Oni2:Slaves of War/Polylectiloquy: Difference between revisions

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:B. Pollution <u>from</u> the ACCs. Cleansing the air is bound to create some nasty by-products, at least with the kind of track record that humans have for creating solutions that create more problems.

:C. Weaponized viruses. Perhaps someone recklessly created a bio-weapon that got out of control.

:E. Extraterrestrial origins. Life from "another world" could be producing natural (to them) byproducts, which are inherently hostile to our life. This is strongly hinted at by the unusual nature of the Daodan as well as the Screaming Cells. The weapon page for the Screaming Cannon states: "This weapon fires capsules that release a mysterious entity known as a Screaming Cell. These creatures seem to exist out of Earth phase, but feed on human lifeforce and are drawn to it when freed". This doesn't mean that all of the Wilderness came from another planet or "dimension", but consider [http://carnage.bungie.org/oniforum/oni.forum.pl?read=17589 this post] by Hardy LeBel on our old forum. Quoting it here for posterity:

{{Pullquote|Well, obviously I don't have much say over what happens next, but MY plan was to take Konoko and drop her into a "road warrior" setting, where small enclaves of society were huddling in atmospheric safe zones. Outside in the badlands Daodan warlords and enforcers ruled over the unfortunate masses.

:*Another universe:

:*Another place:

:::Perhaps alien life is continuing to come through the phase veil on its own, but by what means, and in which places?

:::Or is the spreading Wilderness simply reflecting the success of this foreign life in starting from a single, brief point of introduction and rapidly invading our biosphere?

:::Also, if the Screaming Cells are being harvested through continual openings of the phase veil, rather than from the Wilderness, then we have a ready-made explanation for how the Daodan could be brought over by accident, continuously and in different places around the globe.

:'''Enigmata'''

::Cons: It's complicated! Much easier to just say that the Daodan is a special plant. Also, if the Daodan is transferred on the genetic level, might it be contagious? That would run counter to Hasegawa's notion of the Daodan needing to be implanted, person by person. This would have story-changing implications.

:Kerr tells us that the Chrysalises were being grown "based on the genetic codes of" Mai and Muro. One way to interpret that is that they had extracted portions of tissue, or perhaps used their stem cells to generate a new mass of tissue, and introduced the Daodan to them; perhaps they used a sample from a plant or animal in the Wilderness that they found to be Daodan-enhanced. If the Daodan organism is something as low-level as a genetic process (see the [[Oni2:Slaves of War/Neo-Biology#Daodan organism|Neo-Biology]] page for details), then the idea is that it can leap from species to species, so the source of the Daodan "genes" is not important. Then, when it was eventually decided to implant the Daodanized tissue back into Mai and Muro, Hasegawa and Kerr would have needed some way to take the tissue that had been modified outside their bodies and re-introduce it.

{{Pullquote|Alternatively, the tissue or cellularized (cell) sample may be treated in vitro before being placed on the scaffold layer. For example, cells (such as autologous cells) can be cultured in vitro to increase the number of cells available for seeding on the scaffold(s). The use of allogenic cells, and more preferably autologous cells, is preferred to prevent tissue rejection. In certain embodiments, chimeric cells, or cells from a transgenic animal, can be seeded onto the polymeric matrix. Cells can also be transfected prior to seeding with genetic material. Useful genetic material may be, for example, genetic sequences which are capable of reducing or eliminating an immune response in the host. For example, the expression of cell surface antigens such as class I and class II histocompatibility antigens may be suppressed. This may allow the transplanted cells to have reduced chance of rejection by the host. In addition, transfection could also be used for gene delivery. Urothelial and muscle cells could be transfected with specific genes prior to polymer seeding. The cell-polymer construct could carry genetic information required for the long term survival of the host or the tissue engineered neo-organ.}}

:This method can work not just for replacing missing organs, but, as ¶31 says,

:If all the Daodan did was re-tool the human body a little, we could assume that it was simply running off the normal fuels of the human body: food, water, and air. But in its advanced state, it allows a host to do some pretty amazing things, like throwing around energy balls and generating force fields. Either the Daodan is vastly superior to our bodies at energy generation, or else it's receiving energy from somewhere else.

:A. The Daodan is tied to the "other side". In other words, there's a sort of phase portal inside the host that draws energy from there. This only displaces the question of where the energy comes from to "somewhere else, somehow".

:One final thing to think about: if the Daodan replaces human cells with its own... and it draws its energy from the Wilderness, not food... and some people want to eradicate the Wilderness... what happens to the Daodan hosts if they find a way to destroy the Wilderness?

:Naturally, he's continuing his research into the Daodan. After all, his work wasn't done when the Syndicate raided his lab and he was separated from Kerr and Konoko. What was left for him to do? Well, obviously he ended up implanting Muro with a Chrysalis (forced to by the Syndicate, or did he choose to?), so much of his time would have been spent studying the progress of the Chrysalis, the same kind of work that Kerr was doing on the TCTF side. Perhaps after seeing just how powerful and uncontrollable Muro became as an Imago, he realized that his technology needed some means of being controlled. His goal was to save people from the pollution, not to create a race of monsters.

===How does one control the Daodan?===

===Did Barabas or Mukade die? Either could simply have been KOed.===

:We could bring back Barabas, although he's frankly a boring character, so I don't see much use for him. It would also be weird if <u>none</u> of Konoko's major enemies die, considering that Konoko is a fairly violent femme in the first game, so if we are going to avoid straining credulity, we should bring back only the most interesting enemies from Oni 1. I would rank them in the following order of priority: Mukade, Muro, Barabas. I can see Mukade adding the most depth to Oni 2, so let's focus on what we can do with him (see Mukade questions below).

:No, Mukade is simply a ninja who rose through the ranks and was selected by Muro to be a Daodan host, as Barabas [[Quotes/Consoles#Barabas|rose through]] the Striker ranks to the same end. I can't argue with certainty that he couldn't possibly be an SLD based off Hasegawa's engrams and implanted with a Daodan, but it seems more interesting to make him a unique individual with his own back story and motivations that we can develop in Oni 2, rather than just a "Xerox copy" of an existing character.

===If still alive, what is Mukade doing?===

:A. The Daodan is not perfect, so it cannot make the host perfect (i.e., remove a basic flaw in the cellular processes).

:B. The Daodan was designed to improve an organism but not to grant it immortality. The designers may have a philosophical or cultural reason for Daodan hosts or the general populace not living forever.

:D. The Daodan actually shortens the host lifespan because it forces rapid cell doubling. More frequent cell division accelerates the aging process.