Demon King Daimao downgrade ig

[Saiyan40009]

understood what you said correctly, you were saying that death being not real is what led to the “real world” being considered as fiction, and that it’s NOT THAT the real world is fiction but that because humanity’s lives in the real world are fake they just use the words “story” and “fiction” to better portray this,

but what Im saying is that, they’re lives can be fake just as you said, as well as be genuinely fictional. The 2 ideas can coexist, and to help the argument that it is actually fictional the real world is stated to be the creation of a higher being.

"To put it simply、this world is fake and we are nothing more than someone's creation、" carelessly explained Fujiko。

furthermore how would your argument justify the r>f things that are not stated but implied, like the implication that everything is bound to someone’s plot:

"Exactly。" Bouichirou nodded。 "That is undoubtedly your role。" "My role？So l have to work for the sake of someone's plot？Why？"

And the things like “main character” and “side characters”

“Yes。And that leads to a single conclusion。I get it。We're not the protagonist。" Brave was dumbfounded。 "That's right。" Bouichirou disinterestedly dug into the ground with his foot。 "And yet your role as a side character has yet to

the characters believed that if a life after death vulve fictional. It is based on that God spoke He created his world that fictitious now as Dontalke said he speaks them uses a lot of philosophy so it can easily simply be bouchiro talking about each one has a paper destination I do not see how that shows a tracendence

 

[Catzlaflame]

first I want to make sure that I get this straight, it’s not that your particularly denying the POSSIBILITY that they’re could be a r>f difference between afterlife and earth but that you think we are taking the absolute highest possibly interpretation of the lore to argue it
And you also say that there is never any implied transcendence between real world and afterlife. But that’s not necessarily true:

Gyazo

gyazo.com

now Ik we don’t treat author statements with much regard here but, in this case I think it’s very important. Why? Because the OP’s argument is that the r>f is metaphorical, when determining if something is metaphorical or not we are determining wether the author tried to portray something as x or as y. Here he is verbatim aknowledging afterlife having transcendence over earth.

Those ideas can exist simultaneously yes, but I never said they can't. What I said was that the metaphoric interpretation itself is enough to call the world fictional.

I was under the impression that the only argument being made for the r>f being metaphorical is the death is fictional stuff, what other argument was there? (Apologies if I have to make you repeat something, I just thought that was it)

 

[Gohanblanco217]

Wtf is even happening?

 

[Ningenron]

Metaphorical is not the main argument for the afterlife though, a bunch of anti feats and context for it are presented as well.

 

[DaReaperMan]

I’m aware. I meant count in the sense of be taken seriously. “Some” people are neither informed nor waited for more input to agree other than for their clear bias.

"WAAAAAH BIAS!" Is all I'm hearing as someone who never even heard of the verse before reading through the OP. If your going to make an accusation, make damn sure your accusations are correct on the right people.

 

[Darksmash]

first I want to make sure that I get this straight, it’s not that your particularly denying the POSSIBILITY that they’re could be a r>f difference between afterlife and earth but that you think we are taking the absolute highest possibly interpretation of the lore to argue it
And you also say that there is never any implied transcendence between real world and afterlife. But that’s not necessarily true:

Interesting, I was not aware of this tweet. Sadly it's a bit too vague. Would have been better if the author had elaborated on what "higher level universe" means in context, because you can consider afterlife superior in the sense of not having a boundary wall compared to the main world I guess. Similarly what does "human idea world" mean? Seems a bit opposite to R>F, since if the afterlife had viewed the human world as fiction the latter would have been like ideas in comparison to it.

There are also the tons of contradictions from the verse itself. Like afterlife being compared to the original world in size, or stuff like Hiroshi being unable to tell the truth of the original world's history despite standing in the afterlife(which should view the entire history as fiction by virtue of a R>F difference). I think they should be given priority over a vague author tweet that doesn't even confirm a qualitative transcendence by itself.

I was under the impression that the only argument being made for the r>f being metaphorical is the death is fictional stuff, what other argument was there? (Apologies if I have to make you repeat something, I just thought that was it)

Death being fictional, multiple stories existing in a single universe, past being perceived as stories etc. The list goes on.

 

[Naito-desu]

Iirc Word of God is alright only if it doesn't contradict the direct nature of what their story says

 

[AKUTO123]

So that story can't be just one world.

And it contains worlds like Akuto's own one, since he created (or was supposed to create) all stories. He did so by calculating backwards from his original story, i.e. the world of the living.

I would advise

By repeating DT on this subject, I want those who discuss in this discussion to read the cosmology blog first because it will save us a lot of trouble. It is important to understand why characters are in these tiers first. As I said I will respond within 2 days. I'm a little busy right now

 

[Zeitgeist77]

I agree with this change

 

[Ningenron]

done adding cites/References for the quotes.

 

[Catzlaflame]

Interesting, I was not aware of this tweet. Sadly it's a bit too vague. Would have been better if the author had elaborated on what "higher level universe" means in context, because you can consider afterlife superior in the sense of not having a boundary wall compared to the main world I guess.

Ig…. but I think that’s a bit of a stretch… especially since even outside of the lore the author highlights a r>f transcendence, if he meant for it to be just a representation of death being ”not real” I think it would’ve been said in literal terms since he’d be addressing an IRL audience.

Similarly what does "human idea world" mean? Seems a bit opposite to R>F, since if the afterlife had viewed the human world as fiction the latter would have been like ideas in comparison to it.

Not particularly sure, I had assumed it was a language barrier, but what your saying makes sense.

anyway I think the opposition has laid down they’re arguments and most other things mentioned have already been discussed. So let’s just see who the majority agrees with, (and other responses)

- personally Im fine with nuking the high-1A as the stories having finite space addresses the current justification pretty well,

-I’m neutral on anything below high-1B/1-A

darksmash interpretation makes sense but I still think somethings can be interpreted a bit differently.
we should just ask ant to tag a bunch of staff

 

[Ultima_Reality]

Next statement that was interesting to note as it's very rare for authors to explicitly state it, is that time doesn't behave in a continuous way, ie. it is discrete as there is a minimum time interval:

Hah, yeah. That statement is pretty damning. I'm not particularly convinced by the arguments against the virtual reality being an actual 4-dimensional space, but provided the same principle applies to it as well, which I assume it does, it wouldn't really matter either way, since higher-dimensional objects being uncountably infinitely larger than lower-dimensional ones depends on spacetime being a continuum to begin with.

Given that, even if the Afterlife does indeed see the normal universe as fiction, its low-end would be Low 2-C instead of Low 1-C.

A note before I start - in one translation the "hierarchy" between stories was usually referred to with terms such as storification and story density so I'll be using them for easier notation (to understand things easier)

Just to clarify, is the "story density" of those worlds explicitly related to the regress of stories that the two excerpts above mention? I ask because, like others said up there, the whole deal about densities of stories was ditched as a justification for hierarchies years ago. So far, you made a claim that the two are related, but didn't show evidence of that.

And if everything above wasn't enough of an explanation, let's do an easy analogy - claiming the Afterlife to be infinite would be the same as claiming the planet Earth to be infinite because you would arrive at the same point after

Yeah, my stance on that is the same as what DontTalk said up there. Something being finite within a higher reality doesn't mean much if there is an ontological difference between it and something from a lower reality. This is already a standard we apply to verses with similar cosmologies (See: SCP and Umineko), so, your one hope is the stuff about the Afterlife not being ontologically above the universe in the first place, which leads to my question above.

Now, Darksmash pointed out that the text also states the only difference between the normal world and the Afterlife is that the latter has a barrier which makes so space loops at its edges. Which I assume comes from this excerpt:

He moved his left arm.“And what does it mean?” she asked.“If the world we lived in was fictional, then the afterlife is also fictional. I started to think about what differentiated the two worlds and the answer I found was the presence or absence of an external wall,” he explained. “The world of the living had an external wall, but this world does not. No matter which three-dimensional direction you move in, you will return to your starting point. You can continue forever, but the space is finite.”“I understand the concept, but what does it mean?”

And... frankly, I think it's pretty useless as counter-evidence for the Afterlife being on a higher level. It's just saying that the two worlds are different in structure, and nothing beyond that, as far as I see.

 

[DontTalkDT]

I'm gonna get to the rest people replied to my stuff real soon, but let me quickly answer this first.

Hah, yeah. That statement is pretty damning. I'm not particularly convinced by the arguments against the virtual reality being an actual 4-dimensional space, but provided the same principle applies to it as well, which I assume it does, it wouldn't really matter either way, since higher-dimensional objects being uncountably infinitely larger than lower-dimensional ones depends on spacetime being a continuum to begin with.

Given that, even if the Afterlife does indeed see the normal universe as fiction, its low-end would be Low 2-C instead of Low 1-C.

That is basically like in reality plank length / time is a smallest unit of distance/time. A cube that is 1.616255*10^35 planck units in side length is still a 1 m^3 cube. In terms of size there is no difference between one where one can in practice separate it into infinite smaller chunks and one where one can not. You can't exactly claim two otherwise identical infinite spaces are different sizes due to various capacities to divide them.

As you know higher dimensional size is also more so based on measure theory stuff than on the actual layers.

 

[Ultima_Reality]

That is basically like in reality plank length / time is a smallest unit of distance/time. A cube that is 1.616255*10^35 planck units in side length is still a 1 m^3 cube. In terms of size there is no difference between one where one can in practice separate it into infinite smaller chunks and one where one can not. You can't exactly claim two otherwise identical infinite spaces are different sizes due to various capacities to divide them.

As you know higher dimensional size is also more so based on measure theory stuff than on the actual layers.

I wouldn't say that's a good example, since the planck scale being the smallest possible unit of space and time is wrong even in real life. Sure, the geometry of the manifold certainly works differently in scales shorter than the planck length/time, but the rest of the axes is very much still there, and so they cannot be called elementary units in any sense of the word, as far as I am aware. Contrast that to Daimaou, which flat-out states time cannot be subdivided past a certain point.

And I obviously agree to that, but the tiering system works and has always worked in terms of uncountably infinite differences, hence why blowing up uncountably-many universes was seen as a way to qualify for having 5-D AP from the beginning. And those differences only exist in a framework where space is continuous, since this is what allows any object to have uncountably-many cross-sections of itself in the first place.

In terms of a spacetime set, this could be represented by the variable t being able to take on any real value, all of which are used to indicate a single point in the time direction. If the variable is instead constrained to a discrete (i.e countable) set of values, then its scale compared to the former is obviously reduced.

 

[DontTalkDT]

I wouldn't say that's a good example, since the planck scale being the smallest possible unit of space and time is wrong even in real life. Sure, the geometry of the manifold certainly works differently in scales shorter than the planck length/time, but the rest of the axes are very much still there, and so they cannot be called elementary units in any sense of the word, as far as I am aware. Contrast that to Daimaou, which flat-out states time cannot be subdivided past a certain point.

I mean, you can't meaningfully subdivide things below a planck length either. As in, everything below that can't be measured. That's not too dissimilar to what we have here. After all, that distance still exists. You just in practice can't divide it more. An individable line still has a length. Physical undevidability doesn't imply that it mathematically is a single point or anything like that.

And I obviously agree to that, but the tiering system works and has always worked in terms of uncountably infinite differences, hence why blowing up uncountably-many universes was seen as a way to qualify for having 5-D AP from the beginning. And those differences only exist in a framework where space is continuous, since this is what allows any object to have uncountably-many cross-sections of itself in the first place.

Not quite. The uncountably stuff also, or to say mostly, comes from the fact that measures sum up under countable unification, but not under uncountable one. That is still the case. I mean, what you assume is that we should take a (smallest unit x infinite^3)-slice as basically 3D thing, when it is already a 4D object.

Even if we strictly go by physical divisibility, that would then not mean that the timeline isn't an infinite 4D space, but that destroying just the universe just in the present instant in time is insignificantly small 4D. That would then become significantly large once you do that to infinite of those blocks.

In terms of a spacetime set, this could be represented by the variable t being able to take on any real value, all of which are used to indicate a single point in the time direction. If the variable is instead constrained to a discrete (i.e countable) set of values, then its scale compared to the former is obviously reduced.

The time being discrete doesn't mean the line doesn't exist. Like, imagine it spatially. Say you have a stick that is 1 su (smallest unit) high and wide, and 100 su long.

These wouldn't just be 100 infinitesimal points lined up, but instead of 100 undividable blocks of 1 su in length.

In fact, the novel corrects the initial view regarding the smallest unit explaining how time is more so made up of blocks or, more specifically, is actually like a script or piece of text. No surprise as the world is a story. The individable parts are not single infinitesimal points in any case.

“I am not. According to our knowledge, what is time?”

It was an abstract question, but Hiroshi realized it had taken a step toward the core of the issue. To redo the world and avoid that conclusion, he had to understand what time was.

As a student, he had a certain level of education about the physical concept of time, so he gave the textbook answer.

“Time is relative and it can be compared to the space in which an object moves. The higher the speed, the larger the space the object can move through and the more possible phenomena it can encounter, but the object can only move in one direction. In two-dimensional terms, it is like only being able to choose one point on the circumference of an expanding ripple in the water.”

“That is more or less it. A single object cannot exist in multiple places simultaneously, but that rule falls apart here. That is why I was able to travel back in time.”

Bouichirou picked up a branch and drew a line on the ground.

“An object cannot exist in multiple places simultaneously because time actually has a smallest unit. If time – that is, the space you compared it to – can be infinitely divided, the paradox of Achilles and the tortoise can be achieved.”

He made a mark at the center of the line and then another mark at the center of the newly divided line’s right half. Once he had divided it 32 times, the width of the marks was greater than the width of the line portion.

“If these marks represent matter’s smallest unit, this is how it works.”

“I understand that, but how does that relate to being able to travel back in time? In fact, this understanding of time means you can’t transcend it.”

“Exactly. In the water ripple model, the other points on the circumference are nothing but possibilities. In other words, they are what could have happened but did not happen. Even if a single piece of matter returns to the previous point, the rest of the matter is no longer there. However, the world we are so familiar with did not function under the water ripple model.”

He used his foot to erase the line and drew a different line.

“This world is constructed in a way impossible under the laws of theoretical physics. You could say this world is like a recording on a single tape or like a chapter of text. It has linearity.”

He drew multiple squares on the line and the number of squares increased the further right he reached.

“All matter exists simultaneously in these squares and the past remains as the past. You can view the past as a pile of blocks that continues to grow larger. In that case, it is possible to rearrange the blocks.”

Like, in context, the smallest unit of time (well, blocks using the corrected model) we are referring to is something like a word or a sentence.

 

[Darksmash]

And... frankly, I think it's pretty useless as counter-evidence for the Afterlife being on a higher level. It's just saying that the two worlds are different in structure, and nothing beyond that, as far as I see.

I think that quote is still quite significant, because the character was addressing the fact that both the original world and afterlife are fictional and the only difference between them is the presence of a boundary. Never once stating that there is an ontological difference between the two(which is quite a significant difference I must say). And later they list earth, virtual space and the afterlife as "different dimensions".

There is also the fact that it's just a massive stretch in the first place. The novel doesn't even quantify it's R>F difference. We never see the original world as existing some kind of book/dream in the afterlife. We never see them directly manipulating it from the afterlife (quite opposite in fact, since they weren't even able to tell the history of the original world from the afterlife and needed a special device to time travel).

And the only evidence that puts afterlife where it is that I know of is the characters saying that coming back from afterlife can prove that the world is fictional, which has different context that I elaborated on above. And then the multilayered fiction stuff which was referring to normal 4th wall breaking in context:

“A story that’s revealed to be a story. The deus ex machina that appears at just the right moment isn’t there for the sake of catharsis. It has appeared to tell us what it is that we were thinking is a story, and tell us that is fictional. What that god tells us is the pleasure of a story, and its limits. And now, we’ve become the deus ex machina. We ourselves have become the god.” Boichiro pointed to himself, and then back to Brave.

(Volume 13 chapter 3)

 

[DontTalkDT]

Let me split this up into things that are relevant for any characters tier and things that are not.

Things not relevant to any characters tier​

The OP shows that Akuto was basically rebuilding the afterlife for each possibility, and being an isekai doesn't really mean the original world has to exist in it.

The story reflects the reality inside of it. If the story mentions both worlds, then both worlds exist within the story. From the inside a story is truth and reality, not just some fake setting.

Then what was the world? The world was fiction.

But at the same time, the world was an absolute truth from inside that fiction.

From the outside, it was fiction. From the inside, it was truth.

That's how stories in the verse work.

Additionally, I disagree with the interpretation that Akuto created only one world at a time. You can see this section of the explanation blog, which shows how he is initially stated to create multiple ones, or the last thread on the subject.

However, that is actually not relevant to his tier, as creating a multiverse doesn't change the Tier in Tier 1.

Firstly, It's just a very important detail to add. Secondly, it's not just the Main Universe:

I mean, it's not very important because it literally doesn't matter for the power of any character in the verse. Even including the non-virtual alternate dimensions in it, it doesn't matter for the justification of the rankings of any character in the verse.

"Many times" when there is only two statements for the amount of possibilities ? Can you cite these supposed "statements"?

Three:

They could even be seen as existing as infinite parallel worlds.

The space itself was finite and the characters were finite, but the combinations were infinite. Opening up the possibilities was not just a concept.

When the possibilities were infinite, stories instantly became impossible.

I mean, it's also pretty obvious why it's infinite here when seen in context.

Akuto “recalled” a term he did not previously known as if scanning through his brain and retrieving the data.

“I see. It’s a thought experiment where you assume a world where anything is possible and thus say anything logically feasible can happen.”

“Yes. In other words, anything that can be described in text can happen. That also tells us the limits of this world: anything that cannot be described cannot happen.”

Yoshie then began explaining the concept of possible worlds which was difficult to grasp just from the database information.

For example, the two statements “an elephant flew through the sky” and “Hitler visited Paris in the year 2000 AD” were both impossible in reality, but they worked in writing. If elephants were flying creatures and if Hitler had not died, they could occur even in reality. They were true in a world that could have been. In that case, it became clear that near infinite possibilities were contained within the world. They could even be seen as existing as infinite parallel worlds.

“You will create all of those logically possible worlds,” said Yoshie as if giving an order.

We are talking about all logically possible worlds. “Hitler visited Paris in the year 2000 AD” is a possibility and, logically, so would be “Hitler visited Paris in the year 2001 AD”, “Hitler visited Paris in the year 2002 AD”, “Hitler visited Paris in the year 2003 AD”... Context-wise what it has to be here is clear.

As for the translation part, it Doesn't change much other than proving my point further considering it says "Endless" which high likely implies that the Kanji that is in that statement is 無限に/Mugen Ni which sometimes gets translated endless/near infinity. Here some examples for that:

That's speculation and since I don't have the raws in a searchable format I can't confirm. Also, don't forget that a translator tends to take context into account when translating things. Context that you don't get just from a dictionary alone.

1."current afterlife" or not, it Doesn't mean much.

2.the OP already proved that most of the verse is finite.

3.He never created Infinite stories.

Some scans for your claims would be appreciated btw.

There is a long page with all quotes right here.

1. 無数/Musū=/=infinite no matter what.

2. The other translations saying otherwise doesn't means anything considering how the original Text is more valid than them.

1. Infinite number is one of the suggested translations in dictionaries.
2. No, because again, translators don't just translate things word for word but also consider context and stuff. Two good translators, independently, deciding that this should translate to infinite, is a good indicator that this probably should be interpreted as infinite.
3. I don't have the raws in searchable form, so I can't confirm if your claim that that word is used is actually true to begin with.

And it's pretty clear the same Outer Gods that invaded his stories.

No, no it isn't.

Not only that, but there is no proof anywhere that Akuto is "inserting" his avatar or anything of that nature inside these stories so before that argument is even brought up - it is invalid as it's unsupported by anything in the story

So you are saying that Akuto died in the story was literally the same Akuto that afterwards just continued creating stories? Doesn't really work.

Akuto was in Dresden on February 13, 1945. The Allies performed a completely meaningless bombing and he was caught in the firestorm along with Junko. He was badly injured yet did not die, but he had watch helpless as Junko died before his eyes. Afterwards, he lived by standing in the city as a wounded soldier and begging for money from people, but he eventually died of malnutrition. That possibility ended there.

Or he, not as a character or avatar, but physically himself, was supposed to be part of the universes/stories that are in himself?

The space itself was finite and the characters were finite, but the combinations were infinite. Opening up the possibilities was not just a concept. It actually released the walls of the world that supposedly existed within Akuto.

This was similar to further universes being born within him.

Wasn't the reason because the way they did it is not important and definitive enough though?

I don't understand the question on a grammatical level, but let me just post quote relating to that.

He had supposedly eliminated the source of the mana civilization, but the past had not changed.

No, it technically had changed.

“The origin of the mana civilization changed?” asked Hiroshi.

“It is not that the laboratory’s data was salvaged,” answered Bouichirou. “A researcher who was off duty received some data by email and managed to use that to develop mana on his own. That is now the moving tale told in history books.”

Bouichirou gave a thin smile. It looked like a devilish smile yet it also looked kind. Either way, the smile showed he had known this would happen.

That enraged Hiroshi.

“The security should have made it impossible for that researcher to receive the data by email!”

Bouichirou shrugged.

“Yes. I am well aware of that. But no one has any way of knowing that now. That’s how history works.”

“Do you really have to act like the story was fabricated?’

“But it was fabricated. It really was.”

“Really?”

That unexpected statement caused Hiroshi’s eyes to open wide.

“Yes. Only those involved can truly know history. We were not there, so all we can know is the historical information that someone could have forcibly rewritten.”

“That means anything could be made into the truth!” shouted Hiroshi.

“There is no such thing as truth. At least, there isn’t if this world really is a story.”

“Then does relate to the theory of time you explained to me before?”

“Yes. If you change something, something else is inserted at an appropriate point somewhere else. It is changed by someone.”

It was hard to believe, but Bouichirou had no reason to lie as Hiroshi would be able to confirm for himself whether it was true or not.

If that “someone” was the Law of Identity, she was being quite cruel. If her intent was to prevent the world from being changed, she would be sending the world toward destruction. If her intent was to prevent the world from being destroyed, it would be best for her to support Hiroshi’s attempts.

While thinking on that, Hiroshi felt a dark emotion welling up within him.

If he killed someone or changed history in an important and definitive way, it was possible not even the Law of Identity could prevent it. He was reluctant to kill, but it would not be a problem if this truly was the afterlife. (He had no proof it was, though.) He would only be changing the timing in which that person arrived and it made murder feel less definitive. Also, if he could end it all with a single sacrifice…

“By the way, did you ever succeed in killing an important individual?” asked Hiroshi as a challenge.

Bouichirou understood what he meant and gave a strange smile.

However, the two of them did not exchange any more words.

Brave felt utterly defeated.

He had kept count up to the 35th time.

He had killed Akuto more times than that, but nothing had changed. Not a thing.

Bouichirou had stopped hiding his pity partway through and Brave had clearly felt the sympathy of one who had been through the exact same thing.

“You should stop. Surely you know that.”

“I know all too well that someone is maliciously refusing to let me change history,” replied Brave in despair.

“That’s right. For some reason, this flow of events is not allowed to change.”

“But I’m one of the people who caused history to head down that path.”

“Yes. Even your futile struggles to change history are a part of that history. That is how it seems to work.” Bouichirou sighed. “I realized after I died, that my death was already decided.”

“Then I’m doomed to continually suffer in the same way? I have to repeat this unrewarded murder again and again as long as my will remains? And all of it is meaningless?”

Brave asked despite knowing the answer.

“Exactly.” Bouichirou nodded. “That is undoubtedly your role.”

“My role? So I have to work for the sake of someone’s plot? Why?”

“In this world…no, that is not a good way of putting it. In any world, there is no one with free will. Even you are doing this because you desire the result that will satisfy you, but those thoughts are in line with the ‘story’. What is happiness? If your stomach is full and a member of the opposite sex stands beside you, then you are satisfied. Even if that member of the opposite sex dies, the feeling of loss will not last too long. It does not create a gap that cannot be filled by another. Even those who seek out the finest foods despite their full stomach will settle for the food nearby when their stomach grows empty. There is no difference between biological satisfaction and happiness. If it were not for the ‘story’, that is. Many things are given value in a religious way: love, bloodline, success, one’s view of life, etc. But in a purely biological perspective, such things should not be given value. Stories support the human intellect, but they also infect it like a virus.”

“But we managed to resist it. We realized that and we’re trying to destroy the natural story. We know the history reaching this point is unnatural. The characters have realized they live in an artificial story, so the story has grown unstable!”

Brave’s eyes sparkled at this new discovery, but Bouichirou’s expression did not change.

“That is the kind of story this is.”

“What?”

“This is a story of divulging what stories are. The convenient deus ex machina does not exist simply as catharsis. It appears in order to tell us what it is we perceive as a story and to help us believe that the story is fictional. That god tells us of the pleasures and limits of the story. And thus we ourselves have become the deus ex machina.”

Bouichirou pointed at himself and then at Brave.

“We are the deus ex machina?”

“Rewriting history can save one from any problem. Even an unfortunate death or a terrible failure.”

“So…the deus ex machina hasn’t been forbidden. It just will fail?”

“Yes. And that leads to a single conclusion.”

“I get it. We’re not the protagonist.”

Brave was dumbfounded.

“That’s right.” Bouichirou disinterestedly dug into the ground with his foot. “And yet your role as a side character has yet to end. After all, Brave is now your only name and you have not lost that title. Most likely, all you are allowed now is to display bravery once everything has been lost.”

“And yet I’m still a side character, huh? So who’s the protagonist?”

He asked despite knowing the answer.

“That is of course the one who divulged several layers of fiction in the story. Most likely, the ending will come when he brings an end to the story exactly as the story dictates. The role of a demon king is to destroy the world, is it not? If a story does not allow the prince and princess to marry and live happily ever after, it must end with the world ending.”

Tropes such as?

Tropes might not have been the best word.

Akuto is the protagonist of TLOI story and the extra-universal gods introduce elements that attempt to destroy his desires.

“I don’t know.” He shook his head. “But I can say a few things with no real proof. They may both be fictional, but there is a fiction with something outside and there is a fiction with only the inside. And in the latter case, some are the protagonists and some are the background characters. I think whatever we do will be successful…while in this world at least.”

“And yet I’m still a side character, huh? So who’s the protagonist?”

He asked despite knowing the answer.

“That is of course the one who divulged several layers of fiction in the story. Most likely, the ending will come when he brings an end to the story exactly as the story dictates. The role of a demon king is to destroy the world, is it not? If a story does not allow the prince and princess to marry and live happily ever after, it must end with the world ending.”

On the other hand, the stories created by the extra-universal gods were intended to destroy his desires. Also, its outer surface as a story was hidden, so it was shown as if it were the truth. That too was a final shape of a story.

In the story where Akuto is the protagonist that shouldn't be the case.

Or it could refer to unreasonable death.

“But the extra-universal gods brought the story of unreasonable death into me. Its story density should be fairly low.”

Things theoretically relevant to some characters tier​

Doesn't mean much because even the previous version is considered transcendent.

Yes, but reality-fiction levels don't require the levels to be infinite to count as a higher layer.

Well, if you say so. Not like it changes anything since the afterlife is treated as being a reflection of the original world and comparable to it in size. Plus the context of afterlife literally being an escape from the destruction of the original world.

How is any of that a contradiction? A higher layer can look like a lower layer. That doesn't indicate anything. And yeah, the afterlife is an escape from the original world... like, obviously a higher layer wouldn't be destroyed if something that is a fictional story to it gets nuked.

Since it was shown that Akuto doesn't even create his worlds genuinely, he literally just creates the story at the beginning and gives people false memories. Generating false memories of some previous life isn't off the possibilities.

Not sure what you mean with him not creating the worlds genuinely. They are worlds, regardless of how people got their memories. As mentioned further above, stories in the series aren't simply fakes either. From the inside they are just as real as any other world.

And, mind you, if Akuto gave them fake memories there, then it wouldn't be a story of her being reincarnated, but a story of her thinking she was reincarnated. That's a difference that would show in the text of the story, but said text states she was actually reborn. You shouldn't invoke devil's proof here, by asking for evidence that something was part of that story which never was stated to be.

Earth and afterlife are literally treated as seperate dimensions.

Yes... and? Doesn't prevent Akuto from creating a copy of Earth in the Afterlife.

It would still be metaphoric, since even if we assume that the LOI in context is the self insert in the story it would still not be fictional to the guy who was speaking. Plus the "context" never clearly describes the relationship between stories and reality in the verse. Tons of context establishes that it is metaphoric, but nothing implies it's actually some ontological transcendence.

At a certain point in the story people became aware of the fact that their world is fictional. So they know that everything they experience is a story.

Also, the context never clearly describes the relationship? Have you missed the parts where stories are called fiction from the outside and truth from the inside, characters acknowledge they are fictional, and the stories are linked to being dreams of the storyteller? Like, what do you want more? An explanation that dreams can't kill you?

How can someone that is fictional to Akuto write Akuto's story?

He doesn't. He writes a story about ending all stories and then submits it to TLOI.

“No. Well, I suppose you could say it is both. You have recorded the story of the demon king. That means you have properly acknowledged this world and that convincing you is the same as convincing him. Of course, you must also convince me.”

The Law of Identity’s voice was flat as if being mechanically altered.

“You mean we must convince each other that the story has ended?”

“Yes. So show me the records you have made.”

As she insisted, I transmitted the final file – that is, the final volume of my novels – over the internet phone.

She confirmed she had received it and then I waited.

I could say nothing until she did.

As a record, meaning could not be found in it.

It would simply have a forced influence on the story.

At the moment, the “heaviness” was stronger.

“Do you think the virus has infected the mind or the body?”

That was what the Law of Identity said first.

I felt obligated to answer even if I did not understand.

“Isn’t it both? I think the body is infected first, but it is the mind that is controlled.”

After a short silence, she asked another question.

“The truth he needs to learn is that the story has ended and that learning that truth will save the people. Correct?”

It was a strange question. I was not sure what she was attempting to confirm.

“I can’t say for sure, but that is what I thought. He attempted to save the world. No, since the afterlife and the Law of Identity exist, I think he must have believed it could be saved in some way.”

“As you are aware of that much, I will now give you these final words.”

“Okay.”

I waited, but I received only silence as if she were hesitating.

“What is it?”

“Nothing, I will give you those words now,” she said. “You are incarnated and imprisoned here. That is the role of the hero. The world will be saved. Those living there and those who can entrust themselves to the lightness of the story will eventually come to me.”

TLOI made the final decision of whether his result is acceptable.

Also, Hiroshi isn't fictional to Akuto. They are on the same level, aside from Akuto having more control of the Afterlife. While he is in the Afterlife Akuto, who controls the Afterlife, can still involve him into a story of course by transforming the afterlife as a whole.

Akuto called a guest to the space containing the infinite surface. There were few personalities that were not influenced by him and there had only been one person from whom he had been able to receive advice.

Hiroshi was there with a sheepish smile.

“Is this the first time we’ve spoken like this?” asked Hiroshi.

He was not wearing the Brave suit, but he was definitely still Brave.

“We’ve been apart for a very long time,” said Akuto.

“I never really thought about speaking with you as an equal.”

“Perhaps not, but I feel like we both realized this moment was coming.”

“I didn’t come here because you called for me. I chose to transfer to this time and space because I knew this moment was coming. For me it’s been a few months, but has it been millennia for you? Either way, it’s been a while.”

“Sorry about having you come here.”

Akuto smiled and held out a drink.

“This place is like a never-ending plain…or desert.”

Hiroshi looked around.

“I could make it into any form, but I want to produce as few stories as possible.”

“This really is your world.”

“Yes, I suppose it is. What do you want to drink? I hadn’t decided on that yet.”

Akuto spoke casually and Hiroshi peered into the cup to find what had no form beyond being a liquid.

“Water. Carbonated water.”

As soon as Hiroshi said that, the contents of the cup transformed into cold mineral water with bubbles inside.

“I see.”

He drank the water and it refreshingly wet his throat.

“What does it feel like to be able to do anything?” he asked after taking a breath.

“It feels like arriving at the farthest reaches of biological pleasure,” immediately replied Akuto.

Hiroshi smiled a bit.

“I’ve never felt that.”

“No, you wouldn’t have.” Akuto smiled too. “But we stand on the same stage. We’re probably the only ones who haven’t become a concept.”

“A concept?”

“You can’t understand someone’s personality just by looking at them, but now I can truly experience them. Even if other people’s reactions are mechanical in nature, we have no way of determining it. What resides within me right now may be the countless personalities of all existing people.”

4-D Doraemon when?

What's the problem with that? Of course, the pocket would need to be stated to be infinite in size and then someone would need to demonstrate the ability to reality warp that. Beyond that I see no problem, unless its terribly inconsistent. Luckily, in DKD case it isn't.

The quote quite explicitly states they called it 4-D for ***** and giggles just because it was a hard thing for them.

Not to mention said Dimension requires a finite amount of energy to function. and has been shown to be used to BFR/Seal people:

You can affect parts of the dimension with finite any and can seal people in it, so?

And no, it's not stated to be 4D for ***** and giggles. Virtual Phase Space is complicated, so they usually just call it 4D space. But that doesn't mean it is actually not 4D space. Heck, that very same quote confirms that it is infinite in size.

BFRing to a higher dimension? Sounds legit.

I mean, for one BFR to higher dimensions exists and makes sense. However... which part of this is BFR to a higher dimension? Our regular spacetime is 4D. It's BFR from spacetime into other spacetime...

I don't care about what is implied, all I care about is what is shown in the series which is akuto Failing to create them.

We don't rank things by what you care about, though. And no, Akuto is not shown failing to create them. He, at best, is shown to fail to create them in finite time and even that is questionable. I will once again link you to the explanation page, since some things are explained there, but I will also link you to the last thread with long debates about the subject which you can all read. As said, result of the last very recent thread isn't up to debate, as I'm not having that same debate every few weeks.

1. Breaking boundaries? Literally what? Scans Would REALLY be appreciated.

The space itself was finite and the characters were finite, but the combinations were infinite. Opening up the possibilities was not just a concept. It actually released the walls of the world that supposedly existed within Akuto.

2.The OP already disprove the afterlife being anything remotely close to R>F shenanigans.

It doesn't.

Can you post scans instead of theories and assumptions? The OP clearly shows the reason it's called infinite is due to a spatial loop.

Scans for what? Your quote saying the afterlife is finite coming from long before the quote in which Akuto creates an infinite world? For the afterlife being changed countless times in the parts inbetween these quotes?

"This world" was referring to the afterlife:

Pretty sure "this world" in that quote refers to the world they are actually in at that moment in time. If they meant the afterlife, in which they are not, they would probably say "that world".

Ironically, it doesn't even matter, since the afterlife is also a world that is designed to be influenced by the wills of its residents.

The capital had the same peaceful atmosphere as before the war, so it felt like they had travelled a few months back in time. Based on the sunlight, it was still a bit before noon. The difference in time of day helped make her feel dizzy.

Akuto had predicted this, but even he could not remain calm.

“I was right… But it’s still a little surprising.”

“H-how can you just accept this!?”

She lashed out at him both due to surprise and due to not understanding how he had predicted this.

“I have no proof, but I think this reflects our desires,” he answered.

“Our desires? I still do not really understand.”

“I had a feeling the things happening here were related to what you were imagining.”

“It is true everything I was afraid of seemed to happen,” she agreed.

“Yes, and that would explain why we can see without light and why we heard that beast in the forest.”

“Perhaps.”

Junko closed her eyes and focused her mind, but opened them again after a few seconds.

“But are you sure?”

“If this world – this world of the afterlife – does change based on our thoughts, only powerful thoughts must work.”

“I should be able to do that because it is the foundation of magic.”

She produced a mana sphere in her hand and made it rotate.

“That may only work because it’s a familiar action. Given the structure of this world, my thoughts may be the strongest.”

I don't think that's what is meant, but even if it were it would be perfectly in line with current rankings.

1.proof that every layer has stories?

Akuto in the afterlife is still caught in stories.

“I may be the creator here, but I don’t feel like a god. What I can feel is that stories are binding us. Even when I create worlds, I am only free in which story I choose and to what degree I take that story. In the end, I want to destroy that and escape this world.”

“The blonde Keena disappeared when she was satisfied, so you must be satisfied as well.”

“I get that, but what does it mean for me to be satisfied?”

“You live in a fiction yet you hate fiction. You have a natural urge to divulge fictions, so you will do so one after another. You destroyed the system closing us in, but the next system activated. The fiction has multiple layers. It is in an infinite retreat. It’s like a hell that continues on and on forever, so it isn’t an easy thing to deal with.”

Also mentions how fiction has multiple layers and is an infinite retreat.

I believe you know the quote that the world of the living is a story. If not, see tha explanation blog. Of course, TLOI infinite story within story thing is fiction, since that is what it's all about.

The extra-universal gods are already included in that, but they as well are stated to be fictional:

“But when you get down to it, even the extra-universal gods are fictional. They merely cannot distinguish between god, mankind, and ghost. Only once you inform the higher being and create an enclosure within a single universe can you make a clear distinction between the three. That allows you to understand who it is you are inside.”

And that would already be all layers that appear in the story.

Let me also say again that the philosophie is such that human experience is a story:

Let me reiterate: our minds are infected by the virus that we call stories and someone injected that virus into us.

That is why humans commit suicide. They take a reckless action and they die.

But as is standard for parasites, stories also benefit humans.

People cannot perceive time as a sensation. We instead perceive it as a story. Without a perception of time, we would likely have never developed the intelligence we have. Stories are intelligence.

So should we cast aside those stories?

No, we must never do that.

If we do not do that, they will end.

Stories always end. For mankind, that ending is the time of destruction.

And Akuto's whole strugge was about freeing everyone from stories.

“Okay. That means I need to think about how to respond to that higher being,” said Akuto. “I don’t just want to save the beings inside me. I want to save all the beings inside the Law of Identity’s universe. I want to free them from the stories. That is my wish.”

2. The statement comes from Hiroshi who lives in a low story world though. And not sure why Akuto is relevant.

Since you said they attacked the creator I assumed Akuto was talking, but yeah it's actually Hiroshi... which makes me wander why you think they are attacking the creator since Hiroshi isn't the creator of that story (see end of chapter 4 for reference of that).

3.you ignored multiple things from the OP argument such as how those layers shares the same space and time.

Didn't see anything that would suggest that.

4. Wait, you agree that the verse uses "story" and "fiction" in a metaphorical and illusory way? Why do you take some as literal then? Cherry picking much huh.

Language is context-sensitive. If you, for example, expect "world" to always mean the same thing throughout 13 Volumes of a novel you will have a hard time with your reading comprehension.

Which meaning to use when isn't cherry picking but something that's integral for one's ability to understand novels.

In DND you, in particular, have to keep in mind that stories from the outside are fiction and from the inside are truth, so that one has to keep in mind from which perspective is currently spoken. Of course there are methaphors beyond that, like "Stories are a lot like gravity, aren’t they? Doesn’t their weight bind us and lead us to avoid “lightness”?" which obviously doesn't mean that stories are like gravity in a literal sense or that it is their literal weight that literally binds people.

Something being context-sensitive doesn't mean you can arbitrarily choose its meaning.

Ah, good ol turning anti feats to feats.

Cite the scan of her being stated as such.

That required thinking about the Law of Identity.

At face value, that was the undeniable principle that you were yourself.

The fact that you were the person who was thinking your thoughts could not be shaken and that had already been touched on when it came to proving the existence of the world.

But what if the world were someone’s dream?

That answer was also simple.

The world was created by the storyteller known as the Law of Identity.

Then what was the world? The world was fiction.

But at the same time, the world was an absolute truth from inside that fiction.

From the outside, it was fiction. From the inside, it was truth.

What if one tried viewing the world as fictional from the outside perspective?

How did the world come to be?

Rejecting all but the Law of Identity would leave yourself facing the one Law of Identity all alone. That would be one origin. It was possible the one having the dream lived in a world that was itself the dream of someone in another world that was again someone else’s dream, but even if that chain continued back infinitely, one specific origin could be found by facing that one Law of Identity.

That one would be the one who had taken in all existence and all life.

That one would be too lonely to call a god.

They would be a truly solitary individual.

Then what was the world?

All the miscellaneous things added to the Law of Identity would be the world.

Even if the world was fictional to the Law of Identity, that fiction could be life with a will of its own. In fact, it would normally exceed the Law of Identity’s will. And if each individual was free, someone would eventually attempt to learn the truth of the world.

Akuto also stated they are part of the story and was able to freely summon them.

Akuto thought on Bouichirou’s words for a while and then suddenly spoke.

“I’ll summon the extra-universal gods.”

Even Bouichirou looked surprised at that.

“Can you do that?”

“They should have been made a part of the story, too. I’m not sure how much we can understand each other since we don’t share a story, but it should still be possible.”

They are also just fictional and have a "higher power", that being TLOI.

“But when you get down to it, even the extra-universal gods are fictional. They merely cannot distinguish between god, mankind, and ghost. Only once you inform the higher being and create an enclosure within a single universe can you make a clear distinction between the three. That allows you to understand who it is you are inside.”

Akuto thought about Bouichirou’s analysis.

“Okay. That means I need to think about how to respond to that higher being,” said Akuto. “I don’t just want to save the beings inside me. I want to save all the beings inside the Law of Identity’s universe. I want to free them from the stories. That is my wish.”

----------------------------

So, this took me like 3 hours to write, so I will not reply for... well a while. Might wait for Akuto123 or so, before I invest more hours into replying to the replies of this.

 

[Tarang123]

So, this took me like 3 hours to write

How tf did this take you 3 hours to write? How many times were you editing it lol?

 

[DontTalkDT]

How tf did this take you 3 hours to write? How many times were you editing it lol?

Searching all the quotes from the novel and stuff adds a lot.

 

[Tarang123]

Searching all the quotes from the novel and stuff adds a lot.

I suppose...but 3 hours? Damn...that's pretty ridiculous ngl. If I had 3 hours to look for quotes and make evidence, I wouldn't do it unless I was really invested into the topic...

 

[DemonKingAkuto]

So, this took me like 3 hours to writ.

I'm ngl I thought it took you like 7+ hours at first

 

[OnsokunoSonic]

I don't know anything about the verse but I think you guys should check the author's Twitter because he got something like this.

 

[Darksmash]

The story reflects the reality inside of it. If the story mentions both worlds, then both worlds exist within the story. From the inside a story is truth and reality, not just some fake setting.

Only the text that tells the story has to be true. In Daimao time itself is perceived as stories, so the difference between the past and memories is trivial. When Hiroshi asked Akuto to create a low density story for him he later states that the world just came into existence around the time where the story was supposed to start and everyone had false memories of the past. This was also done by rebuilding the afterlife. Clearly if Akuto just needed to create the story and had the ability to create them seperately he had no incentive to reset the afterlife. And if the story contained everything mentioned in the text then the past should have been included.

Hence, being an isekai doesn't mean the other world has to necessarily exist inside it.

Additionally, I disagree with the interpretation that Akuto created only one world at a time. You can see this section of the explanation blog, which shows how he is initially stated to create multiple ones, or the last thread on the subject.

I think an important factor to take into consideration when making sense of this is that multiple stories can exist within the same instance of the universe created by Akuto. Each with their own main characters and stuff. That's what the "chaos" here was talking about.

Yes, but reality-fiction levels don't require the levels to be infinite to count as a higher layer.

Let's not talk about the fact that the difference between two layers is never stated in Daimao and remains vague to the end.

How is any of that a contradiction? A higher layer can look like a lower layer. That doesn't indicate anything. And yeah, the afterlife is an escape from the original world... like, obviously a higher layer wouldn't be destroyed if something that is a fictional story to it gets nuked.

It can look like a lower layer, but that's not the same thing because while it can look like a lower layer the actual scale would obviously be infinitely higher. Instead here they are saying there is absolutely no difference between the two. They don't even mention any ontological difference while literally calling both of them fictional.

Not sure what you mean with him not creating the worlds genuinely. They are worlds, regardless of how people got their memories. As mentioned further above, stories in the series aren't simply fakes either. From the inside they are just as real as any other world.

And, mind you, if Akuto gave them fake memories there, then it wouldn't be a story of her being reincarnated, but a story of her thinking she was reincarnated. That's a difference that would show in the text of the story, but said text states she was actually reborn. You shouldn't invoke devil's proof here, by asking for evidence that something was part of that story which never was stated to be.

I already gave the example of Hiroshi's story above and how time in Daimao is perceived as stories. If the memories of the people state that their current world is an isekai then it would be true even without said world having to necessarily exist.

Yes... and? Doesn't prevent Akuto from creating a copy of Earth in the Afterlife.

??? What

TLOI made the final decision of whether his result is acceptable.

Hmm, alright I will concede this particular point. Although this also counters your argument about the law of identity in the story being some kind of self insert.

At a certain point in the story people became aware of the fact that their world is fictional. So they know that everything they experience is a story.

Also, the context never clearly describes the relationship? Have you missed the parts where stories are called fiction from the outside and truth from the inside, characters acknowledge they are fictional, and the stories are linked to being dreams of the storyteller? Like, what do you want more? An explanation that dreams can't kill you?

Except it said she was a story from Hiroshi's perspective. And this was an argument to show how the usage of stories is metaphoric in the first place.

Also, as far as I am aware the "dreams of the storyteller" thing was a hypothetical vague unelaborated one off thing from Volume 12 and isn't how stories work in Volume 13, where multiple stories with different main characters can exist in the same space. That isn't possible if each story was a different dream on itself.

 

[Fixxed]

DisAgree, with this reason

 

[Darksmash]

I don't know anything about the verse but I think you guys should check the author's Twitter because he got something like this.

It's a bit weird how he says "I think" and "I don't think" when he wrote the novel.

 

[OnsokunoSonic]

It's a bit weird how he says "I think" and "I don't think" when he wrote the novel.

Probably his style of saying things so it doesn't feel too formal.

 

[Urshani]

It's a bit weird how he says "I think" and "I don't think" when he wrote the novel.

maybe he's like me and forgets stuff he writes often

 

[Megaraptor149]

I think this is not a downgrade anymore.

 

[Shyouu]

It's funny how the new attempt of downgrading a strong Japanese series verse is now by copying shit in comicvine. Is this a collaboration or sumshit, lmfao.

 

[Lormac_CC]

It's funny how the new attempt of downgrading a strong Japanese series verse is now by copying shit in comicvine

Don't care if it was copied from comicvine. The OP pointed out things that were acknowledged by those who are knowledgeable on the verse, it is left for supporters to prove them wrong. So saying something shit because it is copied from comicvine isn't to good

 

[Urshani]

Don't care if it was copied from comicvine. The OP pointed out things that were acknowledged by those who are knowledgeable on the verse, it is left for supporters to prove them wrong. So saying something shit because it is copied from comicvine isn't to good

yeah that's genetic fallacy (not u other guy)

 

[Shyouu]

So saying something shit because it is copied from comicvine isn't to good

Nah. I was referring it as "shit" since I don't have the words to refer it to, I didn't meant it as the very definition of shit. But then again I guess I could've refer it to "stuff", but that wasn't even my main point and intention.

The one who's defending the downgrade mainly isn't even the OP himself lol, but someone who's always on the agreeing side when it comes to tier 1 downgrades

 

[Ultima_Reality]

In fact, the novel corrects the initial view regarding the smallest unit explaining how time is more so made up of blocks or, more specifically, is actually like a script or piece of text. No surprise as the world is a story. The individable parts are not single infinitesimal points in any case.

Ah, i see. From what I'm reading, it seems like they're actually correcting the notion that time has a smallest unit (In a physical, internal sense, at least, if you get what I mean) by saying that their universe is not structured like this, with that being what allows them to time travel, yes? If so, I concede on this point.

I think that quote is still quite significant, because the character was addressing the fact that both the original world and afterlife are fictional and the only difference between them is the presence of a boundary. ]Never once stating that there is an ontological difference between the two(which is quite a significant difference I must say). And later they list earth, virtual space and the afterlife as "different dimensions".

It can look like a lower layer, but that's not the same thing because while it can look like a lower layer the actual scale would obviously be infinitely higher. Instead here they are saying there is absolutely no difference between the two. They don't even mention any ontological difference while literally calling both of them fictional.

Which is why I asked about the evidence for story densities and the regress of stories being connected. Since, as far as I've seen, no one properly addressed those two scans, and like I said, even the OP only made a claim without actually substantiating it, in regards to them:

That required thinking about the Law of Identity.
At face value, that was the undeniable principle that you were yourself.
The fact that you were the person who was thinking your thoughts could not be shaken and that had already been touched on when it came to proving the existence of the world.
But what if the world were someone’s dream?
That answer was also simple.
The world was created by the storyteller known as the Law of Identity.
Then what was the world? The world was fiction.
But at the same time, the world was an absolute truth from inside that fiction.
From the outside, it was fiction. From the inside, it was truth.
What if one tried viewing the world as fictional from the outside perspective?
How did the world come to be?
Rejecting all but the Law of Identity would leave yourself facing the one Law of Identity all alone. That would be one origin. It was possible the one having the dream lived in a world that was itself the dream of someone in another world that was again someone else’s dream, but even if that chain continued back infinitely, one specific origin could be found by facing that one Law of Identity.

“You live in a fiction yet you hate fiction. You have a natural urge to divulge fictions, so you will do so one after another. You destroyed the system closing us in, but the next system activated. The fiction has multiple layers. It is in an infinite retreat. It’s like a hell that continues on and on forever, so it isn’t an easy thing to deal with.”

That aside, the Afterlife being a fictional realm could still occur even if it was a layer above the universe, assuming its status as a part of an infinite regress is valid, so that's not counter-evidence of any kind.

The second argument just falls under the already mentioned standards for R-F differences: The scale of a given object in its own layer of reality is irrelevant, and the "scale" of things is itself only greater in the sense that a higher layer would be more real than anything fron a lower one, otherwise, everything can behave exactly as it does in the latter, and there'd be no issue with that. People compare fictional objects to things from the real world all the time, even; that seems to be just what's happening here.

 

[Otonashi]

cool

 

[Otsaka]

I think this is just a conspiracy nothing more

 

[DemonKingAkuto]

I think this is just a conspiracy nothing more

What are you referring to?

 

[DemonKingAkuto]

also why the **** am I still in this thread, I'm probably spoiling a **** ton info for myself since I'm only on act 3

 

[Darksmash]

Which is why I asked about the evidence for story densities and the regress of stories being connected. Since, as far as I've seen, no one properly addressed those two scans, and like I said, even the OP only made a claim without actually substantiating it, in regards to them:

The first dream hierarchy quote was just a hypothetical thing mentioned in Act 12 that wasn't mentioned again in Act 13 as far as I am aware. It's not even known if it had any connection to the multilayered nature of fiction that was mentioned in the 2nd quote, which was just talking about 4th wall breaking in context:

“A story that’s revealed to be a story. The deus ex machina that appears at just the right moment isn’t there for the sake of catharsis. It has appeared to tell us what it is that we were thinking is a story, and tell us that is fictional. What that god tells us is the pleasure of a story, and its limits. And now, we’ve become the deus ex machina. We ourselves have become the god.” Boichiro pointed to himself, and then back to Brave.

(Volume 13 chapter 3)

Basically in context it's talking about a story that's revealed to be a story and breaks the 4th wall, and the characters realising that even if the story is about revealing it's own fictional nature they are still obeying the plot and don't have free will. And above all else we don't even know if afterlife is a higher layer in context of these quotes. Even in the plot it sure doesn't act like one, with Hiroshi being unable to tell changes in history of the original world even after coming to the afterlife(which should supposedly transcend that timeline).

That aside, the Afterlife being a fictional realm could still occur even if it was a layer above the universe, assuming its status as a part of an infinite regress is valid, so that's not counter-evidence of any kind.

The second argument just falls under the already mentioned standards for R-F differences: The scale of a given object in its own layer of reality is irrelevant, and the "scale" of things is itself only greater in the sense that a higher layer would be more real than anything fron a lower one, otherwise, everything can behave exactly as it does in the latter, and there'd be no issue with that. People compare fictional objects to things from the real world all the time, even; that seems to be just what's happening here.

Even going by that logic, they mention both worlds being "fictional" in that same segment, so they are clearly taking their "realness" into account when they say there is no difference between the two. There isn't any reason why they wouldn't mention afterlife being less fictional in comparison to the original world if that were true, especially since in context of that volume they are literally talking about things like fiction and stories.

Also just interested but what do you think about afterlife being 3 dimensional? Because if we accept the 4D virtual space as referring to actual 4D and accept the afterlife as (hypothetically) a higher reality viewing the lower one as fiction where does it all fit?

 

[Ningenron]

I mean, it's not very important because it literally doesn't matter for the power of any character in the verse. Even including the non-virtual alternate dimensions in it, it doesn't matter for the justification of the rankings of any character in the verse.

It would matter if the thread passes.

Three:

The first one is from "Near infinite" statement which I didn't count for obvious reasons. The offical translation of that part of the statement doesn't say the same thing.

But anyways, I'm gonna concede to this cuz them being infinite or not would not affect the downgrade

We are talking about all logically possible worlds. “Hitler visited Paris in the year 2000 AD” is a possibility and, logically, so would be “Hitler visited Paris in the year 2001 AD”, “Hitler visited Paris in the year 2002 AD”, “Hitler visited Paris in the year 2003 AD”... Context-wise what it has to be here is clear.

The OP already showed that he's not creating worlds or anything but just rebuilding the afterlife over and over after each time while inserting fake memories.

That's speculation and since I don't have the raws in a searchable format I can't confirm. Also, don't forget that a translator tends to take context into account when translating things. Context that you don't get just from a dictionary alone.

Well, Neither do I can confirm anything. But again, it doesn't affect the rest of the downgrade.

1. Infinite number is one of the suggested translations in dictionaries.
2. No, because again, translators don't just translate things word for word but also consider context and stuff. Two good translators, independently, deciding that this should translate to infinite, is a good indicator that this probably should be interpreted as infinite.

I mean, the author himself agrees with me.....so?:

3. I don't have the raws in searchable form, so I can't confirm if your claim that that word is used is actually true to begin with.

The raw, the translation. Here you go.

No, no it isn't.

Why so? As far I'm concerned nothing indicates otherwise

So you are saying that Akuto died in the story was literally the same Akuto that afterwards just continued creating stories? Doesn't really work.

Why would it be death in a literal sense? for all we know about the possibilities is just Him basically inserting fake memories.

Or he, not as a character or avatar, but physically himself, was supposed to be part of the universes/stories that are in himself?

Yes, same way he was participating in activities in the afterlife for like three chapters.

I don't understand the question on a grammatical level, but let me just post quote relating to that.

Fair enough.

Tropes might not have been the best word.

Akuto is the protagonist of TLOI story and the extra-universal gods introduce elements that attempt to destroy his desires.

Ah, you meant that.

What's the problem with that? Of course, the pocket would need to be stated to be infinite in size and then someone would need to demonstrate the ability to reality warp that. Beyond that I see no problem, unless its terribly inconsistent. Luckily, in DKD case it isn't

Because it won't make any sense scaling wise if we take it as literal.

Here an example:

higher with the Formless Power (One of the Merlai Elders, who had analyzed and researched the Formless Power for centuries, has stated the Formless Power is far above that of the magic system of The Computer Gods and black magic combined, being able to replace them as the new magic, and may be used as an infinite source of power; its power is said to be equal to that of Awakened Demon Kings, such as Act 12 Akuto, who are able to kill the Computer Gods)

both Formless power and Akuto scales above the computer Gods whom supposedly can "create universes known as virtual alternate dimensions, which are infinitely vast, 4th dimensional spaces"

But the problem is, the feats of the characters that scales above them are subpar and not even remotely comparable. Here some examples:

Formless power is literally just a 20Km wide meteor that failed to even fully wipe the earth:

“A…meteor…” She was clearly confused. “A meteor?” Fujiko peered at the mana screen Yoshie was watching. She had a bad feeling about what she would find. The screen showed a small glowing star visible in the daytime sky. “Meteors aren’t that rare, are they?” asked Yuuko. “This isn’t like normal ones.” Yoshie displayed some data on the mana screen, including a diagram of the meteor’s path.

.

Anyway, the meteor is about twenty kilometers in diameter.”

.

{...} but we have no physical means of dealing with the meteor.”
“Is the Formless Power really that great?”

.

When the giant meteor struck the earth, it created an explosion large enough to penetrate the atmosphere and it tore up the earth’s crust. The shockwave that spread in a ring circled all the way around the planet and blasted upwards on the opposite side like a volcano eruption. Simply put, everything from the surface to a few kilometers up would be utterly destroyed and very few humans lived more than three kilometers above ground.

.

The meteor further approached the earth.

A portion of the fluid on the surface extended toward the earth like a tornado and formed a giant whirlpool on the ocean surface.

Seen from the surface, that was almost certainly the exact scene of destruction Yamato Bouichirou had once seen. In that whirl, he may have seen the forms of alien thought entities.

But the whirl quickly lost all meaning. The meteor itself approached the surface and the earth’s crust was blasted outwards like splashing water.

To Korone, the scene was absolutely silent, but it was not difficult to imagine tens of thousands of people’s screams mixed in with that ripped up crust.


The half sphere explosion caused the planet’s atmosphere to swell outwards and to pulsate as if alive.

A shockwave travelled along the earth’s surface and left at the collision point on the opposite side. After a short delay, a wave of crust and seawater followed.

After that wave passed, that portion of the surface could no longer be seen. Only the boiling ocean surface was visible through the smoke.

.

Due to the meteor, ocean had remained only on a portion of the earth and everything else was covered in brown clumps of rubble.

To make it even worse, it can be repelled by meteor level power:

Akuto took a fighting stance as he asked and Marine instinctually did the same. However, his expression made it clear he did not understand why the boy had done so. “Wasn’t it because that meteor is his goal? I don’t understand why you keep asking about this. If my people’s Formless Power can be controlled using the Branch, I should be able to deal with the meteor.”

Then we got Marine (Ranked as low 2-C on his profile fyi) being disparate Against a missile:

After The One’s somewhat theatrical statement, something happened in the footage on the mana screen. The submarines fired a missile into the air.

“No!” shouted Marine.

He knew what that missile was. Unlike anti-air or anti-surface missiles, the trail of smoke began to stretch high, high into the sky.

“Oh? That is the weapon that was abandoned in ancient times, isn’t it?” asked The One mockingly.

“It is a nuclear missile,” said Marine in despair.

That ballistic missile would rise high into the sky and drop down, so it was difficult to shoot down and could attack from a long distance. The warhead was nuclear, so a direct hit could break through even the mana civilization’s strongest shield.

And Akuto breaking a bunch of walls was Abnormal:

Suddenly an alarm sounded and the side of the ship was destroyed.

Both of their expressions changed to confusion.

After boarding the ship with overwhelming power, Akuto appeared from beyond the broken pieces and smoke.

This normally unthinkable sight left both The One and Marine speechless. Abnormal was the only word to describe this boy who had approached almost before the alarm could sound, broke cleanly through several dozen walls, and then casually walked inside.

“Don’t bother trying to justify your actions,” said Akuto.

Marine with the Formless Power was scared of something as weak as this:

Marine used the Formless Power once more because his body would have been torn apart by the shockwave otherwise.

As proof, the flying ship exploded from the inside.

Marine did not want to think about how great a force it would have taken to accomplish that. A flying battleship like that had armor almost as thick as a tank, but it had burst like a balloon.

we also have everyone (Akuto is included) being so hopeless Against the Meteor.

<So the meteor is the result the people wanted?>

“That’s what it would mean,” said Yoshie in resignation. “And even if it isn’t, we don’t know whether the meteor can be eliminated or not.”

“But…” said Keena. “But if everyone hopes for the meteor to go away, won’t it happen?”

With a serious expression, she brought her hands together as if praying.

Yoshie nodded as if to say she knew that.

“Of course… Of course that’s what I want to happen. But…”

.

We could flee to space, but our resources would not last,” said Korone.

The moon base had been destroyed and the space station had lost almost all functionality.

“Listen. I’ve thought about this as rationally as I could and…well, it would take a while to explain, but the only one to truly survive will be Soga Keena,” said Yoshie.

.

“Yes. Only the demon king can use it, so this will be our plan: the empress, the demon king, the Jewel Branch of Hourai, the Robe of the Fire Rat, the Dragon Neck Jewel, and the Swallow Cowrie will be brought to the old space station in orbit. The empress will be put in cold sleep and the demon king will enter the world of the afterlife once the meteor hits.”

.

Akuto pulled his feet out of the ground, walked over to the Jewel Branch of Hourai, and picked it up.

“What will you do now?” asked Marine.

“It may be hopeless, but I’m still going to try and stop the meteor,” he answered.

.

“The odds of stopping the meteor with our technology are more or less zero, so we will choose the path of survival. The ocean is several thousand meters deep and some areas are sure to escape the destruction.”

.

For a while, Keena had been swinging the Branch like a magic wand, chanting strange spells, and focusing her mind as much as she could, but she could only use as much magic as mana allowed and nothing special happened.

“I understand that, but still.”

“I get what you’re trying to say and I know you don’t like giving up, but we have no physical means of dealing with the meteor.”

So hopeless that they needed to escape to the space:

We now have permission to go through with the plan. The official story is that Soga Keena is escaping to space.”

Yoshie gave that report upon entering the conference room in the Merlai village.

Only Akuto was inside that conference room, the Robe of the Fire Rat sat in front of him, and he was reading the user’s manual.

.

While lifting the capsule, Akuto and Brave ascended the tower and flew into the blue sky. Once they finally broke free of the atmosphere, Akuto preserved mana around them and Brave’s gravitational control propelled them.

After opening the airlock of an abandoned space station, they set down the Swallow Cowrie.

The station was meant for experiments and it only had enough space for a few people to work, but it was enough for the four of them to speak. The earth was visible from one window and the meteor traveling through empty space was visible from the other.

So, yes, it's definitely inconsistent.

You can affect parts of the dimension with finite any and can seal people in it, so?

The fact that finite energy can make a dimension that is "supposedly" infinity to function...?

And no, it's not stated to be 4D for ***** and giggles. Virtual Phase Space is complicated, so they usually just call it 4D space. But that doesn't mean it is actually not 4D space. Heck, that very same quote confirms that it is infinite in size.

The quote literally says they called it 4-D Cuz of muh complex topic so that most people just decided to called it 4D. nothing more nothing less.

It's not really that hard to get.

We don't rank things by what you care about, though. And no, Akuto is not shown failing to create them. He, at best, is shown to fail to create them in finite time and even that is questionable. I will once again link you to the explanation page, since some things are explained there, but I will also link you to the last thread with long debates about the subject which you can all read. As said, result of the last very recent thread isn't up to debate, as I'm not having that same debate every few weeks.

I've read both of them before multiple times in fact.

It doesn't.

Even if it "doesn’t", Darksmash argument still stands.

Also, If Akuto wanted to test his possibilities and Afterlife truly existed on a higher plane of existence, why wouldn't he just test them on the lower plane of existence? Since he supposedly sees that as fiction from afterlife testing out his possibilities on that level of existence would be much more easier and efficient, Instead he was rebuilding the afterlife to test them one by one.

Since you said they attacked the creator I assumed Akuto was talking, but yeah it's actually Hiroshi... which makes me wander why you think they are attacking the creator since Hiroshi isn't the creator of that story (see end of chapter 4 for reference of that).

You said these stories are not on a lesser plane than Akuto, which is wrong considering it's from the lower story world that Akuto created for Hiroshi to end his story.

Didn't see anything that would suggest that.

The time passage being the same between the afterlife and the main world does not suggest that?

“In relationships between men and women, there are some things that can’t be changed by liking or not liking someone. Even after living for thousands of years, you’re still a little boy, aren’t you, Sai Akuto?”

.

It would be too much of a pain to give the exact number, but it has been over a thousand years, Akuto-san.”

the time passage between universe flows the same does not suggest that?

“The concept of ‘cruel’ is only something you feel because you view things through stories. You will simply start over from the beginning. In the next instant, you’ll go to the void universe, and then you will shift to the faceless universe, and then the gravity universe. Though it may take tens of
thousands of years."

Language is context-sensitive. If you, for example, expect "world" to always mean the same thing throughout 13 Volumes of a novel you will have a hard time with your reading comprehension.

Which meaning to use when isn't cherry picking but something that's integral for one's ability to understand novels.

In DND you, in particular, have to keep in mind that stories from the outside are fiction and from the inside are truth, so that one has to keep in mind from which perspective is currently spoken. Of course there are methaphors beyond that, like "Stories are a lot like gravity, aren’t they? Doesn’t their weight bind us and lead us to avoid “lightness”?" which obviously doesn't mean that stories are like gravity in a literal sense or that it is their literal weight that literally binds people.

Something being context-sensitive doesn't mean you can arbitrarily choose its meaning.

Not quite sure what are you saying but sure.

That required thinking about the Law of Identity.

At face value, that was the undeniable principle that you were yourself.

The fact that you were the person who was thinking your thoughts could not be shaken and that had already been touched on when it came to proving the existence of the world.

But what if the world were someone’s dream?

That answer was also simple.

The world was created by the storyteller known as the Law of Identity.

Then what was the world? The world was fiction.

But at the same time, the world was an absolute truth from inside that fiction.

From the outside, it was fiction. From the inside, it was truth.

What if one tried viewing the world as fictional from the outside perspective?

How did the world come to be?

Rejecting all but the Law of Identity would leave yourself facing the one Law of Identity all alone. That would be one origin. It was possible the one having the dream lived in a world that was itself the dream of someone in another world that was again someone else’s dream, but even if that chain continued back infinitely, one specific origin could be found by facing that one Law of Identity.

That one would be the one who had taken in all existence and all life.

That one would be too lonely to call a god.

They would be a truly solitary individual.

Then what was the world?

All the miscellaneous things added to the Law of Identity would be the world.

Even if the world was fictional to the Law of Identity, that fiction could be life with a will of its own. In fact, it would normally exceed the Law of Identity’s will. And if each individual was free, someone would eventually attempt to learn the truth of the world.

I'd rather picking a statement that comes from Act 13 and not one from act 12 from a journal that is just a hypothetical speculation not supported by the Story. Unlike this one:

Akuto whispered to himself as he gathered his thoughts. And then he had a realization, and let out a sharp gasp.“The awfulness felt when you realized that you are you... The Law of Identity!”When he realized this, another voice appeared.“The Faceless Universe allows the Law of Identity to exist.”

Which is supported by WoG itself:

Akuto also stated they are part of the story and was able to freely summon them.

They literally were invading Akuto personal space before that:

“The extra-universal gods are invading even the space where you can act freely, so the actual universe is likely the same. If you obtain true satisfaction and accept death, this space will come to an end. That will cause it all to scatter. Even those of us who were reincarnated here as eternal beings with a role to play will disappear.”

One of the Gods is literally what Akuto becomes later on:

All the souls gathered. Anger, sorrow, jealousy, envy, all of those feelings were spat out, to be left behind in this world. The universe began to contract. Space folded around Akuto, and closed.
“Are you taking me too?” Korone asked, as she was absorbed into Akuto.
“Just like Zero, a personality can affix itself to a liradan and gain a self. You have a self too.”
Akuto smiled. His body began to shrink as well. He was absorbed into Keena too.
Eventually Keena turned inside out, and disappeared into this new world — the anti-universe. All that was left was void was within void. Void without even words. In other words, a new void universe was born.

Hell, even Her will can be exceeded by "Fiction":

Even if the world was fictional to the Law of Identity, that fiction could be life with a will of its own. In fact, it would normally exceed the Law of Identity’s will. And if each individual was free, someone would eventually attempt to learn the truth of the world.

They are also just fictional and have a "higher power", that being TLOI

Above.

 

[Ningenron]

Also, just gonna add some minor miscellaneous.

Formless/Faceless power and the Extra-universal Gods are equal:

The girl named Kei placed a hand on her chin and looked upwards.

“Hmm, but we aren’t the ones to decide if the empress is up to the task. That demon king has the empress on his side, right? Doesn’t that make us enemies of the empress?”

“But only the empress can use the Jewel Branch of Hourai and we need the power that has awoken. That is most likely the only power that can oppose the extra-universal beings.”

“Then it doesn’t matter who the empress is. We just want to use that power, right?”

Kei leaned back in her chair as if sulking and she clasped her hands behind her head

Supported By WoG:

Sub planetary Extra-universal Gods?

Void Body Akuto shouldn't have any kind of NEP Since the Void universe is explicitly said to have "existence":

“The only thing in the Void Universe is existence itself.”