I love the symbol for Cauldron because it works in different orientations. Depending on which way it’s facing, it could be a C, an omega, or, well, a cauldron.

Hah, yeah! Or, as I ended up interpreting it – a Latin

Ʊpsilon 😉

Also, here comes a thought: What if the Endbringers are the result of Cauldron attempting to test on animals and it going horribly wrong?

It’s a bit out there as far as theories go, and I’m not sure how likely I think it is, but it’s crazy enough that it just might work.

Do you think anyone we know could’ve bought their powers from Cauldron?

Hm… it’s possible. It sounds like most Cauldron powers cause severe physical bodily changes, unless they managed to overcome that and that’s indeed what they mean by Deviations. Anyway, it’s the strongest clue I have to work with.

We only know a few people with that sort of thing going on, and the main ones that come to mind are confirmed to be either dropped off with amnesia in relation to Nemesis, or escapees like… hang on. Shamrock was a test subject, and she didn’t seem to be a “monster”. I guess, unless her bodily changes were things that wouldn’t be particularly visible, that’s evidence suggesting Cauldron is capable of non-monstrous powers. That may still have been what determined which 4/5 Subjects ended up released, too.

The contract made it sound like Deviations happen for psychological reasons, allowing them to test whether it’s likely to happen. So I guess due to their openness about this with their clients, Deviations would be less common in people who have bought the product than with test subjects.

Anyway, to get back to the speculation on who might’ve bought their powers: Maybe Siberian?

Ooh… or perhaps the Travelers. Maybe that’s what’s happening to Noelle, for that matter. Maybe a Deviation doesn’t necessarily happen immediately?

Then again, I already commented on Cauldron apparently being sort of upfront about Deviations, so if that were the case, wouldn’t Noelle and the Travelers know what the cause might be? Hm.

The redhead in Faultline’s Crew is Shamrock, mentioned in Gregor’s interlude.

Yep! As I mentioned, I had forgotten about her, but once her name was mentioned, it all came back to me. 🙂

You seem to have been confused a couple of times by Labyrinth’s teammates being exempted from her power, despite having stated at the beginning of the chapter when you were describing her power that she can exempt people from it?

Basically what happened was that Faultline not being exempt confused me because I would’ve expected her to be, and since I was already somewhat unsure about the specifics of Labyrinth’s power, it caused me to question whether that was actually a thing in the first place (then again, that much was pretty clear in Hive). Fortunately, Gregor helped set things right.

Relatedly, one of the other asks I just got provides a good explanation for why Faultline wasn’t exempt (besides what I eventually settled on, that being able to slice through Labyrinth’s constructs was more useful to her in combat than them not being real to her):

Most of Faultlines Crew slid down from the ceiling on columns labyrinth made. Their descent would have been a lot faster if the poles hadn’t existed for thrm

This is a very good point. And as for why Labyrinth didn’t just remotely exempt the Crew from her power after that:

In 5.7, Labyrinth doesn’t make her power unable to affect Skitter until she touches her, so presumably Labyrinth needs to be touching someone to make them immune.

Which I was probably in response to me suggesting Labyrinth might’ve been toggling it on and off for Oni to make him repeatedly fall. I guess he was just tripping because of the movement of the columns up and down.

And, uh, tripping in a different way because Labyrinth.

The Merchants can be as unlikeable as Taylor wants, she can be as gruesome as some people who fought in that ring, but whatever happens or has happened, she still stood idly by, watching a dying man crawl as he bleeds to death. No one walks right out of an experience like this the same way they were before.

Yeah, that’s true.

I know I was pretty harsh on the guy, but for all my talk, I don’t think I’d be able to do the same thing Taylor did if I were in her shoes.

There’s a lot I wouldn’t be able to do in Taylor’s shoes.

Dude, you promised that you’ll have a new chapter today. How many days are you going to postpone the new chapter?

I don’t know when “today” was when you sent it, but… I didn’t promise anything. My #next posts are intended as information about when I intend to liveblog (or, back when I was in school, when I’d be able to), with no guarantees.

Either way, this is kind of rude. I completely get the desire for further reactions – I follow a lot of liveblogs myself – but please keep in mind that I’m doing this exclusively for your enjoyment and mine, spending a lot of effort per session. I actually do this relatively frequently these days.

I think I have the right to reschedule every so often, but if it really bothers people, I could always go back to not scheduling in the first place.