effectively becomes a puppet leader for them, or worse still…she loses herself to the most extreme Anti-Duvos barkers, and advocate to conquer and colonize just as Duvos has. Plus, with all the shit that S!Wis had to deal with Duvos in MTAS, she's absolutely not jumping the gun to leave behind a community that she fought to preserve and move out to a war front. Considering the MTAS builder's slated to appear in MTAE, we'll have to see how that story plays out...

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T!Wis's story - the long version ❤️

[MTAS and MTAP spoilers below]

🪙 Childhood

When they married, Viktor Willows and Sophia Willows brought together two heads of the biggest industries in the Alliance: Viktor, banking and finances, and Sophia, the railroad. Obviously, to preserve their fortunes and their names, they wished to have children who would grow up to prosperous futures. Outside all the material needs for their children (a life of comfort, the best education money could buy, the smartest and most resourceful people in the Alliance mere handshakes away), they wanted to truly cover all of their bases. That included on a spiritual front, despite neither having really grown up with particularly superstitious beliefs.

And so they paid a visit to the most famous soothsayer in the world, in the capital of Seesai, who read the stars and their energies and compatibilities and all sorts to determine the best way to go about the future, including how many children to have. Three, the soothsayer said. Three children, no more, no less, and their business and family would be prosperous and well.

Viktor and Sophia were able to have two children themselves; first their son Diamantis, then their daughter Chrysanthi. But they sadly found themselves unable to produce another child, so in a panic, they turned to adoption.

Meanwhile, V5!Wis and her father were still in the process of adopting out the other clones. Vega 5 was their facilitator, helping them seek out potential good families. Once they got word that the wealthy Willows family was looking to adopt a child, they pressured the Lins to let them adopt the next clone. Not only would it be a boost for their reputations, but help Vega 5 score a potential private funding partner. The Lins weren't entirely sold on the Willows' potential to be a good family for a clone; their fame and prominent standing in society was actually the exact opposite of what they wanted. They aimed for more ordinary people, focused on making the best for themselves and those around them, not entirely clouded by external ambition. But as time passed, Vega 5's pressure only grew, and they were all but forced to let the Willows take the next clone in.

T!Wis's childhood wasn't entirely bad. Her parents doted on all of their children, fostering their interests. While her siblings took interest in the family business and the cutthroat world of politics, Wis was intrigued by the relatively humble occupation of building. A highly-respected profession across the world, essential for the continued well-being of every society, but comparatively...low class. At first, Wis's parents thought her interest in it was merely a phase. But when she was in middle school, she expressed interest in becoming a builder for a living. And that was when things started taking a turn for the worse.

While her siblings shot to the top of their school rankings with nearly every honor and award under the sun, Wis was more focused on shop classes and practical science and engineering classes. Her parents tried to dissuade her from her path, but when you tell a teenager that they're wrong and wasting their potential, they naturally only want to double down. The parental comparisons began, both among her siblings and with her classmates (which, of course, they knew all the families of). Why couldn't Wis be more like her brother and sister? Doesn't she know that building's a saturated market in Atara? She'd be a lot more secure if she goes for something better. It wasn't too late to change courses. They could get tutors. Have her shadow within the Willows' company. Her brother's the heir to the big man's chair, but certainly with enough effort they could at least get her into the C-suite...

The more time passed, the less and less Wis wanted to listen to the grumbling of her parents. Her relationship with her siblings strained as she tried to get them to realize that something was wrong. They admitted that they weren't entirely comfortable with all the things they were saying, and tried to dissuade their parents' remarks a little bit, but they ultimately still felt too intimidated to do anything drastic, fearing that displeasing them would lead to the loss of their support and their home. Far easier to lie and save face to keep the household together.

☁️ Tallsky

Wis began applying to builder academies in late high school, and her parents finally relented a little once she had received an offer from Tallsky's academy. Tallsky was known as the "City of Builders," having originated the profession as we know it today, and only continuing to foster a community of incredibly skilled builders, even entire lineages dedicated to the craft and passing techniques down through the ages. Wis's parents figured that as long as she was at the top of the building industry, maybe it'd be okay.

Wis's time at academy was a breath of fresh air. A solid 4 years away from the pressures of her family (though people did recognize her as being a Willows, which was always awkward at best), surrounded by people and a culture that was driven so much by what she was passionate about. She always dreaded going home during breaks and vacations.

After she graduated, she was to immediately start a workshop in Atara, hopefully to climb the ranks and build herself a good enough reputation there. After a year, though, whatever results she got weren't enough to satisfy her parents, once again comparing her to her older siblings, primed to take over the Willows' company at a moment's notice and freshly elected to the Alliance Counsel (the youngest member in history, no less).

At her wit's end and just a hair's breadth away from exploding entirely, Wis managed to finagle a deal out of her parents. One last chance. She'd move back to Tallsky instead and build her career there. It wasn't Atara, but for builders, it was definitely the next best thing.

And so she got herself a fresh start, but unlike her time in the academy, she wasn't terribly interested in being agreeable. She had to prove herself, and with what she experienced in Atara, she had to be able to do anything to get ahead. So while her rankings were unmatched, she quickly garnered another reputation: for being the most ruthless and deceptive builder anyone had the displeasure of working with. Don't take her offers of collaboration, she'll write you a contract to screw you out of the profits and rep points. Snatch commissions up while you can, because we're pretty sure she's exploiting legal loopholes to get more. She's not technically doing anything illegal, so we can't bring the Commerce Guild down on her. Her clients don't complain, because her work is legitimately incredibly skilled. Everyone was at a deadlock when it came to Wis.

🪻 Another her...?

One day, at a meeting with a supplier in Walnut Groove, Wis was wandering down a street filled with happy, passionate artisans, all going about their day. She didn't think very much of them. The whole culture of Walnut Groove was kind of laughable to her. So lackadaisical. No ambition. So imagine her displeasure when she suddenly sees her own face...happily throwing lopsided pots on a wheel, in a workshop on the side of a street. This was Wisteria Lark.

As it turns out....Wis's parents neglected to tell her that how she got adopted...and the fact that she was a clone. This other clone, Walnut Groove!Wis, was delighted to meet another one of them for the first time, but was immediately put off a little by her new clone sister's rather unpleasant disposition. T!Wis saw WG!Wis as everything she couldn't be. Middle of the road. Making mistakes. Happy with mediocrity. Despite that, she was convinced to give WG!Wis her address, if only to send her letters every once in a while to gloat.

Things only escalated from there, because only a few weeks later, she saw her face again. This time on every newspaper in the news stand. The Hero of Sandrock. Wisteria Cyprens. And then again just a few days later. Also in the papers, posing tranquilly next to in progress repairs in Portia, which was just devastated by the attack by the Rogue Knight. Wisteria Birck.

Her own face, elsewhere in the world, being happy and finding fame and caring people by the circumstances dropping them into their laps. While she toils around in the dust, everything she wants constantly evading her.

She angrily reached out to S!Wis and P!Wis, sending them letters and telegrams to challenge them to build-offs, demanding that they square off in order prove her superiority. Both of them, exhausted and not up for another hostile threat, especially from another clone, refused and told her to back down. Undeterred, she ventured out to Sandrock herself to give S!Wis a piece of her mind. Luckily (though it would soon be unluckily), not only was S!Wis there, but so were P!Wis and D!Wis. D!Wis happened to be traveling the world at the time and arrived in Sandrock after the invasion, and both she and P!Wis were there to see S!Wis and aid in her recovery from the invasion.

Naturally, none of them were pleased to meet the very annoyed T!Wis, and while they harshly told her to stand down, after doing some digging, they approached her again with the worst thing imaginable: pity. It seems like they managed to figure things out from what WG!Wis told them, and from news in Tallsky and what they knew about the Willows family. It doesn't have to be like this, they said. Who was T!Wis even trying to prove herself to?

❌ The Breaking Point

T!Wis abruptly left Sandrock once her sisters started trying to sympathize with her. This was even worse than dealing with her family. Or so she thought.

All the pent up resentment, combined the all the new anger towards her clone sisters, finally came crashing down the next Winter Solstice, when she returned to Atara for the holidays, and what would be the last time.

What started as an ordinary New Year's feast turned sour once Wis's career was mentioned, along with the other clones. Things escalated quickly, ending explosively as Wis screamed out all her true feelings towards her parents' treatment throughout the years, before rifling through the estate, grabbing as any valuables and her things as she could carry, and leaving for good, catching the next train to Tallsky just a few hours later.

She couldn't work for a week solid after that. Rumors quickly started churning, and Wis started feeling the walls closing in on her. She couldn't do this anymore. She had to run away. Someone where no one would talk about her, no one would recognize her, nothing.

In a desperate measure, she vented to WG!Wis in a letter, not expecting anything to come out of it. She was the only one left who she hadn't completely infuriated. To her surprise, WG!Wis offered her a place at her workshop in Walnut Groove. Being such a carefree place that hardly paid attention to rankings and things like that over the love and passion of individual craft, it was the perfect place to get away and lie low. Her name wasn't anywhere near as big there.

So T!Wis pulled some strings, striking her name from the Atara and Tallsky resident records, and set her old workshop alight. And then she saddled up a horse and made her way to Walnut Groove, to hopefully live a calmer, more fulfilled life.

💅 What's next?

T!Wis's biggest goal from here on out will be to relearn her true passion for her craft, which she lost when it got swallowed by her need to prove herself. And more importantly, how to calm tf down 💀 WG!Wis will help her accomplish that with her incredibly contrasting nature, being a serial hobbyist that chases the high of finding new passions, and T!Wis will gradually help her in turn by teaching her how to bite the bullet and strive for mastery in a craft, which requires dealing with the frustration plateaus and blocks.

Eventually she'll reconcile with her other clone sisters, and come to see them as her true family. Their eccentricities and their different approaches to life, despite them all having the same face, voice, and name, become a source of comfort for her. She doesn't have to be the one disgraced Willows, the tumor on their perfect nuclear family. She's a Wisteria. Doing her own thing like all the others.

...Perhaps until MTAE, though. Given how the background of the story is about the ever increasing tensions with Duvos, I think that a wealthy family like the Willows would start getting involved...and maybe not in good ways. We'll have to see how T!Wis manages to handle her old parents and brother potentially trying to fund war efforts along the border and in Evershine...she might have to head on over there to try and persuade P!Wis not to take their sponsorships...

Perhaps she may even try to reconcile with the Willows siblings and have them finally resolve their family conflicts for the better? 👀 Have her brother start running the business in more ethical ways and for better reasons? Maybe her sister gets voted out of office when she doesn't take the more extreme platform to bolster efforts towards all out war and T!Wis helps her to advocate for more beneficial policies at a local level? Who knows...

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Wisteria Willows ❤️

a.k.a. Tallsky!Wis or T!Wis

My meanie gorl... She's an ass and she won't apologize until way later in her story so I will apologize on her behalf in advance dlkdrjkdfjj

💅 Occupation: Builder

💅 Birthday: Summer 17

💅 Age (at the start of MTAP/MTAS): 22

💅 Height: 5'3"/160 cm

Story

The short version:

Youngest daughter of the wealthy Willows family, a clan with a long history in finances and the railroad. While her siblings took up illustrious careers inheriting the family business and joining the Alliance Counsel, Wis opted for a much more humble path: building. Constantly compared to the success of her siblings and other children of wealthy families, her relationship with her family was never really more close than basic civilities by the time she was a teenager.

Following a disagreement with her parents, she returned to Tallsky after graduating from their Builder Academy to make her name in the city of builders. Ruthless and deceptive right up to the limit of legality, she is determined to cement herself as not just the best builder in Tallsky, but the Alliance, if not the world. Though it's readily evident to anyone aside from herself that she's trying to prove herself to her own self first, even above her family.

The (very) long version (contains spoilers for MTAP and MTAS)

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Behold, the simplified relationship chart for all the clones....

(you'd best open image in new tab if on desktop....)

Couple things to note:

Several points on here are other ppl's OCs!

This doesn't include all of S!Wis and P!Wis's NPC friends made in their respective towns...because this chart is too large as is 💀 only the most important ones are on there.

When a relationship is marked as "dependent," that means that they could vary depending on universe/continuity, since I'm a multishipper!

Yellow = Not related, Solid orange = biological family, Dotted orange = adopted family

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Wis's Baby Pictures 💖🥺

ah. hm. hang on, that isn't right...

uh... thought i had it somewhere...

hmmm....

wait no, wrong picture...

wait, something else is coming through here...

ahhh wait here it is!

there we go :>

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Wisteria Cyprens 🧡

a.k.a Sandrock Wis, or S!Wis

The OG Wis! (p!wis was technically the first but she wasn't nearly as developed so shhhhhhhhhhh) She's changed a lot since I first conceptualized her all the way back in April 2023. Back then she was just "hehe she really like building a lot and she's a clone wahoo". Fast forward a year and suddenly she's a deconstruction of the aftermath of the spoiler arc in MTAS's main story that I'm still in the process of writing a whole damn longfic for dlkdrkjdkr

🌄 Occupation: Builder

🌄 Birthday: Fall 26

🌄 Age (at the start of MTAP/MTAS): 25

🌄 Height: 5'4"/163 cm

Story:

The short version:

Originally from Highwind, Wisteria once had a workshop that later closed down. But from her insatiable appetite for building and the solid quality of her work, it evidently wasn’t any fault of her own. Though outwardly rather reserved, she is a warm and stalwart companion to those she trusts. She likes to garden, finding the inhospitable soil of the desert a fascinating challenge.

She fell in love with the eccentric Director Qi, at a time where both of them were feeling the turmoil of the events in Sandrock, and when they both started to question for the first time where their happiness truly lied. Their curiosity for the past, the stars, and each other brought them together, and the constant, steadying, and pragmatic presence they could give each other kept them together through thick and thin.

She's not particularly fond of the grandiose reputation and attention she gets towards the end of MTAS's story as the "hero of Sandrock." She'd much rather be remembered as a builder that helped keep Sandrock on its feet time and time again instead of a fabled war hero.

The (very) long version (contains spoilers for MTAS)

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~Lore~ FAQ

Last Updated: 12/2/24

Why were the clones made?

No one* knows...though there's not a whole lot of good reasons why clones would be made, if you think about it...

Who were the clones cloned from?

Someone from the Old World. No records of her were ever kept, since whoever made the clones didn't really think it prudent to keep them... The only information that remains is that the original was a student in her twenties at the time her genome was taken. And that's it.

How were the clones found? How is it that they're out and about in the world?

Dr. Zhijian Lin, a researcher from Seesai that would later move to Vega 5, was out on a research expedition in an undisclosed location, when he stumbled upon a large and somewhat intact ruin. It led deep underground, revealing all sorts of labs. In one room, he found an array of strange machines, each with a large tank filled with an unknown liquid...and suspended in some of them...was a baby. Already fully developed, someone just needed to get them out and cut the umbilical cords.

The researcher reported this all to Vega 5 right away, and set out to try and release all of the babies so they could live. The first clone he released was Vega 5!Wis, and he decided to raise her as his own daughter to make sure that the clones would be able to survive. Once she reached adulthood, they both started finding families to adopt the others to. And that's how the others came about!

Why “Wisteria?”

Near the ruins of the lab, the researcher saw a wisteria tree. The identical, clustered blossoms gave him an idea. Initial testing from some very carefully gathered samples pointed to all the babies being genetically identical to one another...and so he collectively named them all Wisteria, hoping that one day they'd all be able to grow and flourish!

So this researcher had the bright idea to name a bunch of IDENTICAL clones the same name???

Yes! :>

Who is #8?

There are 7 Wisterias, but 8 clones. #8 is the only non-Wis clone. She was a bit more hidden away and harder to access in the clone's facility, and the researcher and V5!Wis never managed to find her. She is also different in that she was put under suspended animation as an adult, around the age of 20 or so. 8 is not her name, nor is it a nickname she takes in universe, that's just what I and the folks over at OTAS have taken to calling her for now.

How'd #8 get out, then?

Someone else found her. They had significantly less benevolent reasons to release her than the researcher with the Wisterias...

Why is #8's name a secret?

She's rather reclusive. That and she doesn't really like talking about herself. The other clones don't even know about her very existence until after MTAS is finished. Aside from herself, there's only one person who knows her name beforehand. Hence, her name is kept a secret...for now.

Is there anything weird about the clones' bodies, given how they were made?

With the Wisterias? No. They are all 100% standard humans. Barring Duvos!Wis, of course, since Duvos modified her themselves. Presumably they don't have to worry about clone degradation either...whoever made them probably had to solve that problem first and foremost in order to get them to actually be viable.

With #8? Oh yes, there is definitely something weird about her physical makeup. And it's more than just her hair :>

How many clones are there?

There are only 8 clones left today.

How many clones WERE there, total?

No one knows the exact number. Far more than 8, though, that’s for sure.

…How many clones WILL THERE BE, in the future???

These 8 are the only “canon” ones (there IS a ninth clone…but she will only be around temporarily…).

The reason why I limit the main ones to 8 is because I want all of them to have their own part in the overarching narrative of the clones, their origins, how they find each other, and how they learn about who they are. And it’s difficult to fit any more, especially when WG!Wis is already hard enough for me to give a significant plot for!! She has a significant part in other clones’ stories, but she herself is the least consequential to the overall narrative (at least, at the time of writing this).

However, I do have a bunch of non-canon clone concepts for regions I didn’t get around to, and coming up with more, even for regions I’ve already covered, would be fun :>

Do you have a condensed timeline of events for the clones?

Work in progress, but eventually yes. The establishing events of their story are pretty much done and set in stone, but I'm largely still working out the details of the individual clones' stories, and now with MTAE being added to the My Time canon, things are still in development. What I'll likely do is have a post for a timeline that will get updated as new details come to light.

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FAQ

What is "The Wisteria Project?"

In universe, that is the name of the project started by Vega 5!Wis's father, who discovered the clones and the lab facility they were inside. The objective was to be able to release all of the clones safely from suspended animation, and adopt them out to families that would be willing to love and care for them, and pass the story of their unusual origins onto them. Did they succeed? Mmmm...sort of...

Out of universe, that is the name I've put to developing all of these characters, through art, writing, and whatever else will help me tell their stories!

I have questions about the clones’ lore…

See this post! But also feel free to send an ask if you got another question (especially if it’s for an individual clone!) :>

Can our OCs be friends/lovers/etc??

ABSOLUTELY!! I would love having more fwends for my silly gorls, and I’m a multishipper, so they could potentially smooch 👀👉👈 Feel free to ask in DMs/asks/notes/etc….I am shy and I barely know how to ask y’all 😅

Are your asks/DMs open?

Also ABSOLUTELY!! Please feel free to say hi or give me an excuse to yap about any of the clones :> Only request I have is to keep things SFW…the OTAS NSFW section is perhaps the only place I feel comfortable talking about that stuff lol

Why clones? Where did this concept come from?

I’ve never made proper OCs before, even for farming/life sim games. For player insert characters, I just make myself 😂 Normally it’s not a problem, each game is its own lil universe. But with the My Time games, they all take place in the same world…so between having a “me” in both Portia and Sandrock and those games taking place at the same time, more or less, I had to be able to justify that somehow in universe. And then I thought, what if they were just clones??? After all, this is kind of a sci-fi world and it’s implied that the Old World was VERY advanced, so it’s 100% plausible, isn’t it?

If you’re wondering whether they’re still self-inserts or not, the answer is kind of? They’re separate characters from me and always have been, but all of them take inspiration from parts of me and my life or the lives of people around me!

What about each individual clone and their story?

When it comes to creative work, I’m very much a top-down person. Everything stems from a core premise, purpose or idea, and whatever else it needs on the side to flesh it out or to get it executed comes afterwards.

Portia!Wis and Sandrock!Wis were tied very heavily to the stories of their respective games, but I also use them to expand on or analyze some central part of the generic player character. For the clones in other cities, their central premise was based on me thinking about what little we know about these other places, and what kinds of people would come out of being ingratiated into their respective cultures. Who would you become growing up in the culturally rich and laid back city of Walnut Groove? What about the power hungry army of Duvos? Right on a war front in Lucien? etc.

How the hell can you tell the clones apart?!?

I know, it's hard! 😂 But these are the primary distinguishers:

Color: I associate each clone with a particular thematic color, all in a rainbow. I mark their tags with a respective color heart emoji! You'll see it as the background of their ref arts, and I try to incorporate them in some form into their designs.

Hairstyle: Each clone wears their hair differently, though they all share some features like the hair part or tucking it behind their ears when it's long enough.

City/country: Each clone is associated with a particular place. Note that it's not necessarily the place where they were raised in, just the place that they're most strongly associated with (and also, to be able to distinguish them somewhat because there's a bit of overlap where some of them live with each other lol). When I refer to a clone, unless it's obvious which one I'm talking about, I'll always prepend the first letter of their place to their name (e.g. Sandrock!Wis -> S!Wis)

Surname: Every clone has a unique surname….but I’m not expecting anyone to memorize all of them lol 😂

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Ｗｅｌｃｏｍｅ

This is a sideblog for my OCs in the universe of the My Time series of games, the main ones being a handful of clones from the pre-apocalypse Old World, kept in suspended animation for centuries before being "born" and raised in the modern era. Their stories are based on events from My Time at Portia, My Time at Sandrock, the upcoming My Time at Evershine, and the expanded world of these games that the canon has yet to show us all of.

If you're new to the clones' story, I recommend checking out my blog FAQ and lore FAQ to get a primer!

Asks/DMs are open :> Come yap OCs with me!

Tags (links will appear once actual posts start getting made about them):

❤️ Wisteria Willows, a.k.a Tallsky!Wis or T!Wis

🧡 Wisteria Cyprens, a.k.a Sandrock!Wis or S!Wis

💛 Wisteria Ashpen, a.k.a Lucien!Wis or L!Wis

💚 Wisteria Ashe, a.k.a Duvos!Wis or D!Wis

🩵 Wisteria Birck, a.k.a Portia/Evershine!Wis or P/E!Wis

💙 Wisteria Lin, a.k.a Vega 5!Wis or V5!Wis

💜 Wisteria Lark, a.k.a Walnut Groove!Wis or WG!Wis

🖤 ??????, a.k.a. #8 (for now)

🌈 All clones

✨ Other characters in the cloneverse (fankids, family members, etc)

Other places I am:

@shady-groves: My main blog, not used for very much aside from reblogging cool things I come across :>

@sanddusted-wisteria: A sideblog specifically for Sandrock!Wis and MTAS!

My AO3 - I've only written stories for S!Wis as of now, though that might change as time goes on

Bluesky

You can also find me on the Our Time at Sandrock discord!

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Same as it ever was

Same as it ever was

Same as it ever was

Same as it ever was

Same as it ever was

Same as it ever was

Same as it ever was

Same as it ever was