***Major Spoiler*** The ending scene of Through Fiery Trials

Just another bucket of fire-vine oil on The Who-done-it flame is Nahrman’s statement that the REAL Schueler would be spinning in his grave in response to his planned performance that he was about to give a sneak preview of kinda gives the implication that there is a false Schueler involved....

(Personally I’d laugh my arse off if it ended up that Nahrmahn and the IC are about to kick off their plan when Owl says, “Um... a situation has just come up that REALLY needs to be investigated before we do this...”)

OK, OAR has the time span as mere days between Alexandria and Kau-yung's retaliation. The two angel visits are days apart and the scenes with Kau-yung and Shan-wei are between those visits. During the second visit Kau-yung's retaliation hits. RFC could have played around with the time frames, but there was two years between the initial visit in the story and the prior visit recalled by Timothy.

I have to wonder just how much setup Kau-yung engaged in prior to the detonation? I can't imaging not trying to create some sort of preparations in the years leading to that final confrontation. There was 65 years to prepare, after all.

PlaysWithBees wrote:Just another bucket of fire-vine oil on The Who-done-it flame is Nahrman’s statement that the REAL Schueler would be spinning in his grave in response to his planned performance that he was about to give a sneak preview of kinda gives the implication that there is a false Schueler involved....

(Personally I’d laugh my arse off if it ended up that Nahrmahn and the IC are about to kick off their plan when Owl says, “Um... a situation has just come up that REALLY needs to be investigated before we do this...”)

Or worse, they just get done kicking off such a plan and OWL says... “Um...a situation has come up...”

PeterZ wrote:Langehorn did not order the strike, but had to support Chihiro's actions or broaden the rift further amongst the command crew. Had Langehorn ordered the strike, he would never have been comfortable admiting Kau-yung into his presence. Kau-yung and Shan-wei were married and separated only because of their apparent disagreement regarding deviating from the original plan for Safehold. A deviation Langehorn advocated.

A probability: Chichiro deceived Langhorne, claiming that, for example, Pei is preparing some sort of decapitation strike (the "misplaced" nuke fit perfectly into that), and thus Langhorne, despite all reservation, either ordered the Alexandria strike, or at least give Chichiro the authority to do so as precaution.

Afterward the attack, Langhorne grew suspicious about what exactly happens, and asked Kau-Yung to attend the meeting at which neither Chichiro nor Schueller were invited. We knew what happens next.

P.S. Still, there are a point that puzzled me... Someone besides Kau-Yung knew about Nimue PICA. Someone invited to the meeting with Langhorne at the same time. Someone, who Kau-Yung was willing to kill to protect the secret - which means, somebody he did not trust.

Dilandu wrote:P.S. Still, there are a point that puzzled me... Someone besides Kau-Yung knew about Nimue PICA. Someone invited to the meeting with Langhorne at the same time. Someone, who Kau-Yung was willing to kill to protect the secret - which means, somebody he did not trust.

Is this in addition to the programmer who bypassed the time limit on autonomous operation?

Weird Harold wrote:

Dilandu wrote:P.S. Still, there are a point that puzzled me... Someone besides Kau-Yung knew about Nimue PICA. Someone invited to the meeting with Langhorne at the same time. Someone, who Kau-Yung was willing to kill to protect the secret - which means, somebody he did not trust.

Is this in addition to the programmer who bypassed the time limit on autonomous operation?

Proctor died in Alexandria - he was noted among the Fallen Archangels (he wouldnt be among them, if he perished in Kau-Yung strike). So, commodore clearly meant somebody else... and why exactly he decided to mention this person specifically to Nimue?

Dilandu wrote:

PeterZ wrote:Langehorn did not order the strike, but had to support Chihiro's actions or broaden the rift further amongst the command crew. Had Langehorn ordered the strike, he would never have been comfortable admiting Kau-yung into his presence. Kau-yung and Shan-wei were married and separated only because of their apparent disagreement regarding deviating from the original plan for Safehold. A deviation Langehorn advocated.

A probability: Chichiro deceived Langhorne, claiming that, for example, Pei is preparing some sort of decapitation strike (the "misplaced" nuke fit perfectly into that), and thus Langhorne, despite all reservation, either ordered the Alexandria strike, or at least give Chichiro the authority to do so as precaution.

Afterward the attack, Langhorne grew suspicious about what exactly happens, and asked Kau-Yung to attend the meeting at which neither Chichiro nor Schueller were invited. We knew what happens next.

P.S. Still, there are a point that puzzled me... Someone besides Kau-Yung knew about Nimue PICA. Someone invited to the meeting with Langhorne at the same time. Someone, who Kau-Yung was willing to kill to protect the secret - which means, somebody he did not trust.

I can see something like that very easily.

Now if this is true or something similar and visitation is from Schueler, then what's under the Temple was set up by Chihiro or whoever prevented Schueler from coming clean earlier. Whatever is there hasn't given any sort of timeline for awakening. That means there is some sort of trigger to activate it all. Is that trigger electricity or some confluence of events indicating sufficient drift within the Temple from Chihiro's version of the plan.

This is too aggressive for the IC and I'm pretty sure that it violates their rule about not performing miracles.

Also that scene from OAR that people are discussing? I think that that scene and this scene take place in the same church.

SCC wrote:This is too aggressive for the IC and I'm pretty sure that it violates their rule about not performing miracles.

Also that scene from OAR that people are discussing? I think that that scene and this scene take place in the same church.

I have been thinking about this chapter for the last 2 days. There are two possibilities: it is Operation Androcles or it is Schueler. If it is the first, I agree with you that it certainly looks like it would be violating the rule of not performing miracles (though, IIRC, the original statement was by Merlin who declined to be a new Archangel). In this case, I suspect that the Testimony will have a lot of detail from before the bombardment of the Alexandria Enclave and will be short on Schueler's activities during the War of the Fallen. There might be a change of tone from enthusiasm at the beginning to disillusion at the end.

If it is Schueler, it could be anything. For example, it could be an AI activated easter egg (probably activated by the enormous spike in the number of victims of the Punishment - this assumes that the Inquisition was updating its records regularly). Or a Schueler download activated on God's day in YoG 905 and had spent months looking over the situation and has decided to throw in the towel.

SCC wrote:This is too aggressive for the IC and I'm pretty sure that it violates their rule about not performing miracles.

Also that scene from OAR that people are discussing? I think that that scene and this scene take place in the same church.

hmmm - IRC - I thought that the angel scene took place in LakeView which is on the south west coast of the Lake. the Schuller bishopric is on the south east coast of the Lake... but I could be wrong on this!