Comments: "Not Only Raji. . ."

[Kereth]

Okay, we've had a request for "Not Only Raji. . ." to be moved to only post once a week. I suspect some people might disagree, so before I listened to <name withheld> I thought I'd ask the rest of you! What do you think? ^^

[Kereth]

Update: I decided I don't care what you people think anyway. Not Only Raji. . . continues on it's current schedule this week. It would take me forever to finish on a once a week schedule, so you people can just sit it out and deal with it, or hey, give up reading too, if you prefer ^^ Seriously though, the suggestion probably wasn't serious, but I wanted to give anyone who wanted to a chance to agree with it seriously. Well, your chance is up! Mwahaha! Story updates later today...

[Urthdigger]

Why in the world would anyone want you to only update once a week? If it's a pacing problem, you post up in Nimbus regularly, so they can read it up there.

[Kereth]

Aaaaand the "Not Only Raji. . ." thread hits five pages.
Is there no end to this madness? I mean, really, is there no end?

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Next time on "Comments: Not Only Raji. . .": Kereth posts something helpful and interesting!
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[Kereth]

Bother... I fear I may be fulfilling the "Next time on "Comments..."" thing I said last time, but I've got to make this post anyway.

Got another question for everyone. You can choose to answer this or completely ignore it, and I'd actully like your opinions on this, though I may still go ahead and do whatever I want in the end, like with the last post.

First, an explanation. Following this story, I will do some filler bits with Kereth's personal history, written as a journal. Should actually be interesting to some and rather amusing to pretty much everyone else. Once that is done and I get back from my honeymoon and all the random international trips that I expect to occur shortly after I finish the current story, (expect a hiatus) I will be running another story, called "Something Shinier" which will be the conceptual followup to Kereth's development in the "Something Shiny" tale.

Now... after that...

I am considering planning a sequel to "Not Only Raji. . ." continuing the saga of the Hand Guild and its transition to what it is today. I would be called "Damora," and detail the events that followed those in "Not Only Raji. . ." citing Hand influence in a lot of the historical events of the retroverse (which I will not list here, for fear of spoilers) It will be quite awesome and rather epic, I hope, but it will also, I'm afraid, be well before Kereth's time, and contain much information that would be restricted outside of Hand Guild leadership, so I could not justifiably post it anywhere in game. (Will talk to Kana about putting a heavily guarded guild library in during the recode, but for now. . .) So.. yeah. Kereth can't write it, and I have no IC reasons to have it told, unless such a library goes in and Kereth is "trying to fill it with text suitable to a library of Cyllyl" or somesuch. My question then becomes:

"Would any of you be interested in such a story, or is it too out of line with the traditional concepts for rp postings?"

Reply and state answers and arguments here. I'd really like to know what you think. I am strongly tempted to write the tale as it makes NOR pale in relative awesomeness in my mind.

Waiting to hear from ya'll,
-Kereth Midknight

[Urthdigger]

I'd be interested in it. I'm sure some reason can come up as to why they'd wind up in a library, anything's possible if you stretch the rules to the limit.

[Kereth]

We're talking revealing high level conspiracies and other secrets of the Hand Guild. Kereth wouldn't tell this stuff to anyone below the Sixth Degree, and then only on an as-needed basis. Seriously, if I got a library that was locked and sealed with boobytraps in a hidden section of the guild it _might _ be ic for him to reveal the information there, on the grounds that any Hand that can get to it has earned the right to know.

Telling Ciang would be valid, for example, but she'd already know. She was there. (Oh, did I mention there would be some changes to the cast?)

[Urthdigger]

Right, but this is all assuming Kereth puts the information in the library. Should it be details written down by Kereth detailing the history for the next Imam to see, then somehow leaked to the outside, that'd be one IC way for it to get out. That's just an idea I thought up just here, I'm pretty sure something far better could be thought of.

[Kereth]

Fair enough. I think the issue though is that people in general shouldn't know some of the details of the story ic. For it to become common knowledge just how many of the more subtle gaps in Perdow's history could be filled by "a Hand did it" would actually be catastrophic for the guild. If necessary, the post can just end up on news/rp boards and never be written down in game, even as Ciang relating the story to Kereth verbally or somesuch.

Mostly, my question is, if no means of establishing ic reasons for the story's telling is made, do people think telling such a story is acceptable? It's rather outside the boundaries of a normal rp story. "Not Only Raji. . ." is already a stretch of that, as it is just being told _by_ my character theoretically and is not even written in the character's narrative voice, so it's hard to define as "roleplay." This next story has even less rp grounds for its telling, and even a few against it, so what I'm asking is if people are interested enough in hearing the story that they think it makes up for the fact that I'm kinda' smudging the rules a bit in order to tell it.

[Kereth]

Wednesday's "Not Only Raji. . ." will be delayed. I'm in no fit state to do anything right now. I'm sorry.

-Kereth Midknight

[Kereth]

So, here's the announcement I made as a note at the end of the last post on retro.

OOC: And thus we reach a real mile marker in the "Not Only Raji. . ."
storyline. No, I'm not just referring to the announcement that was
just made. This was, in fact, the ONE HUNDREDTH POST of
"Not Only Raji. . ."! (Including the preface and all end of chapter
posts) Yeah, I know what you're thinking ("When will this guy
shut up?"), but I thought this should be cause to celebrate! So,
what better way to celebrate 100 posts than by finally getting up to
100 rpp, eh? Eh? I'm actually not that far off, and this is not just
some random pandering for rp points. Just, in accordance with
that goal, if any of you out there have been reading and enjoying
"Not Only Raji. . ." so far, and you haven't happened to have sent a
vote already this week, send one now, to show what you think of
the story as a whole, and not necessarily of any specific post. If I
don't get 100 rpp by the end of this week, that's perfectly fine. I
just thought it would be a cool coincidence. Anyway, 100 down
and only. . . I'm not sure how many to go. Too lazy to count.
Take care everyone, and thank you so much for reading!

Pumpin' 'em out!
-Kereth Midknight

So whatcha' think? I'm awesome, huh? 100 posts, and I have reason to suspect that at least two or three people are still reading! How cool is that? The whole rpp thing is just for fun, really. Congratulatory tells, mudmails, or posts on this thread are also perfectly acceptable ^^

Just reminding you how cool I am.
-Kereth Midknight

[Kereth]

I assume everyone has figured out by now, but the "Next time" posts on "Not Only Raji. . ." are always wrong. Just had to say that before I made today's explanation, in case somebody was still missing it.

Anyway, I'm not sure when it happened, but I think by this point (and indeed well before), I've comfortably established enough that those "Next time" posts are consistently innaccurate that I can use them to actually give information about the story ahead, if only by process of elimination. I've done this a couple times already, especially at crucial points when I want the reader to know what isn't in the following post. As an example, during the chapter "Master and Apprentice" the "Next time" section once read "Hot anakim action!" owing to my personal need to clarify that there was, in fact, going to be no "hot anakim action" portrayed during the next post. Another interesting time was "Dead men tell no tales" near the end of "The Gardeners." I was hoping people would have noticed the pattern and would be led to wonder exactly how the statement was going to be made innacurate by the next post. More examples, including some rather dramatic ones, are still yet to come in the story.

I've also used the "Next time" section, on occasion, as a bit of comic relief, or to accentuate and already existing joke, such as part two of "The Mullah" when the comment read "Two visions walk into a bar. . ."

Anyway, I guess this post serves more as a sort of "Writer's commentary" than anything. . . oh well. What do you think about the "Next time" sections anyway? Are they working the way they were intended?

[Urthdigger]

Eh, I had noticed that they're false, but I always assumed it was just joking around and could be true or false, never occured to me to use it to find out what's going to happen. I like them

[Urthdigger]

Erm... I'm sorry for distracting you , but thanks for all the help .

[Kereth]

Something that probably needs to be cleared up that some of you are doubtless wondering about concerning Nihan:

Many people might have been a little puzzled at first about how Nihan knew so soon that she was pregnant.

Others still might have been thrown off with the maternity leave comment in chapter 18, part 3.

Both these comments stem from a very simple fact: Anakim lay eggs.

Typically, when an anakim man and woman of their parent faith (that of Sikkar) wish to have a child, the anakim woman will express this desire by laying an egg. When the anakim man beholds this newly laid egg, if he also desires to produce offspring, he will attempt to fertilize the egg, in hopes of creating a new anakim.

In some, more heathen societies, anakim who have fallen from the true path have been known to practice all sorts of unspeakable things. One such is to try to imitate the mating practices of other races. While this can reportedly be quite pleasureable, owing to the similarities in anatomy, it is largely frowned upon by the majority of anakim society, and owing to some of the forces involved (and the fact that anakim physiology was not intended to undergo such processes) quite unhealthy. If worst comes to worst, it has been known to happen for an anakim woman to actually get an egg fertilized while stlil inside her body. This egg will begin its growth and development early, and when the time comes for it actually to be laid, the process can be quite painful and damaging for the woman, who will still be expected to roost it afterward if she survives (which under the right biomantic supervision is almost always possible).

A side effect of this early fertilization is that the woman may appear to be, for all practical purposes, pregnant, and many anakim will even refer to them in such a fashion (while simultanously shunning them for the horrible deeds that have led them to such a state). The distinction however, is quite clear: anakim, even when working through this unnatural process, do not give birth to live young, they lay eggs.

As for the comment about arcanus, no, arcanus are not the only race on Raji at this time to get pregnant and bear live young. It's just that when it happens to an arcanus, it's a much -larger- deal

-Kereth Midknight

(Addendum: The increased pain and suffering inflicted upon an anakim woman laying a more developed egg is often accredited to the just punishment of Sikkar for her unholy deeds.)