I want to understand what “The Storm” is exactly.
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@OracleSage As Aragorn said to Frodo: “You have my sword”
Only I don’t have a sword, but I think you understand what I mean 
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Current life goals:
- Solve Fragment Eleven
- Solve Fragment Twelve
- Survive possible mortal peril brought about because of 1 and 2.
But first… I need some chocolate. Possibly some wine.
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Smooth bourbon for me. Augie and the 94 Mounties deserve a bit of a toast. I need a strong drink for equally strong men and women
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That’s the spirit… literally. I wasn’t going to go hard - but uh, thinking about what happened to him makes me kind of want to get drunk. I’m kind of trying to be responsible, since I’m supposed to be doing some “homework” later.
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Vodka and melon Gatorade for me at the moment lol and pizza for good measure 
poor Augie and Marty
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I don’t know if anyone’s replied yet about what Teddy says when the distortion starts, I started the a rough “translation” at 2:46 in the video.
“Can you stop?”
“Ethan, you remember what it means to remain here…” - not for sure, noise became to distorted for system.
“Ethan”
“Ethan, listen to me!”
“You come back here.”
“Back to this/the room”
“I said, HERE!”
and then the loud noise, which has a bit of music-like tones mixed in.
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…
I missed so much! But that’s what I get for working at a Starbucks during finals week.
In regards to the book changing, maybe I’m imagining things, but I feel like the symbols for the unlocked keys of flora and fauna have changed. I don’t remember those dark green specks being there before. Or the text on the sides. But I’m also not visual at all. I can pick up on slight changes in sound, but it took me three days to realize someone I see every single day cut and dyed their hair.
As for the number of fragments, it’s 16. The book says “Sixteen chapters locked within, truth and treasure you might win. The gathered parts unlock the door, beyond is what you’re looking for.”
Some of us looked into kemeticism and Egyptian mythology with the last fragment, but it went in an entirely different direction with altered video. I think the word “byte” shows that this one will stay on that same level with Aether coming in and out of various technologies.
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Considering the threat we now know we may be facing, and the fact there are so many more of us now (and more new Mountaineers appearing every day), we should probably consider repeating the protection spell performed during the search for fragment 10, once we have recovered our energies from today’s ritual casting.
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I have noticed a lot of new faces/icons recently.
If the same people have to do it again, y’all might want to give me and @OracleSage a few days’ notice so we can have the boxes ready on time.
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The writing’s definitely been there since the beginning. The locks are the same, as far as I can tell. I have a screenshot of the book from just after the second assessment and the speckles are there.
It’s interesting, though. I haven’t thought about the text in a while, but it mentions ‘unlocking the door’ which, according to Augie, the bad guys control doors.
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So just to do a morning recap of all the craziness of yesterday, mostly for my own benefit cause I have the memory of a goldfish some days. Standard disclaimers apply that I may be making half this stuff up.
The Book of Briars has always existed, and has sought out others to open it before. The 94 Mountaineers, Monarch’s Mountain, maybe even those who made the paths of Wool and Silver.
Something doesn’t want the book open. Something that’s intentionally keeping the world in the dark about magic for it’s own reasons. This something is likely behind ‘The Storm’ which seems to have wiped out everyone who’s made significant process in opening the book. That something is also somehow related to Kemetic Solutions, and perhaps the organization/entitiy/EBG that’s controlling them.
The Book is …complicated… it’s not entirely a book, more of a spell or a process. Brandon Lachmon would say it’s building connections between unconnected things and events, and by doing that, creating Magiq. Each fragment, each assessment, is another set of connections used to power the spell. What is this spell’s purpose? Hopefully to open a version of the door Brandon opened, and KS wants to open. A door to the source of magic ,and reintroducing more of it to this world.
As for what’s next… I don’t really know. We didn’t learn anything about the 18 gates. Augie didn’t say anything about Climber. It is interesting that Augie got agitated when Climber was mentioned. Either Augie was somehow conditioned to forget her, and was fighting it, or…maybe the thought of Climber alone agitated him?
Hopefully Aether got what he hoped for and more information becomes available on the 117-2, or in the Lost Athenaeum. Let’s keep our eyes open.
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And my (book about) axe(s)!
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You all have my love
…and whatever scary sh 
t I can turn into #ShapeshiftingGoss
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Which of my swords would you like?
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So question, and this may be my own confusion being new to this world. “The Storm” has stopped people from opening the book multiple times over. If we are assuming that the book potentially opens the door to the source of magic, then we potentially have the same goal (albeit through very different means) as KS. So then why would those behind the Storm be opposing us and at the same time behind the efforts of KS?
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I can only guess, and I’m often wrong, but why stop being wrong now?
We aren’t making any claim to exclusive use or ownership of what lies beyond the door. I doubt KS or those beyond them can say the same. KS wants to control everything, and use the power they find beyond the door to do it. That fits in with what we are told are the goals of those behind the Storm.
That’s not to say everyone at KS is evil, of course. Maybe some people in KS really want to make the world a better place, and think that their hands are just the most capable of making that happen. Maybe Teddy’s a good guy in a bad world and just sees what he’s doing as his best, or only chance, for improving the world.
The Mountaineers have never, to my knowledge, formed a plan for what to do once the book is open. We’re not planning on hoarding this information, and dolling it out for our own purposes. What we want is just to learn the truth and see it set free.
Does that make us the good guys? Well, pretty much everyone assumes they are the good guys in their own story. But as those who know ritual magic better than I have mentioned a few times the past couple of days. Intent is everything. And what we and KS intend, seem to be vastly different. That’s why those behind the Storm probably want to stop us.
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Gonna put on my tin foil here @Ryvick and say “corporations” if we successfully open the book them magiq will be something they no longer control and in this would control is power
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