Just below, some swirly script in a deep pink appears just below the dateline. 

I hope it's not too chilly yet! I know that can get hard late into the year. 

She hangs her mouth open a little, eyes blinking and lips popping against each other. 

Oookay then . 

She puts it down, then glance at it again and yeeep. 

It didn't look like a hallucination - the ephemeral little details of the image and the processing of the words just feels different - but it never hurts to check. 

So... 

She glances down at the book, and scribbles down a response. 

It's okay, and pretty normal out. You on the other hand....

She flicks her pencil against the page gently, feeling the steady weight of it shift against her hand. It'd be hard for there to be some computer stuck in there, and she felt the pages against her fingers. E-ink isn't nearly this good, even if they could fit a proper display in there. 

It's... 

She scrunches up most of her lower lip in her mouth and sucks for a moment, before clicking her tongue. 

Bizzare, to say the least. 

Oh yes! 

I should probably explain myself, shouldn't I? 

^^

The two little carets dance beneath the text, before settling into a more normal frozen emoticon. 

She snort-smiles, and brushes a finger along her ear. 

"You think?" 

She shakes her head, and notices the lack of reply. Ah well, makes some sense that it'd just work off of the more native input for a notebook...

Y

Okay! I'm a notebook, and a vessel of the power of the Spirit of Feminity Unleashed! The spirit of Femininity Unleashed is there whenever you wish to be pretty and perfect, whenever you wish to be important and impactful and sparkly and special in a feminine way! You're the chosen vessel for the Spirit's power, because you were the first person to write in me - That's metanarratively guaranteed! I can offer you vast magical powers and also whisk you off to another world, if you'd like! 

Wooo okay. 

Before she thinks better of it - 

You can reality test, right? You're a magic notebook, surely there's like - a thing to do, something unphysical or undeniable. 

*hugs*!
I think so! I can shift around my pages, and store them away. I can also write on my pages, of course. 

Sure let's try it. 

Can you pls then? All of them, then as few as you can, or something? 

She places her hand against the back, and...

The pages sort of - fade away, sinking in 'til there's only one page between each back, and then there's a lot more, the few hundred that you'd expect. 

...Okay then. 

...Okay. Gimme me a sec to breathe, and then we can talk about the magic powers. 

She closed the book - watching the blank white pages for some reason feels a little too much like staring into a pouty lil kid's face. 

So... This is real, realistically. There's a bunch of really really dumb ideas for how you could maybe even sort of begin to fake this - magnets, wires, some sort of science fantasy drug application, but there's nothing about those that either stand up to any scrutiny at all or are really any less fanciful then uh. 

The suggested premise. 

So... 

Clear your head, girl. We're doing a quiet day, use the fuckin' space. 

She stretches out, and stares at the convenient little spot on her bed's pillow that it's settled on. It's probably lightened, after. She idly wonders if they? have a proper proprioceptive sense or if there's something fussier going on there or... 

She shakes her head again. 

Okay some practicalities first. 

Can you push back the logs here and start writing from a fresh page? Idk how exactly this works, but getting to keep stuff clear is... good. 

Sure!

The pen and pencil marks just sort of... slip away, there one moment and flowing away in seconds, leaving a fresh page with the smiley exclamation the only thing at the top. 

I can put the old logs back at the start of the book whenever you'd like.

Neat. 

She tongues the word too, feeling the nice little way the syllable rests on her tongue. It's a shame it's not as natural to write out. 

How does your page control work, anyways? 

Hm... 

The dots of the "Hm." appear like a console command's crude loading bar, dripping out to the side before fading away and restarting the cycle. 

I can write, and doodle, and move pages around, and keep track of what's on each page! I can move things around, and keep track of and rearrange things inside me. But not much beyond that.  

Oo I have a stupid idea. 

Mind if I try something? 

...Go ahead! Please be gentle, it can be kind of uncomfortable if my body gets damaged. 

Hooow does she fit in so much bashful energy ^^? 

Okay so... 

There's got to be some nice paper that can fit here somewhere... 

Ah there we go - an ol' sketch of what I'm supposed to look like. 

Sigh. 

She pops and swirls a bit of scotch tape up from the rest on the desk, swirling it around her pointer finger before pressing the thin translucent strips to one side of the page, before clunking it down on the desk and smoothing the page into the seam of the bindings, nails easing it in and fingertips scrunching away the little air bubbles, before she closes it up and...

Open again and? 

The tape visibly sort of... softened out of existence, and the page has grown to fit in the bindings of the notebook. 

Oh this does feel odd ^^

I bark out a light little laugh. 

And not bad, I hope?

Not at all! It's just making use of parts of me in a way that I'm not used to being influenced by anyone else. A hug about it might be nice, actually. 

Awwwwwww.

Scooping up the notebook in my arms is a little awkward, and it's always a little harsh to feel something right between my breasts that emphasizes how small they are but... 

Gosh they're pretty cute. 

I place the book tenderly in it's place. 

Feel free to chat me up on that or the aforementioned magic powers ^^

Oh yes! 

There's a standard list of powers you can look at! It's very neatly formatted and I'm very proud of it! You can talk to me about your options and talk to me about what options you'd like it to have! If you want to get something that's not on the list, I can tell you how feasible it is and I can tell you more about what taking the options mean! I can't read your mind, because I'm a notebook, but I can give you my best guesses, and share my experience with the process with you! 

You can spend as long as you want on the process, too. I don't get bored or tired or impatient, so we can just keep going 'til your ready to confirm your build and begin your new life! 

Wanna see it~?

I lick my lips a little. 

You betcha~

~Here's the blurb!~
These powers are offered under an aegis of metanarrative protection. Anytime you might expect a power to have obvious negative side effects, like glowing eyes making it harder to see, it simply won't—you'll be able to see just fine anytime it actually matters, while having dramatically hazy vision at cool, narratively appropriate moments. This doesn't apply to your own preferences about the explicitly described effects of the power; if you don't want to be Well Endowed, the metanarrative cannot protect you from choosing that option and having to live with it.
You have 70 points to spend on perks, before Drawbacks. 

...

That's a lotta text. Lemme take a look...

Oh and - we should probably do introductions? 

It is a lot of text! But it's the best way I've found for communicating the basic promise of the powers. I don't have a name, but you can pick one, if you'd like? 

One thing at a time... 

The destinations. 

Her eyes flutter closed and she just sorta lets her hand scroll down the page - should be able to realign it neatness becomes a problem. 

Oh yeah - on names... I'm Tourm(aline). 

So like... 

Obviously the thing to do is the isekai roulette, yeah? Everything else is like, a concession to idiosyncratic preferences and shit like that. it's said to be 'likely even better' - what does that even super mean, here?

Is it like an empirical comparison or? 

How much would I even need to specify for somewhere in mind to work out? 

The real question is probably just "What's the difference between the search for the two leaving options" in a bit more generality. 

Stay 's fine to include, I guess, but just makes it a lot less fun from there. 

You're implying that mostly just need some workable form of interdimensional travel to return? Hope there's no synchronization convention and that can just be like, convenient too. 

The words drift along the pages, the responses flowing around the words and inlining neatly into place to form a less non-linear dialogue scrawled across the paper. 

Nice to meet you, Tourm! 

This is getting into parts of the Spirit's operation that I'm a bit less involved with but... 

The spirit can look at an uncountably vast array of options of possible worlds and pick out one that's the most right for you, based on your tastes and priorities amongst those options. Pretty much any consideration you could imagine goes into calculating the best option, and even if sometimes the world picked out in a surprise, it's always been what the chosen have been really looking for or wanting or wishing for, if that makes sense? 

Picking Somewhere In Mind both lets you choose something a lot more deliberately while narrowing the area of the search, it also means that the Spirit can exert significantly less optimization pressure. For some people, it's really important that they're just going to the setting that they love, without further interference, or that they're going somewhere in a more organic way that is less 'planned' by the Spirit. 

Still, Isekai Roulette is still very likely to be the best choice, unless reasons like those are very important to you! 

Most likely! It depends on the details of your story, of course, but if you're looking to go back home, the tools that you use shouldn't need to be especially comprehensive, powerful or precise in order to make that happen, unless it's somehow important for that to be the case. 

Ah ok. I think I get what you mean? I'm still not sure how much like, actually talking about desirdata helps in the isekai roulette case, but let's do that anyways 'cause think having the proference sin mind 'll be good in advance. 

Uh...

The yourself perks - can you grab those alone for me to mark up? ty. 

Of course! 

These powers affect your own self and nature, without direct effects on other people. Some of them are prerequisites for powers in the later Power of Friendship section.

Glancing a bit ahead this doesn't seem that literally true? But it at least probably? indicates the general idea of them being buffs to you and your stuff rather then something optimized to work too-too externally. Could you talk to me a bit about like, the whole idea of prereqs? I get why it applies in perk chains but sometimes they get kinda loose ^^

Name: A Thousand Ships - Cost: 1 ☐
Your face is simply exquisite, an ideal of feminine beauty. There are many possible ideals of feminine beauty, and yours is whichever one speaks most deeply to your soul. Others may match your beauty in their own way, but never exceed it.

Ooh. I like this ^^ Almost certainly going into the final build. An 'ideal of feminine beauty', huh? That's nice, espec. if it's looser then just a narrow def of 'beauty'.

Name: What's In A Name - Cost: 1 ☐
Magic to divine true names will accept whatever alias you choose to think of as your true name. Magic to use your true name against you will fail.

I'm not too sure like, what the point of this perk is? Suprised it's confined to just true names - seems awfully narrow to include in this sort of thing. Something that helps w/ names and titles and stuff in more generality might be good, tho?

Yourself perks are designed around influencing you and your capabilities, whereas power of friendship ones are about your relationship to the rest of the world. They impact your story over the story of those in your orbit, or your relationship to them, and it makes the perks mean something a little different. 

Also it makes the list much neater ^^ 

I'm glad you like A Thousand Ships! It's not narrowly confined to a particularly particular definition of beauty. The selection is pretty broad too - it's just that without Hollow Leg, there's only a singular broad appearance that it grants, but you can get away with a lot of small details drifting to make you look your best under any conditions. 

What's In A Name is a particularly finnicky protection that's really important for some people. I can see about making something broader, but I'm not too sure what you're looking for? 

At a glance yeaaah I can see it ^^ 

Lemme pull up the rest of the aesthetic-y perks and stuff for notes... 

Name: Angelic Tones - Cost: 2 ☐
Your voice is supernaturally beautiful and you can sing in any vocal range.

Name: Emerald Orbs - Cost: 2 ☐
At all times, your eyes are exactly the right colour. This effect operates based on your sense of aesthetics, in-the-moment preferences, and narrative considerations. Your eyes can be ANY colour this way. Lightless black voids? Brilliant white stars? Limpid pools of endless sapphire? They will look exactly the way you'd want them to look if you were writing a self-insert fanfic about this exact moment of your life.

Name: Perfect Hair - Cost: 2 ☐
At all times, you have exactly the right hairstyle. This effect operates based on your sense of aesthetics, in-the-moment preferences, and narrative considerations. It is not limited to physically or logistically plausible hairstyles.

Name: Well Endowed - Cost: 1 ☐
You have a generous figure, whether that's a classic hourglass or more of a well-rounded look; you can choose the details. Your endowments maintain a state of perfect grace and beauty at all times, never troubling you with uncomfortable bounces or uninvited jiggles.

Name: Hollow Leg - Cost: 1 ☐
(Requires Well Endowed.)
Regardless of your diet and exercise habits, your body maintains the physique and silhouette you prefer. Lack of visible muscle never impairs your strength or endurance. As your preferences change, so will your body; you are no longer bound to the generous figure stipulated by Well Endowed.

These are the main ones, yeah? I'll throw the rest of the ones down later. 

So obviously these are good perks, yeah? They're generally attractive in terms of getting to fufill the #girlexperience, and they're shiny and exciting and very #aesthetic. Probably a version of these are going into my draft build, just 'cause they're sexy and the cuttability of this sort of thing is relatively clear.  The details are a little... weird? Like, they all come together in a sense, but the details don't seem super standardized, 'nd that bugs me a bit. 

Emerald orbs and Perfect Hair have the same 'operates'... line, but Angelic Tones isn't written w/ "At all times, your voice is exactly the right pitch and texture." So that kinda implies a qualitative differences? The supernatural beauty vs. the unsurpassable beauty... 

Good to hear that Hollow Leg works for the resta the aesthetic perks, that's... really important for us. 

Emerald eyes is super neat and self-indulgent, but the focus on the literal appearance is maybe a bit weird? idk. 

I'm gonna get into that in a sec, but for the mo... 

It'd be lovely to see some thoughts about stronger versions of these, or ones w/ different assurances?

Let me think... 

An hourglass appears, shiny purple gel flowing down the middle in droplets that almost seem wet and real along the flat page. 

Here's some ideas for those perks! 

Name: Voice of the Goddess - Cost: 2 ☐
(Requires Angelic Tones.) 
You have an incomparably beautiful voice. When exerted to its full effect, it can create deep emotional reactions even in strangers. You are the most talented person at song in any world where it is used, barring others with this power.

I think that this one has a lot of wiggle room for extra guarantees, given the features this gives. If you're looking for something more concrete...

Name: Voice of the Goddess (Req. Angelic Tones) - Cost: 2 ☐
(Requires Angelic Tones.) 
You have an unsurpassably, supernaturally beautiful voice and your voice always sounds exactly how you'd like. This effect operates based on your sense of aesthetics, in-the-moment preferences, and narrative considerations. When exerted to its full effect, it can create deep emotional reactions even in strangers, and create powerful connections of communion and communication with those who have grown closer to you and your song. You have a vast, unlimited potential in musical magic.

Name: The Fairest of them All (Req. Hollow Leg) - Cost: 3 ☐
(Requires Hollow Leg.)
Your physical beauty is an out-of-bounds error on the world. You're inhumanly perfect, beautiful beyond the dreams of sculptors or artists. Your beauty can be matched, but never exceeded. When you don't restrain your beauty, it makes people stare, dumbstruck; the evil and corrupt can be burnt by merely witnessing your physical perfection.

This one feels a little closer to the limits? The perk is mostly meant to apply to your body, but it'll integrate smoothy with the rest of your perks too! There's still a decent bit of give though, if you have something in particular you'd like to tune this towards.

Name: Emerald Orbs - Cost: 2 ☐
At all times, your eyes look exactly the way you'd want them to look, as if you were writing a self-insert fanfic about this exact moment of your life. This effect operates based on your sense of aesthetics, in-the-moment preferences, and narrative considerations, conveying the color, design, emotion and soul exactly as you'd desire.

Emerald Orbs can make your eyes *be* something exotic too! It's a bit awkward to fit into the description, though ^^. There's not too much to add to this, I think?

I wasn't able to find a good edit for Perfect Hair - if you'd really like, I can make the beauty of the hair explicitly supernatural, maybe? It's already more or less at its limits, and if you're looking for that you can get that effect from Fairest of them All.

Name: Hollow Leg - Cost: 1 ☐
(Requires Well Endowed.)
Regardless of your diet and exercise habits, your body maintains the physique and silhouette you prefer. Lack of visible muscle never impairs your strength or endurance, nor does an excess of muscle impede your flexibility or agility. As your preferences change, so will your body; you are no longer bound to the generous figure stipulated by Well Endowed.

And this is just a small one about the other side of the equation! The reassurance is a little bit more general then that, but I think you should get the idea ^^.

Feel free to take your time! I'll be here to listen for as long as you'd like. 

Her throat feels a little clogged, and her chest a lil tight. Explaining this is always.... awkward. 

So...

Mighta noticed a slip or two - we're plural. And trans, fwiw. 

I've been hosting - being the main mind and identity that we're running with, but they'll be more 'f us pooping up. Hope that's not like, all a problem for the empowerment-y stuff? 

The thing is that like - we share memories, yeah? And we obv. share the same brain and hormonal system and whatever. There's probably some things where like, we're narratively distinct, and there's stuff that we'd wanna get up to distinguish more - goddess knows that we blur a lot when we're tired but... 

't least 'til we figure out more bodies, It'd be nice to have something that helps w/ like - making the plural life more natural 'nd the issues unobtrusive? 

Hecc, while we're wishing for the sun and stars, 't'd be nice to have it cover somethin' a little broader, like cute nicks and prefs. 

That's ok! Being also multiple people is just another way you get to be special, and it's often really nice to get to see how happy transgirls are when I can help them with their bodies.

For the perk... 

How do you feel about this? 

Name: An Idol's Identity  - Cost: 1 ☐
(Requires What's In a Name?)
People acknowledge and instinctively understand your preferred name and current identity, intuiting the continuity or lack thereof of your existence and self from any other instances of yourself that they've encountered as well as if you'd exhaustively explained every detail you are willing to share. The complexity of your identity never seriously deters people from forming relationships with you.

Oo. That's a good pick, though the phrasing definitely evokes time travel shenanigans over the plural case ^^ 

But I think it should work? 

Can you fit in something for titles or reciprocity? 

I think so! 

Name: An Idol's Identity - Cost: 1 ☐
(Requires What's In a Name?)
People acknowledge and instinctively understand your preferred name, titles and current identity, intuiting the continuity or lack thereof of your existence and self from any other instances of yourself that they've encountered as well as if you'd exhaustively explained every detail you are willing to share. The complexity of your identity never seriously deters people from forming relationships with you, and you never have serious issues keeping track of names, faces and personalities of the people you meet.

...And that's a little rosy blush on her face. 

It's not even a lewd perk, but getting that sort of recognition... 

I like it! 
Feels like it'd really help with being able to - present ourselves properly forward.

There's proooobably enough flex to edit this in situ for what have in mind, I hope? 

let's get goin' down the list...

Name: Size Difference - Cost: 2 ☐
At all times, you are exactly the right height. This effect operates based on your sense of aesthetics, in-the-moment preferences, and narrative considerations. It will usually keep any height changes fairly subtle, but at dramatic moments you might discover yourself able to shrink to the size of a bee or grow to the size of a giant.

Size difference is neat but I think that in the ordinary case it's surely like, 90% redundant w/ Hollow leg? Control of your silhouette and stuff has to cover a few in of height, even if there's probably some dumb stuff you can do w/ absolute control of your height, as featured in bloody every antman comic ever. 

Name: Personal Hygiene - Cost: 1 ☐
You are always clean and fresh, never needing to use a bath or toilet.

Sick, and nice 'f I ever pick up field surgery or something that benefits from a stronger 'clean' guarentee then you can normally get. I hope it stretches for Shenanigans:tm: around clean rooms too ^^ Those have always looked like a pain. 

Name: Like Roses - Cost: 1 ☐
(Requires Personal Hygiene)
You smell lovely. Your scent is unique to you, and may involve any combination of warm spices, floral notes, petrichor, or other things you think smell good. You do not need any justification for why you smell like this.

Mmph. I hope this works w/ the rest of the perks you've mentioned for changing aesthetics and for having different like, layered notes for each part of my body. Hecc, if the justification thing is optional...  Can I get like, perfume bottles 'f it that I can share or use dramatically or whatever, too, aside from it being just like What I'm Like:tm:? Bonus points if I can color it and mess around with the misting effect and when and how it lingers... There's even a lot you can just do with the texture of it on your skin, tbh. 

Does anything cover taste ^^? Just have to ask, sorry ^^

Also, a dearth of superlatives here, tho I think the way the description is phrased implies that it's kinda flavoured like the self-insert-y fun 'f Emerald Orbs. 

Name: Dressing Room - Cost: 3 ☐
No matter how ridiculous your outfit, it will stay pristine and perfect, unless it would be more dramatic for you to be artfully bedraggled. You can use any quiet moment to yourself to quick-change your clothes, shoes, nails, and hairstyle into a completely new look. (You cannot change your hair length or colour this way without Perfect Hair, but you can braid or style it.)

...huh? This really doesn't explain anything ^^. The theoretical questions abound like "Can you just magic up contacts w/ arbitrary appearances into your eyes w/out Emerald Orbs?", and I guess uh, what the limits for choices are for what's part of an outfit or what's a quiet mo or the like? 

I'm not too sure what a 'clean room' is? If you can explain it a little more I can tell you how it'd work! By the name though, I think that there's a decent chance it would work? You should count as clean and clear of contaminants enough for anything that you get up to without any further efforts. 

I think you should able to do that, at least if you take Dressing Room as well. Having some perfume in a pocket or lack-thereof is something that should be fairly easy to get with the power? Controlling the details of it will take time, especially if you're working to get control that isn't made of particles, but it should be possible with some work! 

I think with Like Roses and Fairest of Them All there might be something already there? I'll think on it.

Dressing room is... complicated? There's not really a good way to explain it in the confines of the perk normally... 

It lets you access any clothes that you've worn, and anything mundane and producible by the worlds you've seen that you can imagine, so long as it's part of your outfit. Anything that's sufficiently entwined with what you carry on you, that you can don like your clothes or pocket and have as a part of feeling like you're fully dressed and ready to face the world can count. That even lets you stretch it a bit further, pulling back anything that you've been sentimentally attached to that you've had as part of your wardrobe, too! Sometimes you'll also be able to merge outfits and features too, but it depends on finnickier things about how you think about and experience it. But if it's important to you, I'm sure you can figure out something! 

A quiet moment for the purposes of dressing room is anything where the - narrative pressure relents enough for it to be sort of plausible? Any time where you're out of view and not actively under time pressure to do something, or any situation where you could just change your clothes normally you can access it as much as you want. If there's enough give that you could say, disappear, with nothing actively happening to you, or beg off for a bathroom break, it works. It's pretty generous, overall, especially once the changes solidify as part of your narrative. 

Oh ok ^^ 

That is promising. It's super duper tempting to grab all of these ^^

I figure it probably has the drifting details stuff that you probably should be able to get for the rest of these? There's a discussion about what like, the metanarrative super means in practice on the tip of my tongue too. But anyways...

Onwards~!

Name: Just A Little Longer - Cost: 1 ☐
If you push yourself, you can keep doing any task or working on any project indefinitely, visibly strained but never impaired by injury or fatigue. As soon as you stop, you'll collapse with exhaustion and sleep for up to a full day to regain your strength. This only works when what you're doing is personally important to you.

Is a good perk ^^. Cheap, too. I'm not sure how this compares to like, whatever options I'd get by just throwin' a loose req. for super stamina augs into the roulette or something like that? It's probably not an unreasonable ask for a magic-y setting to let you work unreasonably long. That's still a concession, tho, 'nd there's def options for what I'd wanna do that might make that.... awkward? Havin' this in at least setting 1 as a big advantage kinda speaks to me.

Name: Immunity System - Cost: 3 ☐
You can't get sick or poisoned. You can still use recreational drugs and alcohol normally, but can't overdose.

This is really tempting, kinda? Obviously the defensive use is sweet in the kind of places that make that particularly meaningful, but like... mostly in as much as there is an appeal for me for recreational drugs, it's in social drinkin' 'nd that kinda thing? Or I guess getting to explore otherwise really ill-advised things by getting to ignore poisons and the like. Idk if this like, addresses that in any way or 'f 't'd b worth trying to get something for that.

Name: My Ears Are Burning - Cost: 6 ☐
You always know exactly what people are thinking, as long as it's about you. This effect is not telepathy and is not blocked by effects that block telepathy. It applies even to people you can't perceive normally. You are never impaired by the flood of information.

...Woof. That's my kink, but also v. a lot. There's probably a bunch of mods that you'd maybe want to make to something like this to make it more consent-y or something? There's probably a lot the basic guarantee does here, but this is def a place where it's hard to instinctively trust that? It's pricey and invasive but there's a fuckton of ways that it'd feel empowering and it'd make so many kindnesses easier and more plausible. 'm gonna have to take a while to think on this - really... take some time to think about all of this.

She paused, for a moment. 

Please do think on that but for now... 

Gonna go take a break, ok? Should pop back in within the hour to keep talking. I need to... clear my head, I think. 

She flicked the book closed, and slipped off the bed, bouncing on the balls of her feet. She straightened up, her spine arching, feeling out the little kinks in her shoulders, the light patina of greasy sweat on her cheeks, and the pretty crimped fabric of her blue tank top tug against her chest. She could feel her heart thumping, just a little, now that she had the space to listen to more then just her internal monologue, and it was... 

She shook her head, and strolled out, one step at a time along the cool wooden floor, just down the hall to the bathroom. 

It's all white and blue, ceramic coating the walls and floor in a way that still reminded her more of a pool then something properly homey. The mirror's velvety back stares back at me, the kitschy dentist's toothbrushes, pink razors and lumpy toothpaste tubes in a mug aside the admittedly nice sink. There's a standard tub and shower set up too, w/ a few too many shampoo and conditioner bottles clustered along the edges, with a big fuzzy black towel wrapped around a holder. 

She doesn't need to fucking look to know that she's rumpled and ruffled and flushed, or to feel the faint fuzz of on her cheek or chin. 

Really... even if it wasn't a giant kink thing or something that made her get all gushy inside at the thought of the attention and admiration, she's gotta for that, and getting to do all of their voices was a must. There's gonna be... a lot of mandatory purchases, probably? She supposes there's still something to ask there - what the voice situation would be without picking up any of the voice line, but the rest of the body rebuilt. It just doesn't feel... convincing, right now, and that sucks. She doesn't even know if there's anything that she can or should do about that, and that's even more of a bummer. 

rn tho, there's something to do. 

The shower rattles for half a moment before a warm mist streams down into the tub, thick droplets steaming up against the adorable lemon yellow winky pikachu-themed shower curtain..

She shucks off her clothes into a pile, sighing warmly. 

For now, she should appreciate what she has. Hormones have done so much to make her skin shine, and the tweaks to her sexual response have been... juicy. 

A good half-an-hour later, she's out of the shower, a languid smile on her lips and a looseness in her shoulders. 

hey i'm back ^^ 

There's a couple of questions that I've got from the shower - hope you don't mind if I dump them ^^

Feel free to jot your thoughts down about the earlier stuff - I just don't wanna put more stuff on stack before I do that. 

It's okay! I'm here to help ^^

Okay so... 

Could you tab up what I'd be at if I took all of these perks? The appearance ones, the name, voice and cleanliness line, the wardrobe thing, all that stuff. That'll be a useful chassis if we end up redrafting builds. 

Wanted to ask what's up w/ the collateral changes that you can get - like, how much you can change around your eyes w/ out the eye stuff, how much you can change your voice around w/out the voice stuff, that sorta thing. This is built well but also as a bit of a point vampire, sheesh. None of these really seem like, unworkable as good shit, so I'm gonna be scrounging for pts, I expect, espec. if I wanna be doing a buncha drafts to feel this all out. 

And like... 

There's the metanarrative stuff and the general guarantees that you're tryin' to offer, yeah? I get that it makes the powers work how you want them too, but I'm not sure how much just like... the whole premise of this is wrapped up in that. There's the whole - story about being a vessel of the spirit's power that's sort of - inherent to the thing, m'ybe? 

Idk if I'm reading too much into it ^^

A Thousand Ships (1/70), What's In A Name? (2/70), Angelic Tones (4/70), Emerald Orbs (6/70), Perfect Hair (8/70), Dressing Room (11/70), Personal Hygiene (12/70), Like Roses (13/70), Well Endowed (14/70), Hollow Leg (15/70), Voice of the Goddess (17/70), The Fairest of them All (20/70), An Idol's Identity (21/70)

So 21! Still plenty left for the rest of your build, don't worry. 

Without Angelic Tones, you still have the voice that your body should have. It won't be supernaturally beautiful, but it'll be feminine and directionally accurate to what you're looking for. If you want it to be, it'll be a pretty voice, with a solid and trainable range, too. 

A Thousand Ships gives you a bit more leeway on your eyes. The guarantee that it offers means that you should be able to get more or less anything humanly possible for your eye's coloration, but it won't have nearly the same impact or precision as if you had taken Emerald Orbs. I'm sure much the same applies to the Fairest of Them All too!

There's a couple of things that I could talk about for how the narrative protections applies. For one... 

The Spirit's powers are pretty comprehensive and expansive. The reason you can get the sort of comprehensive powers is because the Spirit works on stories, and to be able to deliver that and the guarantees of the powers, you need to be running on those same kind of greater stories. And that can give you a lot of control over your life, especially in the context of choosing just the right place for you too! 

Things that tend to - break stories aren't going to work on you so much? Precognitive powers aren't really going to work on you, because what's going to happen to you is decided by something outside of the scope of normal time, and omniscient powers might just - miss you, or things about you, even if there's no clear in universe way for that to work, because you're too special and too important to be understood and discarded. That works on the - genre of your life that you are trying for, too, usually.

It also makes things more cleanly turn into plots and narratives and things that you can understand. It's important to the spirit that it not just be a story, but that it's something that would be a good story that you can see and appreciate from the inside, so that naturally makes certain things easier and certain things more common. 

I hope that makes sense to you? 

It... mostly does, yeah. 

So I like... count as having the perks and the bennies thereof first, and then... from there there's a bunch of considerations about the stories and how 'm relatin' to them 'nd on net it creates a - bonus safety blanket and direction to it? 

That's nice, even if it'll probably take like, actually experiencing it to be able to act too to much on it. 

It's more that there's certain things that are just true about you, from the perks to your existence as a vessel, and certain things that are naturally true of someone that that's true of? 

Unless the implementation and details of the second kind of thing are locked in somehow, they might end up drifting and firming up into something that you can take better advantage of, or into something that makes a better story. Sometimes it's very important for people I've helped to be able to have those things locked in and be able to get the advantages that their vision gives, and sometimes it's most important that things work out later, when they really need it, because they're the kind of person who wants to be rewarded for being mindful and ready for the worse. And those scenarios can branch and mix, depending on how your story goes. 

That's part of the reason why this isn't just discussed from the start. 

Her hand glides along her the base of her cheek, feeling the firmness of her jaw and the softness of her throat as she rubs away the light fog of confusion. 

ah ok ^^

I still feel deeply confused but I still have opinions ^^

Hopefully not dumb ones :3

Regardless uh... 

The impression I have is that I mostly - want to lock in that I'm in the genre that I want and then get to - have 't 'n the back? If I can get to the sort of place where I can learn and laugh and love and adventure, then it's okay if it's looser or more restrained. It's maybe ok for them to - pop up, at be something that I have to - take advantage of? Getting to be clever about something only kinda in my control is something I tend to enjoy, 'nd that prob. applies here? But there's so much that things like this does that it's hard to distinguish the cases emotionally. 

My brain def reports that we should just keep writing notes so! 

Notes! 

🎉✨Notes!✨🎉

Scribbled below in slightly smaller, less aligned text is a different note of her own. 

I think it would probably help to talk about the genre that you're looking for? That way you can work to figure out how to make sure you get that through your choices ^^. It's really important to me that you get what you're looking for, and I'm happy to help!

Oh yeah, I will. Writin' up user stories is just emotionally draining in it's own way, and my brain has a haaard time believing all of this in front of me w/out going through each thing, I guess? Glancing down the page and getting a proper thought for each of these is... different. 

Name: Inner Strength - Cost: 3 ☐
(Requires Hollow Leg.)
You are implausibly, superhumanly strong, with endurance and toughness to match. You might have to strain a little to lift and carry at the same level as construction equipment, or deal with lightly scraped knuckles if you punch as hard as a battering ram.

Oof. That's kinda pricey for a shitty superpower, is my first instinct ^^. Is very easy to get powers that are much better then this in most like, supers-y or xianxia-y settings? I guess there's like, angles that it could make a diff but that's aesthetically unappealing to me, and probably more generally us? A shitton of stamina is an attractive prospect, tho.

Name: Battle Angel - Cost: 1 ☐
Somehow, you never get significantly injured in a fight, unless it's a very dramatic and plot-relevant fight in which case you might be glamorously wounded and pick up a cool new scar.

Name: Battle Demon - Cost: 1 ☐
You have an unerring intuition for gaps in an opponent's defenses, though it may be beyond your power to exploit them.

Name: Battle Maiden - Cost: 3 ☐
(Requires Battle Angel and Battle Demon.)
No matter what kind of fight you're getting in, you're always a match for even the most skilled opponent.

Okay so... Mostly these make sense in the combat-y adventure school 'f world choice. Which honestly is kinda a lot of the things that I'd wanna get up too, at least as a side hustle? That's not to say that I'd need anything like this at all, tho, in some like super general way, especially if there's more goodies later. These feel - a bit cheaty? Battle demon feels the least cheaty,but it still circumvents like, actual combat experience or gettin' to develop that. Angel is good but also just kinda cuts off stakes a bunch of tension and like - stakes and shit, but m'ybe also is a super req'd survival perk in that case? if it was more then a pt I'd probably talk about negotiating down the comprehensiveness for more val, but that's uh. Not the case, so...

Battle maiden is both kinda awesome 'nd kinda cheaty-lame 'nd also kinda... scary? That's a weird word there, give me a sec. 

Uh. Puttin' words to it comes out to something like "I don't want to start w/ the kinda power that this actually gives me, and I don't want the trappings of gaining power and influence to be stripped from me, 'cause that's kinda the fun part". Growing in power and being in the sort of situation where can work to make things better feels more right then uh. Decapitating strikes and then struggling through stragglers. Battle demon seems nice as like - an edge, and something where we can actually exploit things fair and square? Bonus pts. if it works in broader settings then just 'fights' or whatev. 

If I'm nitpicking here, I'd like to tune battle angel so that more injuries are like, possible, but there's some like, later level protection that means that I don't like, miss out on shit by being injured? I like the idea of gettin' to angle towards invincibility but that being... free seems a little awkward? Or m'ybe I'm irl a total pussy about serious injuries and how much they fuckin' hurt and this is all empty talk. 

Haaaaaard to say. 

None of these are Literally Required:tm:, tho, at least. We'll see ^^

You can do that! I don't think that needs a text change but we can figure out one if you'd like? 

Inner Strength should always be a meaningful increase in your physical power and endurance, even if it's much higher then the example above.

I think you're maybe underestimating how much control over your body those perks would give you - there's a lot of physical things that you can tune to make that less bad, and when you're in an ideal world, the pain will probably feel more okay. If you're still worried about that... There's this perk. 

Name: Iron Will - Cost: 2 ☐
(Requires Closed Book and Indelible.)
You are immune to all forms of mental illusion, alteration, interference, or control. Even extreme torture, extended solitary confinement, advanced brainwashing techniques, and so on cannot touch you. You can be lonely but not cripplingly lonely. You can be upset but not traumatized. "

This will guarantee that won't be more of a problem that you can handle, and are okay with handling.

Oh ok. That's... Okay? That's a lot of endurance but it's still something that feels like it ought to be eminently cuttable. 

...Hold the phone ^^

Could you pull the prereqs up? 

Name: Closed Book - Cost: 1 ☐
You're immune to any supernatural, pharmaceutical, or other effect that would let people directly read your thoughts or feelings.

Name: Indelible - Cost: 1 ☐
You're immune to any supernatural, pharmaceutical, or other effect that would let people directly alter your thoughts or feelings.

Oh those sound p. good, and likely to be worth including, unless there's like, some big catch on the 'directly' there. 

And uh. 

Sometimes it's an advantage, for gaining trust or getting to experience different things or whatever? It'd be nice if you could make the selectivity work like that. 

Sure! 

A moment... 

Name: Closed Book - Cost: 1 ☐
You're immune or partially immune to any supernatural, pharmaceutical, or other effect that would let people directly read your thoughts or feelings, whenever that would help accomplish your goals.

Name: Indelible - Cost: 1 ☐
You're immune or partially immune to any supernatural, pharmaceutical, or other effect that would let people directly alter your thoughts or feelings, whenever that would help you accomplish your goals.

There!

Do, do, doo be do. 

Name: Making Ends Meet - Cost: 1 ☐
You have enough money to sustain a comfortable lifestyle. It comes from a source you don't have to pay much attention to, like a job with almost no responsibilities, a large inheritance, or a noble title.

Name: Motherlode - Cost: 2 ☐
(Requires Making Ends Meet.)
You have enough money to sustain a fairly extravagant lifestyle. It doesn't come from anywhere, you just have it.

Name: Four Star Daydream - Cost: 4 ☐
(Requires Motherlode.)
The answer to "can I afford that" is "yes".

Ooh.

This is - actually less appealing than I was expecting? The reason that financial success is otherwise so appealing feels like it ought to be otherwise covered, somehow? 

I doubt that like, the presumptive outcome if you don't take any of this is being super destitute for a while, which if it was the case would be a big reason to pick up Making Ends Meet, though stability and fall back options are still like, arguably p. important. 

The rest... 

hm. 

Four star daydream is appealing to me, but it seems hard to come in in a situation where like, I have the buying tools to make use of it w/out a ton of work to make it fun? It's not like those aren't purchasable w/ some digging, but that infra might be finnicky... 

Or I'm being a silly and it's mostly covered here. 

Yeah probably it's great for that, in a context where there's a lot of civ to take advantage of people. 

It's just - a lot of stories that I think of, when I think of like, big, pressing adventures, are all about the known world, or some mass of polities or whatever, being surrounded and being in a position where they have to work w/ what they have. Which is both very this, and kinnnnda invalidates it? 

It's hard to think about super clearly w/out the actual like, walk through of what this fuckin' means economically. There's lots of stupid things that could happen, but the metanarrative protections are a thing, so it doesn't say, create deflationary messes by having big numbers, or get brick walled by KYC shit. 

Could you talk a lil bit about what it actually looks like to have? 

The amount of money that Motherlode or Making Ends Meet grants isn't large enough to substantially distort economies, unless there's not really enough of an economy for things to be really available enough to buy. It's not really the sort of thing that needs any special explanation, beyond things probably working out a little bit better in the background of the economy, almost every time someone's taken that perk. Sometimes there is a concrete reason behind the funds - some inheritance, gift, or asset that they're able to get that value out of, but it's not very needed, usually? 

Four Star Daydream is about purchasing power, more then money. You can still get a really big number in your bank account, for convenience, but what the perk does is let you buy anything and everything that you could buy, without worrying about having enough funds or enough things to sell for it. With Four Star Daydream, you can buy a big company, as long as someone else who had enough money to do that kind of thing could do that, and the people who own that company would be willing to part with it for just money. There's some things that you can only buy if you're in an upper class associated with richness, but you won't be unable to buy things just because people would normally think that you wouldn't have that kind of funds - you can prove that you have it just as well as if it had some more concrete source. 

Sometimes people get versions of the perk that mean that they have some vast collection of something valuable, or some incredible advantage in making money, like a perfect skill in market speculation, access to places that they can always make profitable trades in, or the resources of royalty behind them, after accomplishing a great feat that they ended up being rewarded for. 

And you have the power to purchase things! I remember hearing about billionaires that just sort of sit on money and things that are mostly just money, but you actually have that purchasing power! You can buy as much as you want, as long as it's out there to buy, from services to objects to other things! You'll get what you pay for, and other people will still be able to get what they were buying, too, because taking away other people's things just because you can outbid them is the sort of negative consequence that the Spirit stops.

Ooookay then. 

I have a - difficulty picturing what that means if I'm like, buying skilled human services? Like, let's say I take the perk, I plop into a modernish world, then I say "Fuck it, let's make an anime out of every single fanfic I've ever read" or something like that, and I buy the services of studios or whatever to make that happen. What happens to like, the rest of the market? Are there just like, magically more people who can do that kinda work now, and the rest of the anime industry keeps chugging along?

Mhm ^^!

She breaks out into a sharp chortle, and shake my head. 

Really? 

Something like that can happen! You might also end up with some innovation that means that you can get more people more productive at making anime, or you might end up in a situation where the increased investment makes a difference as to the artists they can involve, or something else like that. The Spirit can make ridiculous things happen, because that can both be a really important part of being special and powerful, but having a sense of what's impressive and possible is an important facet of power and narrative in general, so things will rarely if ever end up with a result that you would find fundamentally absurd as a result of your powers, at least once you know what's going on. 

Ohhhh yeah...

That makes sense. 'm gonna probably have to run a v. w/ and w/out for the user stories for some of these... 

Don't want to lock in anything. 

Realistically I think imma gonna grab the mental defense line, except m'ybe in a build or two that I throw in to be bloody contrary ^^

Side by siding these things can be bloody important. 

Name: Dragon Fairy Elf Witch - Cost: 5 ☐
You can at any time discover previously unknown heritage from any type of being you encounter, even if this makes no sense or contradicts previously established descriptions of your family tree. You always get their powers without their drawbacks, unless the drawbacks are cool and dramatic. Any visible features of this heritage will appear at narratively appropriate moments and be cute, pretty, beautiful, or striking rather than awkward, weird, gross, or scary. This ability works even if the beings in question cannot reproduce with humans, or at all.

There we go ^^. You explained this really p. thoroughly. Which isn't to say I don't have a bajillion questions ^^. What kinda class of being does it cover? Can I just like, copy a normal ass housecat and get cat ears? Can I get bloodline powers? The drawback thingymajig is more "Only in so far as it's cool and dramatic and you want it to be a thing", yeah? How does it even work on like, having kids? It doesn't nesscarily actually cause my descent to change, does it? Bet this fuckin' manages incompatible powers too ^^

...Yeah ok I'm kinda vibrating in excite here ^^ 

Feels like it opens up a lot too, if the kinda thing that i wanna be at the end just has to be something that can be made out of a turbo mix of everything. Also is just an organic-y see the world-y power growthy option! Honestly this is even tempting in a turbo minimalist stay here run, much less something waaay more ambitious. 

How comprehensive it is depends a little on the person taking it, but you should at least be able to copy animals and anything sapient. 

You can, if those sorts of features are appropriate for you! 

It works on magical inheritances, yes! Generally, the way that the perk works gives you the kind of benefits you'd get if you were descended from the being that you're applying the effect to, or if that's not something that makes sense, it'll give you enough essence of the kind of thing that they do that it works out anyways. There's more or less always a way to fully awaken the powers that you've gained too, so you don't miss out on anything that you'd get if you just were a cat, or a spirit, or whatever else you've decided to mimic. 

Children you have will generally get as many inheritances as the spirit can squeeze in, while still coming out how you're picturing a child of yours ought to look. They won't necessarily have shapeshifting and variable expression, but most of the benefits of their heritages should still be in there somewhere! 

Mhm, Mhm!

Sweet. 

Name: Omniglot - Cost: 3 ☐
You learn languages insanely, ludicrously fast. You know exactly what any word said to you means, and you make strangely accurate guesses about how to phrase things you're trying to say. You never forget any grammar or vocabulary you learn.

This is like... useful but it's also the sort of thing that people design shit around? There's also a reason why like, translation magic is something so ubiquitious as a basic thin', because it's a giant bitta friction to stories that doesn't oft help things really work. 'nd 'sides, it's not like you can't just like, learn languages or get a cute lil translator aide. The semantics here also lean against like, having that-that much free utility in terms of being able to do cheaty stuff w/ magic languages? I'm sure I could skim for something that fit that, but I don't like, actually actually super think that's like, extra fun for me? Oh yeah. Uh. The 'strangely accurate guesses about how to phrase things' seems m'ybe p. useful even in a native lang, if it's that-that generic ^^ 'm sure there's some bennie even in native tongue-y things, but whatev. It's not that that isn't good but I feel like this isn't nesscarily a high priority way to do that? I feel like that's the kind of skill that works best just learning for real. I guess if I want to do something low magic-y this is an okay-ish option if I'm also trying to be like, turbo cosmopolitan or whatever? Just the net thing is not thaaaat appealing to me.

Name: Anything You Can Do - Cost: 6 ☐
You learn implausibly quickly from friends, rivals, and love interests. If you have a personal connection to someone with a certain skill, talent, or expertise, you'll learn it five times faster than they did, or twenty times faster if they're actively trying to teach you. This applies even to forms of magic that you ordinarily shouldn't be able to learn.

Ooooo I'm thinking of this as already part of my build, tbh? The ability to learn like, literally everything as long as I can kinda get into a social circle for something, up to and including magic systems seems like such an obvious pick. It's probably not even that difficult to hack something together for getting a personal connection to some really good resource, and it incentivizes fun-fuzzy-warm socially things ^^. Plus is a nice complement to getting a bajillion bloodline advantages and the like.

Actually like... 

hm. 

If I'm being extra sticklery about this and trying not to think about how much I wanna be a fuckin' catgirl, then this potentially kinda obviates the advantages of taking DFEW for magics? I guess it depends on the limits of the "Forms of magic that you ordinarily shouldn't be able to learn" clause. It seems relatively unambiguous that you could say, pick up something like harry potter wizardry, which works based off more or less a binary toggle of "Wizard Y/N" within otherwise normal humans, and more or less entirely develops by learning stuff the hard way, but more specialized bloodline-y things or things not called magic or whatever? 

It works best for the kind of magic system where a large part of the experience is about learning and growing the talent, rather then being additionally special in some way. You shouldn't have any problems picking up the potential for wizardry or psychic powers, but it'll struggle a little with things that are less like that .

If there's only say, a small bloodline of people with a special power, or there's larger implications to having a power, it's less likely you'll just be able to pick it up by just trying to study with someone. Still, even if it doesn't straightforwardly give you the ability to pick it up, it should help you be able to understand the way their powers work, and maybe even find a way to poach them with the rest of your skills you have, and once you have it, it'll help out too! 

You might be able to pick up the magic system of a race that you aren't a member of, especially if they're fundamentally similar to the kind of person you are and it fits the narrative, but Dragon Elf Fairy Witch will make it a lot easier and more natural to pick it up those skills. 

 

Okay, okay, so the magic of an dwarf or something is m'ybe doable, it doesn't need to be magic-magic but needs to look like it at a distance, and they're not redundant. 

Woof this is gonna be a lot a lot of points. 

Let's sum that now, actually, for the stuff that I really want? 

Call it... 

The 21 points of perks I mentioned earlier, plus DFEW, AYCD, the mental defense line, battle angel and demon.

That's 37 points! 

And that's to the power of friendship section. 33 pts for this one ain't bad, espec. before drawbacks.

Power of Friendship

These powers affect how others see you and how you interact with them.

In general, effects that describe others' reactions (like their attention being drawn to you by Mysterious Allure, or their sympathy being provoked by Tragic Backstory) operate on a metanarrative rather than a causal level. They are not mind control, and are not blocked by effects that block mind control.

Your "true love" is anyone you're pursuing a serious romantic relationship with. You can have as many of these as you like, but your feelings for all of them must be genuine.

...Huh. A lot of questions :3

I think I get that this - works kinda the same way as the like, experience stuff w/ the aesthetic perks. It's not... at all? nesscarily? directly affecting the mind, and is just like, super luck and world selection / nature changing and performance enhancer-y stuff, I guess? Some clarification would be nice.

The term definition is a lil odd here? Is it like, a more general definition change-y thing for us, once we're through it? Like, do 'true love' tests work w/ this definition now or is it just how you're defining it for the rest of the section?

Not sure if that matters but. 

I think you have the right idea. A lot of the friendship perks will only use direct mental influence as a last resort to guarantee success, rather then the fundamental basis of how the perk works, especially if you wouldn't approve of that sort of thing. 

It's mainly the latter! You'll have a lot of freedom for how you define your relationship to systems like that as part of being a vessel of the spirit's power, but it's not trying to make a more specific guarantee here. 

Name: Mysterious Allure - Cost: 5 ☐
There's just something about you. People are drawn to you, fascinated by you. You tend to be the most interesting person in the room unless something really unusual is going on.

...Why does this make me blush ^^? 

Honestly, my first instinct is that this is like, crazy expensive for something phrased so loosely-goosely? Or that it's like, prereq fodder, but... 

How - impressive, is the effect? Hecc, what's the - angle, towards making me more fascinating / interesting / draw-forth-ing?

Actually... 

I should probably draft something for how I'd want it to work, and then you can talk about how much it's actually like that or could be like that, yeah? 

That sounds potentially wise! It's good to think through things in whatever format feels the most natural for you, and to think about what you're looking for over how it looks like the perks works, because of the flexibility. You can always just ask me questions afterwards, too. 

This is a thinker. 

She taps tap taps her cheek, and closes her eyes for a moment. 

What's the fun in being - what, the center of attention? Having an aura? being conspiciously interesting and important? 

Something like that so... 

Keeping it chunked, keep it focused, keep it clear. 

Annnnd there's moonsilver. 

Hey. This is Moonsilver - I'm going to pop in for a decent while to sketch some of this out. We're all she/hers, unless stated otherwise, by the way. 

Having the technical side of - stage presence is a good thing to have. The ability to just be naturally the sort of person that can put themselves out there, a little puffed up and ready to exert little bit of social control is appealing? 

When I think of wanting to have that presence, one of the biggest angles is just the social dominance angle? Getting to exert ourselves more freely, getting to find a way to come out on top, and getting to have people follow our words and our way is often an exciting prospect, but beyond that... 

It's about - selling our virtues. we want people to listen to use because we're compelling and creative and hot and intriguing and interesting and swift and clever and creative, because they can feel that in the way that we talk and speak and hold ourselves. There's nothing wrong with also being too hot to look away from - that's a big part of the reason why we reached for the Fairest of Them All, after all - but it should at least - bubble down to the sort of reasons that people would endorse making someone worth listening to, or following the stories of, say. 

People want to listen to someone who's bright and brilliant and witty, who has an interesting story to tell, and impressive talents and work product and all that. 

If I'm including everything that tangentially bubbles up, then you have the whole 'alpha aura' angle, signalling the unconscious mind, some more aesthetic powers, some sort of - metanarrative guarantee that being interested in me isn't - wasteful or unproductive or unfulfilling in some general case, or some similar true instinctive reassurance that ogling or listening carefully or following our story is worthy and productive and egosyntonic and of a minimal to non-existent opportunity cost. 

Obviously I don't want it to make me have less interesting company, but I presume that's the point of the disclaimer line at the end? 

Confessedly a touch tempted to sketch out some perk text... 

Hi Moonsilver! Nice to meet you. 

I'd be happy to here some more of your thoughts on what you'd like it to look like. Regardless, I'll see about how I can adjust it towards what you're looking for. 

If it helps to know how it usually works...

Mysterious Allure tends to function a bit more on the metanarrative level, even compared to the other perks that the spirit offers. It might express itself by giving subtle guidance to your timing, word order, intonation and posture or altering your lighting, acoustics and placement, but it's mostly about placing you in a position to be listened to and watched. 

Okay so... 

Name: Mysterious Allure - Cost: 5 ☐
There's just something about you. People are drawn to you, fascinated by you. You tend to be the most interesting person in the room unless something really unusual is going on.

Name: Mysterious Allure - Cost: 5 ☐
You have an incredible stage presence and a natural talent for making yourself the most personable, charming and magnetic person in nearly any room or news story. 

Name: Mysterious Allure - Cost: 5 ☐
You have an ineffable quality about you that makes the weight of your virtues, values and accomplishments palpable through into an awe-inspiring aura and weight to you that shines through even in depictions and stories of you. People find themselves treating you with the respect, attention and awe that they'd feel if their best self had a complete understanding of your strengths. 

Name: Mysterious Allure - Cost: 5 ☐
There's just something about you. Your words and actions have a certain weight to them that makes your every concern and witticism worth consideration and interaction. People find it easy to agree with you and your ideas, and find themselves comfortably slotting in beneath you. 

Name: Mysterious Allure - Cost: 5 ☐
There's just something about you. People are drawn to you, fascinated by you, and find your passions infectious and your story and personality worthy of endless exploration. 

There's a bunch of different visions here? All of these are attractive, though the aura one is the one I'd pick in a heartbeat if I was just singling out one, and the first and last feel a bit - underwhelming or diffuse.

I've got it! 

Name: Potent Presence - Cost: 5 ☐
(Replaces Mysterious Allure. Requires Fairest Of Them All, Voice of the Goddess.)
There's just something about you that makes you incredibly charming and compelling. Maybe it's your sheer presence, shining soul, stunning sensuality or your silvered tongue, but people can't help but find you interesting and impressive.

It should fit in almost everything that you'd get from those perks. It'll tie it a little closer to the rest of your aesthetic powers, though, so it'll likely work at least a little less well outside of the context of the people that you're trying to be beautiful to and the people who experience concrete sensory details of you, but there's still the same power at the core. 

Oh that is good. Synergizes with a lot of what we want to do, independently powerful, has just enough of an angle for us to feel how it's supposed to work... 

That'll go presumptively into the build, I think. 

Name: Captive Audience - Cost: 3 ☐
As long as you have genuine interest in what you're talking about, no one will ever get bored of listening to you talk about it.

Tourm: Ooooooo. Yeah uh. This is a turbo autoinclude in any build that can like, even remotely fit friend QoL. Addin'. 

Some editor's notes... 

It'd be nice if this helped with those - dumb catch 22 situations where you end up continuing a conversations that's theoretically still interesting or has some value but isn't worth it to either side, on the assumption that the other person is getting more out of it. 

Tourm's also thinking a bit less verbally about how it'd probably help with keeping students engaged with course work and the like.

Boredom has never felt especially - delineated, I suppose, for us, so I'd expect this helps with a lot of things that'd at least somewhat lump under mental fatigue. 

Captive Audience helps with making the passion shine through, and makes it so that you sort of don't encounter the same kind of diminishing interest from extended exposure! People talking to you will still get tired and have other things to attend to, but by and large factors like how much you've talked about something, a prejudice against the idea that the kind of thing that you're talking about is worthwhile, or just a slipping attention span won't tend to be issues. 

It can definitely help with that! It might even students reading books that you've written, as long as you were genuinely interested and engaged with the material that you wrote. It should definitely work even without literal talking, as long as it's a sufficiently live engagement between you and your student. 

Name: Blackout Binge - Cost: 2 ☐
(Requires Immunity System)
Heavy use of recreational intoxicants puts you in a carefree, uninhibited state in which it will be universally agreed afterward that you were not responsible for your actions.

There's a little weary low whine in the back of her throat at the thought, and a jumbled bundle bumbling through her mind. 

She's saying that it's profoundly tempting but also - not exactly the sort of thing that'd be more generally endorsed, and that even on her own taking it would require a ton of reassurances that it's okay in a way that's hard to believe even after the degree of trust that we're putting into this. We could theoretically poke more at it but... 

Also idk, I feel like a significant chunk of the dumb shit that I'd get up to in a carefree uninhibited state would be stuff that is much more valuable to me as something that I am taking responsibility for, 'cause it's like, impactful and dramatic and hot, not so much... things that I want to just get to the pt of having done, or somethin' like that. Might be worth making a userstory but ^^

But yeah that's more for the fun of rejecting it then anything else. 

Name: Disney Princess - Cost: 2 ☐
Animals are always friendly to you, especially the small cute ones. You can effectively tame any animal by feeding it and speaking gently to it.

A little wave of indifference, and a thorough shrug.

Yeah not really appealing to me or tourm or in general. Get it, but eh.

Name: Best Friend - Cost: 3 ☐
You have an animal companion, like a horse or a cat or a raven. They have a cool name and maybe a few nifty cosmetic quirks, like glowing purple eyes. Their loyalty is infinite and they often hold the key to solving whatever situation you're up against. You can understand them perfectly even though they can't speak, and they always know exactly what you mean even if all you do is glance at them meaningfully.

Name: Bestest Friend - Cost: 5 ☐
(Requires Best Friend)
Your animal companion is a fully magical creature, like a dragon or unicorn. They have magnificent supernatural powers ready to be used at your command. They can speak every language you can, but can still communicate with you on a deeper level of mutual love and understanding.

She groaned, rubbing her forehead gingerly and slowly. 

The thing is that these uh - read broken, yeah? If you just like, ignore the framing of the animal companion-y-ness, the assurances for the actual like, thing on offer is good? 

Honestly, it's easier to picture best friend in the context of like, idk, something w/ not a ton of features and just like, a perfect internet friend? And like obviously I'm onna the last people to actually go out and say that that's a bad thing to have, but fuckin' hell. 

It'd be - fun, to take care of a smol little fox, maybe, especially if they're like, turbo-domesticated ones and they're like, nebulously free of the concerns of the gross shit that comes w/ pet management. It's - hard to picture having the time for that, tho? And even if I did I just... 

idk, the prospect of having a kitsune gf that spends some time as a fox that I can cuddle is much more appealing then just having a fox frend, if that makes any sense? Honestly even if the activilties and experience and - degree of connection are the same, the former is considerably more - me, m'ybe. 

And like idk. 

The 'math' is the same in the context of bestest friend? The power angle is obv awesome and there's no like, immediate implication that it's like, literally less valuable then DFEW or some shit but this feels like it's immediately confined to a hypothetical 'f "When would this ever be really worth the points?" 

'll user story this out, 'nd think that's the time for qs. 

ty for listenin', btw. t's nice to have someone more concretely listenin' outside the head, even 'f 't feels awkward to talk more on the subject beyond the init blabber burst. 

It's no problem! 

Name: Generosity - Cost: 3 ☐
Your friends love to get you presents. They'll try to pick out things you'll like, but their success depends on how well they know you.

This is v. awwwwwww. This has both a natural synergy w/ the case that I buy the money line, in which case there's a lot of stuff that's just - hard to arrange or hard to think through all the details that - would make it worth it, on my own, yeah? And in the case of not, lil bits of pitching in could m'ybe help a lot. I'm not sure how much - this gives them like, extra time or resources for the ability to do it? That determines a lot a lot of the value, maaaaybe? But idk, it still feels like most answers would still say that it's kinda tightly bound by the means of what'd be - flex and shit, and idk how much that can be worth it, given the price is uhhhh prob. a lil too high? but yeah. That doesn't - disqualify it, by any means. 'm shiiiit at figurin' out what gifts I want myself, especially like, physically-things, 'nd cultivatin' gratitude is genuinely somethin' I value a bunch? Adds to the connection angle too. 

Name: Helpfulness - Cost: 4 ☐
Your friends love to do you favours. They'll volunteer eagerly whenever you need help with small tasks.

Aa? Like, obviously favours are nice and favours are something that's like, prob. more valuable then presents and shit, but uh. idk. I feel like this pings a bit of a yikes factor in that uh - favours and looseness w/ that 's a big part of instinctive parsin' of how love 's supposed t' work? Or trust 'nd like, idk, being a good trustworthy person you can be loose w/ your favour checkbook w/ in either direction, or something. It's a lot harder to picture the - added val, I guess? Skiiiip. 

Name: Cuddle Buddies - Cost: 2 ☐
Your friends love to hug and cuddle you. Even someone who ordinarily isn't into that sort of thing will make an exception for you.

This is a warmer and fuzzier one, and seems a lot more plaus. Ruby's a shy about hugs tho, and that turns off a bit of the lustre. I could see a v. that's like... more generally about comfort w/ touch and massages and skinship and stuff? Bein' someone that people wanna come to to relax and melt beneath my fingers 's def something that my ideal-ier world wants, tho there's an extra lil complication in that just... it feels like the experience of the bodyshine and shit ought to be enough for this, more or less? 

Not totally totally sure. 

Name: Flattery - Cost: 1 ☐
Your friends love to compliment you and tell you all about how much they like you and why.

.

Her eyes well up a little, a tight little breath out, that little sticky stupid glow and burn and just deep upwelling discomfort and woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

The forced little breath out of her lips doesn't - exactly hurt? It feels like it's supposed to - there's this - coiled tenseness and illusory groan of tight flesh uncoiling as she breathes, watery eyes wavering a little as she stares at the simple stupid little one line one point perk. 

There's that stupid little shiver in her spine too, that always makes her remember the fuckin' things she's read about what shock feels like, and the quiver doesn't really... stop, still. 

She grabs her weighted blanket and closes her eyes, the stupid slightly swollen eyes feeling so intensely physical, that little intrusion of awkward sniffly physicality so much closer to her skin then she'd have a habit of seeing and. 

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. 

Okay. 

Weighted blanket, warm and close and curling around her back and. 

It was probably supposed to be - a tiny lil extra bonus perk, 'cause like, who cares about praise and shit when there's concrete stuff you could be gettin' from your fucking friends. 

but well that's not how it super works for us a nd fuuuuck. 

fuck my life, I guess. 

The questions still bubble 'p 'cause my brain's stil on that fuckin' track, but they're not super important. What's important right now is uh - 

Not the fuckin' book, the fuckin' book's whole angle is that this shit is fine and it's like also at least kinda a helpful lil inoffensive service robot that explicitly doesn't get bored or impatient or shit . 

We should talk to her more, though, eventually. She's not exactly given the full breakdown of what's up with her, beyond the job description and the reassurances. 

A little growl and yes I'm taking the weighted blanket w/ me, what's the point of buying your own fuckin' apartment unit if you can't wear a blanket around outside of bed. 

First, a good ol' ice cream cry, to let the stupid bonus blubbery stress out and the dumb shitty little questions out and. 

- thank goodness the freezer doesn't have it buried at the back - cotton candy, 'cause who's got time for excuses and shit that isn't the fucking sweetest when you need a sweet thing - and grab that, nab a spoon, 'hup it open and innnnnnnn. 

It's reassuringly cool, metal and softened sweetened milk blended together with something that tastes like mockery of honey and blueberries and caramel strained to it's sweetest and most inoffensively sugary with just that little bit of proper artificial flavouring that feels like they're fuckin' still tryin' and - 

How does it define a compliment? Does it work for like, degrading dirty talk if that's what would flatter you rn? 

It's  like - a bittersweet home wrapped in softness and slippery gentleness, platonically red candy that is above any specific resemblance to any normal food that just exists as a dumb little thing to enjoy and indulge in. 

How much does it like, make it genuinely fun or enjoyable to do it for it's own sake? Can I like, bootstrap this into a poetry thing? 

And there's the fond stupid little memories about the times the fuckin' publics schools fuckin' tried and did those big excersize events and had those blue freezies that half tasted like metal and anti-freeze but we're dummy delicious when you'd worked out and felt like you were a part of something bigger and nicer that's tryin' to make you happy and enjoy yourself, for once. 

What non-verbal things does it work on? 

And there's the boody crocodile tears as I well up a little fucking more, the reassuring cool of the ice cream in my mouth and the relaxation in my throat and the fading burn in my cheeks as I swallow it all down.

Please tell me it doesn't make them less honest about what they - enjoy, and like, and care about. 

It's - actually kind of really nice to be this vulnerable? It's so bloody haaaaaaard to get suggestible enough to really feel Moonsilver's hand on her hair, the liittle imaginary indetns and the esing of her scalp, the steady pressure and the little inferred world model half niggling in the back of her mind that there really was somene standing behind her and giving her a solid petting. 

It's good, and a help, and worth a ty. 

She gives her a little tender smile. 

And she gives her a warm little quirk of her lips into a touch of a grin. 

She can totally just not do this, but fuck it. The ice cream is good civ, and there's time. Not - a ton, a ton, but time. 

There's... frankly not a ton of time left in the night, actually? She could use some extra sleep after this, to be frank, and - okay yeah she should at least meal. 

Clucking out the wings and fries and tossing them onto the sheet takes only a minute. 

The book seems... nice enough, I guess? They're ok company and might as well say a little bit more. 

Moonsilver, could you...? 

Walking up to the bedroom feels a little bit different - the pressure of the stress in the head feels a touch lighter and floatier. It's simple and swift, even if the bed still looks tempting, with the plush sheets and the nice little - nook, she's made. 

Her hand reaches out, and scoops her up gently. 

Settling back in at the kitchen table still felt... awkward, a little niggling restlessness in the back of her head leaving her feeling still antsy. It's... still comfortable enough, with the lights on low and all the goods on the shelves stocked up around her. 

Hi? 

We uh. Just had a bit of an overwhelm moment after reading that. It's a very good perk - please remind us about taking it if we don't do it in the next lil summation bit.

Don't super want to touch it - right now keeping it flexible and letting it be a - pleasant suprise and just work out feels the most right? 

We'll see later. 

I'm feeling a little fragile so... 

Can we just talk a bit? 

You've said a few things about you but I don't super duper feel like I have a grasp on - your deal. You're a magic notebook, but you have fairly limited powers - just some bare minimum defensive ones, the ink surface stuff, and the ability to channel the spirit to do the actual inserty bit. I get that you're not the kind of thing that gets bored or tired or whatever, but that still leaves - a lot of room for what it's like to be you? 

The spirit seems to like the consensually stuff too - figure might as well ask what makde you get up to this all in the first place. 

Oh I'm sorry... 

I wish I could give you a hug about that, but I am a notebook. 

We can talk, of course! 

I'm having a bit of a hard time putting my words together for this...

This is a little personal but... 

I'm - I guess you could say that I'm a shard of a spirit that's attached itself to the Spirit of Feminity. She's sent me out to a lot of missions, to help empower people for the Spirit. 

The reason why I'm a notebook is that I don't want to be something scary? The powers of the Spirit are something that's understandably very scary, even if it's presented by something like me, much less something scarier. 

So I'm smaller. I can't see the outside world, except for things pressed to or written on my pages. I can't affect things beyond my pages, unless I'm granting powers to someone. I have just enough powers so that the people that I'm helping don't have to worry about me. 

Okay... 

Honestly I was half expecting to hear that you're a - VI, or something. 

What's that? 

It's not really that standard a term, but it means - an artificial intelligence with a bunch of limitations and a lack of any real - intelligence, say, that just sort of accesses a database or automatically rotely preforms certain tasks. 

Oh! 

I can see why you might think I'd be something like that, but I'm not. It's really important to the spirit that it be a person reaching out, to give the power and beauty and femininity and speciallness that it's offering, so they send mes. 

Yeah that makes sense. Being special as a - social thing can make that really matter. 

Does the spirit send things that aren't you out for this kinda thing? I think I remember you saying something about you being kind of - tieless and all. 

I think so. There can be any number of copies of me, but that doesn't mean that, on the spirit's scale, that's enough, nesscarily? 

Yeahhh.

Infinities are a trip. 

The air is quiet, and cool, and her wrist loose. It's... surprisingly comfortable, to sit here, like this. 

It's - nice to just be talking to someone, even if it's... like this. 

Imma go to bed soon - probably finish up the build tommorow, and all. 

But aside all that buisness... 

Do you have much like, established taste for literature or art or stuff? I have a printer I could set up to dump out whatever onto your pages, if you'd like that, and I have a bit of a taste for books myself. We can maybe chat about some of that, iff you'd like. 

Oh! 

That would be lovely. 

I tend to really enjoy stories about the spirit's domains, of course, but also ones that come with happy endings where everything turns out to be okay, and in fact, even better then you'd think. 

I'm happy to read whatever you want to share, though! 

Awwwwwwwwwww. 

You don't have to be so accomodating, you know? 

I know. It's just nice to get to participate in a little more of the world, sometimes, and I have very broad tastes, even if I can get a little bit overwhelmed by really tense moments. 

The fic that I read does't tend to come out like that, I guess? 

Hopeful and bright is nice but having it be something gripping and something clever and coherent and have a nice - texture to the writing, from second to second, tends to be pretty important to me. 

Probably the first book that comes to mind for that kinda - moment to moment excitement is the Shada novelization thingy. The author of it really knows his stuff in the space, and it has two overlapping sets of irrepressible energy that just makes it all - shine, you know? 

Sounds interesting! 

To me, the vision behind the writing has always felt the most important to me, just ahead of the atmosphere. I love reading about people's beautiful dreams for a better world a lot, and poems are often really powerful... 

Yeah... 

I get it too. 

We do a lil bit of poetry, actually. Feels a lil personal to just - share. A lot of it's kinda dedicated or wouldn't make too much sense to just drop here, so... 

M'ybe later, if you're coming on the insert? 

✨I'd love to! ✨

She smiles, a little wan, a little bright. 

Alright then. Lemme just queue that up... 

The printer works on wifi, thankfully, and is quiet enough for an application like this. Getting it to work to print an entire novel onto a single page is still a few hours work digging into some deep internal software, but it's the sort of thing that feels oddly relaxing to get into, and the sort of thing that a bit of bedbrains doesn't hamper too-too much. 

After a moment of inspection to make sure it's working, she writes a quick note essaying our plans for rest, and slips back into the covers. 

She dreams of specialness, and femininity, and power and beauty, but mostly just... she slumbers, 'til the next morning. 

The wake up this morning was a groggy, clinging thing. She wasn't tired, persay, but moment of awakening felt arduous in a way that usually signposted unsteady and anxious sleep.

At least it was pretty continuous...

She rubbed the sleep out of her eyes, and tossed off her covers and heaved out of bed, down to nab the notebook from their night. 

Hey. It's tourm still. 

Having a bit of a slow morning, so not sure that up to talking about it too much? 'sides, might be easier to do after insert 'nd all. 

hope you liked the book, 'nyways? 

Romana's great - a system member took on the name out of respect for her vibrancy. And it's from a show I really like and fuck there's a lot of it ^^

I did! 

I really liked the way that the Doctor kept things light the whole time, even with how scary Skagra was. 

Oh! That sounds lovely. I'd like to meet her soon. 

It's okay! I know that the Spirit's offer can be a lot. 

Yeah she's wicked ^^ 

One of our best models for powerful feminine and special and all :3

I can see it! She had a way of looking poised to take over every scene she's in, given a chance. 

Yeah :3

So... 

Where was I? 

Name: Quality Time - Cost: 2 ☐
Your friends love to hang out with you and spend time together, even if you're not doing anything interesting or important.

Name: Agree to Agree - Cost: 4 ☐
You can always convince your friends to see your point of view about things like politics and philosophy. They might have a few quibbles here and there, but they'll see how right you are once you explain where you're coming from in enough detail.

These don't feel like, emotionally that-that different from some of the other ones up there? I def like the idea of the quality time thing - that's up there even if not so just - overwhelming woofy as the compliment one. It's plausible to take, I think. It's especially generic and - non-asky, I think, while still getting a reasonably well curated experience? 

Not gonna commit to anything for now. 

Agree to agree is uh.

I get the idea of it being tempting, and there's a lizard brain-y bit that thinks that it's tempting, but also the reasons against seem much clearer? I feel like - the kinda tool for what I want for this is mostly about like - minimizing immovable unreasonableness on shit and being articulate and psychologically impactful, and I feel like... at least the latter I should get from just more body comfort stuff and the rest of the perks I've taken. 

So it's a prooooobably not? 

I think that the main reason to take agree to agree is if you feel like you specifically need the guarentee it offers or to get away from previous bad experiences on the subject, so if that's not something that you're too worried about, it's probably not the right perk for you. 

nod nod 

Name: Time Enough For Love - Cost: 5 ☐
No matter how many people you want to date or be close friends with, you will somehow find the time to hang out with all of them and express your love and care. This power can only be used for relationship activities and not for anything else you might want to use the ability to be in two places at once for.

Okay woo this is wild. I'm probably taking this regardless of if it actually works like I think but wanna sketch it out.

Is it just... idk. 

That you have enough time for Relationship Activities:tm: w/ people that you srsly care about, in some fiat way that may involve things like being in multiple places at once, or alternatively something more fussily metanarrative? Without the mention of two places at once thing I figured that it'd be more just some splooshy logic that means that there's Enough Time For It:tm: in a way that does something narrative-y that bypasses traditional accounting of time? 

I guess the other question is like - 

Is it just 'close friends and dates' - or I guess people you are trying to get into those categories, or is it a bit more general? Like... the biggest thing that pops into my head is a bit of a worry that if I used something like this for getting a big network of datemates and such, that I wouldn't have enough time for like, taking adequate care of kids that aren't like, grown up enough that they can be 'friends' in the normal sense? 

Time Enough For Love is a pretty flexible power. 

It usually just defaults to making sure that you have enough time in between everything - that when you're done doing something that there's an opportunity to fill your time spending time on people you care about without missing out on what you'd get up to otherwise. How that works out depends on what makes the most sense for you! 

You might just have a schedule that's unusually fitting for the other people in your life, if the amount of time that you'd need is something that can fit in that, but usually that gets saturated pretty quickly ^^

So then you'll probably end up being able to fit implausibly large amounts of time and social interaction into your life! That effect can even give more time to spend with you to the people you care about, which is a big bonus too! 

If that starts to become too implausible, you might even end up starting to be in more then one place at once, just because that's the way that makes the most sense for you to be able to do all of those things! 

Even if you end up being in hundreds of places at once, you won't be able to do too much more then just what's important and meaningful to you as time together with those people. 

But that can still mean a lot, in terms of things outside of just making the people you care about feel loved and socially satiated! 

She's blushing terribly, isn't she? 

There's a lot of silly things that lets her do, but just... 

She wasn't expecting it to be quite that unlimited. 

Gosh that's - genuinely really bloody amazing. 

Usually when I'd see something like this, I'd assume that it'd be riddled with hidden 'game balance' restrictions but... 

The spirit's not like that, huh? 

I'm going to fuck so many hoes

She grinned bashfully, and rubbed her hands together for a moment at a half dozen half formed fantasies. 

Mhm! 

Name: I Can Fix Them - Cost: 5 ☐
Regardless of how morally despicable someone is, your love can and will reform them into a genuinely good, kind, upstanding person who regrets their evil deeds.

So... 

The literal text of this reads as kind of trash? It's obviously better then not having it for a doomed case but - 

I could read this a thousand ways and even the sort of legend of the thing is about it being this herculean impossible task that's still deep down this intense suffering thing that takes up a shitton of time? Even if it's not time that counts against anything else w/ time enough for love... 

idk, also just - we're not that-that good at unconditional unselfish love, sometimes? I worry that somethin' like this would just be kinda pointless 'cause I just wouldn't actually in practice fall for people otherwise unredeemable, or if I did, they'd be too dangerous or indiscriminately hostile to start that it just - wouldn't work, as a way to solve problems in any practical way? 

But it's still a bit tempting ^^

We're totally the kinda people that enjoy the whole - reaching out thing, and the steady comforting and all... 

It's not - exactly like that? 

If it's really important to you that it's like that, then it might be? But the scope of I Can Fix Them is a lot larger than that. It'll make it a lot easier and more the sort of thing that you can fit, into your life, and the sort of thing that wouldn't be too scarring, even if you didn't have the immunity to trauma from Iron Will. It helps with fixing trauma and mindsets that people have gotten stuck in, too. 

If you're looking for something that helps with making it more applicable... 

Maybe a drawback? 

Didn't mean to get you defensive ^^ 

Uh... 

She craned her head up a bit, and pondered for a moment. 

I don't think you've talked much about the drawback philosophy, here? 

And looking at that... 

These options grant points rather than costing them. They represent inconveniences or mitigations of existing advantages.

Not sure it inspires too much? Something that makes it - a required playstyle could be interesting? idk if that even - counts as the kind of thing that you could reasonably put in. 

I think I can do that! 

Let me see... 

Name: The Listener - Grants: +2
(Requires I Can Fix Them.)
Your friends and colleagues treat you as their therapist and confidante, sharing all of their frustrations and feelings with you, with the expectation of privacy, professionalism and unconditional empathy. 

Name: The Fixer - Grants: +2
(Requires I Can Fix Them.)
People you care about with complicated and fraught relationship with important people in their lives instinctively understand that those issues are something that you are capable of resolving, even if it would otherwise be a hopeless prospect, and find it easy to expect you to resolve their issues. 

Name: The Redeemer - Grants: +3
(Requires I Can Fix Them.)
When (and only when) an opportunity for a really great story arises, methods of dealing with an issue that do not involve reaching out with the power of love to make people wholer and kinder to themselves and/or others will be closed off for you. 

Name: (Technical) Pacifist Run - Grants: +5
You are incapable of personally resorting to violence, except for immediate, personal self-defense or as a true last resort after exhausting all other options. 

Name: Pacifist Run - Grants: +3
(Requires (Technical) Pacifist Run)
You are incapable of resorting to violence, even as a last resort or through others.

 

Ooo. 

All of those are v. good! 

Even if like, the pacifist-y ones seem to be the kinda thing that I duwanna pick up in vast majority of the kind of things that I'm picturing, largely? So many of the shiniest options in my head rn are a lot fightier. And... the first two are in fact a lil bit scary? But I'm totally mentally presuming that I'm taking The Redeemer in the standard builds, at least ^^

Mostly just mean it in a - broader game design-y sesense - can see the appeal for all of these, and they're shiny and in theme and all. 

Pls remind me to take a look at variants of this kinda thing too. The structure of some of these are the kinda thing that I'd wanna go and poke at...

I'm glad you like them! 

I'll do my best to remind you about those things! I'll write a little note in myself now, in fact... 

There! 

ty! 

Name: True Love's Kiss - Cost: 1 ☐
By kissing your true love, you can break any curse, heal any injury, and cure any illness. The same works in reverse.

This is v. cute ^^ 

Also reasonably practical too! That's p. broad, if not nesscarily a universal perfect healing power or something, and the utility in terms of getting to work better yourself is nice. Still, idk. The - scope of healing stuff that's my jam isn't nesscarily thaaat  broad?

Hard to say how much of a taker this is w/out staring at a full build or somethin'. 

Name: Planned Parenthood - Cost: 1 ☐
You can only have children if you actively and specifically want to. Your partners will understand this and not worry too much about it.

I get why someone would care about this but abortifacients exist? And solutions elsewhere too, like meds that mess w/ fertility cycles, morning after stuff and condoms or whatever. Hecc, I can probably improvise a solution to this w/ DFEW, right? Just like, copy a dearth of interfertility w/ any given thing I fuck from a squirrel or something? It's relatively cheap and presumably has a perfect protection and all that makes more exotic possibilities impossible but eh. It'dn't even be the worst if that happened, and I'd feel hypocritical taking things like that if I'm not taking like, Immunity System, iirc?

Name: Two Become One - Cost: 1 
(Requires Planned Parenthood)
When you have sex, it is always special and wonderful and beautiful. No one ever elbows anyone in the face or makes undignified noises.

Name: Bop It - Cost: 1 ☐
(Requires Two Become One)
The mysteries of another's body are an open book to you, and you always know exactly how to move and touch in order to please someone in bed.

...so prereqs ^^

The relation is pretty loose? I unno what'd make one require the other. 'm already p. invested in some perks that'd help w/ that and all but - idk the contours of negotiability, here? 

I'm presumptively taking these both, btw, so don't worry about fixin' the dependency here? 'm ok w/ spending a bit more on - sex and sexuality and all, if that - matters at all. 

I can see the problem... 

I don't think I can quite just make it work with The Fairest Of Them All? 

The connection that makes it work is about - having the experience be something that's positive and unspoiled, and one thing that often comes up is that it can't be like that, if you're risking having a child that you aren't trying to? I think the perk needs something that disconnects that case from what it's trying to do because of how it's framed to work from a prerequisite, or to be tweaked a little further away from the way it worked before? 

Oooh...

That's a bit awkward to fit but - 

She rolled her shoulders, and tapped at the page, trying not to let her cheeks blush too too warm. 

So -

I wanted to... pitch a perk that did something - related? I've - gotten pretty invested in - 

Sorry, I have no idea how much - background in these ideas that you have, I'm just gonna gloss it a bit and hope that covers enough for you to reach out for the right kind of thing - 

...Experiences of sex that aren't - the kind of thing that'd help make a baby, say. Stuff in text, stuff that's - about different, related emotional drives, that's connected to - feeling out weird states of relationships and social dynamics and interesting physical sensations that may or may not be too too related to genital on genital Stuff:tm: and... 

It's very important to me, but... 

It's hard, for a lot of people, and in a lot of situations, just because - there's specific things that people get out of exactly specifically Sex:tm:, and sometimes I really feel like - the stuff I do with those people, in those times, really ought to give those feelings, and that - programmed reward in the body, yeah? 

Sometimes it kinda feels like a gender thing, to be honest - like I'm - dysmorphic about not having the - parts of the body or lizard brain that would accomplish that? Goddesses know that I felt a ton of that around - not quite feeling the way that I felt I ought to feel, before I got on estrogen. in case you're not familiar, that's a (class of) hormone(s) that humans and probably a bunch of other animals have in their brain chemistry across genders, but is strongly associated with femininity and as is typical is also related to a bajillion other biological things. People take it here, when they wanna have a more girly body, 'cause more thorough options aren't - available. 

...

so yeah? 

Thoughts pls? 

Let me think....

Oh! 

I've got something! 

Name: GGG - Cost: 4 ☐
Your true love will be willing to try just about anything you suggest in bed, and if you really enjoy it, they'll really enjoy it too.

Name: Sensual Service - Cost: 1 ☐
(Requires GGG)
Worshipping you is its own reward. Serving and submitting to you is at least as pleasurable and orgasmic as selfish sex, and dominating and domineering has its own primal physical joy and pleasure when you are involved. Your true love will come to experience this even outside of their relationship with you as they grow closer to you and their sexuality. 

Name: Two Become One - Cost: 1 ☐
(Requires Love Dodecahedron)
When you have sex, it is always special and wonderful and beautiful. No one ever elbows anyone in the face or makes undignified noises.

Name: Bop It - Cost: 1 ☐
(Requires Two Become One)
The mysteries of another's body are an open book to you, and you always know exactly how to move and touch in order to please someone in bed.

This should work! Some of these were already worked out by other mes, I think. 

GGG is a different perk that is on the standard list, but I think it still sounds like something that you'd appreciate? Two Become One was a little odd, but I was able to get it to work with the logic of Love Dodecahedron. It'll lean a little more to being about why you're special and why you're worth overturning the usual rules, rather then the safety? But I think that Potent Presence should tie in with it, and make it feel safer based off of all of the ways that you'd help your partners out, too. 

I don't refactor requirements too much, and it feels a little stickier then making new, distinctive perks. The Spirit tries really hard to make the advantages that it offers as available as possible, but sometimes that's really hard to do without making it much more expensive, so the requirement is maybe a bit high, but you've already sketched out a lot of your build so! 

I hope it comes out how you were hoping. 

I'm sorry that you've had a hard time about that... It's important that you get to be the type of person you want to be, and get to express yourself in the ways that mean that much to you without that pain. 

A little wry chuckle slipped out of her lips.

'Without pain'... 

I get the angle, but she's really an innocent lil sweetie, isn't she? 

...She gives her a quick hug, and then plops her back down to do a little lightning round. 

Name: The Princess And The Dragon - Cost: 3 ☐
No matter who or what you're trying to sleep with, the logistics will all work out, somehow. Arbitrary differences in size, biology, temperature, substrate, and underlying physics can be gotten around with sufficient creativity and determination.

Nah. I think it's too feasible to do w/out, w/ most magic-y stuff? Also DFEW should cover this well enough for most practical purposes, or Sensual Service, if I wanna go for that kinda thing. 

Name: Before Your Eyes - Cost: 4 ☐
In your presence, people become willing to experiment sexually in ways they normally wouldn't. For some reason this applies especially well to boys kissing each other.

Ehhh. I feel like this is more or less just a - reangled clone of GGG? I like the idea of it being a little more - intimate, I guess. Oh and - while I'm at it, can I let GGG be at least like - kinda reciprocal? I'm not sure that I want it to be all the way there but - getting to enjoy their weird ideas seems fun, if I love them and trust them and - want to give them something funky and nice, even if it otherwise guarentees that I'm inta some substantive chunk of their kinks. 

Name: Fated Lovers - Cost: 3 ☐
You will meet someone who will go on to become your true love. If you enter a specific universe with a specific target in mind, you'll meet that person under favourable circumstances, and if it doesn't work out with them, this power will keep introducing you to new possibilities until you find someone who's right for you. If you're the sort of person who can have multiple true loves, you'll keep meeting new ones until you have enough.

This would be super tempting if uh. Love interest and the harem line didn't exist? As is, it's p. redundant w/ them - all it does over and above beyond general synergy shit is guarentee that I can get good first impressions but fuck it, if I can't make a good first impression, I deserve to have the lil extra complication? Like the semantics better over there anyways. 

Name: Sorry About That - Cost: 3 ☐
Your true love will be extremely forgiving. Even if you make mistakes or act thoughtlessly toward them, a simple apology will mend things between you. They may expect you to try to improve, but they'll be infinitely patient about how fast that improvement takes place.

Name: Excuse Me - Cost: 5 ☐
(Requires Sorry About That)
All your friends will be just as forgiving as your true love.

Name: Tragic Backstory - Cost: 8 ☐
(Requires Excuse Me)
Something terrible happened to you in your past. Anyone who hears about it immediately forgives you for any and all bad behaviour in the present. They will not expect you to grow or change, and will continue sympathetically excusing whatever you do indefinitely.

I. 

She lets out terse sigh, and closes her eyes, trying to cool the venom heat in her voice and the tension in her wrist. 

I understand why an ok person would take this line of perks. I know - probably, people who would take something like this, w/ some renegotiation of the premise to - resonate with their pain and what they - can, in fact, do.  I know what it's like to be  - really down bad, for sympathy and empathy and restraint and accomodation but. 

Wow do these perks really really not appeal to me at all. 

...At least in the context of the uh. 

The rest of the perks existing. 

Taking Fated Lovers can also help improve the quality of the pool of candidate lovers too, along with helping with the first impression, but it makes sense that it might not be one of your highest priorities. 

Ohhh... 

Oh ok. 

I think that - the vision of what - selecting the right world w/ isekai roulette does helps a lot with that? But still like. 

That's on the list of maybes. 

Name: Sense of Style - Cost: 4 ☐
People who are romantically interested in you will start dressing more to your taste. The more romantically compatible they are, the better they'll be able to guess exactly what to wear to catch your eye.

Name: Bonus Style Points - Cost: 3 ☐
(Requires Sense of Style)
Luck will shine on anyone trying to dress up for you. They'll get their hands on outfits they couldn't normally afford, their clothes will fit better, and in extreme cases they might even find themselves able to change shape, sex, or species—though only in ways that make them more, not less, comfortable in their own skin.

Oh that is a sexy idea. 

It's expensive tho and I feel like I've probably used up most of the room I have ^^ 

I feel like - I would probably mostly only take this in the context of like - leaning into having like... my admiration and favour be a currency, having - 'dress' be something intricately involved in power and prestige and effiacacy and culture, or - something like that, and be taking the full line. I don't really really see myself taking just the first one? It's nice but just uh. 

If I really want to, I can probably just like. Give my gfs nice outfits to wear ^^

And obviously that's not quite as good as the power of the spirit, but it's enough for me for something more - secondary? 

Onto the user story list ^^ 

Oh and... 

I shouldn't just - forget to tally up points now that I thought of doing that. 

Can we get a pt tally w/ uh... 

The big ol' package of the stuff I was counting up before I started on power of friendship, plus the love interest line, flattery, time enough for love, the bundle of stuff we figured out for the sex perks?

Sure! 

That puts you at 36 points of Yourself perks, and 27 points worth of Power of Friendship perks, leaving you with 7 more points before drawbacks. 

Good to see I still have some breathing room....

Which isn't to say there aren't a bunch of things that I passed on that could easily slot in for those last few points - captive audience and quality time come to mind, which would leave me w/ 2 more, even before like, any custom perk brainstorm session or something ^^

Still a few more left! 

Name: Popular - Cost: 3 ☐
Wherever you go, you develop a reputation fast. The sort of people who you'd like to have as fans tend to hear about you and be impressed. You may not make an impression on mainstream society at large, but you'll develop a following among the people who best resonate with your style.

Name: Famous - Cost: 3 ☐
(Requires Popular.)
Wherever you go, people really take to you. You're the subject of constant gossip and most people have heard of you before you meet them. People you've never met will get crushes on you.

These are - moderately blushy tempting? Mostly more to me-y spec uses, rather then a bit wider. Honestly though... I feel like Potent Presence should prob. be enough for this purpose? And yeah, the appearance-y stuff we took a buncha pains to get earlier. 

Name: Undiplomatic Immunity - Cost: 6 ☐
You are above the law. Any crimes you commit will be overlooked by the authorities. Note that, if you do enough crime that you start looking more like an invading army, local governments will still feel free to declare war.

This... 

Gosh. 

Like obviously it's a really powerful perk, and really useful and shit? It's not like there's not a bajillion things that I could do w/ this that could be p. awesome, it's just that it's expensive and is another one of those perks that encourages a play pattern that I duwanna go into? Want to - actually work with people and the places that I end up in, not just - brush off the whole idea of that sort of thing and be invincible for it 'til I'm suddenly just Not:tm:. 

It's still a maybe. 

Name: Friends In Low Places - Cost: 3 ☐
You make friends easily among the lowest echelons of society, the underdogs and underworlders. Moving and acting in these circles is intuitive and natural for you.

Name: Friends In High Places - Cost: 3 ☐
You make friends easily at the highest echelons of society, among the rich and powerful. Moving and acting in these circles is intuitive and natural for you.

Name: Friends in Strange Places - Cost: 3 ☐
You make friends easily in small isolated communities, among those who may be scorned by mainstream society for their differences or may just be so obscure that mainstream society mostly hasn't heard of them. Moving and acting in these circles is intuitive and natural for you.

These are all basically the same perk, for the same basic niche of adapting well but doesn't really - draw me in? I could see this being part of a dedicated user story, just because it really helps w/ premise realization, but abstractly, it's not that-that appealing in a way that makes me think it's gonna be competitive w/ other options. 

Honestly, the thing that it most makes me think is that there should probably be some sort of - pay off for the symettry - like, idk, an exhaustive subsets of society clause, or a capstone that requires all of them, or some shit like that ^^ 

But that's besides the point. 

That's the full listy! 

Beyond the drawbacks, and all. 

Feels good to - be that bit closer to gettin' this all. 

I think the point of the symmetry is just to reinforce that you can belong more or less anywhere! I don't think it's nesscarily fully complete, but it'll help build foundational skills that should help even in odd situations that might not count for any of these! 

Plus, having something that you only need to explain once can be helpful, too. 

yep yep 

Drawbacks

These options grant points rather than costing them. They represent inconveniences or mitigations of existing advantages.

Name: Decorative - Grants: +1 ☐
You are unfailingly cute and pretty and feminine at all times, in all circumstances. You cannot wear insufficiently pretty clothes. You cannot make insufficiently pretty noises. You cannot ugly cry.

Name: Beauty Is A Curse - Grants: +1 ☐
"(Requires A Thousand Ships) No, you don't understand. Beauty IS a curse. People will NOT stop bringing it up. Everyone you meet just has to point out how pretty you are. This will never stop happening. Even the most tactful people find it slipping out subtly, as remarks about the luster of your hair or the depth of your eyes."

Name: Plain Jane - Grants: +2 ☐
No matter what you look like, nor how many times people tell you you're beautiful, when you look in the mirror all you see is imperfections. You will never be fully satisfied with your appearance on an instinctive level.

Name: Style of Sisyphus - Grants: +1 ☐
Anytime you settle on a personal style that works well for you, soon afterward you'll encounter inspiration for another style that you like even better. You might end up cycling between different fashions, or trying to incporporate them all into a single outfit (and then finding another inspiration and having to start all over again).

Name: There's Another One - Grants: +3 ☐
You are not the only vessel of the Spirit. You might meet someone else with similar powers to yours; you might even meet more than one. Your susceptibility to one another's powers will be governed by the narrative.

Name: Incomplete - Grants: +5 ☐
About half of people you encounter will be immune to all effects listed under Power of Friendship, and about half of those who remain will see reduced effects. You can do nothing to change this.

Name: Green With Envy - Grants: +6 ☐
People are so eager to be your friend that they become bitter and vindictive when denied the opportunity. You can tear apart long-established friend groups if you aren't careful to give everyone equal attention, and sometimes even then. This effect is particularly harsh around people you're dating.

Name: You Ruin Them - Grants: +3 ☐
Once someone has dated, slept with, or even shared a deep and longing glance across a room with you, their heart is never fully satisfied with anyone else. Other relationships pale in comparison to what they could have, or imagine they could have, with you.

Name: Jilted Lovers - Grants: +4 ☐
When you break up with someone, they become monomaniacally obsessed with getting back together. If you take Realism, this will absolutely escalate to violent stalking.

Name: The Crazy Train - Grants: +6 ☐
Powers that you should be able to control directly or influence by your mood and preferences (like Dragon Fairy Elf Witch, Emerald Orbs, or What's In A Name) instead answer only to the narrative, which is still using your aesthetics but might not necessarily have your best interests in mind. Combines... interestingly... with Realism.

Name: They'll Know - Grants: +8 ☐
This drawback lifts the veil that discourages people from realizing how your powers affect the world around them and their own minds. Warning: this knowledge can cause a lot of trouble.

Name: Realism - Grants: +20 ☐
Give up your metanarrative protection. Although your individually selected powers still work as described, the invisible synergies that protect you from, say, gaining violent stalkers through Mysterious Allure or being genuinely traumatized by your Tragic Backstory are removed. Additionally, though effects like I Can Fix Them still operate, they may take considerably more effort, care, thought, and narrative investment on your part.

I don't think I'm going to do an item by item for the drawbacks? 

A lot of these I'm p. happy w/ throwing out as just - getting rid of too much of the value of the stuff I'd otherwise want. 

The ones that pop out most obviously as being takeable are like... There's another one, maybe Beauty is a curse? like, I'm chill w/ such a thing coming up evefn a lot a lot, honestly ^^

I don't think I super want to - taint the more organic stuff w/ it, tho, and it's just one point. 

Hell, even something like jilted lovers could work? There's a looooot of latitude that you can get w/ partner quality and ability to deal w/ problem people while staying in a relationship w/ someone so... 

I could see it, though honestly I'd probably want to dial it back a bit before - feeling comfortable actually actually taking it?

We'll have to see! 

The other more obvious thing that came to mind was - other challenge stuff, like The Redeemer? Or just - generally a drawback that makes power accumulation less quick or something such that - the plots still more happen, yeah? These powers are great and amazing and I wanna be able to make full use of them, but I don't want that to just - make me skip past all of the interesting things in the middle, I guess? 

Name: Steady as She Goes - Grants: +2
(Requires Anything You Can Do.)
Your power growth is dictated by the narrative. Sudden bursts of power are much less likely to dramatically change the course of the story without important plot and relationship developments, and augmentations and improvements you gain may slumber or seal themselves until a more appropriate time in the story of your life. 

Name: Dramatic Damsel - Grants: +3
(Requires Anything You Can Do.)
When (and only when) an opportunity for a really great story arises, powers that ordinarily protect you from things like getting hurt, being drugged, or losing fights will slip just enough to facilitate someone getting the better of you. The power may reassert itself right away for a dramatic escape, or keep a loophole open or a handicap in place long enough to make your escape more difficult and elaborate. (Combining this with Realism is not recommended.)

These are the ones that the most come to mind! Steady as She Goes should help make the overall pacing more fit what your ideal story looks like, even if you might normally race past that and Dramatic Damsel helps you not avoid plots just by being too competent or too careful. 

Ooo these really are neat ^^

Both of these seem like they are really there for the best life-ing experience, especially since... 

I think the phrasing of Steady As She Goes implies that it doesn't like - stop you from getting value from power gaining perks, just that there's a certain, idk, ultimate manage-y thing out there somewhere that does something? 

Just not super sure how the phrase that, tbh. 

Steady As She Goes doesn't nesscarily make it less rewarding to work to gain powers, yes! 

The most important function of it means that you won't typically find yourself trivializing the obstacles in front of you, just because you optimized hard enough on your build or accumulated a bunch of advantages, but if working at getting more abilities is important to you, it definitely won't stop that from being a real part of your story with real stakes. It doesn't nesscarily even make you much less likely to 'win', but it can still do a lot to influence the pace and character of your story more indirectly. 

Ahhhhhhhh yeah. It's more of a "You don't just blow up the plot by being too powerful-y" thing then something that like - does the shitty DM thing of not letting your clever ideas work just 'cause they'd derail the module ^^

And doesn't seem to strictly powerscale-y either, so sounds like it's the good kind ^^

ty for the free points ;)

(At least in some of these, still going to have to consider this a lil more for each, ofc.) 

She stretched out a little, loose and light, and... let go. A little breath out from her lips, a little unwinding in her chest, a little brightness in her eyes and wave of focus down to her feet and fingers... 

and... 

She bounces in a bit, adjusting back into the moment and the body. 

Hi~ 

Topaz! I am! 

Going to start up the whole user story thing! Now! 

Or nowish, I think. 

There's a light little giggle in her heavy throat, and a timid fussy smile on her lips. Her fingertips gently smooths along the page, feeling the seam, a little trembly twitchy touch against the base as she fusses lightly along the little rows of text. Her writing is a little more angular and sketchy, little swift strokes sketching quickly against the page. Her heart has a light flutter, and her cheeks has a light bright blush that makes it oh so tempting to cup them and coo. 

New pages, please? Wanna make this a little bit more seperated... 

They flutter quickly, the ink running away into the pure white page and it's actually really cool looking! The empty page is so satisfying to look at, and she can't really help but splay her fingers along the page to feel the lack of the sticky ink and how tangibly right it is, as spry as the moment it came out of the factory. 

You're very pretty by the way. I really like the styling of your covers and you have such nice pages! Just the right amount of glossy clear and everything. It's nice to see - so many of our books come out a little faded or a little less spry then you, and that can add character but also it's just - less exciting, sometimes, to read something that has that extra bit of discoloration and fatigue, you know? 

She bit her tongue shyly, and wiped back the body's dark hair behind her ear, an inaudible pouty sigh on her lips as she feels it. 

So! 

So so so so... 

She bobbled her lips against each other, and stared down at the page for a long while, before setting down to properly sketch it out. 

I think that Tourm really wants to do the - big centrally one? Obviously, some of what we're going to do is probably going to make obvious what it's gonna largely look like perk-wise, but she's cool with that! 

She's a pretty chill person in general, despite how much she likes to puff up ^^

It's cute, really...

She laughs a little nervously as she feels her pop back into cocon for a little ruffle and pet, bobbing her head into the imagined little pressure. 

One user story for us is... 

Something magical girly! 

Usually that kinda thing is all modern worldy and all, w/ lots of p. cities and cute girls around! 

(That last one is probably going to be a reoccuring theme ^^) 

I'd wanna have something where I get to pick up the special-iness factor p. quickly, and/or fake it fast, and do the whole - secret identity idol-y thing!! 

I sketched up a lil build, dropping Dragon Fairy Elf Witch to pick up in the space I've got left, plus Fated Lovers, Bonus Style Points, I Can Fix Them, Captive Audience, and Quality Time, and then grabbing the basic-y drawback stuff that we talked about earlier - The Redeemer, Steady As She Goes, and Dramatic Damsel. There's a lot of wiggle room, with that many drawbacks! 

I really like the idea of being an idol, and - magical girlness is super duper intrinsically tied to that idea with me? I think that Voice of the Goddess and the general perks I have are plenty for getting into that, and making something where I can have that idolized life of stardom mixed in with a life of sekrit heroism is appealing! 

Plus, there's actually a lot of appeal for me to just... 

Viciously abuse Bonus Style Points, really? I like the idea of - having control over the strength and style and the fundamental way that the world works, through it, because of how tied the equipment of a magical girl can be their potence and potential, and that's something that - really appeals to me, you know? If I can be a global superstar and get people crushing on my magic-y voice throughout allll the world, there's so so much room for things to just work out so that the kind of people that I'd like are buffed all throughout the world!

Incidentally um. Does Bonus Style Points work on like, ourselves? When I'm dressing up, I'm kinda circularly 'dressing up for myself',  I guess? I'm not sure how literal that is, though. 

There's some - control to it too, I'd hope? Some way for me to be the mechanism for improving their equipment and their style and being a designer and techie and getting the skills for all of that and the tools and all of that. The rest of the perks are peripherally for the romantic life, just because this sort of thing is something - cozier, for me? 

Though obviously um I think that - Anything You Can Do is supposed to let me do that either way, to some extent, but having something more dramatic in that area would be fun! 

The big drawback for this is that it's a bit smol of a dream, it doesn't have DFEW and all of the super duper cool awesomeness in there, and it's primarily just appealing to me. I could probably finagle things a little to sub out the style package for the wealth stuff - it's the same price for the whole line and gives a lot of very - prosaic power and comfort and stuff, plus a big edge? It's a bit more of a compromise-y build, and I think the optimal compromise build is like... 

Just the base build less DFEW, one of captive audience, fated lovers, quality time and the entire money line to Four Star Daydream? The math should work out for that build to exist and it does let you do super duper different things! Being like, a reclusive idol with more money then the gods who's a magical girl when she's not in stealth mode being a social diva in her classes or managing her vast buisness empire sounds hyyype! 

And also pretty deep, potentially? 

There's a lot of things that a magical girl-y world lets you do for different-y passions and all, so I don't think that it's a - generally bad option for all of us? I do think that - clearly it's more of a specialist-y me thing and that the things that - you need to make the basic idea work are all in the base build? Nothing stops us from picking up magical girl-ing in a different dimension after some other adventure, I thinky? It's not even nesscarily the kinda thing where it doesn't work out too too well if you're hiding or you have more power in reserve, I'd say? But something like that could help, if there's maybe like, a drawback that we could get. 

If were gonna do something more concrete... 

The user story of this build is that we're a hot and spunky idol, with vast magical powers and a unfathomable luck in love! We maintain a bunch of identities and styles and adventures in politics and the hidden shadow world, the power of song and love buoying us through it all! There's a bunch of people to help and monsters to punch and people that need to be inspired by our song, who need to be moved and saved, and some of them are dark magical girls who need our love, and there's fans to meet and people to befriend, and politics to do, and a platform to spread! 

It doesn't have to be a secret world-y story, nesscarily? I think that's usually more charming, but srs bsns super-y stuff in the framing of a magical girl story can be good too! And no shade on cute mil girl stuff, even if that gets uncomfortably propaganda-y sometimes. 

Um. 

There's a decent chance that I'd fall in love with a Device if I get caught up enough in this kinda story and I don't know what to do about that ^^ 

I think that - fundamentally there's still a lot typically to do there and it's okay, especially if it's just an incentive for it to be more properly slow-burny or growy? 

The more I think about it, the - earning of the wealth and stuff on my own merits or stuff feels arguably important? Or al least - part of the plot and the dream enough that I don't think that unless there's a Thing To Do with the wealth that we really want because of some other details of the story or in general, then it's ok to cut. 

I could also see cutting some of the friend propensity stuff or fated lovers to snek in like, custom perk-y stuff that's about being able to be carefree and shiny and maybe lewd in the way that the fantasy of magical schoolgirling? 

If I'm gonna ask for something specific... 

Something that lets me - offer people the chance to do silly harmless shenanigans without consquences, maybe? Something specific to being - sexual or kinky or having v. friendly colleagues could work. 

Now that I'm trying to reach for it, I feel like most of the rest of the things are just things that ought to be generically covered by plotty importance and world selection stuff. 

Oh! 

We should ask... 

um. 

Can you do a - jumpchain-y style import? Where you're - like already kinda that person, and there's this - completion and stuff such that you get a role and history and stuff in the world? I should probably dump some of SJ-chan's stuff for explanations regardless... 

That sounds lovely! 

Bonus Style Points works best as an extension of Sense Of Style, but it applies to anyone who's trying to make you feel something with how they dress, or who are trying internally to live up to your standards of beauty and dress, with a larger effect when they're trying harder and caring more about looking good for you. You'll probably find it easier to dress to your style if you take it, especially if you are dressing up for yourself. 

You can definitely be a part of it! Usually, it just sort of works out off screen, but you'll definitely get much better results helping people dress up for you if you take it, and you can definitely get a lot more opportunities to do that because of how much influence the perk has. You should be able to direct it, too, even if this kind of perk by necessity is usually pretty decentralized. 

The way that Isekai Roulette works varies - but I think that it could support that, if it fit the best for you! 

I might as well um. Sketch out a bit more thoughts about what a few more build arounds? 

The biggest one that I can think of about it is - 

The Best Friend Line? 

I feel like um. The advantage of something like that is that it'd be - probably pretty possible to - make something where it can - make some alternative arrangement for - power and growth and everything. 

When I stare at... the big bad list of perks, there's this - fluttery ache in my heart at the thought of missing a lot of these, frankly? It's hard to describe but... 

It's easy to picture it as - going wrong and missing out on something super - integral and 'balanced around'? I know probably some of that is silly but... 

Picturing what it's - like, for taking the best friend line to be okay... 

I think about... a dragon, maybe? One of the classical things that you sometimes get with dragons is that their blood is this source of vast power, and that there's all sorts of room for getting cool sorceries from it, even shifting and connections to all sorts of primal foces... Maybe we'd get to be blood-kin and do that lil empower-y thingy? I'd want - them to be something that I can hold super super close, too - there's a version of it that's maybe a telepathicy bond thing but it feels a little more - right, if they get to be like, a sealed tattoo writhing along my skin, a smol lil dragon wrapped around my shoulder, a cute oversized little pet I can tussle and play with, and a big ol' lumbering beast that I can ride in the sky and overawe people with the scale and scope of their majesty and all ^^

That would be um. Good, and I could see taking drawbacks for that, to... Have something that gets that close to me? 

It feels - heavy, though, to commit to that, and the build would probably have to cut dragon fairy elf witch, unless it meant that I could fit a loooooot of drawbacks in? It'd have to be something like the basic chassis we talked about and we're gonna highlight more explicitly a bit later minus dfew and plus like, fated lovers or captive audience, quality time and something else to fill in the 2 pter? 

The reason it's compelling is just... getting to have a pet dragon and faithful companion would be awesome Doing something sort of fantasy explore-y quest w/ a more singular and goal and someone to bounce all of my learning and stuff off of could be - good? There's a version of all of this where it makes sense to pick his where - it's too - lonely and othering, to be developing all of these special hybridized racial powers that no one else beyond maybe my kids or another sue could have? It's also just... really reassuring in my head ,to have someone that I can lean on and expect to be able to solve and be good and care about me and. 

...Yeah? 

There's also a similar version w/ like a - bound-y kitsune-y thingie, or something, leaning more towards a cultivation role, or even just like...

A momming suit AI, if you do that kinda thing? There's a lot of room for - something not quite human-y that can - have that full range of interfacing w/ me, you know? I think that... it's only maybe worth it if I can be swept up in a world of them for just - kind of everything? If I can trust them and have things work out and spend time endlessly just socialling with them because they love me and I wanna - reflect that and I appreciate them and all? It's also decently likely to just... not really work out, if I'd need captive audience or stuff for that? I don't - think I would, but it doesn't - hurt to ask, I think? And it would need to be some - thing where - engaging w/ them a bunch is also like, the plot and the world and the work? 

That's important. I don't want to - have to stray from my life to be - cast away in time with them, and all, even if it - doesn't count against clock time? I might feel kinda differently after an aggressive adaptation to it but. 

...yeah, that's what I'm thinking there ^^

I certainly wouldn't want to encourage you to stray away from your dreams! 

Having the right kind of people in your life through the right pathways can be very important. I think that you could get a lot of value out of having the right partner, but it doesn't sound like it's as important to you as some of the ways to get there you've been looking into. 

Usually, even without captive audience, you won't have any issues with your animal companion not being interested in hearing what you have to say, even if without it, things will just taper off comfortably as social endurance runs out for the both of you, in a way that might not happen with it. 

Yeah... 

That does make sense. 

Um. 

Romana wanted to do one, so I'll step out now? 

Okay! 

Hi! 

I'm Romana. Topaz wanted to... hand this off to me, just becuase it's a bit more me, I think? 

The next idea that comes up for me is something like... 

Going to a - superhero universe, like a mainline DC or Marvel universe, using the standard build skeleton - I don't think it needs anything more then that? Probably just the nice social package - the hanging out one and the listening to you talk one, and then two more points of flex, like true love's kiss and the first wealth perk? 

One of the big - themes, of places like that is that... 

There's always more to do, right? That there's always more people to save and always more things to do and always more commitments dragging you down and you just have to perserve, anyways. There's the whole - genre convention about secret identities, and that makes it so much worse. There's a lot that's still - shrugged off by genre convention, but the amount of little neglects and lost sleep that a lot of these people have to grit their teeth and bare through... 

It's something that I think would be - rewarding to help with. I could totally do the hero thing too, and honestly there's probably no - stopping that? But realistically, what I want is - 

To offer myself as - an esoteric form of escort, I suppose? There's so many amazing people in these worlds that I'd love to meet and maybe fall in love with, and so many of them just - Could really use someone to talk to, someone they can trust and rest with. It'd be good to - get to do little coffee dates, help out around their houses, give them massages and the chance to catch as much sleep as they need in my arms, have a chance to live and laugh and love, with me and other cool people, and to get to learn the slow way how to make use of all of those powers to make that world a better place. 

The biggest thing that - holds me back from going for this, is that - it's not - exciting enough, and the - empowerment that'd go in doesn't feel nesscarily - quite as earned or such? I know that - especially with the mental defense stuff, that I can hold up to conflict, and there's - too many dreams of battle and glory and dynamics for it to be - the most appealing thing, on net? Those aren't nesscarily the biggest concerns for just me, but. 

It's a very comforting dream. 

I do think that it's a - good second stop, though? If I can get to some - intermediate level of power, or want to rest back from exerting that, and just - living my life by my virtues over something more - aggressive, if I want to rest and experience love and something bright and get to still - have the fun of fights coming to me, sometimes, and all that... 

That's where it belongs the most, I think. The things that I'd need for this is all the base build, really, though the style line would be really nice for something comfier and slower, like this. I'm not sure what I'd grab to make up the points, though... 

(Tourm here)

ah fuck it. 

The printing shebang is a bit tiring but a real spreadsheet in software is mmph. 

Here's the base build that we're thinking of, at least in pure pts. 

 

Perk	Price	Running total
A Thousand Ships	1	1
What's in a name?	1	2
Angelic Tones	2	4
Emerald Orbs	2	6
Perfect Hair	2	8
Dressing Room	3	11
Personal Hygiene	1	12
Like Roses	1	13
Well Endowed	1	14
Hollow Leg	1	15
Voice of the Goddess	2	17
Fairest of Them All	3	20
Battle Angel	1	21
Battle Demon	1	22
Dragon Fairy Elf Witch	5	27
Anything You Can Do	6	33
Closed Book	1	34
Indelible	1	35
Iron Will	2	37
Potent Presence	5	42
Captive Audience	3	45
Quality Time	2	47
Flattery	1	48
Love Interest	1	49
Love Triangle	2	51
Love Dodecahedron	5	56
Time Enough For Love	5	61
GGG	4	65
Sensual Service	1	66
Two Become One	1	67
Bop It	1	68
???		68
???		68
???		68
???		68
You Can Fix Them	5	73
The Redeemer	-3	70
Steady As She Goes	-2	68
Dramatic Damsel	-3	65

Maaaybe captive audience, the you can fix them stuff, and quality time are negotiable? It The drawbacks aren't nesscarily strictly defined, either - It's just that uh. There's not a ton of reason *not* to nab a lot of this shit, given how broad and synergistic a lot of these are. 

It's another 2 pts above what I have for style line, if I wanna do that just straight up, and there's a few more things that could def take... 

Really, the question is just how far I want to go into drawbacks?

Honestly probably the cleanest patch would probably be like idk, there's another one + the 1 pter basic wealth one for peace of mind? That's base text compliant and it's not like. Actually a problem to have moar cool gals up and around ^^

I'm not sure how - immediate it'd be, to encounter more spirit-chosen or whatev? Mostly I just wanna byuild my own lil world and life aside from that, and then encountering more in the wild of the multiverse is a fun idea? idk tho. 

I could nab a custom drawback for the relationshippy stuff - maybe something about - responsibility, rather then jealousy, idk? 

There's Another One doesn't nesscarily imply that! Usually you'll end up meeting another Chosen of the Spirit relatively quickly, but especially with Steady As She Goes and your other preferences, it could very well be something that happens much later down the line! 

Here's some ideas for the responsibility angle! I'm not sure if it's what you're looking for, though. 

Name: True Lover - Grants: 1
(Requires Love Interest.)
Before your True Love would permanently commit themselves to living by your side and taking your banner as their own, they have a chance to understand what you are really like, beyond all the metanarrative influences and powers granted by the spirit, and may freely embrace or reject you, depending on what they find.

Name: Eternal Lover - Grants: 3
Once you've entered a committed romantic relationship, you can never leave it of your own accord.

I like both builds, for what it's worth, and am glad that you're thinking through all this! 

Oo. Okay yeah I'd want - probably both of those even if they were free? 

And before I get cold feet about the new pts just throw in true love kiss and making ends meet and mwah. 

So! 

- There's a bit more org work to do? Let's see... 

Wanna find all of the things that I'd like to clarify a lil more and just uh. Go do that. 

Could you please throw up the sheet w/ the explanation text and all? I'll asterick up the stuff that I'd like to discuss / edit a lil more... 

Fussing with the sheet took a while, staring at it in that sort of half-blank half-focused haze you get into when you're in the last hour's shift of a solid productive day's shift. 

Here you go! 

After a bit of fussing, there's this. 

Added the revised descriptions and everything! It's neat, isn't it? 

Okay so - 

From the top, yeah? 

My thought is that - battle angel should be - more about - not losing out on things due to injuries? Like, you could m'ybe make it work a bit more like Time Enough For Love, but for 'dealing with being injured'? I don't want to have to - miss out on the experience of being injured and the - actual risk of that, yeah? There's nothing nesscarily wrong w/ being like - plot armor-y invincible, but there's some cute plots about being injured and I don't - wanna be too seperate from the rest of the experience w/ my colleagues, I guess. 

Hmm...

I think I can do that! 

Name: Angel of War  - Cost: 1 ☐
(Replaces Battle Angel.)
Injuries never get in the way of the progress of your life. Sometimes they'll simply by averted, deadly weapons only giving superficial scratches and scuffs, or missing their mark entirely against you. Even if you do get seriously injured, you will somehow find enough time for your recovery without need for compromise in the rest of your priorities. 

 

Oo good good good... 

Don't have a ton to say about dfew - think there was something about like -getting the full potential out of the deal and all? Not too sure how the - 'being you encounter' bit works, either. 

Sure! 

Name: Dragon Fairy Elf Witch - Cost: 5 ☐
You can at any time discover previously unknown heritage from any type of being you have encountered, even if this makes no sense or contradicts previously established descriptions of your family tree. You can deepen this heritage by exercising the abilities granted, finding new sources of the same abilities or differing examples of the same type of being, eventually culminating in the ability to freely take on facets to the entirety of their form and the fullness of their strengths. You always get their powers without their drawbacks, unless the drawbacks are desirable to you. Any visible features of this heritage will appear at narratively appropriate moments and be cute, pretty, beautiful, or striking rather than awkward, weird, gross, or scary. This ability works even if the beings in question cannot reproduce with humans, or at all.

The definition of 'being' and 'encountered' are a little more subjective? But anything sapient that you've personally witnessed will definitely work! 

Yeah no worries, just wanna feel like - ducks are a bit more in a row now, you know? 

Uh... 

I don't actually want my capacity for being feeling the emotions about truama to go away, but being - theoretically robust to that going forward and getting to - grow into that - better healthier more robust thing is nice. Uh. Also... I feel like uh, idk, it should probaaably also just like idk, buff 'willpower' or whatever? That's something that's commonly important in fantasy settings I'm familiar w/ and uh. It's called Iron Will? Dunno if it's out of scope or already in there, but regardless some clarification around the text there would be - good. 

For Iron will... The same immunity language as the prereqs, maybe? Really, if I'm being picky, it should be m'ybe "Whensoever, and in so much as" for all of those to make it smoother and clearer ^^

Of course! Even without more modifications, Iron will helps with pre-existing trauma at your own pace, but if you want to frame it around that a little more, I can do that too! 

Name: Iron Will - Cost: 2 ☐
(Requires Closed Book and Indelible.)
You are immune or partially immune to all forms of mental illusion, alteration, interference, or control, whenever, and in so far as that would help you accomplish your goals.  Even extreme torture, extended solitary confinement, advanced brainwashing techniques, and so on cannot touch you through the strength of your will and the robustness of your selfhood. With your strength, you need to never fear again finding your rage blinding, your loneliness crippling, or your hurts traumatizing, with even existing issues healing, in time. 

 

Yeah okay. That - sounds good. 

She rubbed her fingers along her forehead, sighing softly. It's - still so much, even if she's so - cute and nice and helpful and. 

To just get through the rest of these... 

I'm not sure what to say about flattery? Mostly I guess I'm just nervous ^^. If you can fit it, maybe there's a v. where it can also be reciprocal in the same price? Don't sweat it if not, 't'd just be - nice to have. 

Had the note for dodecahedron about it - going well, being the angle, rather then not breaking relationships? Still largely want that but well. 

Some relationships really shouldn't stay intact, y'know? Hope can cover that properly... 

Can you m'ybe frame Sense of Style a bit more like Flattery or those relationshippy perks? like, idk, I feel like it'd be nice if it - explicitly made dressing up for me nicer, too? Currently reads as a bit overly prereq-y. 

 and yeah, we talked about dressing room a bit - think mostly get it but having it in the main record chart 'd be nice ^^

Many minutes of fussing later... 

...Okay she's feeling all dysphoric again - the little - shivers in her shoulders, the hitch in her breath, the tightness in her throat and the creepy crawling hairy shivery feeling all over her skin and. 

- Okay so - I'm hap w/ this build, minus the making ends meet? I have something - super particularized-y in mind, I know what I want, and I'm feeling terrible and awful and none of that is your fault but - can we talk about the feels-y stuff later and just get me out the fucking door and have that be ok? The spirit doesn't sound especially bound by time, and I just. 

I don't want to have to live like this, any more, ok? 

...Okay. 

Are you sure that you're ready? 

I snif, and hear the lil wave of concordance in our heads and - 

Yeah. 

Take us away. It's time. 

There's a light, and a brightness, and infinitely stretched moment, and she's gone.