Howdy! It’s time to continue my journey through Worm!

Judging by the fact that I was asked to do the Arc Thoughts after the last chapter, it seems we’re skipping the between-Arc Interlude we’re used to by now and moving straight into Arc 10. Double digits!

Let’s turn the page and find out what this Arc is called…

Parasite. Nice.

I suppose it was really only a question of time before that name showed up. Not quite as much so as Buzz, but still.

So, what does this mean? By definition, parasitism is a kind of symbiosis that benefits one of the organisms and is detrimental to the other… Sounds kind of like the situation Shadow Stalker has with the Wards, which benefits her by keeping her out of jail. Though I suppose you could argue that it’s not so much a parasitic relationship with the Wards as a mutualistic relation between Shadow Stalker and Piggot. Shadow Stalker is kept out of jail, and Piggot gets her little PR boost.

The second person I think of when I hear the word Parasite is Kaiser, who benefited from his subordinates’ help and broke many of those same people psychologically in the process. But Kaiser’s dead, so I seriously doubt that’s what we’re talking about here.

Another possibility is that this has to do with Chariot, whose intention appears to be to become an information-gathering parasite in the Wards.

And finally, since I have no idea what she’s like yet, I can’t discount the idea of it having to do with Imp. Exactly how, I don’t know.

As for chapter 10.1, I’m fairly sure it’s finally time to find out what Taylor and the Undersiders have been up to, who Imp is, and what they intend to do with Shadow Stalker. Although maybe that’s too much for one chapter? At the very least I think we’ll find out one of those things, probably starting with the last one.

So yeah. Without further ado, let’s start louse-combing! Uh, I mean, read Worm!