Katalepsis, Eusebeia Epoche - placid islands; black infinity - 2-1.15
Chapter surfs the rim of the accretion disk, singularity below, void above, accelerating into an infinity of stars ahead.
https://katalepsis.net/2025/07/18/placid-island-black-infinity-2-1-15/
This week's password is: phobia
Epub version of the chapter is also attached below, as always!
Maisie's Magnificent Adventure (it's not magnificent for Maisie, it doesn't belong to her, and it's only technically classifiable as an adventure) continues! This one is ... well, you'll see! I'm genuinely not sure how many chapters are left in the arc, partly because some trickery might be lurking on the horizon (my trickery, not Maisie's) but we will see! Things are going swimmingly, however, and I'm very happy with how this has all heated up and come to a boil. And I hope you're enjoying it just as much as I am, dear readers! I can't say anything more without spoilers, so ... on with the show!
Ah, but first! Yes, that's right, it's yet more fanart! This week I have another two pictures from K25fF. First up we have 'Eldritch abomination (adorable)', which is possibly one of my favourite interpretations of Lozzie ever put to page. One reader on the discord described this as 'unflinchingly honest,' and I totally agree! Love the crocs. Very Lozzie. And then we have 'Eldritch abomination (still adorable).' Also Lozzie! Just, you, seen from a different angle. Hooray for the abyss! And hooray for fanart!
Comments (6)
The faces make me think of AI, it's lack of creative ability and how before it was even slightly good, it would create warped images halfway between things it was trying to depict. Maybe the way the world warps is like that.
I love that thematic resonance, yes! The pattern-face audience is drawing on several different thematic threads - creative repetition, the corporate insistence on safe creative returns, the difficulty of continuing when under that gaze, etc. But the influence of generative AI is absolutely in there too. Thank you for pointing that out!
I love the Yellow family.
Thank you! They're always such a wild plot element, and very fun to explore how they intersect with the metanarrative themes I enjoy playing around with.
Can someone remind me what And-Steel-Will-Rust’s specialty is?
Back in Book One we only ever got oblique hints of Steel's area of interest. Heather never investigated in detail, and she was a bit too clueless to consciously process the hints she did get. Back during the climax of arc 14, we get this exchange: "“They,” the King continued. “They are the only ones who have gone beyond plays. And two of them—” He glanced at Steel, then at Orbit, with a strange pride in his eyes, half admiration and half terrible sorrow. “Their forms of love would be alien to you. Horrifying, most likely.” “There is no horror in bearing new life,” Steel raised her voice, cold and certain. “However it is achieved.”" There was also the thing Steel transformed into in the same chapter - which Heather lacked the pop culture knowledge to recognise (it was a Xenomorph), and I've tried to treat that little easter egg as not really needed to understand what Steel is all about. As for this current chapter, I've intentionally chosen not to explain it yet! By the way Steel is looking at Maisie, I suspect we're about to find out.