Oh, actually I think you have the feel of the story pegged exactly right. Maybe I used the wrong words to desribe it. Number Girl is lighter than my other stories, but it isn't necessarily light, and it certainly isn't lighthearted. It's just that my other long stories have some elements that are much darker, e.g. murder and scenes out of a horror movie. (e.g. Weaver Nine starting with the canon protagonist having spent years forced into a murderous gang, then switching to a canon evil character leading teens to commit mass murder; and Memories of a Simurgh Victim starting with, well, a Simurgh attack and the threat of Very Bad Ends immediately looming for everyone). Compared to that, the crimes of a few schoolgirl bullies is much lower stakes.

That said, it's exactly as you say: in real life murdering someone is a lot worse than bullying them, but bullying, personal manipulation, and the victim's attempts to cope can feel darker in a story. Maybe because those happen more often in real life and most people have personal experience with them, so they get an extra boost in gripping our emotions.

I agree with this. In real life, bullies are rarely 'redeemed' in a single dramatic confrontation, and victims rarely get perfect retribution or justice. That sort of 'messy' real life situation is usually more compelling to me than a dramatic flip in motivations.

I think the reason you see the "180 flip to turn into a stranger" so often is that it's a lot easier to write. Especially if your sympathies are with the bullied protagonist and you have a hard time understanding why the bullies are motivated to bully. If there's a voice in the author's mind urging "I want to fix it, I want the suffering to end!", if they don't feel a firm logic behind why the suffering is happening in the first place (beyond "the bullies are evil and have an urge to hurt vulnerable people"), then a 180 flip is the most natural story progression to flow from the pen.

 

Meet the New Boss

This is a fun little oneshot.
It's only a little over 1k words, so just read it. I don't want to spoil it.

 

Spoiler

I suppose it might be more entertaining if I liked 30 Rock?

 

I disagree. Emma's entire world was pretty much shattered; She thought she was some badass and that torturing Taylor was her right; she finds out that the friend she dismissed as weak not only could have slaughtered her at any time, but chose not to out of mercy but faced down real evil that would make her shit herself in terror.....and crushed it (Coil, the abb, bakuda, sophia even). For a social darwinist that's the ultimate kick in the balls you can get. She also spent time being abused herself for her role in Taylor's origins. Her family also shunned her or couldn't even look at her. She honestly doesn't know what to think anymore; I can think someone would be able to reflect on their life choices and change for the better.

Even in her interlude there were times she had to justify herself (after the bathroom she briefly thinks that she's become evil or has evolved to the point she can enjoy that.)

In summation I think that if emma were shattered as a person she could rebuild into something better (I think that's the plot of Nyctophobia, especially since the author confirmed that yes she will meet Taylor again).

 

Anyone still reading Journey of the Dragonfly? I think the story's getting really interesting, with all the international politics and intrigue rarely done in Worm fics. It might not be the best written Worm fanfic, but its still unique and fun to read.

 

Yeah its pretty cool if only for the brief snippets of the international scene without the hanging thread of Scion.
The story now seems to veering towards a World War 3 scenario.

 

Yeah, probably my favourite currently updating fic. Four updates in the last week was nice.

Author has implemented some pretty interesting butterfly effect style changes. By having Scion disappear with their arrival the scene of international politics has changed. Taylor is still using her knowledge from the future to prioritize her actions, but it may prove useless in such a changed world.

 

Haven't started it, anyone prepared to summarize the pros/cons of the fic? Edit: Or point me to earlier reviews?

 

Jarik's review: https://forums.darklordpotter.net/showpost.php?p=806694&postcount=1477

 

Thanks. Surprised I missed that.

 

Number Girl starts off with the most pathetic Taylor I have ever read. I'd almost compare it to those cutter!Harry stories. But I highly recommend it. The turnabout is masterful.

Spoiler

By chapter seven Taylor pretty much owns Emma. She feels more like a merciful god than the pathetic girl begging for her friend back.

Edit: ... Fucking Tinkers has been sitting on my browser for a while now. Can anyone give a summary? I have struggled to start reading it because I have no idea what is going on.

 

Taylor's mind is dumped into SAO where she proceeds to be GRIM and DARK and HARDCORE all over everybody else. I stopped when Taylor decided to take on the first lvl boss by herself, with Heathcliff off watching her do it, and succeeded. This was after she killed that annoying spiky haired guy at the first meeting where Asuna and Kirito met right in front of everybody and was all, you'll have to do this if you want to live.

 

I'd never watched/read SAO before reading Fucking Tinkers and it got me interested in the show. The general idea is that several thousand people are trapped in a virtual reality MMO, and Taylor is also somehow wrapped up in it. It's pretty entertaining, despite Cruentus' somewhat unflattering take on it, and I'm enjoying it a lot.

 

Yeah... I cant dispute that description. Its pretty much on the nose if unflattering.

But it is something that's a nice fic to read. It entertains me. But I wouldn't go into it with my breath held.

Give it a shot. Don't like it, I wouldn't lose sleep over it.

@ SAO: Another anime/novel in that vein is Log Horizon, though it differs from SAO in that, SAO is trying to get out the sim. Log Horizon focuses more on the ramification of being in the sim.

 

Just finished Fucking Tinkers.

Her soloing a boss didn't bother me so much. She isn't too op in the later chapters and the part of me that would have cared about her success died when I saw someone beat the first dark souls boss with that broken sword you start with.

 

I actually have never been much into MMOs, so despite the obviously MMO-like setting, I interpreted the 'game mechanics' in more of a Dark Souls light. This may be why I wasn't particularly offended by her beating the boss on her own.

 

I mean, she cheesed the boss. In a way that had a direct effect on the story later. And cheesing bosses is canon; that's part of Sinon's backstory after all.

 

I spent about 4 hours attempting that before I finally got it down.

On topic, the stories ok, nothing amazing though.

 

Just binge watched Sao and I actually like Fucking Tinkers more now than I did before. The author did a great job converting sao into the grim world that canon should have been. Fucking Tinkers feels like a slow and terrifying crawl through the floors while society tears itself apart. I felt like I took a punch to the crotch when in E3 they had auto cleared from f1 to f28. Props to the author for creating original content rather than just redoing canon with Taylor inserted into it.