Stories Forum Specific Guidelines:
Using lots of images or hitting us with an absolute novel? Please be courteous and use a
spoiler tag for your post. Thanks!
It's Patch day! The latest update is now live for The Sims 4 which includes gameplay improvements and bug fixes. Click
here to read the notes.
December 1st - It's time for our Friday Highlights! You can check them out
here!
Divided (Updated 26/11/23)
Return to top
Comments
I really enjoyed your "scrapped ideas" section. It's always interesting to me to see other writers' thought process and how many discarded or unused ideas went into making the final version of the story. When I write I have so many ideas and so many paths the story could go down, many different alternate versions of events or characters, or just other turns things could have taken. It's nice to know I'm not alone.
The new character "looks" are great! I'm looking forward to the next act.
Looks like Aine and Rosin have made it to relative safety, for the moment. I wasn't sure if Iris was actually going to let them in, but she seems to at least accept Rosin. Interested to see where this goes.
Eli finding out that Oskar is dead was a sad scene. He seems so lost and devastated. Violeta shows him a lot of compassion here.
Reynold's near death experience with Lunvin (rather than the Peteran concept of the Watcher) was interesting considering that it is not the belief system he has dedicated most of his life to. The fact that Lunvin's enemies end up in her domain after death, instead of wherever they believed they would go, suggests that her afterlife is the only real one. This has interesting implications. I wonder how this experience will effect Reynold, since it appears he is going to live through it.
Meanwhile Reynold is lost in between the worlds with a quite enigmatic Luvnik in front of him, while Aine and Roisin reached a quite precocious safe place in the woods with other witches (btw, I don't remember much about Iris, but she seems like a character which will be interesting to get to know better). The only one who seems to be seeing some positive sides is Owen, and rationally thinking his POV is also quite understandable...
Almost everything changed in comparison to a few chapters ago, what could happen next? I really can't make any prediction this time...
Indeed, Violeta and Eli's reactions to Oskar's death were heartbreaking, especially Violeta's. She's lost the only person she ever cared about, and the only person who cares about her as well. What's even more upsetting is the added inspiration behind this scene- I planned for Violeta to mourn Oskar the way she does, but shortly before planning, a family friend's husband passed. She'd called my mum over to have a chat outside to distract her from it all and I went to check on her as well, she was waiting for a coroner to collect him. And as she kept going back into the house to get stuff, she kept speaking to him and apologising for 'waking' him from 'sleep' , speaking to him although he was alive, and it absolutely broke my heart. And that's what inspired a lot of both Eli and Violeta talking directly to him, and it's why she asks him directly if he'd like to buried at Windenburg with his parents. ;-;
You both make good points about the Lunvin scene, especially the one point you make considering he was seemingly visited by Lunvin instead of meeting with the Watcher despite him dedicating his life to Peterism. Which calls into question if this was a genuine near-death experience or not. What I will say abou the Lunvin scene, is that there's also a chance that he isn't actually talking to Lunvin at all. More will be made clear later when you find out exactly what's going on with Reynold (HermioneSims, you've seen it before in the Magic Trilogy, that's a clue for you) But there is every chance that this isn't Lunvin at all, and that Reynold's overcharged mind is in fact just 'playing tricks' on him, or maybe something similar to that. Time will tell if he did genuinely get a visit from the Mother of Wolves.
Lunvin's afterlife being nothing but a hunting ground for werewolves is stolen from- erherm, inspired by- Elder Scrolls lore surrounding the god Hircine.
Haha I'm glad you brought that up. As much as Owen seems a better person, he's still a billionaire, and so as a result he's doing fine whilst everyone around him is either dead or in danger. He can afford to focus on his own life and future when he's hiding in a cosy mansion, with fat pockets and not being targeted by Volpe purely because he's quiet about his magic. Though he has a more main part, he's still a rich man at heart letting everyone else do his dirty work.
I don't have much time for a lengthy comment, but I enjoyed this chapter a lot. I'm happy to see Daniel freed from Vulpe's control (though even with the written contract, I'm not sure if I totally trust that guy's word, but we'll see
Reynold telling the others he's a werewolf feels like it could have some consequences, especially with Elias' reaction.
I'm glad you liked that scene and I like your outlook on the events of how it played out. You're spot on, Even though Eli was clear in what he wanted from Dan, Dan didn't want to just jump to it in his grief since his mind is still clouded so Dan wanted to make sure he was genuinely comfortable beforehand. Though whenever I write scenes between these two, I am constantly reminded of how much is being kept from Eli...and how much of it was entirely out of Dan's control.
Oh, indeed. I'm not sure what will come out of that revelation yet, but Elias has distrusted Reynold ever since Mother Joyce's speech and ever since he walked all the way to Nebelstadt, which is pretty far and not at all walkable from Henford. Whilst Elias has nothing against witchcraft, he knows nothing of werewolves and he's a very devout Peteran so the revelation that Reynold has killed people has only distanced him even further from him. As well as the revelation that he indeed did kill the witchfinders outside.
Some of those guys make such great vampires, I'm kind of hoping they get turned now... 😜
New Chapter
I am most curious about the new development with Reynold (being able to see a ghost) right now. I love how it raises all sorts of philosophical and spiritual questions for him. That reaction seems totally him. Also wondering if it has come about as a result of his near-death experience, or if is caused by something else we don't know about yet. (Or if it's just something cats do sometimes. Wouldn't surprise me at all.
Oh it does, doesn't it? I can't reveal anything else about what's going on with Reynold, but considering how little we see anything of the afterlife in this story, it does make you wonder, doesn't it? Is it a result of the overcharge, or is it a result of something else? Just what does this mean for him? All I can say, is it won't be anything good, but you've read this story long enough to know that XD
I will tell you my little theory on Whisper - I haven't yet outlined what ghosts he can see or why. But I like to think Whisper's ghost has always been there, because she likes spending time with Reynold and because it's her home. And that she turns green and happy because she can finally have cuddles with him again. And she can see he's not okay and wants to comfort him. ;-;
Seeing people arguing with Volpe is always very satisfying, but I'm also very worried about what he could decide to do now. He's way to arrogant to just let it pass, and he's also rich enough to have the means to cause quite a lot of trouble...
And Reynold probably really started to be concerned, to show up at Owen's place and admit straight away that his issue is magic-related. Low body temperature and the ability to see ghosts, those are quite messed up symptoms for sure...
And Kat is back! I can't wait to see how she'll be involved in the next chapters!
Somehow I hadn't realized that Owen didn't yet know for sure what happened to his father or that Oskar is dead. It's an interesting aspect of his personality that he processes this information as he learns it in a manner that outwardly appears less emotional (though he's clearly wrestling with some emotions internally).
I like how you develop his thought process on magic and science as he's trying to figure out what's going on with Reynold.
Also... "We went through all that so you could tell me I was cold? In winter? After lying on a table wearing almost nothing?"
Hmm... Looks like Kat and Ellie have a tough decision to make.