if you’re still following Pale Lights into its third book— do you have any thoughts on how Breakthrough would react to the world of Vesper?
Unfortunately, I am waaay behind the 3rd Book, due to life getting in the way.
However, this is an interesting question.
For one thing, Vic, Sveta, Ashley, and Chris (assuming he's along for the ride) will be treated as marginalized people due to how the setting puts anyone with pale skin as soulless monsters or slaves or second-class citizens.
Secondly, Vesper is around the technological equivalent of our renaissance era IIRC, so the group is going to be dealing with a society with no concept of tech that they treat casually. And means that things are going to be tough for any of the Tinkers if they need to repair equipment.
Thirdly, Vesper is - generally - a society of nobility, with only a few civilizations being "broadly" against such ideas.
Fourth, the Watch will be a looming threat. Allies at times, yes, but they are a political machine that would carve up Breakthrough to devour any secrets a dissection could show.
Not everything is doom and gloom (pun intended); Breakthrough is massively, massively, MASSIVELY stronger than anyone else in Vesper barring the Gods/Spirits (that we've seen so far). Rain would be seen as a venerated warrior for how devastating his blades and emotion power can be, let alone the heavy hitters like Vic, Capricorn, Ashley, and Kenzie.
Coupled with better quality equipment (not just the tinker tech; Vic and Capricorn armor can deflect modern rifle rounds), experienced team coordination, and stealth thanks to Kenzie, they'd be pretty safe from anyone hunting them down.
Kenzie probably even upgrades her tech by scanning the nearby magic tech they scavenge.
This is not even getting into the fact that Parahuman Powers don't have as devastating drawbacks as Contracts or Gloom Manipulators.
Now the question is: how long does Breakthrough stay on the downlow?
Probably not that long tbh. All it takes is one slave auction or murder of a peasant and shit will hit the fan.
