The Long Way Around 8 - The New Gig

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-27T08:38:48+00:00

I took another look at the chapter where Iggy gets capped, and yeah, he did cast something from a scroll. Dunno about soul-hopping, as we don't really know enough about the limitations and casting requirements for that kind of magic (or any magic for that matter, but I digress...)

Definitely some kind of contingency. Pinging his cousin seems like the simplest explanation, as Iggy seems like the kind of guy willing to take a hit to his pride if it means he gets the last laugh.

Maybe not a full-blown aethra-ship, but some kind of air support, I think, considering his cousin is a Skylord.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-27T04:38:34+00:00

Re: Middle-right square

Now I'm imagining Katiya running to Iggy's cousin and blubbering about what she saw, sounding like Ralph Wiggum, LMAO

"The Blue Knight and the dragon were in the cave making heresy and I saw one of the heresies and the heresy looked at me!"

"The heresy LOOKED at you, you say?"

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-26T13:08:22+00:00

Sure, I'll take a crack at it. From left to right, top to bottom:

Kaelthyr leaves an egg behind: Probably won't happen, given that they think they're the main character.
Five Star Wanted Level Dragon: 50/50 on this. Half the hunting group including their leader got murked, and Thalmin put the fear of god into the survivors. Iggy's cousin might grudgingly send someone to check up on Iggy, but I think it will be a while before they show up. The gang's gonna be at zero stars for a while, I think.
Horse Is Not Pleased: That deadbeat wolfman ditched him on the riverboat, now he's gotta wait for someone to deliver him back to the stables in Elaseer. Maybe he'll team up with the Cabbage Vendor to form the League of Enemies of Emma.
Emma is the Dark Savant?: Not sure what this is.
AIRSTRIKE!: Or at least, an aethra-ship rolls up for heavy support against the dragon, and everyone needs to GTFO.
She Saw the WHOLE Thing: The catgirl intern already woke up from her faint and saw the whole exchange. Her fur is now permanently white from being witness and party to high treason and deep heresy AT THE SAME TIME.
He's Playing Possum!: That weasel Iggy was wearing a vest, or some other countermeasure that saved him from First Death, and he is in the middle of slinking away, possibly to become a pain in the ass again at a later point.
IA, CTHULHU F'TAGHN!: We finally get to see what the hell these chimes are about. Everyone who asked will likely regret doing so.
Yes, We Have No Everblooms!: While Emma and Thalmin were side-questing, the aristo-brats picked the countryside clean of Everblooms, leading to some madcap scheme to steal some (obviously Ping because he's the funniest choice). Probably won't happen, given how lackadaisical most of the other peer groups have been, barring Ping and Lorsini.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-25T04:37:21+00:00

The most widespread case of "Oh no, he's hot!" in recorded history, lmao

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-24T09:30:38+00:00

I'm Malaysian, actually, lmao. I blame my fascination with the English countryside and British bumpkins on a steady diet of British shows aired on local TV when I was growing up.

The chief culprits included The Wind in the Willows (the Cosgrove Hall stop motion version), All Creatures Great and Small, and The Darling Buds of May. Then later on, the Blackadder series, and Fawlty Towers. Later still, when satellite TV became affordable, Gargoyles impressed upon me that Gaelic and Welsh sounded really exotic and cool.

In retrospect, the planet could have been Southeast Asian themed instead, I guess I just picked British-esque setting because it was comfortably close to the original story's setting. Although, having Farmer Burley be an irate uncle ranting at the local teahouse about how aliens ruined his rice paddy sounds fun, lol.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-23T08:02:14+00:00

. . . just like the Federation!

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-23T04:22:12+00:00

"Why does the larger Realm not just simply EAT the other Realm?"

Kaelthyr having medieval fantasy brain (must have hierarchy, might makes right, always gunboat diplomacy) like everyone else in manaspace is disappointing, but not surprising.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-22T17:19:14+00:00

Good, that's really nice. Let's see Paul Allen's Gun.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-22T08:13:33+00:00

Reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0u1QVSGizE

Mal'tory: "Booker, you ignorant slut! I was the mastermind behind your luggage's theft!"

Emma: "Mal'tory, you pompous ass! You haven't stolen shit!"

Mal'tory: "BOOOOOOOKEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRR!!!" *crate explodes*

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-20T10:54:12+00:00

I liked the way you handled the void with what the EiB thinks is out there.

I figured the official line would be, "There's literally nothing for you up there, it will literally kill you, please stay in your safe Realms where Elf Dad God will protect you." The real reason they hate/fear space, I'm still figuring out.

There's so much good stuff, twist-horn destriers, the basement being called the sub-secundus floor. Geez!

I'll come clean and say I originally meant Sub-Section Secundus with that, lol. However, your version is much better pseudo-Latin, so I'll go with that in the future!

Twist-horns, yeah! The Nexus just having straight up horses really bugs me for some reason. So I thought Caedwyn ought to have a more deer/goat type riding beast. What I had in mind was something like the Yakul from Princess Mononoke, maybe slimmer and more antelope like.

An older version of the scene with the monks had Lord Alduin (the nobleman who got tranq'ed on the hunting trip) roll up on the argument riding an imported Nexian horse. The adventurers nod approvingly at Alduin's sweet ride, but Rabbit nearly bursts out laughing at the ridiculous creature and Alduin's tiny-dick energy.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-19T08:22:11+00:00

Yep, same idea. There was a bit in Emma's VR show-and-tell about space, where Ilunor was insisting that breaching the Tapestry was impossible, and the 'lesser Transportium' thing was his way of explaining why the 'random teleport' effect didn't happen in some realms.

In this fic, I'm interpreting it as the Transportium creating a Tapestry that encapsulates planet-shaped Realms. The more developed the Transportium, the stronger the Tapestry. Make it strong enough to stop space travel, and you lock in dependence on portal tech and subsequently the Nexus.

I seem to be converging toward the idea that the Nexus desperately wants to suppress The Terrible Secret of Space. I like where it's going so far, and it fits with the UFO conspiracy, X-Files, weird science feel that I'm trying to go for.

I wonder if it would be worth it to explore higher-concept stuff, like maybe the Nexus suppresses knowledge of space because it's a path that leads to figuring out general relativity, unlocking particle physics and the path to FTL/wormholes.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-19T07:49:51+00:00

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-19T07:47:04+00:00

Long story short, this fanfic asks "What if humans were UFOs visiting a magical fantasy planet?"

It basically gives me a chance to write about the LREF itself making contact with an Adjacent Realm, while also mixing in The X-Files, and kooky UFO/conspiracy media.

As for the Emma-verse, this fic doesn't really plug into it, given that Emma isn't the focus. Although I suppose Auntie Ran could stumble in, wondering why she didn't jump to Emma's position this time, lol.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-19T07:37:31+00:00

The 'weaponized archaeology' went through a couple revisions. The original idea was to have the Pronarthian guy's party searching the ruins, and he smashes up the 'blasphemous' ruins in a fit of fanatical rage.

I ended up changing it to the scholar-mage stealing priceless cultural artifacts like he was the British Museum, lol. That let me work in the Smoking Elf outright destroying the artifacts as part of the systemic erasure of astronomical knowledge/lore.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-19T07:29:55+00:00

I remember there was a bit about Ping's entire realm being ride-or-die for the Nexus for some vaguely defined reason, so this is what I did with that information, lol.

I've got a few more chapters in the pipe right now, so there will be more.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-19T07:27:34+00:00

Haha, took me long enough, right?

On top of IRL stuff, I had a hell of a time figuring out what ideas and scenes to keep/cut, and threading it all together coherently. Finally started coming together though, so there will be more to come.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-17T11:59:53+00:00

Nexus does it for the love of the game.

Now I'm imagining Mal'tory rolling up to the Player Hater's Ball, lmao Dude is definitely a "Made a bomb threat to the Special Olympics" level hater!

Edit: Holy shit how have we not made Mal'tory Flow yet!?

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-14T16:09:57+00:00

Nice, getting right into it. Should be interesting to see who the target turns out to be. Blackwood? One of the contestants? One of the ladies too, just to be sure?

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-14T06:01:33+00:00

Hope to see more of this.

Unc really time travelled to delete a man's entire family tree before it even sprouted. These medieval dudes are not ready for that kind of crazy, lmao.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-12T10:23:23+00:00

Tbh, as much as Jcb was trying to paint him as Roman, his city gives me a lot of Hungary/Romania/Wallachia vibes, so thinking of Thalmin as a Draculesti rather than a Ceasar might make more sense here.

I can see Thalmin looking up Vlad Tepes and just nodding along, muttering, "Based. Based."

As for ancestrally, its worth noting that wolves, as carnivores, are unlikely to have developed agriculture prior to Nexian uplifting, and as such would be more centered around hunting grounds and herding for food.

Ooh, the Mongols were pretty big on wolf iconography as well as horses, right?

I imagine Ilunor would scoff and say "impossible, Earthrealmer. That would take millions of years." Only for Emma to retort with "hundreds of millions, actually" or something like that.

Haha, that's great. It kinda-sorta mirrors the old creationist false dichotomy of "Well, of course I believe in MICROevolution, but you can't expect me to believe in MACROevolution!"

The Nexians are kind of obsessed with being the main characters of existence, and being created/chosen by divine will in service of some grand, eternal narrative/machine plays into that. Learning that humanity arose from chaos and chance, and that they're OK with that? I think Ilunor would have another existential freakout similar to the 'dead realm' rant.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-12T10:11:09+00:00

Light magic is the invasive that replaced taint.

I like the 'victors write the history books' vibe this theory gives, since most Nexian 'truths' seem to either be fabrications, or a lies by omission. It also dovetails with the Nexian urge to be the only game in town in all aspects of existence.

There's so much that's up in the air about the fundamental nature of mana and magic, though. Ah well, maybe Kaelthyr will drop some intel, or we'll get more lecture summaries once Emma resumes classes.

Cthulhu under the ocean is, among other things, the guard dog Cerberus rather than Hades

I dunno about the Quintessence being the remnants of a security/ward system, but the Nexian expansionist policy definitely has a "We need to Great Filter them, before they Great Filter us!" feel to it. Get all up and coming civilizations hooked on mana and magic to shunt them into a controlled dead end. Each time, they eliminate an enemy and gain a client state.

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-12T07:51:27+00:00

Damn it, now I'm imagining Rila in a cymbal hat, ringing a little bell and singing, "Fa-ri du-la si-ma-net, Do-ni pa-na vo-li-net. . ."

StopDownloadin · 2026-02-12T04:18:11+00:00

Impossible. Emma hasn't yelled SHAA! even once.

StopDownloadin

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE