YAY MORE GOAT

>>1099727
>[ ] Maybe she’ll tell you about what’s going on with the swamp.

Is she friends with bush things?
[ACTIVATE CUTE]
How about goat things?

>[ ] What’s a witch anyway?
I don't think we ever asked.

>>1099764
Joke potential:
"So which one are you?"
>?
"Which of the crows?"
>No, "witch."
"Yes, which one?"
etc...

>>1099727
>[ ] What’s a witch anyway?
This is only the second quest about an autistic goat girl I participate in.

>>1099727
>>[ ] What’s a witch anyway?

>>1099793
there can never be enough.
something about adorable goat girls and autism just works

>>1099829
Not on /tg/ or /qst/.
It's 'Iron: A Tief's Quest' on anonkun.

>>1099777
Fucking support.

Plodding along, you notice the witch stops and reaches out with a hand to lightly tap on a dark black spike or staff sticking out of the ground with her fingers. It reaches above her waist in height and has weird-looking symbols painted in red ink on it.

That happens a few times along the way. You think you see something shimmering in the air each time, but otherwise you can’t tell what she’s doing.

Witch magic. Witchcraft. Witchiness.

You ask the girl in black robes. “What’s a witch?”

A short pause. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that you don’t know.” She turns slightly, still leading your group through the swamp. “A witch is someone that borrows power from spirits. Unlike shamans or druids though, we only deal with Cerridwen’s court.”

Blink. "Which?"

"Yes, witch."

... Huh?

The red-haired girl cranes her head, pressing her fingers at the back of her right shoulder. “We talk with a specific spirit-lord for our magic. Some people make offerings to whatever spirit has the power they want. Others, like you, convince spirits to help them.”

You tilt your head, confused. The witch frowns, then points above your head.

You look up and the teethy plant tries to reach for a lock of your hair. Or your nose. You aren’t sure.

Then you realise the witch is pointing at the stone thing in the pot, the one with green markings. You completely forgot you had that.

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>>1100045

The tree trunks around the village of bush things were really thick. They’re thinner here, and you think there’s fewer trees in general too. You still can’t see very much through the fogginess though.

You ask the witch if she’s friends with the bush things. She tells you they’re called rafflesia, and that ‘bush thing’ is a stupid name. You disagree.

Ashtia starts sniffing the air. You’ve reached a wooden cabin, in a place that you can almost call a clearing. The earth grows muddier and sinks into the edges of a lake where the mist is thickest, bright in places from the sparser canopy.

“Give me a minute. Please don’t run off.”

The Witch Of Crows heads into the cabin with the yellow-leafed bush following behind.


>

[ ] Follow her and watch. Look around in the cabin.
[ ] Continue questions (?)
[ ] Lake? Lake... Snake?

>>1100054
>[ ] Lake? Lake... Snake?
>Ask yellow for her oppinion: Rafflesia or Bush Things?

>>1100089
[ ] Lake? Lake... Snake?

>>1100054
[ ] Lake? Lake... Snake?

Bob a cute.
question for bush now, do you like singing/dancing?
question for witch for later, what's a spirit?

Theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x98X4aXq8jM

Wait.

You touch the yellow-leafed bush before she gets out of reach. She turns and stops. You bend down a bit, placing your bucket on the ground and shifting the shovel on your shoulder.

“Are you a bush thing or a rafflesia?”

About a minute passes, then the witch picks up the yellow bush and carries her into the cabin.

You get up, wondering what to do. Lulette taps one of your horns and you glance up, and the grinning fairy puts a long piece of grass into your mouth. It’s bitter, but not in a bad way. You chew on your new blade of grass.

You walk off towards the lake with bucket in hand again. Ashtia is sniffing the ground, and following her leads you to a big pile of blue-green scales and fins resting in the shallows.

It’s that snake again. Bakunawa. That word is long.

You crouch down and touch a big scale. It looks okay now. Peaceful under the bog waters.

The swamp is sleeping too. It’s hurt, but here it’s quiet, serene.

You hum a soft note. Neither the snake nor the swamp answer, but that's fine.

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>>1100538

Later, you find yourself sitting on a clear patch of only-somewhat-dry ground in the middle of a six of the witch’s odd black-and-red sticks. You have your shovel with you, and your companions sit some distance away with your bucket.

The red-haired girl is walking around the hexagon, tapping her totems.

“Yep. I have no idea what you are.”

“I’m a goat,” you supply.

The yellow rafflesia appears carrying something in a small cage of twisted branches in front of her.

You shiver. It feels wrong.

“You wanted to be useful, right?”

You nod, still watching the yellow bush. She reaches out with her cage, opening it on the ground in front of you to reveal a small brown frog. You can tell it’s alive, but it isn’t moving. You can see strange black spots on its skin, distinct from its natural pattern.

The rafflesia walks away and sits next to Ashtia. The witch keeps talking. “We can’t go around and rid the corruption from every plant and animal,” she starts. “Our methods are too slow, and imperfect.”

She isn’t really looking at you, still pacing around the hexagon of sticks. Her voice is strong, but she still has those dark bags under her eyes.

“What you’ve been doing is different, but we don’t know what it is.”

You don’t know either. You don’t remember.

You don’t remember.

“We can try to find out, though.” The witch stops, pointing at the dying animal in front of you. “Can you help it?”

Can you?

>
??? 2
Wild Empathy +10
> Return To Earth: Roll 1d100 + 20, DC 90

Rolled 63 + 20 (1d100 + 20)

>>1100548

Rolled 1 + 20 (1d100 + 20)

>>1100548
dice don't fail me now!

>>1100605
Ah shit.

Rolled 96 + 20 (1d100 + 20)

>>1100548

>>1100619
please tell me this quest doesn't do critfails

Rolled 91 + 20 (1d100 + 20)

>>1100548
Please...

>>1100664
Haha, wooh!

File: EGADS.jpg (117 KB, 850x910)

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(This quest does do crit fails.)

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>>1100695
o-oh.

>>1100695
Oh shit, we're gonna kill the frog!

Rolled 23 (1d100)

>>1100695
(This quest does not do crit fails)
Don't ruin our magic moment! ;_;

You'd think a comfy and silly quest wouldn't do critfails...

>>1100774
This can still be silly. kinda.
Watch, we'll try to sing to heal frog, but in the middle we do a cute little goat sneeze and the frog fucking explodes.
Or something. I dunno

>>1100832
Just don't want this to turn into another RE:Kobold Quest.

I am still livid about that bait and switch, yes.

>>1100832
That's pretty black humor mang.
Definitely not comfrey enough for our sweet baphy.

>>1101080
>>1101046

Double posted there mitts.

File: goat and goat.png (1.68 MB, 1254x1771)

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That's all for this session! Sorry to cut it a little short. I was writing a different quest for the past few days and didn't realise there's such thing as getting kinda burnt out.

Firstly: >>1101080
I make way too many mistakes. The end should be "a flimsy wall against a terrible force of nature."

Nextly: I do have something to say about those concerns.
This quest has always hinted at more serious elements. A story that holds the same level of drama the whole way through is boring.

That said, A Goat-Girl's Fantasy will always be A Goat-Girl's Fantasy.

Next time will be in roughly 44 hours!

>>1101135
>This quest has always hinted at more serious elements.
Yeah, I do like that about it. I just didn't want it to suddenly plunge into morbid, gory frog shovel-murdering just because a bad roll.
But that was resolved pretty tastefully. Instead of mutilating the poor frog we just got informed that the swamp curse is really strong and scary.
gj-bu 4u

File: lines.jpg (709 KB, 1024x1024)

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Theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FgJgACtX1o

You take your shovel off the ground and lift it in both hands. Then you point it at the frog.

You frown. The shovel head is bigger than the frog.

The witch is mostly expressionless, other than the tiredness she always seems to hold. You shake your head, trying to clear your thoughts and remember what happened before.

There’s little visibly wrong, but looking at the little animal hurts. Throbbing spikes in your head, knives in your chest.

You want to help, right? You want to help.

You want...

What’s a life but another body to bury?

no

no no no

NO MORE

Bursting flames without heat. A searing above your brow, temple to temple, a glowing brand of blinding light over your forehead. Everything seems to melt into waves, colours, energy past the Veil.

A pulse, under and over it all, painfully bright and loud. Oppressive. Dominating.

Yours.

A spectral inferno roars, slamming against the boundaries of the world. Gleaming ebony talons erupt and cage the blaze only to be blasted into dust, a flimsy prison for a terrible force of nature.

Then it all disappears.

The witch’s totems are gone, piles of ash barely left to mark where they were. Your companions and the yellow rafflesia are huddled around the black-robed girl. She has a hand outstretched, staring wide-eyed.

You sit at the center of the blasted earth, intact, unable to find your breath.

Before you black out, you realise the frog has vanished.

This quest has always hinted at more serious elements. A story that holds the same level of drama the whole way through is boring.

Well, I didn't notice. Good to know in advance, I guess. I'll probably dip out before it gets too heavy.

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My mistakes were bothering me waaaay too much, so I deleted them and reposted.

Does that bother anyone, actually? I don't think any QMs have that as a habit.

We'll say it's for the sake of archive readers, and not to stop triggering me.

>>1101209
What happened wasn't from the swamp. It was from Baphy.

>>1101228
Whoops. Well hopefully the witch found it informative, she might have recognized the type of power.

>>1101261
Eh, if you're just fixing a mistake then it's really no big deal.

>a goat named Baphy wakes up in a desolated ruin with no memories
It was inevitable that we eventually blew something up really

File: villageoflittlewalkingbushes.jpg (512 KB, 1280x693)

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Theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PR3dKmNu2AI

The air is cold, crisp this morning.

You find yourself lying in a hammock, within the bark and wood walls of one of the rafflesia village’s huts.

It's before sunrise. Quiet. Dim.

You pull yourself out of the suspended bed. Ashtia and Lulette are sleeping on the floor nearby.

Your low leather shoes are on the floor too, by your shovel and bucket. They are mostly mud at this point. You don’t put them on.

You walk through the open entrance of the hut into the village proper. There are very few of the bush creatures outside, the shuffling of their sleepy movements lost to the ambience of the marsh.

Wispy stuff floats serenely. Ethereal trails of smoke, flowing to and from nowhere. Muted colours that follow the distant rafflesia walking around. A void that comes from further along the village’s branch, closer to the giant tree from which it grows, and from somewhere far away, towards the center of the swamp.

It feels strange, and familiar.

You stand there, gazing at nothing.

You feel like you made a mistake.

You don’t think there was anything you could have done different, or any way you could know what would happen. Even so.

Ashtia plods up from behind you. She pushes the hand hanging by your side with her nose, trailing your fingers along her fur.

>

[ ] Wander about. Look at things.
[ ] Find the gray rafflesia.
[ ] Look for the yellow rafflesia.

>>1111230
>Wander about. Look at things.

>>1111230
Graze. You're hungy

>>1111230
[X] Wander about. Look at things.

Time to much about

>>1111230
>[ ] Wander about. Look at things.
>[ ] Graze a little too.

File: swamp.jpg (864 KB, 1228x898)

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Theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzT5bIo7AHU

You walk around the village, on an aimless path that makes sedate ripples of colour around you. You and Ashtia draw some looks, but most rafflesia you pass by just continue on. You come close to the perimeter of the huge bowl of water in the middle of the village, the lake in the trees.

The lake is still, a gray haze drifting above its surface. You don’t know where the water comes from. Rain, you guess.

There’s a rafflesia here sitting on the ground with a basket. Next to him is a pile of long, plain-looking narrow leaves, and the little bush creature is taking up bunches and ripping them up before placing the pieces in his basket.

He looks up at you, and you wave absently. He gives off a glow, a light gray-ish green. The rafflesia takes a small leaf, little more than the size and length of one of your fingers, and offers it to you.

You thank the bush and put the plant in your mouth. It’s bitter and fresh. The same as the blade of grass that Lulette gave you yesterday.

Chewing the long leaf, the waves that aren’t quite here seem to fade a little bit. The change is gradual and barely noticeable.

You return to the hut you woke up in, and take your things. As always, you rest your shovel on your right shoulder. It’s heavy.

Lulette appears on your shoulders, hugging the back of your head while balancing her pot against one of your horns.


>

[ ] Wander around the marsh. Not going anywhere in particular.
[ ] Try to follow the path you took yesterday, to the witch’s cabin.
[ ] Stay in the village. Maybe you could still do something for the giant tree.
[ ] Look around the village. Maybe you can find someone to talk to. Something to do.

>>1111429
>[ ] Try to follow the path you took yesterday, to the witch’s cabin.

>>1111429
>Wander around the marsh. Not going anywhere in particular.
More in character, perhaps.

>>1111429
>[ ] Try to follow the path you took yesterday, to the witch’s cabin.

>>1111429
>[ ] Try to follow the path you took yesterday, to the witch’s cabin.

>>1111429
>Wander around the marsh. Not going anywhere in particular.
Just follow the song.

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You leave together, finding the winding ramp down to the mud and waters of the swamp.

Somewhere along the way the yellow-leafed rafflesia joins you. She is the same as always, seemingly disinterested by default. The strange shimmers are still straying into your vision, and you see that they turn along with the loop of twigs she carries.

At first you just wander, though you can’t not think about the dying tune of the land. You follow it to where it is blanker, more subdued. The place where the trees are thinner and the water reaches above your ankles, where a lonely wooden cabin sits in the mist.

A tranquil place with few sounds beyond the wind against branches. Perched or hopping along the roof of the cabin is a trio of crows. Their master emerges from behind a creaking wooden door.

The red-haired girl looks haggard. The lines under her eyes seem a little darker.

“You’re back.”

With a fairy and a plant still on your head, a wolf still by your side, and a walking bush trailing along, you approach the Witch Of Crows. There's a question on your lips. “Am I a goat?”

There’s a pause. Then she sighs, wearing a dry smile. “I don’t know what you are.”

Mm.


>

[ ] Ask her about yesterday and yourself.
[ ] Press her about yesterday and yourself. Even if she only knows a little bit.
[ ] You still want to help. You... still can help.
[ ] Just talk. Ask her about things. Spirits, plants, songs. She may need a distraction. You might, too.

>>1111620
>Am I part goat?
>Show various examples of goat like traits.
>Being cute
>Horns
>Super cute

>>1111620
[X] Ask her about yesterday and yourself.

>>1111620
> ask about yesterday and yourself and what the yellow bush is doing
> say sorry for not helping the frog

>>1111638
>>1111669
These

You lower your shovel and let it rest behind you, dragging.

“Sorry.”

Another pause. The witch walks up to you. You can see the shadowy, insubstantial hem of her robe trailing on the sodden earth. She raises a hand and brushes your hair, your eyes lowering on instinct.

Her fingers are soft, and gentle, and small.

“Not your fault,” you hear. “You didn’t know.”

The witch either found a fallen tree trunk or made it pop out at some point, and you sit with her for a bit. The yellow-leafed rafflesia joins you, and Ashtia trots off to the nearby lake with Lulette sitting atop her.

You ask about yesterday. The witch tells you some things, though she seems unsure.

“The fire wasn’t physical, but it was intense enough to be seen without using Veil-sight. It didn’t look like some kind of spell, or like a separate power being channeled and used.” The red-haired girl points to the yellow bush sitting next to you.

You finished chewing your bitter blade of grass a while ago. You can still see the rippling around the bush’s loop, though it’s more faded than before. She turns it perpetually, and you realise the loop is bigger than before. Different, with more twisting shapes and brambles.

“It looked a bit more like that. Something innate, done naturally.”

You still don’t know what she’s doing.

>>1111832

The witch makes you leave eventually, and you walk back to the rafflesia village.

The rest of the daylight passes in a sort of daze. You spend much of it just watching the rafflesia move about, living their lives up in the canopy of the marsh. As night falls you join them by the bowl-lakeside and enjoy a mix of spiced crunchy leaves, berries, and sweet pastes.

Listlessness has you sleep early, and again you are up before sunrise.

You seem to have made a habit of this kind of sleeping schedule. Ashtia and Lulette are up as well, and your ennui is starting to give way to anxious energy.

This time the yellow-leafed rafflesia isn’t following you, likely not awake. You pick up your things, and head off to see the witch again.

>

[ ] You do still want to help. It feels important, and the lands isn’t getting better.
[ ] You want to figure out what you can do. There are things you can try. You can be of use.
[ ] You’re cautious. You don’t want what happened to happen again. Even so or perhaps so, you want to learn.

>>1111838
[ ] You want to figure out what you can do. There are things you can try. You can be of use.
>Good goats never give up.

>>1111838
>You do still want to help. It feels important, and the lands isn’t getting better.

>>1111838
[ ] You want to figure out what you can do. There are things you can try. You can be of use.

>>1111838
> you do still want to help
Dice gods willing.

>>1111838
>[ ] You’re cautious. You don’t want what happened to happen again. Even so or perhaps so, you want to learn to overcome the dice gods.

>>1111838
>You do still want to help. It feels important, and the lands isn’t getting better.

File: marsh.jpg (1002 KB, 1499x860)

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Theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9z_-TaZQHqI

You walk through the marsh, tracing the same steps as yesterday and the day before. The tune of the land still calls, broken and frayed.

You want to help. You’ve been driven up until now by that purpose and that hasn’t changed.

But you also need to figure out how. You don’t know what you can do, and don’t think you can just keep going without knowing. The witch can find out. Hopefully.

Another sound enters your hearing. A thud, a splashing. Lots of them. A scuffle of some kind. You turn and start moving towards the source.

Ashtia sniffs, then lowers herself and paces herself a distance away from you.

You smell something odd in the air. The sounds are not stopping. You start moving quicker, pulling your soaked feet and socks and shoes through the mud.

You are concerned because you think that’s the sound of fighting. Crashing and clashing, desperate steps belonging to many.

It is fighting. You hurry, and the scene comes into view.

Someone lies on the ground face down in front of you. He’s in leather armor with protective metal platings that have lost their polished shine to the grime and gloom of the swamp. There’s someone else nearby, slumped to the ground by a tree trunk with a spear fallen to the side.

Further forward, a pair of ebony talons jut out like fangs. Two men are on them, in the same armor as the first two you saw. Impaled.

The Witch Of Crows stands behind them. There’s a splash of red on her cheeks.

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>>1112067

A mutter. “Time’s up, I guess.”

She notices you, and speaks tersely. “Go back to the rafflesia village. Or leave the swamp. Whichever.” The witch withdraws a small ceramic vial, uncorks it, and tips the liquid into her mouth. Then she stuffs the vial back into her black robes, and starts walking.

“Wait.”

She seems to consider ignoring you, but obliges.

“Where are you going?”

“Just a short trip to the city. Don’t concern yourself.”

Your head turns. Thoughts of wanting to learn, of wanting to help, of fixing things. Thoughts of wanting everything to be okay, against the wrongness and the mess and the lost lives in front of you.

She replies to your unspoken words. “You are a wild card. You don’t even know what you are yourself. Stay or leave, either way you must do nothing.”

Why.

For a bare moment, her eyes grow soft. “We can talk after. We can try again, and learn about you. And you can help me remove the corruption in my swamp.

But for now, I have something to do.”

Another thought comes to the forefront of your mind. Something you learned what feels like a long time ago, and you haven’t thought much about until now.

“Why are people hunting you? Why do you have a bounty?”

The Witch Of Crows gives you an answer before she disappears into the murk.

“Because I plot the fall of Silvercrest.”


> Important thoughts, important things:

[ ] The land is broken.
[ ] You need to fix it.
[ ] What are you. Who are you.
[ ] You don’t understand what’s going on.
[ ] Why is she going alone.
[ ] She is your friend.

>>1112074
> why are you going alone
Sounds like a tough job.

Is she off to the guild to kill everyone?

>>1112074
>[ ] Why is she going alone.

>>1112074
>[ ] She is your friend.
>[ ] Why is she going alone.

>>1112074
[ ] The land is broken.
[ ] You need to fix it.

>[ ] Why is she going alone.

Shit, I didn't realize another session had started in this thread. better late than never.

>>1112074
>She is your friend
>Why is she going alone

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Empty minutes pass. Something rustles somewhere nearby, something squawks somewhere overhead. The blade of your shovel is on the ground, and at some point your bucket joined it.

You just wanted things to be okay. You don’t want to sit around and wait, and have someone else do the hard work.

Is that what bothers you?

Each time you saw the witch, she looked more and more tired. More and more harried.

She’s been working all this time.

“Baphy?”

But she wasn’t alone, right?

There’s the gray-leafed rafflesia; but he’s busy with his village and his tree.

There’s the yellow-leafed rafflesia; but she’s young, and is mostly a messenger.

There’s her familiars, her crows; will they be enough? Will she be safe?

“Baphy.”

You could go as well, but the witch’s words ring in your skull.

‘You are a wild card. You don’t even know what you are yourself.’

She’s not wrong.

‘Stay or leave, either way you must do nothing.’

Because you could mess things up? Because something bad could happen if you tried?

What should you do?

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>>1112246

Theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z147pPU9XEY

“BAPHY!”

The world shakes violently up and down. Actually, just your head does. You snap into reality and come face to face with a tiny midriff, then Lulette lets go of your horns and flutters her wings to place herself in front of you.

Ashtia is pressing against your side. The clay pot and plant are balanced on the wolf’s back, about to fall off if not for the teethy little thing biting desperately onto a brown tuft of fur.

The companions that have followed you all this time, as if it were natural.

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>>1112253

You stare at the fairy flying in the air in front of you. She stares back with furrowed brows, though with her sleepy eyes and button nose you think it’s impossible for her to look angry.

She speaks.

“Do you remember the song you sang for me when we met?”

That time, when she first appeared to you.

“It was a really nice song. I liked your voice, and the things you sang about.”

At the edge of that quiet forest, in the cool breeze of the autumn night.

“The wide open sky. The gentle wind. The sunrise. The things you could see and feel, the things you could look forward each time you rested against the grass.”

She’s smiling, ever so softly. The little fairy floats towards you and rests her forehead against yours, eyes closed. Warm.

“Baphy is a silly goat. It’s fine to not think so much,” she tells you with her bell-like voice.

“As long as she keeps going, Lulette knows Baphy will find a happy story.”

Her words reach you, and touch something bright within. Lulette pulls away, retrieving her pot and taking her place again on your shoulders. Ashtia makes a quiet whine, and looks up at you. You heft your shovel and pick up your bucket.

You realised something important: you never told the red-haired girl your name, and never learned hers.

The path she takes isn’t mundane. You know it won’t be easy to catch up to her, but you don’t care. You walk east out of the swamp, together with your friends.

Wherever the path may lead.

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That's the end of thread #7!

As always, I'll announce when the next thread will be on twitter. Seems like my schedule for GFQ is getting consistent now so it'll probably be on the 5th or 6th, though I won't promise that.

Archives are here, if you miss anything: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/qstarchive.html?tags=GFQ

And of course, feel free to tell me what you think.

Thanks for reading!

>>1112276
Cheers for running boss. If we rolled a nat 100 and 1 which would take precedence?

>>1112276
That ending was comfy as fuck, very good use of the soundtrack too.

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Considering >>1112178, I only announce on twitter right now, but do you guys check the discord or the general? I could use those as well.

>>1112319
Thanks. A nat 100 would take precedence.

>>1112359
Glad you liked it!

>>1112460
Also, just remembered this, but:

We Gon now.

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>>1112468

File: Baphy Comparison Example (...).png (2.42 MB, 3200x1440)

2.42 MB PNG

>>1112492

>>1112492
Also, if you could include a link to the new thread in this one once you set it up, that would be really helpful.

>>1114357

Yup. New thread up >>1127609