Alide and Dahlia, but Mostly Alide Respond

I wasn't going to make a response initially, because well honestly I don't have much to say, their read has so far been pretty good, I could make some comments, like that I have no intention of **** Yulia, my only goal is to help Yulia, but then again, even the voices seem convinced I have ulterior motives, so it's not worth defending myself. My actions will speak louder than my words in the end.

No I'm not responding to comment specifically on anything in their reading commentary... Instead it occurred to me that this is a great place to talk about the problem with meta narratives.

Most specifically the problem with a non-meta entity in a meta-context commentating on a meta-narrative.

I get the feeling I'm going to be saying meta a lot...

Anyway... First let me specify... The Tower of Voices is a Meta-narrative. Most of the characters in the story, even Yulia to a certain extent are aware they are in a story. Yulia is only aware that they are in a story to the extent that they are aware they are a story as perceived by the voices. Dahlia, Dreg and I are fully aware that we are in a story and that to a degree everything we do is actually controlled by another.

Marcie and Gina read is also a meta story. Marcie and Gina are not Meta characters and in their normal context are not aware they are in a story, but when put into the meta context of this story they are aware of the existence of their story and will make comments about how they are written.

Fred and Lindsay are not Meta characters and do not change that despite being in the meta context of the Marcie and Gina reads story.

Which is of course a perfectly acceptable choice, but does result in some strange clashes when interacting with more meta aware characters.

Two obvious examples are of course Lindsay and Susan from Unknown7's story doing a read through of Hard Candy and Fred and the rest of the Dark Lord cast responding to Dahlia and I's own read of Dark Lord. Lindsay and Susan exist in a story where the context is vastly different from Hard Candy since they're version is based on Unknown7's own reading of Hard Candy and therefore they are written as incapable of even acknowledging the differing context.

In our read of Dark Lord we commented on how Nogardnep was a stupid name and asked why Farsel wasn't similarly given a backwards first name, something like Ruhtra Nogardnep... In the response Farsel explained that her name was a normal dark elf name and reiterated the in universe reason her last name is Nogardnep, but... this is where the lack of meta awareness is a problem because... Well that's not what we asked. We know why the name is the way it is in universe, our question was why... did Unknown7 decide to go with such a stupid name and then not go the rest of the way... This was a choice made by Unknown7 that he then justified in universe, but the in universe justification doesn't justify his decision out of universe and frankly I'm not interested in what the characters think about the story they're in if they're just going to be parroting what was already written...

I suppose I could also address some quick things... Most notably the incubus boss... The Tower of Voices is essentially at it's core a game and the incubus showed up as a boss on the second floor... therefore in order to have a good game, the incubus boss had to be one that was at a power level that made them suitable as a second floor boss. Sure they could have been an incredibly powerful Incubus that Yulia would have no chance against, but... well that wouldn't be a satisfying game or story.

Spoilers of a sort for The Tower of Voices. Ash is actually also a demon in disguise and had Yulia for some reason tried to fight him, he would likely have wrecked her, hard, but he's also non-hostile because he shows up early, later he will likely show up again and by then hopefully Yulia will be a t a point where she would be able to survive fighting against him if it comes to it, but the game is designed to be winnable.

Also just to provide some fun information, the tower is essentially infinite in size with various ecosystems and environments available, the chosen only explores ten floors of the tower, but us denizens have access to the entirety of the tower, you asked why anyone would want to live in the tower and the answer is because the tower is essentially an entire universe itself and the denizens that live there quite literally "live" there, the same as any of you live on earth. It's actually what makes the guidance of the voices important. If someone not chosen by the voices ventures into the tower, like for instance Esaza, they are subjected to the entirety of the twisted universe the tower is composed of and they are likely to never find their way back out, becoming themselves an eternal denizen of the tower.

Anyway I hope this has helped.

Um... I'm here too and stuff...

Bye everybody.