virality | @Oriade

It seems reasonable to want to play with it off. I also wouldn't recommend the more extreme forms of pain that exist in this game. IE, electrocution via Grand Electric allows you to experience the full extent of your skin boiling, bubbling, and your blood churning like a cauldron, without the consequence of actual death. I think most would rather just die, in that scenario. It feels like it lasts a very long time, even if the attack itself just lasts a moment or two.

( Pause. Then sends follow up message: )

Were you worried about me?

if i wasnt before
I CERTAINLY AM NOW
are you unconsciously traumatized
holy shit

No. I log all my experiences after runs and, barring that, every few hours. It's how I started to notice that I was becoming comparatively more conscious of nociception.

How has it been for you, to be subject to monster attacks? Do you not mind stings, cuts, and burns? Or are you too far from combat to be targeted?

[ Does he say that he knows how those feel?

... ]

im a steam gunner
game says that steam gunners should be attacking from a distance
do i want to though
not really
shooting them up close in the face is a lot more fun

when you experienced those death-like things
did you not really care about how it felt personally
apart from research reasons

Edited 2023-08-05 19:25 (UTC)

What is "caring" except "desire"?

"I don't want to get hurt."
"I don't want to experience lingering pain."
"I don't want to get scars."
"I don't want permanent injury."
"I don't want to leave someone behind."
etc.

My only desire is recuperation. I won't do anything that would prevent my improvement, but I don't think much of anything that doesn't.

If the rush of killing things close range trumps your desire to avoid nociception, I can't imagine you have a healthy relationship with desire, either.

[ He wants to say a bunch of things about all that, but. ]

dont make me sound like a psycho.............
cmon man

Then why risk injury to move in close, when it's optional for your class?

[ Does he really want to answer that? ]

what IS a healthy relationship with desire then

[ No. ]

Probably not something you'd see in this game. An immersive virtual reality experience is most compatible with addictive and compulsive personality types, and people whose needs aren't being met in reality.

If any of us were content, we wouldn't be online.

[ He feels really called out by that, but Mithrun is right. ]

doesnt that circle back to how people are never content

In a sense. A small level of discontent is acceptable. If you were content not eating, you wouldn't eat. If you were content alone, you wouldn't find a partner. I think those small, missing satisfactions add up to an "average," or healthy, level of desire.

People who are missing too much, or who can't obtain what they want, try to satisfy their urges with something else. A sense of accomplishment over hitting level cap in place of approval from their parents. A guild of users to run Explorations with in place of physical friends. Etc.

then what do you think im missing?

[ other than the chance to commit violence, i guess ]

I wouldn't know, since I'm not your therapist.

( Assuming Oria even has one. Mithrun doesn't. Anyway, )

Do you feel you're missing something?

no
i dont think so
im satisfied with my life as it is

If that's how you feel, that's good. Hopefully nothing changes that.

( He doesn't say this with well wishes so much as he says it matter-of-fact. Life is fickle. )

[ Sure is!! ]

thanks
anyway
pls stop dying

I've only died once, and that's because someone killed me my first day.

THEN WHAT WAS THAT ABOUT BLOOD BOILING AND SKIN FRYING????
AND WHO

That didn't kill me. It was just a critical hit.

( But maybe death would've been more merciful, )

It was the person with the display name fandaniel. He has black hair and blunt bangs.

( that's. about all he remembers. he didn't care enough about fandaniel before he got pk'd to commit anything about his appearance or forum posts to memory. He's sure paying attention now, though. )

He invited me to an Exploration with him after the opening ceremony. I thought there was something about him, but I didn't expect him to turn on me and quit the instance.

Edited 2023-08-06 23:37 (UTC)

you went with him
but he had a game breaking bug on him
mithrun...........................................
what the hell

What game-breaking bug

( DIDN'T CARE OR NOTICE , )

[ He'll just... link him the forum post. ]

( Some minutes pass as he reads through the post. )

Maybe I really should kill him.

[ Oria doesn't have anything against Fandaniel personally (yet), but when he sees this reply from the usual Unperturbed Mithrun... ]

can i come watch

If you want. He might try to target you too, though.

( He figures Fandaniel may have been invited because, he's read, players like him are common in these games. If that's the case, the developers are probably curious how players like that are handled.

Add in a couple more logical leaps, and then you get to murder. )

(no subject)

dissimulative - 2023-08-07 09:19 (UTC) - Expand