audio (after shield is repaired and things are settling down at the end of the area)

[coffinturk]

[ Vincent isn't one to mince words. The message is relatively short and precise given its content. ]

We are all changing.

[ Yes. That is correct, Valentine. ]

The marks that appear are connected. But the changes are different even when two people seem to be becoming the same type of monster.

Contact me with the changes you are experiencing and the sigil's appearance. I will make a record.

Deliver it however you wish. Your thoughts on the changes are welcome.

Comments

[firstsoldier]

[Sephiroth is one of those criminal murdering psychopaths, depending on who's side of the war the speaker is on. It shapes his perspective, and also why he never said anything at all about the goodness of anyone's hearts. He knows better than to throw that particular rock in any glass house.]

I'm curious. It is admittedly a side tangent, but why do you believe these individuals would not work for their own benefit?

Your passion on the subject suggests you have experience in the matter, as I do, but it seems my conclusions are different.

[phantomshow]

[Fair enough. He’d be a hypocrite to keep making statements without providing backup when he’s been so vocal about jumping to conclusions.]

I don’t doubt they would work toward their own benefit. But I don’t believe their ideas about what benefits them line up with what benefits the rest of us. I say that because it’s what I’ve seen. Every rotten adult I came across in the past year abused, deceived, manipulated, and murdered to benefit their own interests, for gaining power and wealth. They hurt a lot of people I care about.

[And him personally, but that’s not really the point.]

People like that won’t look at a disadvantaged group like us and think it’s in their best interest to cooperate for the greater good. They’ll think it’s an opportunity to take power for themselves and trample anyone who gets in their way. The only good they care about is their own.

[firstsoldier]

I see. Your observations line up fairly well with my own, in broad strokes. Perhaps it's a side effect of being more used to dealing with corporate malignancy than anything else that I personally feel most "bad people" can be coerced into doing "good things" in this situation.

This may get wordy. I apologize, I have nothing to do in the evenings but sit and think. Is that acceptable?

if ren ends up making a bond with sephiroth over this i will laugh so much

[phantomshow]

[Sounds like this guy needs a hobby. Or maybe he’s just lonely, if his own thoughts are all he has to fill his time. Regardless, while reading this reply, Ren can’t help thinking of Akechi and their debates about the Phantom Thieves and the nature of justice, in those early months when they were both dancing around who they both really were, before their respective masks shattered.]

Go ahead. I’m listening.

[Reading. Whatever. Ren’s good at paying attention to what other people have to say when they need to talk.]

it's safe enough so long as there's no little mountain hamlets to set on fire..

[firstsoldier]

[Sephiroth and socializing don't.. really go together. At all. Ever. They never had. But in the absence of his only friends, this is as close to human contact he gets!]

Very well. In my experience, even murderous criminals are not usually stupid. The stupid ones don't last long.

We must first extract this individual from what they know. After all, this isn't Midgar.

Let us hypothesize your standard petty gang leader has just arrived. Interested in only his own power, willing to beat or kill people to get more power and wealth, extortion and drugs are acceptable and so on, no low is too low if it means gain. He has his small following of equally vile underlings to form his base. He's used to being a bigger fish in a tiny pond.

Now remove him from it entirely and drop him on another planet, where he is surrounded by strangers with powers and abilities he can't hope to guess at never mind match, and his own resources are completely absent. There is certainly an opportunity for him to attempt to seize power! But his name means nothing, his reputation means nothing, and there are no underlings to do his bidding. No-one kneels before a tyrant no-one knows. There are no bribes to levy, no families to threaten.

He must start over, and he must learn more about what he is and what he's becoming in order to gain the power he wants. He can leave the convoy, but then he'll be on his own in a hostile and unfamiliar place, unarmed, unprotected. The monsters of the wilds will not tame so easily to be his new power base.

It serves him (and us) to work with the convoy and not openly against it, learn what he can, share what he is willing to part with, not for any altruistic helpful nature but that it directly helps him build his own power back up. It has nothing to do with the greater good and everything to do with helping himself, or he gets nothing in return.

The more intelligent the criminal, the more likely it is he will understand if he wants to gain power here, he will have to cooperate and "play nice" for at least a while. It is very difficult for anyone to just trample their way through all adversity in this convoy. Even I would be hard pressed to subdue everyone here.

He may be scheming the entire time he's with us, he is not "a good person" and he will never act out of true altruism. But if he wants to eat, if he wants medical care, protection of the convoy, armanents and safety, then as he cannot take them by force anymore he will bend to the rules of civilization.

Aside from how long that got, counterthoughts?

[phantomshow]

[Hoo boy, Sephiroth really has spent a lot of time thinking about this, huh. Ren carefully reads through his words and mulls over his own thoughts before sending a reply.]

I understand what you’re saying. And the scenario you’ve described does make sense.

[Someone like Kaneshiro fits this example - a drug-pushing mafia cog in a bigger conspiracy, preying on high school students but ultimately powerless without his hired goons. If those were the only types of criminals in the world, Sephiroth’s analysis would be correct.

However.]

What if this hypothetical person isn’t an average criminal, though? If they did have stronger powers than the rest of us, like some kind of mind control, for example, they wouldn’t need to “play nice.”

[He’s thinking of Akechi and the mental shutdowns he caused on Shido’s orders. Nobody had been able to guess how he was breaking minds until Akechi himself demonstrated that power in fighting the Phantom Thieves. Until then and to everyone else, it was a strange, unsolvable mystery.

The Metaverse may not exist here, but if there’s one thing Ren learned from the past year in Tokyo, it’s that the world is not as ordinary as it may seem. There’s no telling what secrets Revan may be concealing.]

This person wouldn’t necessarily need supernatural powers. Some of the most corrupt people are also really charismatic. Like politicians.

[Like Shido.

Not all politicians, of course. Some, like Yoshida, choose to use their skills for good.]

They’re really good at saying what people want to hear and getting them to do what they want. Someone like that wouldn’t need to “play nice” for very long. They’d recruit new followers pretty fast.

And that’s just talking about people. Other sorts of entities exist too, and some are really malevolent.

[He’ll wait to see if he’s dismissed out of hand before elaborating on Yaldabaoth.]

[firstsoldier]

Fair. Until arriving here I worked for such a charismatic politician.; I agree they can be very persuasive when they choose to be. Likewise I cannot dismiss the possibility of mental manipulation, but in my experience it tends to not be all-consuming, there are those who can and do resist.

[Robio had been .. A Time, but Angeal had repeatedly shrugged off the effects of the spirits consuming the place, enough where he could try to force others to come to their senses too. Such resistance might be as common as the ability to manipulate to begin with.]

However for both scenarios, a masterful politician with nefarious purposes or a person with the ability to tamper with minds will still find themselves in a strange planet, and I doubt their abilities or charisma will work on the trucks of the convoy.

As far as I have been able to tell, so far only humans and near humans have been brought via the summoning ritual. While this doesn't mean nonhumans can't appear, it also doesn't mean they will. And who can guess the mind and motives of an alien?

[Sephiroth knows better than to doubt such things exist. He's fought them. Fallen under their sway. Had to be dragged back to freedom kicking and screaming. It would have happened again in a few short years had he not wound up here.]

It is my hope our conflicts with such creatures will be opponents, not those drawn here to be "allies". But seeing as this planet seems to draw from other worlds repeatedly, if there is such a being that may appear because you are here, such information may save lives.

[phantomshow]

[Ren’s satisfied he probably won’t be dismissed out of hand, so he decides to elaborate.]

My team and I fought a god not long ago. It called itself the God of Control, and it wanted to make reality peaceful by taking away humankind’s ability to think freely. Before that, it was pretending to be someone who claimed he wanted to help me, through “rehabilitation” so I could fight off the “ruin” it was causing the whole time. It had me fooled into working with it for close to a year before I learned the truth.

[And sometimes, that still eats at Ren a little
bit. He was a pawn in a game he didn’t know was even being played for so long.]

I don’t think it’s likely that something like that would be brought here, but it’s not impossible. Something like that could already be here, and you’d never know. People wear masks all the time.

[firstsoldier]

[He must wonder what qualifies as a god under this particular topic. Not all powerful and all knowing certainly, or human agents wouldn't be required. But something didn't have to truly be a god to be a superhuman threat.]

Masks are an unfortunate necessity of civilization. Would you recognize this god if it appeared here?

[phantomshow]

[Ren is well acquainted with the need for masks. He started wearing fake glasses to appear less intimidating at his lawyer’s suggestion during his first legal ordeal. But at least his deception isn’t done with malicious intent.]

Sure, if it looked the same as it did when we fought, or as the Prison Master who pretended to help me. I’d guess it’s probably able to look like whatever it wants, though.

Someone talking mysteriously about “mankind’s ruin” might be a tip-off, too.

[firstsoldier]

Behavioral recognition will do just as well as visual. There are plenty who preach about mankind's ruin even on my own planet.

I can't begin to know the mind of other humans beyond my own observations. Doing the same for an alien is unlikely. The morality of another species is unknowable, especially one who might be hypothetically immortal as someone would expect a god to be. Whether it could be relied on to accept the need to cooperate I can't guess. We may only hope such beings are few and far between, and not likely to appear. I would prefer to contend with the lesser threat of petty criminals.

[phantomshow]

I’d prefer not to contend with criminals at all. But I see your point.

[Sephiroth has made his points in a logical manner, without resorting to insults. Even if Ren doesn’t entirely agree with them across the board, he appreciates the ability to present a well-reasoned discussion in a level-headed fashion.]

You’ve made a good argument. I’ll think about adding information to this registry.

[He doesn’t have much to add, but something is better than nothing, right?

And now for something entirely different:]

Have you ever gone fishing?