I like this. I don’t know what to say, but one thing is for sure, that I like this.
Westbound Travel (post-apocalyptic, surreal fantasy-western) [Updated 5/18/25, approx 100,000 words]
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Curious, if you have time, what about it you like. But if not, no worries and thank you!
This why i prefer the sword over gun. Without bullets mc is just helpless and has to do what everyone says. Pisses me off how Arch just barges in and starts barking orders and i cant do nothing about it. Love the update so far. Hope Naomi, stranger and i can get poly relationship going
Heard on both counts!
I have been debating how accessible to make bullets, given that they are more or less a “solve problem” option. Currently you can get a bullet from Passerine depending on approval, and another if you don’t hang out with either Cu or Noemi before the gates. You can avoid traveling with Arch through the city by having a bullet, or having been injured by Sir Passerine’s dragons, or by speaking for yourself or having Noemi speak for you with high enough westbound or high enough Noemi approval. You can also get a bullet in our world by attacking Agent Green or trading a memory with the stranger. But very much a work in progress and a balancing act on how accessible I want to make those things, will consider for future drafts and thank you!
As for poly options, I am considering a few, although they’ll probably be fairly specific outcomes, but I haven’t finalized anything in my head so I will avoid saying too much!
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I like the description of the settings and like the feeling of dreariness in the prison and the questions with the first guy.
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There is so much in this project that works so well. (I have not yet finished even my first pass, bear this in mind as i continue)
I’m immediately in love with the setting. You enmesh the different canons your drawing from so quickly. The western and the fantastical melt into and out of one another. The questions and actions were responding to feel weighty, and like they carry double or triple meanings. Its making me stop and think before committing myself to an answer, to consider what i might be all unknowingly promising myself too. I also think the choices are extremely well written in that what i would want to do is not allways presented as an option. Being forced to choose outside of that is cool and feels like a useful challenge to engage with the narrative.
I also think many of the choices you (the author) made writing this leads to a delicious mutability to the narrative. The little details, like man woman or other; or your name, creates the opprotunity for so many different inflections to the story being told. Even 5 chapters in I can already tell i’m going to replay this game so many times, because i want to explore so many branches that i’ve left abandoned. My mom was always really into walking labaryinths when i was a kid and at the time i didn’t care for it but over the years ive come to understand and appreciate the practice. The deliberate trip to a known location, the repetition of steps to take you out of it. Thats how i like to think about art. Art and stories are labyrinths. They take you somewhere then bring you back. But the meaning you take from the art, its different each time you experience because you aren’t the same person and your experience of art is a combination of your lived experience. In the same vein i want to trace so many of the branches of this story, maybe more than once because it feels like there is depth to be explored and experienced. In an inversion of how the mist is consuming the world i feel like theres genuine knowledge and insight to be gained from diving into it again and again.
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I still haven’t read the IF yet but I just had to comment. I’m a Brazilian guy and I’m scared I won’t be able to take some scenes with Cu seriously because…that literally means butt hole in Brazilian Portuguese :']]] aaa I swear I’ll try, but my brain can literally only think of that when I read it…
Anyway, interesting premise, I’ll probably read it tonight. Love the fact one of the RO’s is T4T!
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Holy crud, this was a great response, thank you! I also look forward to you reading more.
I am curious, even if you haven’t finished yet, if there were any moments where you really wished you had a different choice than the ones presented, and if so, what would you have wanted that option to be? Thanks again!
@_sab Yeahhhh, you’re the second person to point this out. Cu is named after Cu Chulainn, from the Tain Bo Cuailnge, but I am probably gonna end up renaming him 
Also! Thanks for pointing out a character being T4T! It was a category of RO I have really wanted to see in IF for awhile now!
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You could just name him Hound, then?
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Thinking in the next update he may be Chulainn
I mean. Tbh I think most of the places where I didnt have the choice I wanted available its because im a people pleaser and I want to say your both right. Like the first time this csme up for me is when cu and noemi are arguing about if history matters for its own sake or if the practical applications are all that matter. Like emotionally I want to shake them and say both you nincompoops but I think thats a less interesting story where I csn say that. I’ve yet to hit a place where it genuinely felt there should be an option there that wasn’t available to me even if I would have liked to say something different.
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Cool stuff, I like how the chracters talk and the atomsphere with the gray and everything. I think it’s also fitting that I played the prologue then stopped and when I continued I actually forgot if the MC is knighted or not I only remember they served no princed.
I’m also curious about the titles in this game, why is prince used as a gender neutral term in the game. Also why prince Newt, it’s an unusual name compared to the other ones for me cause Newt’s an animal and all that. Is the Empress the only one left of her title and power? I’m curious if empress is also gender neutral in the game.
Ps. Please rework the exposition in chapter 1, it’s too long and I only got through a bit of it before skipping.
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Heard on the part about exposition.
As for the titles? Honestly in part just because I thought it would be ideosyncratic and cool. A way of making this world feel odd and slightly off from expectations. As for Newt, also honestly only because I thought the mixture of high titles and lowly-sounding names was fun. Although I did also make a connection with her brothers and parents with Nu’ut.
Minor spoilers about the Empress, lore, and one of the approximately dozen endings I have planned currently: The Empress Eternal is in fact a woman. Because she’s had been around for so, so long before the hour grew late for the world she was the only person with that title, a sort of over-Monarch above all other powers in the Knowable World. There will be an ending, however, where it will be possible for the MC to rise to the Numinous Throne like the Empress Eternal did, and I am currently going back and forth about if, in that ending, I want to call the MC Empress or make it gender-determinant.
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Just finished two completely opposite playthroughs and i must say i absolutely loved it. The setting is amazing you truly get that soulslike feeling of being in a decaying world that is falling apart however the world is also unique enough to be quite different. The choices for our main characters past and how they react to the world feel meaningful and makes them really feel like whatever archetype you want to roleplay as. I enjoyed playing a westbound knight who didnt talk mucy and was completely devoted to those two aspects. Clearly im the 5th member of the original group (I like how you foreshadow that) and im INCREDIBLY interested in the stranger. Havent accepted being anyones Knight yet as Nobody knows he’s real Prince is someone else. I do feel like the current update ends quite abruptly so if possible maybe give a chapter break or finish the scene before the story ends its just a huge break in immersion.
Otherwise great story, massive potential and cant wait to see where it grows. Also I just wanted to know what names have significance
I know Cu is from Irish mythology (also a Fate character). Styx refers to greek mythology. I’m imagining Arch as in Joan of Arc? Maeve as in warrior queen from irish myths(Arch). Eli from the bible(Noemi). Gideon from the bible(Cu). Uther king arthurs farther (Styx). Are there any other significant names or maybe meanings i got incorrect. I have no idea where Noemi comes from.
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Yeah, that’s very fair. I’ll kinda just ended it. I am working on the next update (although I am in a MONSTROUSLY huge chapter), and with it I’ll have fix some bugs, tweaked a few things and also change Cu to Chulainn, and I will try to end it better with the next one.
Thank you! I am really, really fond of worlds that are way, way past their expiration date, and am glad I captured it. Also really liked and appreciated hearing about your character’s choices in the world!
Well, I do have correspondences I want suggest, obviously, between the previous Band of Five and your current Band of Five. They went east, you went west, etc. I don’t know if it’s a one to one match between, say, Maeve and Arch, but yeah, that was what I wanted to suggest, bravo! Other things I’ve stole—er, borrowed from myth are Newt and Geb, along with their parents names, from Egyptian mythology.
With all of these, I have PLANS. I won’t say what the stranger is, or why Noemi’s name, while reminescent of Naomi from the bible, might noticeably stand out from the other names, although I have reasons which hopefully will be suitably satisfying, but I will say this (heavy, end game stories around the MC’s identity): Near the end, the player will be able to choose from one of several different options that they will claim to be their identity, including being the fifth member of the Band of Five, or one of the other four should they share a name. I want to leave it somewhat ambigious if they ACTUALLY are, but the player character can fully come to believe it, and it may very well be true, along with a few other at least somewhat plausible options, I hope.
Anyway, thank you so much for your two playthroughs and comments! Much appreciated
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Ngl i really surprisingly liked the game. The atmosphere in it was a sense of gloom yet normality to it like you would have after a person has lived in an apocalyptic world for more than 4 months or so. I was also surprised how much i liked Prince Geb as aan RO even though i was focused on Th Stranger and Cu at first. The other characters were quite impactful on the memory and Arch was quite fun to comverse with. Will love to see how you will take the story further.
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I am very glad that someone got to the Prince Geb romance scenes! Thank you for playing and the feedback