#rambling mostly

It basically states that Shadowheart was only able to save Aylin because Shart was born a Selûnite and thus born "good." It has nothing to do with the influence of others, the lessons she learned during the adventure, or exercising her agency. It's all about her "true" self surfacing during that pivotal moment.

But saying Shart was "no true Sharran" is just... objectively wrong? She was raised in the cloister, she practiced their teachings, she participated in missions, she spread the gospel. You can say Shart is a bad Sharran, but to say that she was never a Sharran at all? Shart was in that cloister for 40 years — much longer than she's ever been a Selûnite as a child. This is like telling a Catholic nun that they're no true Christian because they were born to devoutly Jewish parents.

Which isn't a bad thing. It's just a side effect of the field for a lot of providers, and even longtime patients.

Genitals can become unsexy to someone who has been urinated on by an incontinent patient who they're trying to cath. Kissing can be intimidating after you treat a patient whose mononucleosis from half a decade ago left EBV in their system and led to a series of complications and eventually a ruptured spleen.

It's natural to become anxious around the human condition when you're exposed to its negative physiological extremes. Not that I need to wrap this back to Stormlight, but for people to whom physical intimacy is important, I think therapy can be life altering in the best of ways. That's why I'm glad Kaladin is being that change for Roshar.

We know they had them (as Capsize notes that she isn't looking for that type of commitment when the idea of marriage is brought up), but not what culturally a wedding is to them.

Cause I was thinking about it, and Kudaai himself doesn't have any power. That's like the whole Thing with the bird trio. They grant the power they inherited without being able to use it for themselves. (And any power they later gained was through illegitimate means). The power is the special flame within his forge, which is doing more than just shaping metal. His "method" depends on that eternal flame.

We know that the show takes place in 2017

we also know the ages of the gang (minus Cain)

Jax- 22

Zooble- 22

Pomni- 25

Gangle- 26

Ragatha- 30

Kinger- 48

I am trying to order who got there when (roughly) again I know this is basically a pointless exercise narrative wise. But fuck it I'm bored.

we know Kinger has been there the longest and Pomni the shortest (duh).

But I think Zooble is the newest next to Pomni. They are one of the youngest but she is also only just now fully challenging Jax's and getting closer to Gangle. This means they have not had a set dynamic with everyone and why they were still pretty raw about their appearance early on in the show. I think character wise it fits and explains a lot of their snappy nature early on.

i have no clue how is next between Jax and Gangle. but if I have to guess I would say Jax has been there longer simply do to the amount of rank pulling with Gangle he does (making her join his teams etc.)

Ragatha is the second longest out of the current crew one due to her age but also she did not get the breaking bad ref (more on that in a bit).

So the order is most likely:

Kinger

Ragatha

Jax

Gangle

Zooble

Pomni

But when did they get there is the next question. ep 5 is a gold mined for this as it shows who knows what. As mentioned Ragatha did not get the Breaking Bad ref it came out in 2008, so that's the cut off for her and Jax's uses more mid 2010's language (cringe, using youtuber as a noun ect.)

I have no clue when Kinger got there but lets say he has been there since the start, ok so the first VR headset used for gaming was in 1994

[in] 1994, Sega had released the VR-1 motion simulator ride attraction in Joypolis indoor theme parks, as well as the Dennou Senki Net Mercarcade game

Taken from the VR wiki

also the theme park thing seems like a relevant ref here.

Ragatha was a real estate agent in or around 2008 aka the housing crisis in the USA which is probably why she was around abandoned buildings, I am going to stay it was early to mid 2008 cause BB was around but didn't gangbusters until early season 2. so she may not have know about it even if it was out. And she is mostly likely the kind of co worker to take the jobs not body else wanted to be seen as more likeable.

Jax i would say it was around 2015 for the fact that he used youtuber as a job title and people were only able to get paid for their vid's since 2015. it also explains his very 'its just a prank bro' attitude that was very popular in that era of YT.

I think Ganagle being around the same time but later that year makes sense to me cause she would be about 20 in 2009 and working in Fast Food this could mean that she still had hope for her future (going to collage) but got crushed by the realities of the rescission and working in retail (fair and real).

side note I can't think of a reason for Gangle to be near the headset at all? like Pomi and Zobble just went to abandoned buildings for fun, Kinger likely worked on it, Ragatha would have been near it due to work, and Jax was running from something so he ended up in a random build at least tracks. But Ganagle? no idea, but here is some bullshit I pulled out of my ass:

she is an NPC and that is why she didn't get an evil version in ep 5

there was a headset at the McDonald's she worked at? maybe C&A made worker training videos?

she found it in the community collage as they were using old equipment to save money?

Zooble I feel would be a year later making it a bit awkward for her to fit in with everyone but also keep to herself for a descent amount of time.

so the final count is:

Kinger 1994 - Worker on the TADC

Ragatha 2008- Was a real estate agent inspecting a C&A building during the rescission

Jax 2015- a ran away who found a C&A building (maybe)

Gangle 2015- ?????

Zooble 2016- Urban explorer

Spitfire struggles the most with the lessons, her outbursts are quicker and more sporadic compared to JB.

If you are new here, or relatively new, you might not know how The Chosen One came to be.

It was 2020 and, as many other, to escape reality I started playing VNs and then IFs. Within some months, a game of my own started to take shape in my mind and then I started writing. At the time, I had absolutely zero knowledge about Twine so learning it was a slow and painful process - but worth it.

In spring 2021 I created the Tumblr blog dedicated to it, what is now my personal blog @kal-down and what was then @/the-upperworld.

The first version of TCO was full of bugs, had a colour palette that was all over the place, and, most importantly, was only written in italian. At the time, I couldn't fantom writing a full story in english, I only did small prompts about MC and Rascia on the blog or translated previews.

Then, mainly thanks to the IF authors I came to befriend on here, I decided to translate the whole demo and publish the inglish version, which became public in September 2021.

During that year's summer, I also started planning and designing what would become my most popular and loved game: The King's Hound. As I made more and more progress on it, with so much difficulty and writing fully in english for the first time in my life, TCO started to feel off.

I guess lack of popularity and interaction, perhaps due to a story featuring a single RO or perhaps due to the unpolished nature of the writing. Still, I deleted almost everything from the blog and made it my personal one, hiding the game from Itchio.

In 2022 I decided to polish the UI a bit, thanks to it you have a now playable and hopefully more aesthetically pleasing game. I also added the Interlude 1 to the game (introducing Rascia for the first time).

And now, here we are. There isn't new content available to play, progress is still very slow, but I think this game deserves a proper blog. It deserves a place to be discussed, especially since I have a published demo and even if it won't ever be popular, I hope the game resonates at least with someone. For this reason, I decided I will leave the game up and visible on Itch from now on, and that I will keep working on it even if I remain the only one interested in the project.

It was my very first IF and I don't want to be ashamed of it. Or hide it. Despite its flaws and hiccups in developement, I am proud of it.