“One big one walking around the ridge—how many in the forest?” Boko asked. “Just the one?”
August cleared his throat in an effort to gather himself and then spoke up.
“I heard the noise in two different spots in a pretty short amount of time,” August said, “So either it was two of them or just one that was moving around a lot.”
“Still probably doable,” Boko said, bringing one of his skewers up to his mouth. “A hundred or so meters north of the location is a lot of bamboo for them to get through to get at us—we’ll just do it quite and fast, be out of there before they even figure out we were there.”
“Coming in from the west might not be a good idea,” Kalter said, chewing. “It will give them a chance to hear us.”
“They will likely hear us when we start to get close to the ring, no matter which direction we come from, because we’ll be cutting down bamboo to get there,” Boko said, drumming his fingers on his leg. “West gives us a straight path back to the field—we can put the rest of the Otrogon between them and us if we do need to retreat.”
“Making the two groups fight would give us a chance to see how dangerous they are as well,” Kalter said in agreement. “Better to avoid it until we have more weapons, but if things do go bad, that’s a pretty decent strategy.”
Melon, who’d been almost completely silent up until that point, finally seemed to gather the courage to speak up.
“The ring you are talking about,” Melon managed, “Has there been any discussion about its purpose?”
August recalled mentioning it to her during their earlier discussion about runes, but it had been kind of lost beneath his curiosity about everything else.
“August and I spoke about it during the first couple of days, then once more with Kalter and Haiko present,” Rittan said, “I suggested that it may have been a Spatial Gate, although to where it was linked, I couldn’t begin to imagine—its orientation was apparently facing directly upwards.”
“It seemed to be a general consensus that a Spatial Gate wouldn’t have the capability to bring me here from another planet,” August clarified, to give her some idea of where both discussions had ended up. “I’m inclined to agree with that part, if only because Humanity doesn’t have this kind of technology on Earth, and there was no matching gate in the bedroom that I was sleeping in.”
“So it’s a new form of long-distance travel that stretches across worlds—a one-sided one that doesn’t need two gates?” Boko wondered, “Why is it out here and not tucked away in some company facility?”
“We had much the same thought,” Haiko said, smiling now. “Perhaps it was still being tested, and they were worried about a volatile reaction if it misfired—placing it on an abandoned island may have been a safety precaution.”
That was a pretty interesting theory. A theory that August probably would have commented on—if the tip of her finger wasn’t fiddling with the skin of his hip. Instead, most of his concentration was now being funnelled towards keeping his body from reacting to the touch, and despite his greatest efforts, he was already failing.
“There was mention of a hole beneath the ring,” Melon said, placing her hands together in an apparent apology. “Could you speak to how this came about?”
August tossed the last of his finished skewers into the fire with as much casualness as he could manage before carefully folding his hands across his lap.
“The ring was kind of sinking into the ground from its own weight, but the hole beneath it was new—I could tell because the walls were smooth when I first woke up but started crumbling immediately,” August said, trying to bury himself in the details to ignore the embarrassment. “The roots, rocks, and lumps of clay in the soil were all sheered through—my working assumption is that the teleportation or whatever happened vanished all of it before I arrived.”
Melon let out a hum of her own, but one that sounded like she wasn’t entirely in agreement with his guess—it left him with the impression that they weren’t describing it in a way that was useful or that there simply wasn’t enough information to figure it out.
“A difficult problem to solve,” Rittan said, placing his own skewer in the fire. “As you said, perhaps a physical assessment will shine some light on it.”
“That’s it,” Boko said, nodding. “Which leaves us the question of whether we think checking it out is worth the risk, and if it is, who is actually coming along.”
“I’m going,” Kalter said, “If it’s some kind of important Gaian technology, then it’s better to keep it under direct watch in case they try and come back for it.”
“I—am also interested in seeing it in person,” Melon said, pressing her hands together again. “I would like to go as well if you will allow it.”
Haiko reached over, in full view of everyone present and then started picking at his hair, apparently starting up an attempt to remove all of the mess that had gotten caught up in it over the past few days.
“This isn’t really a are we allowed kind of situation,” Boko said, leaning back on two of his hands, “We were asking for volunteers—so it sounds like you’re coming to me.”
August stared into the fire in an attempt to pretend like nothing was happening, but his face felt hot, and he had no idea how to deal with all of the sudden attention she was giving him.
“I would like to come along as well,” Rittan said, “If only to finally get a chance to see these Otrogon in person.”
“Well, I suppose that leaves me with a rather difficult choice, doesn’t it?” Haiko said, tapping a finger against her lip. “Do I want to stay here all on my lonesome? I don’t think I do.”
Haiko, apparently having a difficult time of reaching from the odd angle, moved to sit directly behind him, and he straightened up in a quiet panic. The mental render grew larger in his mind, the multiple points of contact causing the pulls at his attention to grow more dominating, and he was left to wonder if he shouldn’t just dive into the fire in an attempt to escape it all.
“I would be most displeased to be the only one here in the event that something attacked our lovely little home,” Haiko wondered, “Perhaps I will come to help collect the bamboo—are you expecting all of us the help hunt the Otrogon?”
“I think Kalter and I can handle that part—we’ll be trying to separate one from the group and pick it off,” Boko said, “If the herd goes on a rampage or something, we might need you to jump in, though.”
I’ve finished the first revision pass of Contention Book 1—days 1-7, roughly 100k words—and now I’m doing the line edit to work out any of the sentence-level oddities that slipped through the rewrite. It’s going up on the place where my first drafts all live as soon as I’ve finished the editing phase, where it will stay until I do some final prep for the ebook. The public first draft version will still be written up until the end of book 2, and then I’ll be switching to only writing the revised version because doing two simultaneous versions is redundant at that point.
It’s working out surprisingly well so far, and I think that’s going to carry on to the second book. Given the rate I’m blasting through the revision, I’m pretty sure I’ll have caught up to the first draft version within a few weeks. Now for a warning and some more interesting stuff for those who are actually interested in the details of the revision;
Warning, this revision process has significantly changed a lot of the main elements of the story you are familiar with, both in characterisation, interface, and tone. So I’m putting out a sort of primer to help understand what’s being changed; it probably won't include every change I've made, so take it with a grain of salt. The power system has been completely overhauled, with unnecessary parts being clipped away and shuffled into a more condensed version that fits more closely with the still unrevealed lore of its in-world construction.
Revision Details in Spoiler.
Spoiler Staying Blueprints are functionally untouched. Removed The role system has been removed. The Survival, Leadership, and Runecrafter skill trees have been removed. The proficiency system has been removed. Level-ups and skill points have been folded into a new system. The recruitment system has been removed, and Summoning now automatically recruits the Voithos. The population cap for recruitment has been removed. The Trait system has been removed. Altered Analysis, Etch, Summoning, and Taming, and some others have now become Integrated Systems that came prepackaged with the interface. Integrated Systems are now something that can be discovered within the environment and learned via Analysis. Inventory now keeps objects in permanent stasis but can only hold objects that can fit inside the confines of the visual HUD element. New Soul Viability. The new level-up system is far more closely tied to the soul and the technology that has been placed inside August. It contains many more personal upgrade opportunities than the original system but requires working through a randomisation/stacking process to increase effects. Monsters Every monster now has a core similar to that of the Efkini Core, with a personality matrix inside of it, and they will all regenerate unless that core is permanently destroyed. Monsters now possess a singular integrated system as part of their base design, and it makes them far more dangerous as a result. New monsters are now present in Devil’s Nest and will be encountered sooner. Story Elements that have changed The order by which blueprints have been unlocked. The buildings they prioritised. The threats they are facing, the monsters they’ve encountered. Rittan and Haiko shared a backstory that was too similar, and the former has been given a new history while retaining most of his personality. I’ve been far more forthright with information about the Voithos and how they were created in the revision, with Haiko delivering most of the exposition. I’ve split up the unbroken morning-to-night perspective into actual scenes to allow for more freedom with the narrative, and there’s a larger focus on making distinct progress than the minutia. [collapse]Seeking Direction: Revised Edition is now live; It's a revised RWBY fanfiction following an OC with Direction Manipulation as his Semblance.
Please remember to leave a rating and a review, it helps a lot with visibility!
If you like my writing and want to see more of it, you can find links to my original books on Elbowsnapper.com
If you want to show some support, get early access, or see my first drafts, go check out my Patreon
Love you guys, keep on keeping on!
Recent Releases:
Ameliorate: Intersect
Reroll: Falling & Shatter
Systematic Soul Sorting: Book 1 & Audiobook. Book 2(First Draft)
Seeker's Precept: The Dragon's Marble
“One big one walking around the ridge—how many in the forest?” Boko asked. “Just the one?”
August cleared his throat in an effort to gather himself and then spoke up.
“I heard the noise in two different spots in a pretty short amount of time,” August said, “So either it was two of them or just one that was moving around a lot.”
“Still probably doable,” Boko said, bringing one of his skewers up to his mouth. “A hundred or so meters north of the location is a lot of bamboo for them to get through to get at us—we’ll just do it quite and fast, be out of there before they even figure out we were there.”
“Coming in from the west might not be a good idea,” Kalter said, chewing. “It will give them a chance to hear us.”
“They will likely hear us when we start to get close to the ring, no matter which direction we come from, because we’ll be cutting down bamboo to get there,” Boko said, drumming his fingers on his leg. “West gives us a straight path back to the field—we can put the rest of the Otrogon between them and us if we do need to retreat.”
“Making the two groups fight would give us a chance to see how dangerous they are as well,” Kalter said in agreement. “Better to avoid it until we have more weapons, but if things do go bad, that’s a pretty decent strategy.”
Melon, who’d been almost completely silent up until that point, finally seemed to gather the courage to speak up.
“The ring you are talking about,” Melon managed, “Has there been any discussion about its purpose?”
August recalled mentioning it to her during their earlier discussion about runes, but it had been kind of lost beneath his curiosity about everything else.
“August and I spoke about it during the first couple of days, then once more with Kalter and Haiko present,” Rittan said, “I suggested that it may have been a Spatial Gate, although to where it was linked, I couldn’t begin to imagine—its orientation was apparently facing directly upwards.”
“It seemed to be a general consensus that a Spatial Gate wouldn’t have the capability to bring me here from another planet,” August clarified, to give her some idea of where both discussions had ended up. “I’m inclined to agree with that part, if only because Humanity doesn’t have this kind of technology on Earth, and there was no matching gate in the bedroom that I was sleeping in.”
“So it’s a new form of long-distance travel that stretches across worlds—a one-sided one that doesn’t need two gates?” Boko wondered, “Why is it out here and not tucked away in some company facility?”
“We had much the same thought,” Haiko said, smiling now. “Perhaps it was still being tested, and they were worried about a volatile reaction if it misfired—placing it on an abandoned island may have been a safety precaution.”
That was a pretty interesting theory. A theory that August probably would have commented on—if the tip of her finger wasn’t fiddling with the skin of his hip. Instead, most of his concentration was now being funnelled towards keeping his body from reacting to the touch, and despite his greatest efforts, he was already failing.
“There was mention of a hole beneath the ring,” Melon said, placing her hands together in an apparent apology. “Could you speak to how this came about?”
August tossed the last of his finished skewers into the fire with as much casualness as he could manage before carefully folding his hands across his lap.
“The ring was kind of sinking into the ground from its own weight, but the hole beneath it was new—I could tell because the walls were smooth when I first woke up but started crumbling immediately,” August said, trying to bury himself in the details to ignore the embarrassment. “The roots, rocks, and lumps of clay in the soil were all sheered through—my working assumption is that the teleportation or whatever happened vanished all of it before I arrived.”
Melon let out a hum of her own, but one that sounded like she wasn’t entirely in agreement with his guess—it left him with the impression that they weren’t describing it in a way that was useful or that there simply wasn’t enough information to figure it out.
“A difficult problem to solve,” Rittan said, placing his own skewer in the fire. “As you said, perhaps a physical assessment will shine some light on it.”
“That’s it,” Boko said, nodding. “Which leaves us the question of whether we think checking it out is worth the risk, and if it is, who is actually coming along.”
“I’m going,” Kalter said, “If it’s some kind of important Gaian technology, then it’s better to keep it under direct watch in case they try and come back for it.”
“I—am also interested in seeing it in person,” Melon said, pressing her hands together again. “I would like to go as well if you will allow it.”
Haiko reached over, in full view of everyone present and then started picking at his hair, apparently starting up an attempt to remove all of the mess that had gotten caught up in it over the past few days.
“This isn’t really a are we allowed kind of situation,” Boko said, leaning back on two of his hands, “We were asking for volunteers—so it sounds like you’re coming to me.”
August stared into the fire in an attempt to pretend like nothing was happening, but his face felt hot, and he had no idea how to deal with all of the sudden attention she was giving him.
“I would like to come along as well,” Rittan said, “If only to finally get a chance to see these Otrogon in person.”
“Well, I suppose that leaves me with a rather difficult choice, doesn’t it?” Haiko said, tapping a finger against her lip. “Do I want to stay here all on my lonesome? I don’t think I do.”
Haiko, apparently having a difficult time of reaching from the odd angle, moved to sit directly behind him, and he straightened up in a quiet panic. The mental render grew larger in his mind, the multiple points of contact causing the pulls at his attention to grow more dominating, and he was left to wonder if he shouldn’t just dive into the fire in an attempt to escape it all.
“I would be most displeased to be the only one here in the event that something attacked our lovely little home,” Haiko wondered, “Perhaps I will come to help collect the bamboo—are you expecting all of us the help hunt the Otrogon?”
“I think Kalter and I can handle that part—we’ll be trying to separate one from the group and pick it off,” Boko said, “If the herd goes on a rampage or something, we might need you to jump in, though.”
I’ve finished the first revision pass of Contention Book 1—days 1-7, roughly 100k words—and now I’m doing the line edit to work out any of the sentence-level oddities that slipped through the rewrite. It’s going up on the place where my first drafts all live as soon as I’ve finished the editing phase, where it will stay until I do some final prep for the ebook. The public first draft version will still be written up until the end of book 2, and then I’ll be switching to only writing the revised version because doing two simultaneous versions is redundant at that point.
It’s working out surprisingly well so far, and I think that’s going to carry on to the second book. Given the rate I’m blasting through the revision, I’m pretty sure I’ll have caught up to the first draft version within a few weeks. Now for a warning and some more interesting stuff for those who are actually interested in the details of the revision;
Warning, this revision process has significantly changed a lot of the main elements of the story you are familiar with, both in characterisation, interface, and tone. So I’m putting out a sort of primer to help understand what’s being changed; it probably won't include every change I've made, so take it with a grain of salt. The power system has been completely overhauled, with unnecessary parts being clipped away and shuffled into a more condensed version that fits more closely with the still unrevealed lore of its in-world construction.
Revision Details in Spoiler.
Spoiler Staying Blueprints are functionally untouched. Removed The role system has been removed. The Survival, Leadership, and Runecrafter skill trees have been removed. The proficiency system has been removed. Level-ups and skill points have been folded into a new system. The recruitment system has been removed, and Summoning now automatically recruits the Voithos. The population cap for recruitment has been removed. The Trait system has been removed. Altered Analysis, Etch, Summoning, and Taming, and some others have now become Integrated Systems that came prepackaged with the interface. Integrated Systems are now something that can be discovered within the environment and learned via Analysis. Inventory now keeps objects in permanent stasis but can only hold objects that can fit inside the confines of the visual HUD element. New Soul Viability. The new level-up system is far more closely tied to the soul and the technology that has been placed inside August. It contains many more personal upgrade opportunities than the original system but requires working through a randomisation/stacking process to increase effects. Monsters Every monster now has a core similar to that of the Efkini Core, with a personality matrix inside of it, and they will all regenerate unless that core is permanently destroyed. Monsters now possess a singular integrated system as part of their base design, and it makes them far more dangerous as a result. New monsters are now present in Devil’s Nest and will be encountered sooner. Story Elements that have changed The order by which blueprints have been unlocked. The buildings they prioritised. The threats they are facing, the monsters they’ve encountered. Rittan and Haiko shared a backstory that was too similar, and the former has been given a new history while retaining most of his personality. I’ve been far more forthright with information about the Voithos and how they were created in the revision, with Haiko delivering most of the exposition. I’ve split up the unbroken morning-to-night perspective into actual scenes to allow for more freedom with the narrative, and there’s a larger focus on making distinct progress than the minutia. [collapse]Seeking Direction: Revised Edition is now live; It's a revised RWBY fanfiction following an OC with Direction Manipulation as his Semblance.
Please remember to leave a rating and a review, it helps a lot with visibility!
If you like my writing and want to see more of it, you can find links to my original books on Elbowsnapper.com
If you want to show some support, get early access, or see my first drafts, go check out my Patreon
Love you guys, keep on keeping on!
Recent Releases:
Ameliorate: Intersect
Reroll: Falling & Shatter
Systematic Soul Sorting: Book 1 & Audiobook. Book 2(First Draft)
Seeker's Precept: The Dragon's Marble
