Let's start from the beginning:
What is schizophrenia? Schizophrenia is a serious mental illness that affects how a person thinks, feels, and behaves. People with schizophrenia may seem like they have lost touch with reality, which can be distressing for them and for their family and friends.
The stigma with schizophrenia is loosely based on the idea that the person is deranged, insane, CRAZY when in reality they just have an illness that causes problems with the connection of the brain. The wiring is a little screwy so through the schizophrenic's eyes the world is a bit more different. For example, Auditory hallucinations are the sensory perceptions of hearing noises without an external stimulus. This symptom is particularly associated with schizophrenia and related psychotic disorders but is not specific to it.
Being a diagnosed Schizo myself I can say that I have auditory hallucinations. The voices I heard weren't random. They are like ticks that people with Tourette syndrome have but inside your brain and your eyes process the information from real life and what your brain is glitching out on. You heard those voices somewhere, some place before whether it was a family member, tv show, any type of experience at all you have had. Seen, heard, and you may not remember where, when, how or why which is okay.
Everyone's experience with schizophrenia is of course different to everyone else. Not everyone is the same, perhaps similar but not the same and I just wanted to share mine.
My diagnosis hasn't gotten me into trouble however, I did experience it one time when trying to harm another kid who was a neighbor of mine. Luckily, the parents arrived in time before anything went wrong. Pretty sure I traumatized that kid forever, ruined their life, etc. My parents were in complete denial of my illness at the time so I wasn't diagnosis until age 33 (I am 42 now). Yet imagine if they did, I feel like I would've been doing better in life.

Hi, So glad I came across this group with so much information from everyones different experiences. This is my first post so bare with me as it may be a little long.
So to start my cycle has always been bang on 30 days but the last 2 months it was 27 days. Last period was 1st may. 9 days before my due period i started having this dark brown discharge (21st of the 5th) which lasted around 3 days. On the 23rd my boobs got really sore and i was getting twinges in my lower abdomen (got this with my last 2 pregnancies )so done a pregnancy test on the 24th which came back positive. It was serious shock as we have our family and are making plans to travel in the coming months and years in a canpervan we are converting atm. We seriously debated abortion but after 2 agonising days decided we couldn't fo through with it. Just as we started to come to terms with it on Saturday 27th i was holding my 4 month old neice and she pushed her we foot down on the right side of my lower abdomen and there was a very sharp pain. When i went to the toilet again i was bleeding. Bright red blood. Its weird because all that day i felt funny and was actually ready online searching about eptopic pregnancy. I knew something was different this time in my gut. Anyway i started to get little light headed and panicky so my husband took me up to the A&E. Got bloods done to confirm pregnancy and an internal scan which obviously didnt show anything as im not far enough on. They couldn't find my right ovary but could see there was no active blood flow which i couldnt really understand as the bleeding lasted into the next day for roughly 24 hours in total, bright red but no clots. They rang the next day with bloods and said they were 100 Hcg (if thats right ive been in such a daze since finding out we were having another baby🙈) so called me back up again yesterday for more bloods and done another scan which again showed nothing and couldnt find my right ovary. Those came back last night (29th) after a very agonising wait and i was told the Dr thinks it seems like and early miscarriage but wants to confirm with more bloods tomorrow (31st). I was in a world of my own so didnt ask what the levels were this time. Im assuming they stayed the same or dropped/increased just slightly. Im really nervous about tomorrow as i just want and answer as to whats going on. Im due to go on holiday to Ibiza next Saturday with my cousin and sister and we have been really excited about it as the last holiday we planned got cancelled due to covid kicking off. Ive literally saved every spare penny i had to get on this holiday and with the way things are going with the cost of living i doubt very much i will be able to afford another anytime soon. I could deal with being pregnant on holiday and not drinking but after all this now happening i honestly dont think i could go and enjoy myself without drinking. If it turns out eptopic then its either gona be surgery or that injection from what ive been reading. I cant drink with the injection and i doubt i can fly after surgery. God forgive me but im kinda praying for a miscarriage. Just so i can go and try and have a good time and forget all this happened. I feel for anyone who has had to go through this or anything similar as the waiting is just brutal. I just want it to all be over with tbh. Just for context i have had pain in the right side a little in my chest and tonight a pain shot through my jaw. Most of the pain isnt overly bad so i dont know if its just my anxiety causing it. Ive also has bad lower back pain and pain in my right arm and shooting down my right leg where i suspect if its eptopic thats the side its on. All the symptoms of being pregnant are fading. Sore boobs and achy legs and the twinges i got with the other 2 pregnancies.
Has anyone ever experience these kinds of things with a miscarriage? I know people do loose the pregnancy symptoms some times but does anyone get the pain one sided? The short period off bleeding? The nurse told me that can happen with a miscarriage but i honestly think she was trying not to worry me.
Thank you for taking the time to read ❤

https://www.reddit.com/nosleep/comments/13u9t3m/my_father_always_kept_the_shed_locked_today_i/Part 1:
The darkness around us was oppressive, cloying and total. Anywhere we weren’t pointing our flashlights would turn into a solid wall of black, impenetrable shadows. But we could hear something. As we walked further down the hallway, we heard soft footsteps and giggling.
Sometimes, it sounded like it came from directly behind us. At other times, it would come from the rooms all around us, the endless rooms that split off the hallway on both sides. We found some strange things in those rooms as we walked slowly, the gun raised in my hand and the bowie knife raised in my brother’s.
There were corpses in some of the rooms. Many had partially mummified in the dry, chilly air down here. Others were clearly fresher. One woman was hanging from the rafters with a note pinned to her chest. I looked back at Gil when we reached this part of the hall. We had stayed out of the rooms since the incident with the little boy, but some deep innate curiosity needed to know what was on this note. Gil nodded at me, and we walked forward side by side, scanning every corner of the room and looking behind smashed-out fish tanks and torn sofas covered in black mold for any signs that we weren’t alone in here. Once we were both satisfied, we returned to the young woman hanging in the center of the room.
She had somehow climbed up to the ceiling, opened a panel and found a sturdy enough beam or rafter to tie the rope to. Yet there was no ladder or anything remotely tall enough to reach the ceiling nearby. It was somewhat of a mystery. I explained this to Gil, who looked somewhat confused- and alarmed. He clearly hadn’t realized it until I pointed it out to him.
I turned back to the woman’s corpse, picking off the note, which had been stuck into the front of her blouse with a huge wooden splinter. Gil kept a look-out while I read, shining his light back and forth in a circle across the room, holding his ridiculously huge knife in the other hand like some sort of medieval swordsman. I saw with increasing horror that the note appeared to have been written in the woman’s own blood. Looking at her body, I saw a deep slash on her left arm, one that had clotted days ago. I looked back down at the desperate message this dying woman had left for us.
“To anyone who finds this,
“My name is Michaela Mansfield. I came in here by accident through the sewers underneath the town of Caplin. My two friends and I went exploring and got separated after a girl in our group twisted her ankle. I went forward alone to find help while my other friend stayed behind with the injured girl. After perhaps a day of being lost, my flashlight started to die, and I thought I was going to die with it. And then I saw fluorescent lights up ahead. They were flickering and looked like they might sputter out at any moment, but it was the only hope I had. I followed the lights and found myself in this hallway. When I tried to turn around and go back, the entrance to the sewers had disappeared. It was just a hallway that seemed to extend forever, the one that has haunted me for weeks now.
“Please, if you find this note, tell my parents what happened to me. Take my golden locket and return it to my mother and father as proof. I hope you have better luck getting out of here than I did.
“Goodbye, and may God forgive me for what I’m about to do.
“-Michaela.”
I looked up at Gil, with one eyebrow raised. I saw he had been reading the note over my shoulder rather than keeping a look-out. I sighed, deciding not to say anything.
“We can’t take the locket,” I said. Gil shook his head.
“We have to take the locket,” he said.
“They’re going to think we had something to do with this girl’s death if we just show up randomly with a piece of her jewelry. Actually, I think I remember when this girl and her friends went missing. It was on the news. Her parents were pleading for anyone with information to come forward. I think the cops were acting on the suspicion that it was murder or kidnapping or something. But they probably just went exploring without telling anyone and never came back.”
“We’ll wipe it down and send it anonymously through the mail with a note explaining what happened,” he said. I sighed, giving up. He was right. It was the right thing to do. But I’m sure many innocent men have gone to prison over trying to do the right thing. I pointed to the note.
“This doesn’t help us at all,” I said. He shrugged.
“Maybe it does, and maybe it doesn’t. It doesn’t really help us formulate a plan, but it does give us information. For example, now we know that this place probably connects to a lot more places than the shed. We might be able to get out through dozens or hundreds of exits. If it connects to a random sewer over in Caplin, then it could connect to places all over the county.”
“True,” I said, “but what if it connects to some alien world? Or to a black hole? What if it connects to some point in the void between galaxies and we get sucked out to our deaths?” He simply shrugged again, seeming apathetic to these possibilities.
“Well, in that case,” he said smugly, a half-smile forming on his lips, “our deaths would probably be a lot quicker than they would at the hands of these creatures down here.” Then he started laughing. It sounded eerie in this dark, forlorn place, where everything smelled like yeast and the floors were all wet substrates growing strange jungles of alien molds. He reached forward and took the golden locket off of the woman’s neck, placing it carefully in his pocket. We started walking out of the room together.
“Also,” I said, “the note seems to imply that the entrances are temporary. She couldn’t find her way back out after she got in here. What if they’re all like that? What if they’re like… I don’t know, lobster traps, or Venus fly traps, or something? They draw people in here, and then once they’re inside…” I stopped speaking as soon as I realized I heard someone following us.
I heard running footsteps. A high-pitched giggling started, then was cut off. We both stood there in the darkness, our flashlights pointing forward. Then the voice of that demonic little girl started up, high-pitched and somewhat inhuman-sounding. Her words all had a strange hoarseness to them, an uncanny valley sound as if she were only imitating human emotions and human speech.
“Adam’s ‘It’, but he won’t play,” she said sulkily, her voice bouncing off the walls, the rapid beat of the footsteps approaching nearer and nearer. “He says his throat hurts. So I guess I’m ‘It’! You better run!”
“God dammit,” Gil said, swinging his giant knife around from side to side as if he were going to bat a mosquito with it. His light flashed and wavered as he tried to keep a watch on all sides. But I knew she was coming from behind us. I could feel it. I kept my light shining down there, the gun raised, trying to emanate a calm I didn’t feel. Then I saw a flash of blue, zigzagging crazily past a chair leg and the snapped remains of a folding table, tiny legs pumping at a superhuman speed. She looked like little more than an approaching blur.
“Listen to me very carefully,” I said, trying to keep my gun pointed on her. “We need to cut off her head.”
“What?!” Gil said. “Why?”
“Last time, bullets didn’t work on…” I began, but then she was on us, no more than a few feet away, jumping over the discarded junk that intermittently appeared on the sides of the hallway. And then I felt myself knocked over by a tremendous force that took the air right out of my lungs.
I still had my hands crossed in front of me, one holding the gun and the other the flashlight. The skeletal face of the creature was mere inches away from my own, biting and gnashing madly. I could see small muscles in the back of her mouth working furiously. She was pushing down on my arms with all of her strength, which was far more than such a small body seemed to suggest.
The gun was pressed closely to the front of her chest. I was about to pull the trigger when I felt the weight start to lift off of me. I saw Gil behind her, wrapping his arm around her neck and pulling her back. She still gnashed and bit in a mad frenzy, small droplets of blood and saliva dripping off her mouth and into my face. She kicked her body back and forth like an enraged snake, freeing her neck from Gil’s grasp. He went to grab her, and her skeletal face opened up wide, the jaw hanging halfway down her neck.
With the speed of a cat snatching a mouse, she leapt forward, snapping her jaw around some of the fingers on Gil’s left hand. I saw his index and middle finger disappear into her mouth, and he began to scream in agony.
I was scrambling back to my feet by this point. I ran at the girl, using all of my body weight to push her. She went tumbling on the floor, her mouth flying open as she landed hard on the wood. Two mutilated fingers flew out, rolling across the floor and disappearing into a dome of black mold. I was sweating heavily now, drops of perspiration rolling down my forehead and stinging my eyes. I tried to wipe them away, thinking of what to do. My mind screamed at me to shoot, to empty my entire magazine into this little monster, but I knew in my heart that it would just be wasting bullets. Deep down, I knew what I had told Gil earlier was true- we had to cut off her head. Just like in the old myths of vampires or demons, I had a deep instinctual feeling that fire or decapitation would be the only way to deal with her, and as for fire, we had no flamethrowers.
“Gil!” I said. “Get ready!” He was holding his spurting hand tightly against his chest, still grasping the bowie knife in his right. His face was alarmingly pale and white, and I wondered if he might not just pass out right here and doom both of us. But he hadn’t dropped the knife, even while fighting the writhing monster, even while getting his fingers bitten off. He is stronger than he looks, I reassured myself.
A sense of calm and clarity overcame me then, and I saw what I needed to do. The demonic girl was getting up, growling and spitting and laughing. I ran over and stomped on her back, putting my full weight on her body to drive her back down. Then I took the pistol and shot her through the back of the kneecaps, one bullet for each.
She wailed as dark red blood poured out of her small legs, turning her head almost all the way back to try and bite me. Her hands were changing, the small fingers lengthening and darkening into sharp, black claws, and I knew our time was running out.
“Now!” I yelled, and Gil ran forward, using his right hand to swing the bowie knife. I watched it fall in a descending arc, as if in slow motion, watched it approach the spitting skeletal face that looked at us with black eyes and unfathomable hatred. It went clean through, and was so sharp that for a split second, the head stayed there, the face blank, looking like it was still attached to the body. Then it tumbled forward, dark blood spurting out of the neck and staining the white and gold molds underneath with its crimson hue.
Gil fell back against the wall, breathing fast. He dropped the bowie knife on the floor. I saw his flashlight, still on, had rolled against an ancient wheelchair that was probably new back in the 1960s. I stopped and grabbed it, shoving it in my pants belt so it would give me more light to work with. Gil still had his hand clasped to his chest. Slowly, I put my hands forward and grasped his injured hand by the wrist. He inhaled deeply, gritting his teeth and closing his eyes.
“We’re going to need to wrap it in something,” I said. He nodded. I took off my shirt and started ripping long slices from the bottom, then wrapping them around his hand tightly in an attempt to slow the bleeding. When I got to the fingers, he flinched and seemed to waver on his feet. I reached a hand out in case he was about to fall over, but he managed to steady himself. “All done,” I told him as I put my shirt back on, which was missing the bottom third portion now and looked rather absurd, almost as if I was wearing a woman’s crop top.
“It feels like my hand’s on fire,” Gil said in a hoarse whisper. “We’re going to need water, too.” I was feeling the start of dehydration pangs myself.
“That girl, Michaela, her note said she was stuck in here for weeks. That must mean there’s water. Assuming her counting was correct, seeing as there’s no sun or sky to go by. If there was no water, she would have died after a few days, especially being on the move,” I said. I was hoping that we would find food as well, but it wasn’t really life or death. I knew that we could potentially go weeks without food and still live, even though it would feel extremely unpleasant and weaken us physically. I sighed, shining my flashlight at Gil.
“Ready to keep going?” I asked, and then the lights started turning back on. Most of them were still either out or flickering on and off rapidly, but enough of them were lit to see down the hall.
“Oh, thank God,” Gil said. “At least now we’re not walking through this junkyard in the fucking dark.” Up ahead, I saw something new as well. It looked like the hallway forked off. I pointed at it, and Gil’s eyes widened. “Finally, after walking for endless miles, this place does something!” As we neared it, I saw there was even a sign. One pointed left, reading, “To Veriden”. The other pointed right, reading, “To Rusty Township”.
“Hmm…” I said, “I’ve never heard of either of those places. They’re definitely not in the county.” Gil’s dark brown eyes looked past me, into the room behind us, and they widened. I reached for the pistol, turning quickly, but I found nothing but a mostly empty, half-lit room. Against the corner was a vending machine and a soda machine.
“Oh thank God!” I said, running forward, reaching in my pocket for some money. Then I remembered I had left my wallet at home. After all, I thought we were just going into the shed. Gil strode right past me.
“Don’t be an idiot,” he said, taking the butt of his bowie knife and smashing the glass of the vending machine. “You don’t need money. Who’s going to call the cops, the walking undead and demons here?” He pulled out brands I had never heard of: Overholser’s Beef Jerky, chocolate bars with caramel and peanuts called Eisenhearts, Took’s salt-water taffy and Riza’s fruit snacks. The other vending machine was no less alien, as I smashed it with the butt of the gun and found Springy’s Lemon-Lime Soda, Kanna-brand cola and Saint Kristoff’s Ginger Ale, among others. Not one of the brands was recognizable from our world.
We tore into the food with ravenous hunger, chugging bottle after bottle of soda. It all tasted similar enough to what we expected, though some of it was rather strange. The ginger ale, for example, had small silver shavings on the bottom of each bottle, their trademark gimmick, and Gil swallowed them and nearly ended up choking. I smacked his back hard, laughing.
“I don’t think you’re supposed to drink those,” I said sarcastically. We were filling up our pockets when the drumming started from down the hall. It was so sudden and loud in the otherwise perfect silence that I jumped nearly a foot, spinning around and taking out the gun. It was becoming second-nature to me by this point, and so much adrenaline was constantly pounding through my body that I was as jumpy as a cat.
The drumming grew louder and fast. It reminded me of the drums some ancient Aztecs must have used when cutting out the hearts of prisoners of war. It had a deep, primal beat to it that would be useful for stirring people up during acts of savagery and violence. It was coming from the direction labeled “Rusty Township”. I could barely hear myself think over the intensity of the drum beats. I tried to motion to Gil that I would go first since I had the gun but that he should stay right behind me, but he looked like he was just smiling and nodding and likely hadn’t understood a bit of what I was trying to communicate. Sighing, I started forward down the corridor.
I peaked my head around the next corner, where a doorway opened up into a huge gymnasium. The ceiling towered over me. I saw dirty, disheveled people standing in a semi-circle around a metal coffin that was stood up on one end against the back wall. Blood was pouring out the bottom, following a river of clotted gore that stretched across the gymnasium and curved off to the right corner. The people surrounding the metal coffin were laughing, clapping their hands and cheering, stomping their feet in time with the beats. I saw scurvy blossoms and festering sores across their faces and exposed skin. And, for the first time since we had gotten lost down here, there were windows around the edge of this massive chamber, windows showing the outside world. I ran over, looking out.
I saw a city on fire, the buildings burning and sending up thick, black plumes of smoke. It reminded me of what Berlin at the end of World War II must have looked like. Fronts of houses had collapsed inwards, the streets were cracked and filled with debris and I saw bodies hanging from lampposts up and down the street. Many of them were so old that the ropes were starting to fray. Some of the bodies had started to mummify, with thin, papery skin clinging tightly to desiccated muscles and hanging jaws.
Around the corners of houses and alleyways, I caught glimpses of strange shapes: crouching half-animal, half-human beings who carried sledgehammers and long knives, robed figures who seemed to float over the devastated and cracked ground, and children with red skin who I saw crawling up walls on all fours like geckos.
The drums stopped as suddenly as they had started. My ears were still ringing. I turned back to the semi-circle of sickly, dirty people. They had stopped their clapping and dancing and cheering, and now just stood like statues, staring at Gil and me with flat, dead eyes.
“You shouldn’t stare into the Township,” a thin woman with filthy black hair said. A strange accent crept into her words, one that I had never heard before. “Strange things live in there, and they come out when the drums stop.” She stepped forward, whispering. “We keep them away by giving a sacrifice every time the drumbeats come. The blood satisfies the ones in the city and the others in the halls. We will all have our turn in the coffin, sure enough.”
Another member of their group stepped forward and opened up the metal coffin. I saw long, thin spikes sliding out of a body, and then a pale form fell out, landing on the dirty floor with a wet smacking sound. The smell of coppery blood in the air was now overwhelming. Gil and I both gasped in unison as we saw this form on the floor was a person, a young woman in fact, almost totally drained of blood. Dozens of puncture marks were sliced into her face, neck, stomach, legs and arms. An expression of pain and horror was frozen onto her dead face, her wide, staring eyes looking up at the ceiling.
“You killed her!” Gil said, aghast, still clutching his mutilated hand close to his body in an unconscious gesture of his anxiety and fear. “Why? Why would you put someone from your own group in an iron maiden?”
“Iron maiden?” the woman with the black hair in front responded. “Aye, that’s as good a name for it as any. We call her the steel mistress in my world, in my time, and the steel mistress sees a lot of use…” She gestured out the window, her face emotionless. “You see my world, after all. It is a place that always reeks of death, and more often than not, reeks of fire too.”
“What part of the United States is this?” Gil asked, gesturing out the window. The woman frowned.
“I do not know these ‘United States’,” she said, shrugging.
“What country are you from?” he asked.
“Why, Victoriat, of course. But Victoriat only has three states. Rusty Township was the capitol, until ‘twas attacked by the Black Hand Allegiance soldiers. We’re all refugees from Rusty here,” she said sadly.
“This isn’t getting us anywhere,” I said to Gil under my breath. He nodded, sighing.
“Can you tell us how to get back to the stone steps? Big, circular stone steps that go around and around?” Gil asked the woman in one last attempt to get a sensical answer out of her. She nodded her grimy face.
“Aye, in the center of the Undergraves,” she said, pointing past the iron maiden and the dead body on the ground. I realized that there was a sign up on the ceiling in front of the next corridor, one pointing left and saying, “To Rusty Township center” and one pointing right and saying, “To the Undergraves”. The sign was so covered in dust and specks of black mold that it was no wonder I hadn’t seen it.
“Do you have any maps of this place?” I asked the dirty woman and her friends. They all shook their heads.
“There are no maps of the Undergraves, but the stairs be at the center. You just take a right here and follow the path straight. Ignore all forks to the right or left, just keep following it straight…” We were walking away fast now, trying to leave these lunatics behind. “But you’d be mad to go there now after the drums just stopped!” Her voice was fading rapidly as Gil and I ran forward.
“Those people were fucking nuts,” Gil said. “Killing each other just because they think the blood keeps away demons.”
“Brother,” I said through heavy breaths, “if you and I lived down here for a few months, we would be just as crazy as those people.”
As we jogged into the Undergraves, I realized the walls were turning into something organic and pulsating, like being in some huge intestine. Massive forks to the left and right appeared every few hundred feet. From them, dark shapes appeared, stepping forward. They moved shakily, blurring as they stepped to the right or left randomly, their mouths opened wide and seeming to be filled with blackness. Their eyes looked like pure black sockets, and the rest of their body was no more than a shaky silhouette of shadows. When the first few stepped forward, I didn’t know what to do.
I gingerly raised the gun, deciding better safe than sorry. They were coming at me fast, jerking randomly, their skin seeming to writhe and shiver as I stared at it. As they got within ten feet of me, a deep burning heat started to fill my body, as if I were standing in front of an oven. I started shooting, one bullet for each of their center mass, and they dissipated into smoke. I watched the black stuff curl back into the red, pulsating room they had just come out of. The sense of heat dissipated instantly, but my skin still felt warm and strange.
We were running through the Undergraves now. Miles of slick gore covering the floors, strange tissues growing across the rooms and tumor-like sacs covering the fluorescent lights, which even here flickered endlessly across the ceiling.
In many of the rooms, I saw people strung upside down from the ceiling, their ribs sliced open. Strange, hunched figures sliced the meat into strips, preparing it and drying it. One of them looked at me with its pig-like face, its bovine legs walking across the sticky floor, slowly and uncertainly at first, and then running for me. I was running low on ammunition by this point. Gil came from behind and disemboweled the creature as it raised its butcher’s knife. It had been so focused on me that it hadn’t noticed him jogging up with his blood-stained bowie knife in one hand.
“I can’t run much longer,” Gil said, panting. I nodded wearily. Neither could I. “My hand is still on fire, too. I really should have gotten medical attention, like, twelve hours ago…”
Part of me wondered if the stairs were even here, or if we had been lied to, sent into the worst part of this strange hall to become sacrifices to these abominations. We had, after all, put our lives in the hands of a band of lunatics.
But at this point, we had nowhere else to go but forwards.

​
https://reddit.com/link/13vybpp/video/8v1x2xkfk03b1/player
Hi, I’m a sophomore film student at a large university who finally ditched the DSLR for a cinema camera.
I previously used my 1DX Mark ii for dozens, if not hundreds of shoots for years. And before that I’ve always had a camera in my hand since age 9. I know I’m very young to be owning a cinema camera, and I told myself I wasn’t going to get rid of my 1DX until absolutely necessary.
I started getting on bigger crewed short films as the DP and cinematographer and was using the Canon as my workhorse. I’ve had multiple of these shoots and it seemed to have reached the point where the camera I was using was keeping me from reaching my potential. The 1DX is one of the greatest cameras ever made and set the standard for 4K photo body cameras of today, but it isn’t perfect. The dynamic range is poor and in the end it’s a fantastic photo camera that’s also great for video.
While still being a sophomore in college, funds are obviously tight, and a new camera isn’t cheap. I knew I wanted something that shot at least 4k and could shoot raw (I started diving into the world of color grading). I had my heart set on a C200 but ended up holding off. I started joking around and looking at older used REDs as a joke, and found out they were actually pretty affordable. Yes they are out of service, and they’re not the peak of engineering, but these are full fledged cinema cameras that shot Hollywood movies, and you can own your own now.
After much deciding, I went with probably the least liked RED of all, the Raven. It shoots 4.6k raw (yes 4.6 not 4.5, not sure why red calls it the 4.5, the resolution is 4608x2160) at 120FPS which is mind boggling to me coming from my 120 fps at 1080 on the 1DX. It’s also very compact and has the beautiful color science of all RED cameras. The downside is the smaller sensor size. It seems RED intended the Raven to be used on drones and gimbals and in order to have a smaller body, it seemed they decided to go with a smaller sensor. This sensor is smaller than your average S35 but larger than a M 4/3 sensor. This concerned me when buying the camera, and almost swayed me not to buy it. However, after reading and researching the camera, I decided it was the right one for me.
Coincidentally, a man down the road was selling his entire Raven kit for $3,300, and I ordered him $3,000 cash today, which he accepted. I got a fully kitted, functional 4.6k Cinema camera for $3,000. Of course I had to add my own L lenses, my rails, and other accessories, but after that I was in business.
The flexibility of the footage in post isn’t even comparable to the Canon. It completely blows Canon out of the water, as it should. People who compare their DSLRs or even worse, their phones to cinema level cameras are sadly mistaken. There’s a reason Guardians of the Galaxy was shot on RED and not iPhone. The dynamic range and organic color science that comes from these beautiful machines takes the crown by miles compared to our phones. Don’t get me wrong, I have a brand new iPhone and the camera is great, but nothing even close to the RED.
I’m excited to be able to more easily partner up with this camera on my sets for film school, as well as be the only crew shooting with a real cinema camera, most are using the BMPCC 4k, another great camera. And now we’ve reached the present. I’m using my camera everyday, getting better and more comfortable with it each time I go out. This is the short montage I threw together of my trip down the street to Alki Beach, Seattle.
Let me know what you think of what I’ve said, and the video. Thank you!

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Whether you're drawn to the mesmerizing symbols, the immersive theme, or the prospect of big wins, the Choy Sun Doa slot machine delivers an unforgettable experience. Step into the world of ancient China, where luck and fortune await those who are daring enough to spin the reels.
The Choy Sun Doa slot machine offers an enticing blend of captivating visuals, innovative gameplay, and the potential for substantial rewards. Inspired by the richness of Chinese culture, this game invites players to embark on a thrilling adventure in search of the God of Wealth's blessings. By understanding the origins, mastering the gameplay, and employing effective strategies, you can maximize your chances of hitting the jackpot and unlocking the boundless treasures hidden within the Choy Sun Doa slot machine.
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Ugh. Something happened today that just leaves me wondering who I am and what I want and what I like and all that. I mean, it is not just this one thing that suddenly made me feel like this. Have been feeling this way for months. But it came back after this rejection. I got rejected from an opportunity because I was too young. Well, there were other reasons, but this is the most important one, I guess. It makes me wonder if this is worth doing at all. Even if I manage to fix the other issues, how many more people will reject me because I am too young? I don't know what i want to do anymore? I don't know if I want to go to college anymore. I don't know what I would even study if I did go. School sucks. I haven't seen my friends in months. I feel so aimless and frustrated. It feels so suffocating to be in the same room for days on end with nothing interesting to do. Sometimes I wonder, why I am not like everyone else. I wish I were. I tried to change. But, I was so miserable. But being myself is also miserable. What is my place in this world? Where do I fit in? Will I ever find my crowd? Sometimes, it feels like I should move to another country. Maybe I will find some like-minded fellows over there. But it's just so expensive. Why is something always in the way of me trying to get something. I work hard for what I want. Yet, every single time I pick myself, something knocks me down. I am a real nice person, I am kind, I help people out all the time, yet no one is here for me. Why is that? Why do I always understand everyone and make time for everyone, yet everyone is too busy for me? I am sick of school and studying the things I hate. (I feel like I should clarify, I hate what I study, that doesn't mean I am bad at it). And being either by myself always, or with people who don't get me. I am sick of either being able to just lying here scrolling through my laptop and watching Netflix all day or working/studying all day. There is absolutely nothing else for me to do. I don't know what my hobbies are. I don't even know if i can learn it about myself now. I am just so sick of this. I want to do something fun. Something I enjoy. But lately, nothing seems fun. Even my youtube feed doesn't seem to know what i like anymore. I am just so bored of everything. Something is supposed to happen next month (kinda personal), and whenever I am reminded of that, I am not sure where it leaves me once it happens. Where do I go from here? Am I too ambitious? Let's say I reach my goals, then will I even be happy? Am i the right person? Am i good enough for any of this? I just wanna scream so loudly. I can't even sleep. I hate the thought of waking up and not having a feeling of purpose in life. Nothing feels worthy anymore. I think of doing something, and immediately, I think, 'What's the point?'. For everything! This is so unlike me. There doesn't seem to be a point to anything. I just want to be happy. Why does everything feel too restrictive when I have everything I need? Gosh, I really want to cry, but I can't.
I wish someone can help me figure this out.

Wow what a combination. Was in a another world for like 5 hours. Unexplainable. Not for the weak minded.

i’m not diagnosed with bpd but i highly suspect i do have it. regardless of if i do, i do have abandonment issues that i’ve known about for years and years. i’m able to see that it clearly stems back to when i changed schools in grade three. i lost all my friends and had none for about half the year. when i finally made them they were these awful girls who would not hide talking behind my back. nearly every time we hung out it would be going fine until the inevitable happened. i cannot stress enough how normalized this routine was. two or more of the girls would go off to have “private talks”. these private talks would never include me. i would beg and pull at their arms and barter in order to be included in the private talks. i was in no way ever allowed to join. sometimes it would be only a few of the girls and i would play with another girl. sometimes it was all of them and i would sing to myself. i made plans on how i could be included in the private talks but nothing ever worked. i felt like such an outsider and i knew that i wasn’t fully accepted. i felt very lonely and abandoned. i had made friends but i knew that our friendship was conditional on these private talks and me changing so i would fit better. i felt that there was something very wrong with me. i was told later that they were about me. it kills me that i’ll never know what they said about me in this talks. this experience has really changed my worldview and i hate that it has. my mom keeps telling me to just get over it but i just can’t. it has stuck with me for so long and it has changed the way i enter any new relationship. when 2 friends i had made in highschool went off bc they wanted to talk to each other alone i was literally transported back in time. i cried and had panic attacks and it felt like my entire world was exploding. i feel embarrassed at how i treated that friend because i was in survival mode. i ended up pushing her away because i felt she was abandoning me like they had all those years ago. we did talk about it and i told her about the bullying that happened when i was younger. she seemed like she thought it was a bad thing to happen to me. i recently told some friends about what happened to me when i was younger because another person was talking about an experience that was very similar to mine and they seemed like they thought it was a bad thing to happen to me. i somewhat regret telling them about that and some other things that happened to me because i do not want to seem like i am manipulative or trying to make them feel sorry for me. i feel a little bit embarrassed and i did not tell the story to the best of my abilities. i’m worried they’ll begin to think i am too much work too. my mom seems to think i should be able to get over the bullying from grade 3, even though i can’t help but be reminded of it constantly and have history repeat endlessly. i don’t think she understands how i can’t just “get over” this, and that it was a really big deal. maybe she’s right though. maybe it wasn’t that big of a deal, and it wasn’t trauma. maybe i’m just really good at overreacting, like i always do. it keeps affecting me though. i’m wondering if bullying can even be considered trauma? and if this is trauma? i know that bpd usually happens because of trauma (correct me if i’m wrong) and this doesn’t seem as extreme as i usually think of trauma being. unless i have forgotten something that happened to me (i have forgotten a lot of what happened in grade 3, and maybe i’m over or under exaggerating?). if i do end up diagnosed with bpd, which seems likely, i don’t know how much sense it would make that i have it, if my trauma is not that extreme. this clearly affects me and my current relationships but i don’t know if it’s trauma?

So, Jedi Survivor is the first game I’m playing on my PS5, and here’s my impressions on it. For context, I have just beaten Dagon in the Forest ring and am playing on Jedi Knight difficulty
As for why this is so long after the hype (ya know, one month)…well fuck you ya clicked on this anyways
Game looks good…but there’s still some of the same tech problems from the last game. Texture pop is really bad, basically every customization screen takes at least 2 seconds for the textures to unpixelate. In fact, one of the textures on one of the clothing options is just fucking broken (the one with clone trooper boots).
Also there’s some weird…what I can only describe as screen tearing that happens sometimes. The camera will move and the skybox gets a bit pixelated and jagged for a few moments. During initial setup there was a setting about camera blur I think? Maybe that’s something to do with it?
Combat feels…heavier in the original, in a bad way. All of Cal’s swings feel like they take longer then before to hit. That and somehow small groups of enemies feel WAY harder to deal with in the first game. Three scout troopers and a single storm trooper in the distance were not this hard in the first game. Also not a fan of the change to slow and especially the triangle button on the two saber style.
The story feels…I don’t know. I see what they’re going for, but it just isn’t clicking for me so far. That opening mission is very stylish with the long walk, but those guys you work with are introduced way too late in the mission for me to care about them dying though I’m impressed that they pulled the rug out from me on Bodo dying so far.
Cal and gang splitting up is fine but also…ok this is a “other things floating around the current discussion” thing, but I see the mystery of “Why did Cal and Cere fall out?” And my mind goes to “What did Peter Parker do to ruin everything?” That Wells has been teasing for the last year. That’s not the game’s fault, that’s just a me thing of being tired of this kind of setup. Greez is still the best and he’s gotten more likable by the minute…though I can’t figure out why he can’t just unlock the door so I can get to the goddamn aquarium.
I think part of my problem with the plot and the game so far in comparison to Fallen Order is that…it kind just dumps your ass in this huge open plane and says “Go that way, also here’s a bajillion other things”. Fallen Order, while having huge maps, was still kind of linear but with clever secrets and shortcuts in the style of Metroidvanias. Here…the whole thing’s just too fuckin big all at once.
”Well just go to where the story is and let that be your guide”
I mean yeah…but that feels kind of against what the devs are trying to impart on me here. I get the message of “here’s the story, also this big chunk for you to go around in and stuff”. I think this is probably why I don’t find BOTW interesting (haven’t played it, this is speaking from impressions). That whole “the game dumps you in the world, says the story is that way and just lets you go” thing everyone praises it for sounds like a nightmare to me. Really hope this doesn’t turn into another Elden Ring/RDR2 debacle
One more point on the story, and again this is 100% a me thing, the minute they started talking about The High Republic I started to check out. And before you say anything about me being an Old EU elitist, here’s a nuclear take: I don’t care about/like The Old Republic either. Ironic considering I’m the history guy, but yeah I just don’t care. Part of it is because I played KOTOR1 for the first time as a junior in college…in 2020, and didn’t enjoy myself at all, part of it is because I always find that sort of setting to be a lot of “it’s like the modern thing, but slightly different!”, part of it is because for the ancient past, their tech and culture seems…almost identical to the current timeframe, and that apparently everyone back then was Uber powerful compared to all the weaksauce guys now. Again, this is 100% a me thing I don’t blame the game for, just something that’s holding me back.
I know that whole spiel was very negative, but that’s because I’m just better at articulating my issues with the game then what I like about it. I am still enjoying the experience, I’m just not constantly creaming my jeans like it seemed everyone else was a month ago, in between talking about the gigabyte issue.
Anyways, here’s some random miscellaneous hopes, questions and notes:
-Hope there’s a red lightsaber Crystal and inquisitor armor like the free update in the last game
-Hope you can get actual Jedi robes
-How the hell do you mark collectibles? There’s the waypoint markers but the way the tip describes it makes it sound like how you could scan Riddler trophies in the Arkham games
-Dagon using the force on his stub of an arm is cool, but not as cool as how they did that idea in the 2003 clone wars
-Cal looks weird as shit with a beard in the custom screen. It looks like it’s fake. Looks mostly fine in the world though
-Cameron Monaghan and Debrah Wilson still look really odd in game. Cere’s still got those huge eyes and Cal’s face just looks…odd, I think it’s the chin. I don’t know if that’s just a problem with the models or the photoscans they did, it just looks off.
-There better be more then just this one planet and Coruscant, because if there’s less then the first game I’m going to be very cross.
-Getting REAL tired of this prospector planet
-Is the Mantis no longer customizable?
-WHEN THE FUCK DO I GET RID OF THESE SEEDS?!
-Do the stables…do anything?
-Spawn of Oogoo is a cheap as shit boss and is the only time I lowered the difficulty, I have no shame in saying that.
-Hope there’s something like the crashed Venator, that was my favorite local in the first game

So, here's the fourth chapter. Sorry for releasing it a bit late, I've had some pretty tough finals. The next chapter might be delayed as well but after that I should be able to get back to my normal schedule of once a week or possibly better. And thanks for the support on my last chapter, your upvotes and comments mean the world to me!
Big thanks to u/Rand0mness4 for proofreading my chapter and to u/SpacePaladin15 for creating NoP and its amazing literary universe.
CW: Descriptions of desecrated bodies (just your ordinary sapient cattle farm)
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Memory transcription subject: Oscar Williams, UN Marine
Date [standard human time]: December 3, 2136
With the hum of the cars’ engines tapering off, everything turned quiet, far too quiet. The only sound bar my own breathing was the wind making its way through cracks in the building’s metal shell. Gunfire should’ve been raining down on us by now. The building in front of was at least the size of a football field and going by the faint, but disgusting, smell of the poor victims, the place was packed. There was no way only the about two dozen scalies we eliminated worked here.
Where was the fight? Were all of them hiding inside? We couldn’t have gotten all of them before, right? Well, there’s only one way to find out where the fuckers were hiding.
Richards lined us up next to the large pair of doors separating us from the farm and a soldier from another squad grabbed a handheld battering ram. I doubted the door would hold after just a few hits with a rock but speed was of the essence. The faster we cleared out the arxur infestation, the more people would survive. I wasn’t about to let anyone else die in that hell. My grip around my rifle tightened and time almost seemed to slow down when the first hit was winded up.
We were quietly signaled to step back from the door and with just one hit with the battering ram the lock was separated from the rest of the door. The force from the hit slammed the door open and we promptly stormed in through the opening. But no gunfire met us. The inside was just as deserted as the outside had been. We had entered what seemed to be some kind of warehouse, large crates strewn throughout the floor and deep freezers lining the walls. At that moment I desperately wished I was a mouth breather. The stench, that had previously been contained by the sheet metal walls, was now flooding into my nostrils. Manure, unwashed bodies, and rotten meat. I tried my best to focus on anything but the freezers but every single wall was covered with them. Wherever my eyes darted, more proof of the murders appeared. A dried splotch of blood, some tufts of fur, a bloody machete.
They took pride in it. Pride in this… They’re going to pay.
We crept through the wide open space, making our way from cover to cover. The dirt floor muffled any sound our footsteps would’ve made and we were only exposed for brief moments. If any arxur caught us, we wouldn’t be caught like a deer in headlights. After one of our many rushes between covers, I ended up next to one of the many freezers.
Oh god. My poor nostrils.
The smell had grown even stronger and when I glanced at the freezer I quickly realized why. It seemed to have lost power, going by the fact that it wasn't cold, and that the lid was ajar. The remains of a person, a person who had friends and family, were rotting away inside. My knuckles were turning white from how hard I gripped my rifle and my teeth felt like they were going to crack due to my jaw clenching so hard. I was going to repay them in kind. Those motherfuckers, wherever they were.
When I stood up, en route to the next cover, my eyes caught a glimpse of the inside of the freezer. Pieces of mangled body parts filled the bottom of the box and a swarm of insects swarmed around something in the middle and-
Retch
Parts of yesterday’s meal filled my mouth when I realized what was hiding under the swarm. A severed venlil head with empty eye sockets stared back at me. Blood had dripped down from the sockets, painting long streaks of orange in the white fur. The head’s mouth was locked in an expression of terror and pain and the neck looked like it had been ripped off from the venlil’s body. Part of the spine hung limp beneath the neck and, knowing arxur, I doubted the venlil had been dead during the ripping.
As soon as I found out where they were- Where the hell were the arxur?
Realization suddenly flashed through my mind. Of course those cowards had fled. Fled their just punishment that I had sworn to deliver. My grip around my rifle tightened when I thought about the fuckers running this farm. They’d almost certainly escape justice, and there was in all likelihood nothing I could do about it. If only I could convince Olivia to hunt them down like they deserved.
My train of thought was brought to an abrupt end when we reached the other side of the warehouse. The door on this wall was far smaller, clearly just used by personnel. And it didn’t even have a lock. Maybe they decided to take cover behind this smaller choke point. I immediately squashed the idea in my mind as soon as I thought of it. They weren’t disciplined enough to not rush us with nothing but their natural weaponry.
My theory was quickly being proven true when we rushed into the next room. There wasn’t a single arxur in sight, but the sheer amount of victims more than made up for their absence. We had emerged on some kind of raised walkways, overlooking cramped pits filled with aliens sleeping in the most abhorrent conditions. The air reeked of unwashed bodies, feces, and many other disgusting smells I didn’t even recognize. The victims in the pits looked even worse for wear than the rest of this dilapidated building. Several of the harchen in the closest pit were covered in deep gashes and some even missed entire body parts.
Torture, there was no other explanation. Those fucking crocs.
As I looked around at the other pens, it was quickly made evident that the treatment of the harchen was more of a rule than an exception. Over in another pit, several krakotl had been completely plucked, and what I assumed to be words had been branded onto their backs. Despite my deep hatred for most of their governments, I couldn’t find it in myself to be mad at anyone here. They’d more than likely been captured long before they even knew earth was still inhabitable and even if they weren’t, they still didn’t deserve this torture.
This was so much worse than I thought. Of course it would be horrible but this, how-
Nausea quickly filled my thoughts and before I could even bend over, today's lunch spilled out of my mouth, and I wasn’t alone. At least a third of my fellow soldiers had the same reaction as me.
Good to know I’m not the only empathetic person here. Maybe they’ll agree that the arxur deserve to be treated like their prey after this. Oh, what I would do if I caught any of them.
“HELP!”
The krakotl’s hoarse scream sent a shiver down my spine. It sounded like they hadn’t used their voice for years. I hastily pulled up my bandana and checked that my visor blocked my entire face. I didn’t dare think about what would happen if they realized we were predators.
“P- P- Please help us…”
The screaming had quickly woken up the rest of the aliens who were looking at us with a mix of bewilderment, fear and hope. My eyes darted around the pens while my mind prayed that they wouldn’t land on anyone that recognized our ‘arboreal’ eyes. After what felt like the longest five seconds of my life, I finally allowed myself to breathe a sigh of relief. If no one had fainted yet, they probably didn’t know we were human.
“We’ve come to rescue you, you’re going to get out of here. Just stay calm.”
Richards immediately took command of the situation, preventing widespread panic from the aliens.
“T- T- Thank you… Is the f- f- federation winning?”
The brave krakotl who asked us for help clearly thought we were from the federation and I silently thanked god everyone else seemed to believe the same thing. If they didn’t there would be pandemonium. Those poor souls must’ve seen arxur bloodshed every single day. I could barely imagine how terrified they would be if our identity was revealed. In their eyes we would be nothing but another species of predators and this was the worst possible place to try convincing them we weren’t.
“We’re just going to make sure there are no arxur left in the building, then we’re getting you out of there. We’ll be back before you know it.”
Avoiding the question. I really hoped Richards didn’t tip off the aliens about us there. At least she didn’t deny that we were from the feds. As long as we got out of there as quickly as possible, everything would be fine.
“I- I- saw them leaving. They were a- a- angry, and before they l- l- left they- they…”
The krakotl lifted their wing and shakily pointed towards a dark corner of the room as their voice faltered. Some kind of poles with clumps in the middle filled the corner but any more detail was masked under the veil of darkness. Carefully avoiding looking at the flickering lamps filling the building with light, I turned on my night vision goggles and as soon as my brain registered what it was seeing, I wished that I had been born blind. The poles were wooden stakes and the clumps were the mutilated corpses of a dozen aliens. Deep gashes stretched across their abdomen and their intestines were pouring out of the holes. Not even their heads were spared. They were nigh unrecognizable from blunt force trauma and one of the victims still had the hammer buried in their face. Disgust and rage flared up within me, almost stronger than I’d ever felt before. I wanted to vomit and chop arxur into small pieces at the same time.
Why do they fucking exist? Why the fuck do I have to fucking see this. How can someone… do something like this? And why did we let them escape? Wait, the faster I clear this building, the faster we can hunt them down.
“You’re safe now, we’re getting you off this planet. Squad, we’re make sure there are no arxur left on the premises.”
Sergeant Richards’ command immediately pushed me to act. While about half our our force moved to clear out the rest of the building, my squad rushed for the back door at the other end of the cattle pens. We quickly made our way outside into a large yard, the dirt ground stretching several dozen meters from the building before slowly morphing into a field. In the distance, several large piles of timber were piled high next to a large, deforested area. The only feasible place for the arxur to hide on this side of the compound was the shack that stood at the edge of the yard. In contrast to the concentration camp, this building actually looked relatively structurally sound. Thick concrete walls, a door made of something other than sheet metal, and a roof with only a few visible holes. That was incredibly impressive for an arxur.
Just gotta check this shack, then we can start chasing the fuckers.
Following Richards’ directions, we quickly began making our way towards the building. Reminding myself there was no time to spare, I sprinted ahead of the others and squeezed through the slightly ajar door. A loud slam emanated from behind me as the door shut behind me and I emerged into something that almost looked like living quarters. Several bedrolls were laid out on the ground, piles of equipment were scattered across the floor, and a large scaly repti-
SHIT SHIT SHIT!
They hadn’t left. Those fuckers just laid in ambush, waiting for me to let my guard down. Its hideous body sat on one of the bedrolls, radiating bloodlust. I could feel its eyes bore deep into my soul, sending an involuntary shudder down my spine. Every single part of it was tailor made to kill, and nothing else. It could easily rip off my limbs with its massive claws, and then chop them into tiny pieces with its razor sharp teeth if I was careless.
Can’t be careless then. That fucker isn’t going to walk out of here alive. If I’m going down, it’s going down with me.
I instinctively threw myself to the ground, raising my rifle to take out my target. My rifle was aimed directly at the unarmed creature’s head, through the chain-link fence sectioning off the arxur from me. Just before I pulled the trigger, my brain connected the contradictory information, stopping me from firing from sheer bewilderment.
Why the fuck did that thing not have a weapon? And why were they in some kind of improvised prison?
“Hey! Oscar, the door’s locked. What’s your status?”
David’s voice and a loud banging on the door I just passed through snapped me back to reality. I was locked away from my squad in a room full of arxur. The same species that fucking impailed a dozen people out there. And here they were, right in front of me, behind a chain-link fence. Red flashed before my eyes as I realized what was happening.
They were trying to fool us. And those morons thought I wouldn't notice. They put up that barbed wire, trying to exploit our empathy. We’d try to imprison them, and then they’d strike. And they would have succeeded, had I not been alone.
I slowly stood back up, and shuffled backwards until I stood flush against some kind of railing. The multiple arxur that were hiding behind the chain-link looked at me with unreadable expressions but I could noticeably see their eyes widen as I raised my rifle.
Finally realizing the jig is up? They were going to pay for for the people they fucking impailed, for the venlil whose head they fucking ripped of, and for the fucking cradle.
All I had to do was tell the white lie that they attacked me and open fire. Then my squad wouldn’t be murdered and justice would finally be served. The arxur remained quiet as mice as I prepared to enact justice, probably in shock from their stupid ploy being seen through. I was eternally thankful that they were so stupid. The anger that had filled my entire system slowly melted away, being replaced by satisfaction at their imminent demise. Right as I was about to press down on the trigger one of the arxur began speaking but as I looked for the culprit I saw that all their mouths were shut. The voice was high pitched, almost childlike, and it echoed from… below.
What the-
“Hi, what are you? You look really cool!”
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Is Oscar being a bit delusional? Should he analyze the situation a bit more objectively? Possibly, but where's the fun in having completely sane characters.
Anyways, the two protagonists are about to meet. Will said meeting remain entirely civil or will Oscar "accidentally" drop a grenade into the pit? We'll find out next time.

Good morning reddit,
I have been toying with an idea for a couple of months now and have a solid story but have gotten hung up on the "Techno-magic" system. There are benefits the nanobots grant to each species that need to be learned, but each species independently evolved to add something else only that species has. Im not looking to give them super powers but practical abilities that would help with everyday life in their respective planet.

1. One of the species was introduced to a planet with heavier gravity so the nanobots merged with muscle fibers to help enhance strength to combat the additional Burdon of gravity. This give the species additional strength when on other less gravity heavy worlds.
2. A land squid species had the nanobot develop into nodes at the ends of tentacles to help sensory perception. Allowing hunting for food in rocky area or understanding the land layout, the moon they developed on has active seismic activity so the added perception allows them to see rock formation that could topple over if an earthquake hits. They are great for scanning environments detecting traps or collecting data
3. This species is a herbivore species that was not the apex predators of the moon and developed a shocking defense mechanism similar to an electric eel. They can store and discharge electricity at will to something that is touching them. Developed into their bodies are micro organic generators that over time can build up electricity.
4. An Avery species that had developed the nanobots into the skin allowing them to harden the outer layer when about to impact the ground that would normally cause damage.
5. Another Avery species that developed a filtration system in their lungs that would allow the storing of lighter gases inside their body, giving them better control of altitude adjustment and making them faster. This filtration system also eliminates airborne toxins and pathogens when breathing.
6. A hyper intelligent species that have a near photographic memory, when clumped together they can act as a sort of hive mind to achieve the common goal of the group. These are the only ones with a sort of telepathy. They can hack other species, accessing their minds as databases and either minipulating them into a thought pattern or to steal data. They are not able to freely access others, they need both a cypher to understand the thought pattern and have the target open allowing access or in some state they are unable to prevent.
7. A chameleon like camouflage built into the skin that doesn't render the person invisible but matches the pattern behind the person to blend in at a level that is almost imperceivable.
8. Pheromone minipulation that could be used to make an attacker less aggresive, or motivate themselves to fight through pain. Walking drug pharmacy in a way.
9. 9
10. 10
11. 11
12. 12
13. 13

I have a solid understanding most of them and have them worked into the story. I was wondering if anyone has any unique ideas to fill in the rest or else i was going to duplicate abilities to the remaining but with some different twist.

We know that the U-20 Arc lasted 41 chapters (109-150) and so far the Neo Egoist League Arc started on chapter 153 in 2021 and after 67 chapters we are only on the 3rd game. In real life the U-20 World Cup winner will play 7 games, 3 group stage games and five bracket games. If Japan is to win then they will need to play 7 games. Based on this info how long do you think the U-20 World Cup arc will Last. In my personal indication if the Blue Lock vs Japan U-20 game was any indication of how the U-20 World Cup games will play out I’d say we are looking at least 3 years for the U-20 World Cup Arc to conclude. (To be fair that game had a lot of flashed back and had bad pacing so who knows.)
If this is accurate and the series won’t end without Japan winning a FIFA World Cup then 4 years in Blue Lock will have to pass. I could see this manga running for like another 10 years.

The trivialization of doping in Jiu-Jitsu and the biggest fallacies in defense of its use.
Contrary to what people want to believe, the biggest advantage of those who use these resources is not the strength itself at the time of the fight, which should be welcomed, but the ability to recover faster from strenuous training sessions and injuries. If it were just the benefit of strength itself, some not well-versed could accept the argument that “Jiu-Jitsu is not strength, so put a weightlifter there to see if he wins”, but this is an argument from those who think about steroids as the thing that makes you bloated and muscular, when in reality the biggest benefit is different. In cycling, for example, there are no athletes with large muscle mass, so there are several cases of athletes caught using doping, even when strict control are applied.
Within everything I've heard and read about it, I'll say again that the biggest benefit is the possibility of much faster recovery between one workout and another and coming back from injuries faster. While one athlete arrives at the end of the week exhausted and in need of rest, the other is able to continue training without feeling drained. It then becomes a matter of logic: among athletes of similar levels, if one can train more than the other, whoever trains more has an advantage.
It is known that there have always been people using drugs to improve performance in training and championships, but those who used or still use them do not usually admit it outside their circle of intimate friends. For me, this is the biggest proof that whoever does it knows they are cheating. This person is ashamed to publicly assume their behaviour, as he secretly wonders if he would be capable of the same achievements if he were clean. Therefore, he does not want the public to raise concerns about his ability to achieve the same results, because, within himself, he bets he would not.
“The use of anabolic steroids does not make a person good at Jiu-Jitsu.” This is a common argument from those who defend those who test positive in the anti-doping test, but again it starts from a wrong premise, that the purpose of use is just to gain strength. The drug itself doesn't make anyone good at Jiu-Jitsu or even become good at strategies involving competition. If I were to give steroids to a lady walking on the Copacabana promenade, she won't enter and win any championship. But think of your gym partner who trains the hardest with you, that balanced out training, which you win one day and he beats you the next. You are always pulling and encouraging yourself to improve. Did you think of anyone? Now give this guy an enhancer. Will he have an advantage or not? The answer is yes and ends with the initial argument, which is a reasoning that only thinks about gaining strength, so it is used in the wrong circumstances and therefore leads to wrong conclusions. Faced with this example, I can still argue that yes, the use of anabolic steroids can make a person good at Jiu-Jitsu, as it allows them to train more often, bringing about faster technical evolution, if we consider that training evolves. Still using the same example with this training partner who now started to use enhancers. Imagine that before, he did 5 workouts a week and now he can do twice as much, because it doesn't take as long as for him to rest or recover from an injury. At the end of 12 months you trained 260 times and he trained 520. If the next year you stay clean and he doesn't, he will have accumulated 1040 trainings and you will have 520. It's like he advances two years for every year of training you did . Can you imagine how much more Jiu-Jitsu techniques evolve in someone who initially has a similar level to his, but manages to train twice as much? So I could even say that the use of anabolic steroids can actually make a person good at Jiu-Jitsu. Robbing a bank can also make a person rich, but I don't want to get rich that way. It goes from how you want to achieve your dreams and goals.
I can imagine some people arguing that “so I take it too”. Got it, but then it would be you and him getting undue advantage over two other friends or opponents from another gym. What's the problem? The problem with that is that it's illegal, it's prohibited, so whoever does it and enters a championship like the IBJJF that forbids it in the rules, is cheating.
A simpler and more direct example. If it were possible a confrontation between you and your identical version, but that makes use of these anabolic steroids. Who gets the advantage? Those who ask themselves know the answer and when they know it, it is impossible to support any defense of its use, unless the illegality in the rules and the health risks are disregarded.
"Those who don’t want to use it, simply don’t." When reading about the undue advantages of those who take it, without listing the health risks, it might even seem like an excuse. If it speeds up recovery from fatigue and injuries, should I take it? Let's ignore that it's against the rule for a moment, as I know that there are events that don't test and one could argue that in those events it's not illegal. Yet there are health hazards that some people are not willing to deal with..
“If you test everyone, there’s not one single person that will be clean.” This phrase has become a cliché in BJJ, as well as the idea that “you can only be a champion by taking enhances, because everyone takes them”. Phrases that also start from wrong premises, first because it is not true that everyone takes it, although many of those at the top do. What must be remembered is that there are those who prefer to respect the rules and not use enhancers, even if they have become a minority. These people may be eliminated in the early rounds or even in the qualifying stages. Those who are wronged are likely to be people much closer to yours and my reality than the reality of those false champions created in the laboratories. When you decide to admire someone who makes use of these subterfuges, you are choosing as an example someone who wins by cheating. I go back to giving the example of the person with financial success, because it is easy to understand, I admire those who conquer financial independence through honest work, even if their wealth is less than that person who achieved greater amounts, however dishonestly.
“I had to use it to keep up with the others” If you understand that using it is illegal, that by using it your opponent is cheating, do you want to do the same as him? I understand that you might feel wronged, but is your response to this to become equal? If that's your justification, I don't think you think any differently than who uses it.
“You have to take into account that I am older and fighting against the new generations” But the rule does not change according to age. There are categories for each age, if you choose to venture out with the younger ones, that doesn't give you the right to use enhancers. At least in championships that the rule prohibits it. It would be like signing up for a Jiu-Jitsu championship, being punished by knocking out my opponent with a punch and feeling wronged. NO, the rule is clear regarding the prohibition of punches, as well as the use of doping. If, due to age, the athlete is no longer able to face the younger ones, enter the category of the older ones or retire from competitions. Natural order. In addition, the veteran who assumes the use, leaves in the air the doubt that if in fact he was not already using it since he was young. If there are championships that don't test, why don't they fight only those? No one is obliged to fight in the only federation that tests it, the IBJJF, even so, everyone wants to, because they know it is the most prestigious one. The strategy is not a secret, they use it indiscriminately and seek the title and recognition by the IBJJF, if they are eventually caught in the weak test, they still enjoy the notoriety until the exam is released. They give more seminars, close sponsorships and are invited to compete in other paid events while they wait to pass the punishment deadline without fighting at the IBJJF. When it's over, they fight back and do it all over again. There are already athletes who have been caught more than once. They are not scared, as the punishment is not valid for other events and the number of people who still manage to defend it is alarmingly growing.
“But it's unfair to only test the champion” This phrase is a smokescreen against the real problem. Of course, the ideal is to test everyone and with more efficient tests, but it is financially unfeasible for now. Faced with this fact and the fact that this is usually said when someone “gets caught”, the phrase becomes just a distraction. Better to test only the champion than nobody at all, just as it is better to arrest only one assailant than none at all. Can you imagine someone arguing that it is unfair to arrest just one robber because it is impossible to arrest everyone?
“There is no undue advantage, I just do hormone replacement” an athlete told me trying to convince me. I was curious to understand better and I learned about it. In fact, there are some cases where hormone replacement is necessary, they are very specific cases or for much older people, over 65 years old. This black belt who told me that, a Brazilian champion in the adult category, saw absolutely nothing wrong with taking hormone replacement. As he was younger than me, I asked him at what age he had started and without any shame he said that at eighteen, only in doses to adjust the recommended levels. He was convinced that this was okay. I discovered that it is normal for athletes over thirty or forty who started using testosterone at a very young age to actually need to replace it, as the body stops producing it naturally. I cannot accept that these cases serve as excuses or justification for normalizing use.
“I've already been tested and I wasn't caught in doping” is not the same thing as saying with all the words “I've never used prohibited substances, I'm against it and anyone who does is cheating”. Have you ever asked yourself why you haven't heard from the lips of some great champions the repudiation of those caught in doping? I'll give you a hint, it's for the same reason certain politicians don't celebrate the arrest of other corrupt politicians. Deep down, they're just thinking "Thank God" for not being the ones to get caught.
Ask these 3 questions to your sports idols: 1) Do you use or have you used any substance to improve performance? 2) Do you consider that whoever uses this is cheating? 3) In your opinion, should athletes who have already been caught in the anti-doping exam be banned from fighting all events?
If they stutters when they answers, you may be suspicious. Most don't have the courage to assume it, but some, on the other hand, are already no longer ashamed and trying to normalize the use. In 2015, I heard a five-time black belt world champion, speaking at a crowded dinner table for anyone who would listen, so it shouldn't be a secret, the following statement: “The way the IBJJF tests, only on the day and with a urine test, only those who are very stupid are caught in doping. It is enough to use it accompanied by a good doctor who knows when to stop and that way the substance leaves the body before the test day, without disturbing the benefits during training”. I trained with several teams, lived with several athletes. I've heard confessions of using it from their own mouth or even from their training partners. I'm not saying this because I want to point out a specific person, and I don't even need to, anyone in the field already knows, but I see the problem as being greater than accusing just one individual, I'm just saying this because I see that they're trying to normalize something that can't be accepted in Jiu-Jitsu. Its use has become banal and that scares me, but not as much as realizing that defending its use has been broad and open, not only by athletes, but also by practitioners who use it as a hobby. They lost the shame of defending doping and seeking justifications for it. Even among students who are not professional athletes, who sometimes do not even compete or only do it sporadically, are using it indiscriminately. I consider this a dangerous path. It is possible to win fairly without enhancers. I speak not only based on my achievements, but also based on other champions I've seen rise to the top. Think about which choice suits you best and think that, for those who use it, it must be horrible to go home, look at the medal table and wonder if they would have being able to win them without enhancers
Wrote by black belt World Champion Felipe Costa

This post is inspired by a recent analysis I saw on this subreddit earlier that challenges the idea that Oshi No Ko is a tragedy, which I have linked below. I find it a great read and would highly recommend everyone to check it out! Note that this post isn't meant to respond to the linked post below, but an independent analysis of why Oshi No Ko could be a tragedy.
https://www.reddit.com/OshiNoKo/comments/13u6ke8/an_analysis_of_oshi_no_ko_the_story_is_not_a/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
This analysis will be split into three parts:

1. An analysis of the elements of tragedy and how Oshi No Ko aligns with it
2. Certain points of foreshadowing specific to the story that points to certain characters' deaths
3. Other miscellaneous reasons for why it would make sense for Aka to make it a tragedy (and maybe why it wouldn't)

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1) Elements of tragedy
I'm still a bit of an amateur at literary analysis, so I would love for others to add more insight into this which I might have missed.
According to Aristotle, a tragedy has three main characteristics (hamartia, anagnorisis, and peripeteia) that align with 6 other elements in the story (plot, character, diction, thought, spectacle and music). I'll explain each element and how the manga connects to its tragic aspects (as well as tragic characteristics, where applicable).
Plot (The Uncontrollable)
Quite intuitively, Aristotle says tragedies are supposed to end in tragedy. Tbh, there's not much to discuss here, since any protagonist dying would be disastrous to the other characters (as well as the entire fandom). What is more interesting to discuss though, is the claim Aristotle makes, which is the tragic events that happen in the plot should be out of the tragic hero's control.
I give you our very likely tragic hero: Aqua (this is not an assertion. The characteristics I describe later throughout the analysis also give reasons for why Aqua's character lines up with a tragic hero's).
Interestingly enough, Aqua has had a long track record of doing insanely reckless things that have earned him the ire of other characters and fate himself. Two main examples are his response to Akane's suicide attempt early on in the manga, as well as his decision to suddenly reveal his and Ruby's relationship with Ai to the public. Both times, Aqua was criticized for the averse impacts his actions have had (even though he later solves the Akane situation with the raw footage video), and honestly were highly dependent on a lucky response from the public. Even during his previous life, the mf ran after a stalker into the woods at night AND TOWARDS THE EDGE OF A CLIFF without any thought about his safety whatsoever. Especially in his currently emotionally-driven and irrational state, if Aqua keeps up this trend of doing reckless things, he could very well provoke a response entirely out of his control that might bring his downfall.
Character (Hamartia)
According to Aristotle, a tragic hero must have hamartia: a tragic flaw that eventually leads to their downfall. In this case, Aqua's progression as a character seems to be driven by one very large motive: his unhealthy obsession with avenging Ai's death. Given the current point in the story (the 15-year lie movie arc) is completely based on his obsession with Ai, it gives the necessary buildup to have that character trait backfire on Aqua to kickstart the tragedy. There are also explicit criticisms of this flaw of his, such as Akane's active opposition to Aqua's self-destructive behaviour, as well as some implicit ones like the recent interaction between Aqua and the crow girl in chapter 118. In the chapter, the crow girl says that Ai didn't get reincarnated unlike Ruby and Aqua, and that maybe he should consider the reason he was reincarnated. To many (including myself), this could imply a suggestion that he should reconsider his current path and use this second life of his to the fullest. When he let go of his intent for revenge for Ai earlier (because he thought his father was dead), he started TRULY living like a normal person. It is more than possible that Aqua's obsession with revenge and Ai could be his hamartia.
Diction (Anagnorisis)
Diction in tragedy is based on anagnorisis: the sudden realization the tragic hero has about their situation, and that eventually leads them to their downfall. I believe we've already seen this anagnorisis in the manga: When Aqua realizes that his father is alive, and who Hikaru is.
This is the point where Aqua begins his downward spiral, and we see him start to revert to his vengeful, self-destructive arc. Except for this time, we see it amplified tenfold since his motives previously were somewhat diverted from the story painting his rise and development as an actor. Now that that's done, this particular downward spiral is centred solely on its purpose: revenge. This realization is the turning point to turn him into the self-destructive, hateful mess of a person he is currently; which is what leads us to the next element:
Thought (Peripeteia/Catharsis)
A tragedy isn't just a story of the protagonist suffering at the end of it. It is a rollercoaster that constantly builds up the disaster the more twisted the tragic hero becomes, until it drops; and there is a release of emotions within the audience. Pity, sadness, grief. Relief. It is not a sudden twist of events, not an unexpected ending. It is an outcome everyone sees coming and when it finally hits, it releases all that buildup in a burst of emotions. This is catharsis.
Catharsis is primarily built with three components. The character (as mentioned earlier) of the tragic hero must begin with a morally upstanding individual, who the audience grows to root for. Then the downward spiral of events as a result of the anagnorisis. Then the release of emotions in the eventual downfall/death of the character.
It's very easy to argue that Aqua resembles that morally upstanding person. Even in his previous life as Goro, he's had many feats that point to his strong moral foundation. The fact that he was a doctor signalled his desire to help others. That he cared about his patients (Sarina) so much to the point of even taking up their hobbies post their death in their honour. That he actively stuck to his obligations as a doctor rather than to his instincts as a fan when he was with Ai. Up to his life as Aqua, where he is portrayed as a great brother who truly cares for Ruby (quite intuitive, examples are sprinkled throughout the manga). Additionally, a very common trope in these tragedies is to have the morals of the tragic hero into their very own hamartia. Guess whose hamartia could also be seen as a product of his undying love for his mother as a good son? Aqua himself.
But at this stage of the manga, we no longer see that loving Aqua. We no longer see his compassion and start to see him become a more twisted and hateful person in the current arc. The majority of his appearances now feature him with a black star in his eyes, which is typically referred to as a symbol of lies and manipulation, often with killing intent (this would take a whole other analysis). But even without making these assumptions, we've already seen him do some terrible things, such as actively manipulating Kana by playing with her emotions, casting Akane aside despite her good intentions, exposing his and Ruby's relationship with Ai without Ruby's consent, etc. I'm sure all of us still love Aqua and truly want to see him come out of this alive, but for most people, it is undeniable that he is the same compassionate, empathetic individual he was at the start of the story. That is the second component of catharsis to a tick.
The part we haven't seen yet is the ACTUAL release of catharsis, the horrific events that happen to the tragic hero at the end of the story. We haven't gotten to that part at this point in the plot yet, but since the first two components are present, it is fair to assume that the final release is impending.
Spectacle (Realism)
There's not much to discuss about spectacle here tbh, since this isn't a live play. However, Aristotle's view on tragedies is for them to work, they have to imitate reality to an extent to make them relatable to the viewer. We can see the manga adhere to this rule by not only using realistic settings but also tackling realistic issues related to the entertainment industry. This doesn't mean anything though, since it's a manga. Just wanted to point that out.
Music
Yeah, nothing much to discuss here. This is a manga, there's no music. The anime music banging though!
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2) Foreshadowing
"Yeah OP, you have a long essay about what a tragedy is and all, but what if I don't buy any of that?"
I wouldn't blame you. That's the whole point of starting this discussion with the analysis! But here are two more examples that I think foreshadow Aqua's tragic end.
Some might say this is a stretch, but I find it interesting why Aqua ended up playing the villain while filming the Sweet Today adaptation in the Entertainment World arc. He even explicitly mentions the irony of it all, playing the "stalker that killed Ai." But it is never brought up again throughout the manga. I can understand it being a lone tongue-in-cheek irony thing, but for a writer like Aka who is always so comprehensive with his motifs and symbolism even in this manga, it doesn't rule out the possibility that this was foreshadowing Aqua's eventual dark path. Also, the stalker ended up committing suicide after killing Ai. Which has also been expressed as Aqua's plan once he kills his father. Make of that what you will.
In addition, an enigmatic character who is showing some rising relevance in the story is the crow girl, who is not only a supernatural character, but also has some semblance of being a deity of death (crows are also a very widely-used symbol of death). We never truly see her before her appearance in the Private Arc, but when she interacted with Aqua and Ruby, both of them seemed familiar with her. They both may have met her somewhere off-screen during their reincarnations. The reason I bring her up is that the three appearances she makes, it often has to do with death in some way. Be it a discussion about Gorou's death or Ruby's discovery of Gorou's corpse. The one appearance that doesn't seem to have much immediate proximity to the theme of death is her latest one in chapter 118. Yes, this is during an arc that is about revenge for Ai's death, and Aqua's pursuit for Hikaru's death, but this interaction doesn't seem as linked to those as her other appearances. This interaction with Aqua was not about a previous death; hence, the logical conclusion is that it foreshadows an impending one. And while some might argue that the death might be Hikaru's, I believe this to be a bit too random, and Hikaru's character too insignificant (development-wise) to make this about his death. Consider that of all the appearances Crow Girl has made thus far, they have all been about one other character's death and one character only. Aqua, and his previous life as Gorou.
I want to note that it's been a while since I've read the earlier parts of the manga, and presently am writing this largely off my memory (I also really can't find the time to do a comprehensive re-read up to the current point in the story while taking notes). If there are any other possible moments of foreshadowing I've missed, please bring them up in the comments since I would love to know as well!
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3) Miscellaneous/Meta
As we cross the 2k word mark, I would like to end with an additional comment about the series in itself, and why it might make sense to Aka to make this story end as a tragedy.
Unlikely his other massively popular series (an absolute masterpiece), Kaguya-sama, Oshi No Ko is a series dedicated to dark themes. It is a series that exposes the dark side of the entertainment industry, actively tackles potentially triggering themes about suicide and parental abandonment, and has shown no mercy to the prospect of making its readers squirm with shock, discomfort, and sadness. It is a series that began by killing off its protagonist and ending its FIRST arc with one of the hugest and most emotionally devastating twists in manga history. This sends a huge message to the audience: do not expect happy endings, this series is dedicated to making you cry. While it doesn't rule out the possibility of Aqua getting a happy ending, a tragic ending would absolutely be consistent with the narrative that the story has had so far.
That said, in a small point for devil's advocate, this is also a series that largely hinges on twists and moments that shock readers (in a very NON-comprehensive list, we have Ai's death, Akane's imitation of Ai, the discovery that Aqua's father is alive (at the time we thought he was dead), Ruby and Akane suddenly discovering Gorou's body, and Sarina's absent mother showing up as the distributor for the 15-year lie movie in the latest chapter). Aqua, who has long been saying he doesn't intend to live once he's enacted his revenge, kind of deviates from that trend. If HE were to die, that wouldn't exactly be a shock to the audience, since it's been a long time coming. In short, it is possible that all my previous analyses about the release of catharsis and the foreshadowing might've also worked as reasons AGAINST the story ending in Aqua's death since it counteracts the whole strategy of the manga getting its appeal from its twists.
Therefore, if this isn't about Aqua's death, then there's one other plausible way this could be turned into a tragedy. An event that would absolutely break Aqua and might turn him into an empty shell of the person he once was, POSSIBLY resulting in him taking his own life by proxy.
I'm talking about Akane Kurokawa's death.
I won't get into a whole other analysis about whether or not Akane's death is likely. But one thing the post I linked above and I agree with is, if someone were to die, it might be Akane. This is also a thought that is shared by a lot of fans in the community and has been arguably foreshadowed through her flawless imitation of (a now dead) Ai, her strong resolve to oppose Aqua's plan and save him (which might result in her doing some things that might end in her death, potentially also making Aqua feel responsible), and even more explicitly, that damn bridge scene in chapter 97 that made most of us think she was going to die. There are a lot of reasons to expect a possible Akane death in the near future, since it would not only be consistent with said foreshadowing but would also arguably have the same if not stronger tragic impact on Aqua and the Oshi No Ko fandom if she were to die. I pray that I am wrong, but these are my speculations for now.
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Conclusion
Long story short, this was an analysis that looked into the elements of a tragedy and how the Oshi No Ko storyline thus far has fit within it. Independently of that, there are some additional reasons to suggest Aqua's death in the future; and if not, it MIGHT be Akane's (I REALLY HOPE I AM WRONG).
If you've read all 2.5k+ words of this analysis, thanks! I want to note that I am not a literary expert, and there are simply too many unresolved nuances to form a definite prediction on the outcome of the story now. Therefore, I'd love to hear some more of your thoughts in the comments and am very open to further discussion or debate on this matter. Hopefully, this has given some food for thought on the literary aspects of the series, and I can't wait to see where it goes!

-Red-
April 19th, 11:13 A.M., The Sprawl
I sparked a dilapidated Vita-Cig that I’d snagged from Trodes and peered out into the Sprawl; the careful equilibrium of a well-orchestrated black-market had returned; pushers and gangers lined the alleys, watching for signals from rooftop lookouts to avoid the single Peacewatch cruiser that had been stupid enough to enter the dockside. The poor bastard would be dead before the afternoon was over… not that I had much sympathy for his kind. Peacewatch made it a habit to stay out of the Sprawl: unless the Eggheads predictive crime system said something catastrophic was coming, they policed their kind and left us in the hands of the mob. I’d never iced an officer. Not yet at least.
“Your partner should be ready shortly, I think he’s just tying up a few loose ends,” Akari said, snatching the cigarette from my hand and taking a long drag.
“Remind me again why you think I should take the shrimp with me instead of Nico and Roman?”
“He’s smart… and the other two are working on something else. Besides-- you need brains on this one, Red, not muscle,” she giggled, passing the cigarette back.
“Whatever you say,” I paused, grabbing the smoke, “what do you have them up to?”
“There’s a shipment of Xeno-grade weapons coming down from the colonies. Nico and Roman will be liberating them from the Slicers. Or, their share, at least. It won’t be much, maybe a dozen guns, but it’ll be worth it: the force field tech alone will pay for the trip as soon as Fincetti’s goons start trying to take your heads off with plasma cannons and mono blades.”
“What do you mean, their share?”
“The job was too big for us to take on alone. I linked up with another enterprising group of Freelancers. If it goes well, maybe we can hire them on for the heist, we’re going to need more people if we want to walk out of there alive.”
We?
“What, are you planning on coming along now?” I asked, snuffing out the smoke.
“It only seems right; Trodes is coming along, and I’m a better shot than he’ll ever be. Besides, you have a dangerous habit of getting shot, and I can’t have you going down in the field,” she said, winking as if to punctuate the sentence.
“You sure? We can manage, you don’t have to come with us, you’ve done so much already.”
“I know I have, that’s why I have to protect my investment. If you go down out there, then the team is without a leader. A military scale operation like this will go south real fast without someone competent in command.”
“You’ve got me wrong, Akari: I’m no leader. I’m just someone who wants to live in a better city and doesn’t mind taking the trash out himself. Besides, why do we need a leader? We’re all competent adults acting in concert, of our own free will. We all know what we’re doing, if a situation arises and someone needs to take charge, it’ll happen.”
“You’ve got a lot of faith in a crew you just met,” Akari said with a sneer.
“You know why I asked you to put the team together, Akari?”
“Because there’s a bounty on your head that could finance twenty retirements, and you know you can trust me?”
“No, well yeah, but that’s beside the point—I asked you because you’re not a Fixer, you’re a part time street doc that works the front desk at the most popular Freelancer hotel in the Sprawl. If there’s anyone who knows who’s gonna get the job done, it’s you. See, a Fixer is going to be okay with whatever losses they deem acceptable beforehand, but they’re fine with keeping that to themselves. If you thought any of these mooks were going to crack under pressure, or do something stupid, you wouldn’t have set me up with them.”
Before she could respond, Trodes emerged from the stairs leading to the lab. He winced as the sunlight hit his eyes, shrugging on the hood of the oversized sweatshirt that blanketed his meek frame. Glimpses of pain showed through every tremor laden step he took. A cloak of wires enveloped his skull, feeding into an old-world cyber console.
“It’s insufferably hot out here,” Trodes sighed.
“Don’t worry, we’re not going far. Chances are that whatever hole we’re meeting BFU in will have air conditioning,” I responded, clicking my key fob, and signaling the bike to pull around.
Trodes face fell flat when the Supersonic rolled around the corner; apparently, the prestige of carving through the skyway on a state-of-the-art Taffington jet-bike was lost on him.
“Are we taking… that?” Trodes stammered.
“We are. Unless you’ve got a pair of wheels with two seats?” I asked, mounting the bike and revving the engine.
With an exasperated sigh, Trodes boarded the passenger seat. I could feel him behind me, vibrating as tremors gripped his body.
“You good, buddy?” I asked.
He nodded vigorously, clenching the handrails with white knuckles.
Akari shook her head and headed back to the lab.
I heard Trodes mumble something under his breath, but it was quickly drowned out by the jet-bike’s purr. I carved into the skyway. Driving in the Sprawl was pure freedom: almost nobody owned vehicles with aerial capabilities in this part of town. It didn’t take long to reach top speed.
Slummers and gutterpunks walked the streets like zombies in a drug addled haze. The scent of gunpowder, pollution and burning ozone coalesced into a putrid stench that reeked of poverty and violence. Patches of azure moved in militant formation below; the Vorrath had taken to the streets. On a different day, a better day, I would’ve helped them. Most slummers hated the Offworlder Coalition, but not me—at the end of the day I always figured that I had more in common with poor people from another planet than rich people from another district of the city. At least we shared the same struggle.
The bike slowed to crawl; the Neo-Confederates were about, backed by a platoon of Brown-Shirts that looked like a tide of sewer run off, crashing through the streets with reckless abandon. Civilians fled for their homes. Fuck.
The jet-bike careened through the air before finally landing atop a building a few blocks away from the impending conflict.
“Get off,” I said, turning back to Trodes.
“Why? You don’t intend to abandon me at this altitude, do you?”
“Not as long as I survive—I’ll be quick, I just need to ventilate some Nazi fucks, understood?”
He shook his head and muttered a string of curses.
I tore through the air, circling around the impending conflict. I chased a handful of cheap amphetamines with a poorly rolled joint and swooped low, behind the rolling tide of brown shirts. This wasn’t the first time I’d made myself an enemy of the city’s Neo-Nazi’s; I’d killed at least a dozen of them in my career as a courier, but those were isolated incidents, back-alley brawls away from the mob.
This was a whole new ball game.
I fell slack as my Teleoperations module synchronized with the bike. My consciousness faded, reemerging into the HALO-Net’s stylized rendition of the bike’s interior. I wasn’t just the pilot now—I was the bike. Bullets carved twin streaks of crimson into the brown tide. It didn’t take long to hit top speed, 3.7 seconds, to be exact.
The group turned in nearly perfect unison, launching volley upon volley as I passed overhead. The bike’s shields barely held together; I felt every round, like a flock of birds violently slamming into my side—not enough to cause any real damage, but more than enough to get the blood pumping. I slid into an alley a few blocks off and waited for the shield generator to recharge. Gunshots rang out from the streets, alongside the sizzle of plasma meeting flesh. Soon the din was drowned beneath the roar of dozens of Vorrath war cries. I took to the sky.
Trodes was exactly where I left him, nervously clutching a knock off version of a Locust flechette pistol.
“I was beginning to doubt your survival,” Trodes said shakily.
“Wrong again, little guy,” I paused, reigniting a half smoked joint, “it was just a quick hit and run, we don’t have the time or the numbers for a pitched battle. Now, hop on.”
It didn’t take long to find BFU’s base of operations. Black flags and Anarchist graffiti covered the walls of the abandoned warehouse they’d apparently taken up residence in. A field of repurposed Peacewatch turrets were installed atop the roof, complimented by a web of cameras that spread across a three-block radius. Anarchists of all species and creeds loitered outside. The guards ranged from Cyborgs and Vat-Grown, to Vorrath and Vorstihl, each wearing a variant of the black flag with colors corresponding to their ideologies.
As I hovered above the building, I saw a familiar face: the rookie from earlier. Alarmingly, his cruiser was nowhere to be seen. His face was wrought with horror, as a pair of cyborgs led him inside the warehouse.
“They’re certainly less than subtle,” Trodes said.
“They don’t have to be subtle, they’re the biggest citizens political organization in the Sprawl. Peacewatch avoids them if they have anything less than a full platoon on hand,” I explained.
“Red… before we enter negotiations with these hooligans, I must inquire as to what your motivation hitting the vault is? Surely you know there’s a strong likelihood that you won’t make it out, and from what I’d heard about you, I always understood you to be a man who knew how to keep himself out of the line of sight of dangerous people,” Trodes said, nervously.
“Fincetti is the most dangerous man in the city, short of O’Bannon. He controls the black market with an iron fist and is instrumental in all the things I hate about living here. The problem is, I have no way to do anything about it right now… but there’s something big in the safe—there must be—for fucks sake, he iced his family over it. I’m hoping there’s something in there that can give me a little leverage, so I can cross him out afterwards.”
Trodes was silent for a moment, simply reaching as if to ask me to pass the joint. I obliged.
“I have my reasons to want O’Bannon dead too, I’m in,” he paused as a coughing fit seized him, causing the joint to fall to the ground, “there’s something you should know though: I’m working with an entity of great power in the Net; I don’t know what precisely it is, but I know it saved my life more than once. As a matter of fact, it’s the only reason I was able to obtain the blueprint of Fincetti’s bunker, and his security plan.”
“Is it… is it an unshackled AI?”
“Unlikely: it seems to understand compassion and empathy on a uniquely organic level, something that rarely slips past Netwatch.”
“Alright, well whatever it is, you keep an eye on it and let me know if things get shady. I appreciate you telling me.”
Trodes nodded in silence.
The crowd parted expectantly as I landed along the streetside. Dozens of eyes were immediately glued to Trodes and I. A cyborg with a steel double mohawk emerged from a sea of leather, patches, and smoke. A sawed-off shotgun hung at his side.
“Red, I presume?” the Cyborg asked, extending a steel hand.
“That’s right, and who’re you?” I answered, clasping the borgs hand as firm as I could manage.
“They call me Diezel, and I’ll be your host today,” he released my hand and looked me up and down as if assessing whether I was a threat, “follow me, everyone’s here so we can get straight down to business.”
The warehouse’s interior had been renovated drastically; layers of open-faced lofts sat stacked upon each other, consuming the walls. Nearly every non-violent law in the city was being broken in the lofts, from cooking chems and explosives to studying banned literature and Doomguard martial arts. It was beautiful. We followed Diezel through a winding hallway of munitions manufacturing stations, before finally emerging into an immense circular room, with rows of seats climbing the walls. I couldn’t believe it—there must have been two hundred people present.
The lights dimmed as we entered the arena. Diezel led us to the rooms center, ushering Trodes and I onto a great circular platform; he fell into place on a platform across from us, beside a Vat-Grown woman bearing an orange and black flag on her arm, and augmentations that cost more than my bike. Behind the duo a bulbous Vorstihl lurked; tentacles draped down his back, carefully pulled away from his cyclopean eye. A red and black flag was displayed on his arm… it was only then that I noticed the blue and black flag on Diezel’s arm.
The platforms each rose roughly fifteen feet into the air, before microphone stands emerged from the center of each platform. Diezel stepped forward, past the microphone.
“Before we start, I’ll explain how this works: the three of us are representatives of our specific unions—but the people are free to interject. One union voting to aid in your endeavors does not guarantee the help of the other two, as each union demands a perfect consensus. Likewise, if a faction without one union decides to help you, it does not necessarily mean you have the support of the entire union. The only way you’ll end up with total support is cross union consensus. Do you understand?”
A consensus: of course, they needed a damned consensus.
“I do,” I answered, speaking away from the microphone.
“Then let’s get this show on the road,” Diezel stepped back, finding his microphone before continuing, “Red, Trodes, welcome to the Bouleuterion,” he paused a moment as the crowd erupted into cheers, “beside me are my comrades Aria and Korvirex, and we stand ready to hear your proposal.”
“As most of you probably know, Don Fincetti is the most powerful man in the underworld, hell—maybe even the city—what you likely don’t know is that he has a vault beneath the city, guarded by an army of Harvesters. I intend to break into the vault, slaughter the Harvesters and strike a blow to Fincetti that he won’t forget… and I intend to kill him shortly after. What I ask is simple: you help me in what’s to come, and when he’s finally dead, you can all split his turf among yourselves. All I care about is making sure he doesn’t live long enough to poison the Sprawl more than he already has.”
A murmur emerged from the stands. I gazed across the way to see the three representatives huddled together, whispering amongst themselves. Finally, Aria stepped towards her microphone.
“What you ask of us will likely mean the death of many of our people… we need something greater than what you offer—we need a guarantee of mutual aid—you have a reputation in the Sprawl, we would ask that you employ it in helping us when the time comes to resettle the Sprawl. Namely, we’d request your assistance against the gangs that may try to fill the power void you seek to create,” Aria explained.
“That seems reasonable,” I said.
Aria stepped back as Korvirex moved forward.
“Tell me, Red, are you familiar with the Offworlder Coalition?” Korvirex asked.
“I am—as a matter of fact, I aided them on the way here—they were marching against the Neo-Confederates and the Brown Shirts. I insured that they had the element of surprise.”
Korvirex stroked the beard-like tentacles that hung from his chin in contemplation.
“Good. What I ask is that you help us to secure their trust, we have offered solidarity where we could, but our forces are spread thin. The ideology of many of the exiled Vorrath rebels that found their way to Nova City—it matches that of our union. If our help was offered, would you agree to assist us in aiding the Coalition, so that they finally have an opportunity to get on their feet?”
Trodes leaned towards in, whispering in my ear.
“It would be prudent of you to make a counteroffer: proclaim that you’ll help with the Coalition, if they’ll spread the word to other groups whose goals may align with ours. There will likely be at least a couple hundred Harvesters in the Undercity when we strike… unless they’re occupied elsewhere.”
“I would happily help with the Coalition, on the condition that your faction spread the word about what we’re doing to like-minded organizations. As it stands, we could still use more numbers to match the Harvesters,” I said.
“These conditions may be satisfactory,” Korvirex said, before retreating into yet another group huddle.
The audience watched on in silence.
Finally, Diezel reapproached the microphone.
“The representatives have deemed this topic worthy of discussion: you’re free to leave, we’ll get ahold of Akari in a couple days, when all the details are ironed out.”
“A couple days?”
“Reaching a consensus can be a slow process at times—be prepared for a renegotiation of conditions, as there will likely be more stipulations made once the process is complete,” Diezel explained.
I nodded, and the platform beneath my feet began to descend towards the floor. The crowd erupted into cheers.
Hopefully Nico and Roman would beat us home.

Hello guys, i bought SOD2 not to long ago, and got to play it recently, really enjoyed the first few hours of tutorial (took my time with it) but now that i just found a new camp, still trying to work things out and i am just getting bombarded with the messages for help. From other groups and people in my camp. Like literary every freaking step i make someone needs help(You would think it would be a bit quieter after zombie apocalypse) .I was helping one camp mate , and after that another one got depressed because i took to long and his brother died and by the time i helped someone else another campmate wants to leave. Other people on the map keep making request and getting angry at me or basically threatening me if i won't help and trough all this i am trying to scavenge the parts to upgrade sleeping conditions in my camp because people are upset even more. Is it possible to tone this all down somehow? Because atm i am just driving from one side of map to another doing fetch quests just to try and keep people happy, and i am struggling with that. I was really enjoying slow approach of exploration, scavenging and crafting at the start in this amazing post apocalyptic world, but now i just feels like a chore because i can't really even play the game without spending most of time doing fetch quests so people don't start leaving or becoming hostile.
Sorry if i sound like i am complaining , but my play time is limited after i come back from work, and i rally want to enjoy this game instead of feeling like doing more work.
Thank you in advance for any kind of advice i will get!!!

What Is The Aurelian Empire?
The Aurelian Empire is a peaceful and diplomatic civilisation in the universe of "No Man's Sky". Originating in the Western edges of the Eissentam Galaxy. The Empire, throughout its history has expanded - through conquest or diplomacy - to encompass and directly rule a total of 266 systems, all of which centre around the home system of Regnum Solis.
The desire of the Empire is to invite and spread knowledge, experience, kindness, generosity, science and reason across the myriad of stars that make up the known universe. This community will be ever-present to contribute, aid and guide all travellers in their journey across the cosmos, no matter what form it may need to take.
So the legend has been told, two thousand years ago, the near-mythical founder of the Empire was born on the world of Alexandria Primus to humanoid parents. Named Aurelian by his mother and father, whose names were Isha and Tarrick, he lived a simple life for twenty-six years before necessity called for him to found his great Empire.
As the years has passed, the knowledge and teachings of Aurelian were passed from generation to generation, paving the way for an advanced wealthy and society of thinkers and scholars, architects and artists, scientists and inventors, explorers and pathfinders, who above all valued logic, reason, generosity and good will to all. These teachings, being exercised in the hands of Aurelian's descendants have allowed the Empire to reach out into the stars and leave their mark on the universe.
Our histories, lore and legends are of paramount importance to us and our identity and so we protect them fervently.
What Are The Citizens Of The Empire?
The citizens of the Aurelian Empire are known individually as a Praetorix, or plurally as Praetorixa . They can be identified by the colour of their capital ships, suits and bases, being styled in the traditional black, white and red. They choose to dedicate themselves to acquiring, freely sharing and teaching the knowledge and experienced they have gained with any who would seek it, free of monetary compensation, however no freely given donation will be turned away.
Within the Empire, there are various other ranks and titles by which citizens are known. There is no superiority or authority gained over any other citizen of the Empire by attaining a particular rank or title, rather it is a signifier of experience. The following ranks and titles, save for Praetorix, can only be granted by the Emperor of the Empire. They are as follows, (singulaplural) in order from "highest" to "lowest":

• Hetaera/Hetaeroi
• Strategos/Strategoi
• Legate/Legata
• Tribune/Tribuna
• Prefect/Prefecta
• Centurio/Centuria
• Praetorix/Praetorixa.

True citizens of the Empire, no matter their rank or title, who is flying our standard in any capacity, will never bare any ill will towards another traveller, whether they be a citizen or not. They will come open-palmed, and open-armed, present good will, kindness, generosity and an eagerness to assist in any way they can. They will accept and respect your opinions, life/playstyle and philosophies. They will gather and impart upon you also, inspiration, knowledge, experience and friendship from every encounter.
Who Is The Current Emperor Of The Aurelian Empire?
The current Emperor of the Aurelian Empire is a humanoid being known as Tiberius Magna Aurelianus, the last name being that of the founder of the Empire as per tradition. The official title of the Emperor is Invictus Imperator, and so the official title of the current Emperor would be Invictus Imperator Tiberius Magna Aurelianus.
The Emperor does not rule as an absolute monarch (thought hat is the extent of his power), however, and does hold close an inner circle known as Concilium Ferrum or the Council Of Iron. This inner circle is made up exclusively of the most experienced Hetaeroi, and acts not only as an advisory body to the Emperor himself but also as governors and diplomats of the ever-growing Empire.
How Can I Support And/Or Join The Aurelian Empire?
Support:

• Help other players by answering their questions on forums such as this one
• Help other players in-game, whether that be by building, exploring, collecting data, completing missions, or just hanging out
• Spread your wealth of knowledge and experience across the stars

If doing all of the above is innate to you, why not join and:

• Team up with other citizens of the Empire and build, learn, collect, create and discover together across the stars. Build outposts, farms, storage compounds and more
• Become part of a friendly and ever-growing community of helpful and open-minded travellers
• Make yourself familiar with the traditions and celebrations of the Aurelian Empire
• Contribute to the No Man's Sky wiki by discovering and learning all that you can
• Discover and claim new systems in the name of the Aurelian Empire
• Take a deep-dive into the lore of the Aurelian Empire or create your own character and submit it to u/PoisonPanc4ke for it to be approved and entered into the Lore.
• Be kind, be open-minded, be generous to and caring of your fellow traveller and citizen of the Empire. Lend a hand where you can, share your knowledge and expertise, support your fellow citizens and work together to create a truly wonderful and welcoming Aurelian Empire.

Supra Astra Ad Victoriam (Beyond The Stars To Victory)

This is maybe an odd question, but I'm not sure how or if it's important it is to accurately capture life experience on CASPA. Appreciate any perspective/advice on this, apologies for the wall of text.
I'm in my 30s and I lived a-- for lack of a better phrase-- non-career-focused life in my 20s. Got a bachelors but then spent years doing many small things, often not paid. I wrote for a hyperlocal blog, reviewed theatephotography/painting by emerging artists, wrote neighborhood guides, lived in an illegally converted industrial warehouse artist-collective that hosted readings/exhibitions/parties, published zines, ran writing groups, helped make/acted in experimental short films, traveled around the world, lived in Argentina and Berlin for a bit, interned at a small feminist press, worked at a gallery, did A/V for events for an artist's residency, managed a paintesculptor's studio, wrote/edited artist writing, wrote grants, co-authored a book length manuscript (not published), and other scattered things of this nature. Paid rent by working at neighborhood restaurants where staff was quite involved in the running and community events.
My question is-- could this go on CASPA or no? I don't include it now because a lot of it seems "unprofessional", scattered, and unpaid. It doesn't fit as volunteer work in the traditional sense. My PS could be a good spot, but it's already kinda long.
To me it seems like these things show a genuine dedication to my artistic community and my 'hood, even if it's not the traditional kind of service. Is this kind of life experience/volunteering not really relevant to apps, counting more as a hobby or something like that? I have a 3.3 cumulative GPA, 4.0 in all pre-reqs & 2k+ hrs PCE.
For example, I lived in Argentina for a while and became fluent in Spanish. Worked in a Mexican restaurant and was bilingual at work. I translate at the hospital every day. My college-aged coworkers applying to PA school have years of college Spanish credits but are not fluent and are not allowed to translate. Another college-aged coworker applying PA is going on a school-sponsored "mission" trip that costs $$$ and the itinerary she showed me looked like a sightseeing/surf vacation. (Sorry I'm old and bitter hahah!) This "experience" stuff is clear on apps. Seems like a miss to show nowhere on CASPA that I'm a non-native speaker who learned the language on my own through experience and who translates for the docs in the ER. Can't find a way to put it in that doesn't seem awkward and forced.
Again, apologies for the wall of text. Anyone, especially non-trad applicants, have thoughts or advice on this?
Thank you in advance!

-Red-
April 19th, 11:13 A.M., The Sprawl
I sparked a dilapidated Vita-Cig that I’d snagged from Trodes and peered out into the Sprawl; the careful equilibrium of a well-orchestrated black-market had returned; pushers and gangers lined the alleys, watching for signals from rooftop lookouts to avoid the single Peacewatch cruiser that had been stupid enough to enter the dockside. The poor bastard would be dead before the afternoon was over… not that I had much sympathy for his kind. Peacewatch made it a habit to stay out of the Sprawl: unless the Eggheads predictive crime system said something catastrophic was coming, they policed their kind and left us in the hands of the mob. I’d never iced an officer. Not yet at least.
“Your partner should be ready shortly, I think he’s just tying up a few loose ends,” Akari said, snatching the cigarette from my hand and taking a long drag.
“Remind me again why you think I should take the shrimp with me instead of Nico and Roman?”
“He’s smart… and the other two are working on something else. Besides-- you need brains on this one, Red, not muscle,” she giggled, passing the cigarette back.
“Whatever you say,” I paused, grabbing the smoke, “what do you have them up to?”
“There’s a shipment of Xeno-grade weapons coming down from the colonies. Nico and Roman will be liberating them from the Slicers. Or, their share, at least. It won’t be much, maybe a dozen guns, but it’ll be worth it: the force field tech alone will pay for the trip as soon as Fincetti’s goons start trying to take your heads off with plasma cannons and mono blades.”
“What do you mean, their share?”
“The job was too big for us to take on alone. I linked up with another enterprising group of Freelancers. If it goes well, maybe we can hire them on for the heist, we’re going to need more people if we want to walk out of there alive.”
We?
“What, are you planning on coming along now?” I asked, snuffing out the smoke.
“It only seems right; Trodes is coming along, and I’m a better shot than he’ll ever be. Besides, you have a dangerous habit of getting shot, and I can’t have you going down in the field,” she said, winking as if to punctuate the sentence.
“You sure? We can manage, you don’t have to come with us, you’ve done so much already.”
“I know I have, that’s why I have to protect my investment. If you go down out there, then the team is without a leader. A military scale operation like this will go south real fast without someone competent in command.”
“You’ve got me wrong, Akari: I’m no leader. I’m just someone who wants to live in a better city and doesn’t mind taking the trash out himself. Besides, why do we need a leader? We’re all competent adults acting in concert, of our own free will. We all know what we’re doing, if a situation arises and someone needs to take charge, it’ll happen.”
“You’ve got a lot of faith in a crew you just met,” Akari said with a sneer.
“You know why I asked you to put the team together, Akari?”
“Because there’s a bounty on your head that could finance twenty retirements, and you know you can trust me?”
“No, well yeah, but that’s beside the point—I asked you because you’re not a Fixer, you’re a part time street doc that works the front desk at the most popular Freelancer hotel in the Sprawl. If there’s anyone who knows who’s gonna get the job done, it’s you. See, a Fixer is going to be okay with whatever losses they deem acceptable beforehand, but they’re fine with keeping that to themselves. If you thought any of these mooks were going to crack under pressure, or do something stupid, you wouldn’t have set me up with them.”
Before she could respond, Trodes emerged from the stairs leading to the lab. He winced as the sunlight hit his eyes, shrugging on the hood of the oversized sweatshirt that blanketed his meek frame. Glimpses of pain showed through every tremor laden step he took. A cloak of wires enveloped his skull, feeding into an old-world cyber console.
“It’s insufferably hot out here,” Trodes sighed.
“Don’t worry, we’re not going far. Chances are that whatever hole we’re meeting BFU in will have air conditioning,” I responded, clicking my key fob, and signaling the bike to pull around.
Trodes face fell flat when the Supersonic rolled around the corner; apparently, the prestige of carving through the skyway on a state-of-the-art Taffington jet-bike was lost on him.
“Are we taking… that?” Trodes stammered.
“We are. Unless you’ve got a pair of wheels with two seats?” I asked, mounting the bike and revving the engine.
With an exasperated sigh, Trodes boarded the passenger seat. I could feel him behind me, vibrating as tremors gripped his body.
“You good, buddy?” I asked.
He nodded vigorously, clenching the handrails with white knuckles.
Akari shook her head and headed back to the lab.
I heard Trodes mumble something under his breath, but it was quickly drowned out by the jet-bike’s purr. I carved into the skyway. Driving in the Sprawl was pure freedom: almost nobody owned vehicles with aerial capabilities in this part of town. It didn’t take long to reach top speed.
Slummers and gutterpunks walked the streets like zombies in a drug addled haze. The scent of gunpowder, pollution and burning ozone coalesced into a putrid stench that reeked of poverty and violence. Patches of azure moved in militant formation below; the Vorrath had taken to the streets. On a different day, a better day, I would’ve helped them. Most slummers hated the Offworlder Coalition, but not me—at the end of the day I always figured that I had more in common with poor people from another planet than rich people from another district of the city. At least we shared the same struggle.
The bike slowed to crawl; the Neo-Confederates were about, backed by a platoon of Brown-Shirts that looked like a tide of sewer run off, crashing through the streets with reckless abandon. Civilians fled for their homes. Fuck.
The jet-bike careened through the air before finally landing atop a building a few blocks away from the impending conflict.
“Get off,” I said, turning back to Trodes.
“Why? You don’t intend to abandon me at this altitude, do you?”
“Not as long as I survive—I’ll be quick, I just need to ventilate some Nazi fucks, understood?”
He shook his head and muttered a string of curses.
I tore through the air, circling around the impending conflict. I chased a handful of cheap amphetamines with a poorly rolled joint and swooped low, behind the rolling tide of brown shirts. This wasn’t the first time I’d made myself an enemy of the city’s Neo-Nazi’s; I’d killed at least a dozen of them in my career as a courier, but those were isolated incidents, back-alley brawls away from the mob.
This was a whole new ball game.
I fell slack as my Teleoperations module synchronized with the bike. My consciousness faded, reemerging into the HALO-Net’s stylized rendition of the bike’s interior. I wasn’t just the pilot now—I was the bike. Bullets carved twin streaks of crimson into the brown tide. It didn’t take long to hit top speed, 3.7 seconds, to be exact.
The group turned in nearly perfect unison, launching volley upon volley as I passed overhead. The bike’s shields barely held together; I felt every round, like a flock of birds violently slamming into my side—not enough to cause any real damage, but more than enough to get the blood pumping. I slid into an alley a few blocks off and waited for the shield generator to recharge. Gunshots rang out from the streets, alongside the sizzle of plasma meeting flesh. Soon the din was drowned beneath the roar of dozens of Vorrath war cries. I took to the sky.
Trodes was exactly where I left him, nervously clutching a knock off version of a Locust flechette pistol.
“I was beginning to doubt your survival,” Trodes said shakily.
“Wrong again, little guy,” I paused, reigniting a half smoked joint, “it was just a quick hit and run, we don’t have the time or the numbers for a pitched battle. Now, hop on.”
It didn’t take long to find BFU’s base of operations. Black flags and Anarchist graffiti covered the walls of the abandoned warehouse they’d apparently taken up residence in. A field of repurposed Peacewatch turrets were installed atop the roof, complimented by a web of cameras that spread across a three-block radius. Anarchists of all species and creeds loitered outside. The guards ranged from Cyborgs and Vat-Grown, to Vorrath and Vorstihl, each wearing a variant of the black flag with colors corresponding to their ideologies.
As I hovered above the building, I saw a familiar face: the rookie from earlier. Alarmingly, his cruiser was nowhere to be seen. His face was wrought with horror, as a pair of cyborgs led him inside the warehouse.
“They’re certainly less than subtle,” Trodes said.
“They don’t have to be subtle, they’re the biggest citizens political organization in the Sprawl. Peacewatch avoids them if they have anything less than a full platoon on hand,” I explained.
“Red… before we enter negotiations with these hooligans, I must inquire as to what your motivation hitting the vault is? Surely you know there’s a strong likelihood that you won’t make it out, and from what I’d heard about you, I always understood you to be a man who knew how to keep himself out of the line of sight of dangerous people,” Trodes said, nervously.
“Fincetti is the most dangerous man in the city, short of O’Bannon. He controls the black market with an iron fist and is instrumental in all the things I hate about living here. The problem is, I have no way to do anything about it right now… but there’s something big in the safe—there must be—for fucks sake, he iced his family over it. I’m hoping there’s something in there that can give me a little leverage, so I can cross him out afterwards.”
Trodes was silent for a moment, simply reaching as if to ask me to pass the joint. I obliged.
“I have my reasons to want O’Bannon dead too, I’m in,” he paused as a coughing fit seized him, causing the joint to fall to the ground, “there’s something you should know though: I’m working with an entity of great power in the Net; I don’t know what precisely it is, but I know it saved my life more than once. As a matter of fact, it’s the only reason I was able to obtain the blueprint of Fincetti’s bunker, and his security plan.”
“Is it… is it an unshackled AI?”
“Unlikely: it seems to understand compassion and empathy on a uniquely organic level, something that rarely slips past Netwatch.”
“Alright, well whatever it is, you keep an eye on it and let me know if things get shady. I appreciate you telling me.”
Trodes nodded in silence.
The crowd parted expectantly as I landed along the streetside. Dozens of eyes were immediately glued to Trodes and I. A cyborg with a steel double mohawk emerged from a sea of leather, patches, and smoke. A sawed-off shotgun hung at his side.
“Red, I presume?” the Cyborg asked, extending a steel hand.
“That’s right, and who’re you?” I answered, clasping the borgs hand as firm as I could manage.
“They call me Diezel, and I’ll be your host today,” he released my hand and looked me up and down as if assessing whether I was a threat, “follow me, everyone’s here so we can get straight down to business.”
The warehouse’s interior had been renovated drastically; layers of open-faced lofts sat stacked upon each other, consuming the walls. Nearly every non-violent law in the city was being broken in the lofts, from cooking chems and explosives to studying banned literature and Doomguard martial arts. It was beautiful. We followed Diezel through a winding hallway of munitions manufacturing stations, before finally emerging into an immense circular room, with rows of seats climbing the walls. I couldn’t believe it—there must have been two hundred people present.
The lights dimmed as we entered the arena. Diezel led us to the rooms center, ushering Trodes and I onto a great circular platform; he fell into place on a platform across from us, beside a Vat-Grown woman bearing an orange and black flag on her arm, and augmentations that cost more than my bike. Behind the duo a bulbous Vorstihl lurked; tentacles draped down his back, carefully pulled away from his cyclopean eye. A red and black flag was displayed on his arm… it was only then that I noticed the blue and black flag on Diezel’s arm.
The platforms each rose roughly fifteen feet into the air, before microphone stands emerged from the center of each platform. Diezel stepped forward, past the microphone.
“Before we start, I’ll explain how this works: the three of us are representatives of our specific unions—but the people are free to interject. One union voting to aid in your endeavors does not guarantee the help of the other two, as each union demands a perfect consensus. Likewise, if a faction without one union decides to help you, it does not necessarily mean you have the support of the entire union. The only way you’ll end up with total support is cross union consensus. Do you understand?”
A consensus: of course, they needed a damned consensus.
“I do,” I answered, speaking away from the microphone.
“Then let’s get this show on the road,” Diezel stepped back, finding his microphone before continuing, “Red, Trodes, welcome to the Bouleuterion,” he paused a moment as the crowd erupted into cheers, “beside me are my comrades Aria and Korvirex, and we stand ready to hear your proposal.”
“As most of you probably know, Don Fincetti is the most powerful man in the underworld, hell—maybe even the city—what you likely don’t know is that he has a vault beneath the city, guarded by an army of Harvesters. I intend to break into the vault, slaughter the Harvesters and strike a blow to Fincetti that he won’t forget… and I intend to kill him shortly after. What I ask is simple: you help me in what’s to come, and when he’s finally dead, you can all split his turf among yourselves. All I care about is making sure he doesn’t live long enough to poison the Sprawl more than he already has.”
A murmur emerged from the stands. I gazed across the way to see the three representatives huddled together, whispering amongst themselves. Finally, Aria stepped towards her microphone.
“What you ask of us will likely mean the death of many of our people… we need something greater than what you offer—we need a guarantee of mutual aid—you have a reputation in the Sprawl, we would ask that you employ it in helping us when the time comes to resettle the Sprawl. Namely, we’d request your assistance against the gangs that may try to fill the power void you seek to create,” Aria explained.
“That seems reasonable,” I said.
Aria stepped back as Korvirex moved forward.
“Tell me, Red, are you familiar with the Offworlder Coalition?” Korvirex asked.
“I am—as a matter of fact, I aided them on the way here—they were marching against the Neo-Confederates and the Brown Shirts. I insured that they had the element of surprise.”
Korvirex stroked the beard-like tentacles that hung from his chin in contemplation.
“Good. What I ask is that you help us to secure their trust, we have offered solidarity where we could, but our forces are spread thin. The ideology of many of the exiled Vorrath rebels that found their way to Nova City—it matches that of our union. If our help was offered, would you agree to assist us in aiding the Coalition, so that they finally have an opportunity to get on their feet?”
Trodes leaned towards in, whispering in my ear.
“It would be prudent of you to make a counteroffer: proclaim that you’ll help with the Coalition, if they’ll spread the word to other groups whose goals may align with ours. There will likely be at least a couple hundred Harvesters in the Undercity when we strike… unless they’re occupied elsewhere.”
“I would happily help with the Coalition, on the condition that your faction spread the word about what we’re doing to like-minded organizations. As it stands, we could still use more numbers to match the Harvesters,” I said.
“These conditions may be satisfactory,” Korvirex said, before retreating into yet another group huddle.
The audience watched on in silence.
Finally, Diezel reapproached the microphone.
“The representatives have deemed this topic worthy of discussion: you’re free to leave, we’ll get ahold of Akari in a couple days, when all the details are ironed out.”
“A couple days?”
“Reaching a consensus can be a slow process at times—be prepared for a renegotiation of conditions, as there will likely be more stipulations made once the process is complete,” Diezel explained.
I nodded, and the platform beneath my feet began to descend towards the floor. The crowd erupted into cheers.
Hopefully Nico and Roman would beat us home

im having trouble invading worlds/getting summoned for sunlight medals in ds3. im only level 77 atm, ive been farming Lothric Knights in the meanwhile. was wondering if anybody was willing to help me out or if there was a trick to get invasions/summoned in 2023. Praise the sun!

The trivialization of doping in Jiu-Jitsu and the biggest fallacies in defense of its use.
Contrary to what people want to believe, the biggest advantage of those who use these resources is not the strength itself at the time of the fight, which should be welcomed, but the ability to recover faster from strenuous training sessions and injuries. If it were just the benefit of strength itself, some not well-versed could accept the argument that “Jiu-Jitsu is not strength, so put a weightlifter there to see if he wins”, but this is an argument from those who think about steroids as the thing that makes you bloated and muscular, when in reality the biggest benefit is different. In cycling, for example, there are no athletes with large muscle mass, so there are several cases of athletes caught using doping, even when strict control are applied.
Within everything I've heard and read about it, I'll say again that the biggest benefit is the possibility of much faster recovery between one workout and another and coming back from injuries faster. While one athlete arrives at the end of the week exhausted and in need of rest, the other is able to continue training without feeling drained. It then becomes a matter of logic: among athletes of similar levels, if one can train more than the other, whoever trains more has an advantage.
It is known that there have always been people using drugs to improve performance in training and championships, but those who used or still use them do not usually admit it outside their circle of intimate friends. For me, this is the biggest proof that whoever does it knows they are cheating. This person is ashamed to publicly assume their behaviour, as he secretly wonders if he would be capable of the same achievements if he were clean. Therefore, he does not want the public to raise concerns about his ability to achieve the same results, because, within himself, he bets he would not.
“The use of anabolic steroids does not make a person good at Jiu-Jitsu.” This is a common argument from those who defend those who test positive in the anti-doping test, but again it starts from a wrong premise, that the purpose of use is just to gain strength. The drug itself doesn't make anyone good at Jiu-Jitsu or even become good at strategies involving competition. If I were to give steroids to a lady walking on the Copacabana promenade, she won't enter and win any championship. But think of your gym partner who trains the hardest with you, that balanced out training, which you win one day and he beats you the next. You are always pulling and encouraging yourself to improve. Did you think of anyone? Now give this guy an enhancer. Will he have an advantage or not? The answer is yes and ends with the initial argument, which is a reasoning that only thinks about gaining strength, so it is used in the wrong circumstances and therefore leads to wrong conclusions. Faced with this example, I can still argue that yes, the use of anabolic steroids can make a person good at Jiu-Jitsu, as it allows them to train more often, bringing about faster technical evolution, if we consider that training evolves. Still using the same example with this training partner who now started to use enhancers. Imagine that before, he did 5 workouts a week and now he can do twice as much, because it doesn't take as long as for him to rest or recover from an injury. At the end of 12 months you trained 260 times and he trained 520. If the next year you stay clean and he doesn't, he will have accumulated 1040 trainings and you will have 520. It's like he advances two years for every year of training you did . Can you imagine how much more Jiu-Jitsu techniques evolve in someone who initially has a similar level to his, but manages to train twice as much? So I could even say that the use of anabolic steroids can actually make a person good at Jiu-Jitsu. Robbing a bank can also make a person rich, but I don't want to get rich that way. It goes from how you want to achieve your dreams and goals.
I can imagine some people arguing that “so I take it too”. Got it, but then it would be you and him getting undue advantage over two other friends or opponents from another gym. What's the problem? The problem with that is that it's illegal, it's prohibited, so whoever does it and enters a championship like the IBJJF that forbids it in the rules, is cheating.
A simpler and more direct example. If it were possible a confrontation between you and your identical version, but that makes use of these anabolic steroids. Who gets the advantage? Those who ask themselves know the answer and when they know it, it is impossible to support any defense of its use, unless the illegality in the rules and the health risks are disregarded.
"Those who don’t want to use it, simply don’t." When reading about the undue advantages of those who take it, without listing the health risks, it might even seem like an excuse. If it speeds up recovery from fatigue and injuries, should I take it? Let's ignore that it's against the rule for a moment, as I know that there are events that don't test and one could argue that in those events it's not illegal. Yet there are health hazards that some people are not willing to deal with..
“If you test everyone, there’s not one single person that will be clean.” This phrase has become a cliché in BJJ, as well as the idea that “you can only be a champion by taking enhances, because everyone takes them”. Phrases that also start from wrong premises, first because it is not true that everyone takes it, although many of those at the top do. What must be remembered is that there are those who prefer to respect the rules and not use enhancers, even if they have become a minority. These people may be eliminated in the early rounds or even in the qualifying stages. Those who are wronged are likely to be people much closer to yours and my reality than the reality of those false champions created in the laboratories. When you decide to admire someone who makes use of these subterfuges, you are choosing as an example someone who wins by cheating. I go back to giving the example of the person with financial success, because it is easy to understand, I admire those who conquer financial independence through honest work, even if their wealth is less than that person who achieved greater amounts, however dishonestly.
“I had to use it to keep up with the others” If you understand that using it is illegal, that by using it your opponent is cheating, do you want to do the same as him? I understand that you might feel wronged, but is your response to this to become equal? If that's your justification, I don't think you think any differently than who uses it.
“You have to take into account that I am older and fighting against the new generations” But the rule does not change according to age. There are categories for each age, if you choose to venture out with the younger ones, that doesn't give you the right to use enhancers. At least in championships that the rule prohibits it. It would be like signing up for a Jiu-Jitsu championship, being punished by knocking out my opponent with a punch and feeling wronged. NO, the rule is clear regarding the prohibition of punches, as well as the use of doping. If, due to age, the athlete is no longer able to face the younger ones, enter the category of the older ones or retire from competitions. Natural order. In addition, the veteran who assumes the use, leaves in the air the doubt that if in fact he was not already using it since he was young. If there are championships that don't test, why don't they fight only those? No one is obliged to fight in the only federation that tests it, the IBJJF, even so, everyone wants to, because they know it is the most prestigious one. The strategy is not a secret, they use it indiscriminately and seek the title and recognition by the IBJJF, if they are eventually caught in the weak test, they still enjoy the notoriety until the exam is released. They give more seminars, close sponsorships and are invited to compete in other paid events while they wait to pass the punishment deadline without fighting at the IBJJF. When it's over, they fight back and do it all over again. There are already athletes who have been caught more than once. They are not scared, as the punishment is not valid for other events and the number of people who still manage to defend it is alarmingly growing.
“But it's unfair to only test the champion” This phrase is a smokescreen against the real problem. Of course, the ideal is to test everyone and with more efficient tests, but it is financially unfeasible for now. Faced with this fact and the fact that this is usually said when someone “gets caught”, the phrase becomes just a distraction. Better to test only the champion than nobody at all, just as it is better to arrest only one assailant than none at all. Can you imagine someone arguing that it is unfair to arrest just one robber because it is impossible to arrest everyone?
“There is no undue advantage, I just do hormone replacement” an athlete told me trying to convince me. I was curious to understand better and I learned about it. In fact, there are some cases where hormone replacement is necessary, they are very specific cases or for much older people, over 65 years old. This black belt who told me that, a Brazilian champion in the adult category, saw absolutely nothing wrong with taking hormone replacement. As he was younger than me, I asked him at what age he had started and without any shame he said that at eighteen, only in doses to adjust the recommended levels. He was convinced that this was okay. I discovered that it is normal for athletes over thirty or forty who started using testosterone at a very young age to actually need to replace it, as the body stops producing it naturally. I cannot accept that these cases serve as excuses or justification for normalizing use.
“I've already been tested and I wasn't caught in doping” is not the same thing as saying with all the words “I've never used prohibited substances, I'm against it and anyone who does is cheating”. Have you ever asked yourself why you haven't heard from the lips of some great champions the repudiation of those caught in doping? I'll give you a hint, it's for the same reason certain politicians don't celebrate the arrest of other corrupt politicians. Deep down, they're just thinking "Thank God" for not being the ones to get caught.
Ask these 3 questions to your sports idols: 1) Do you use or have you used any substance to improve performance? 2) Do you consider that whoever uses this is cheating? 3) In your opinion, should athletes who have already been caught in the anti-doping exam be banned from fighting all events?
If they stutters when they answers, you may be suspicious. Most don't have the courage to assume it, but some, on the other hand, are already no longer ashamed and trying to normalize the use. In 2015, I heard a five-time black belt world champion, speaking at a crowded dinner table for anyone who would listen, so it shouldn't be a secret, the following statement: “The way the IBJJF tests, only on the day and with a urine test, only those who are very stupid are caught in doping. It is enough to use it accompanied by a good doctor who knows when to stop and that way the substance leaves the body before the test day, without disturbing the benefits during training”. I trained with several teams, lived with several athletes. I've heard confessions of using it from their own mouth or even from their training partners. I'm not saying this because I want to point out a specific person, and I don't even need to, anyone in the field already knows, but I see the problem as being greater than accusing just one individual, I'm just saying this because I see that they're trying to normalize something that can't be accepted in Jiu-Jitsu. Its use has become banal and that scares me, but not as much as realizing that defending its use has been broad and open, not only by athletes, but also by practitioners who use it as a hobby. They lost the shame of defending doping and seeking justifications for it. Even among students who are not professional athletes, who sometimes do not even compete or only do it sporadically, are using it indiscriminately. I consider this a dangerous path. It is possible to win fairly without enhancers. I speak not only based on my achievements, but also based on other champions I've seen rise to the top. Think about which choice suits you best and think that, for those who use it, it must be horrible to go home, look at the medal table and wonder if they would have being able to win them without enhancers
Wrote by black belt World Champion Felipe Costa