Analysis of All-Terrain Vehicle Market Size by Research Nester Reveals the Market to Grow with a CAGR of ~5.70% During 2023-2035 and Attain ~USD 10.46 Billion by 2035
Research Nester assesses the growth and market size of global all-terrain vehicle market which is anticipated to be on account of the growing importance of ATVs in agriculture sector, and growing popularity of outdoor activities.
New York – April 13, 2023- Research Nester’s recent market research analysis on “Market: Global Demand Analysis & Opportunity Outlook 2035” delivers a detailed competitors analysis and a detailed overview of the global all-terrain vehicle market in terms of market segmentation by application, engine, fuel type, and by region.
Growing Collaborations for the Development of Off-Roading Vehicles to Promote Global Market Share of All-Terrain Vehicle
The global all-terrain vehicle market is estimated to grow majorly on account of the increasing collaborations, and investment by the key manufacturers for the research and development of off-roading vehicles• Increased Manufacturer Investment and Collaboration in All-Terrain Vehicles- Manufacturers have increased their collaboration and investment in off-road vehicle research and development. Polaris Inc. established a 10-year agreement with Zero Motorcycles for off-road vehicles and snowmobiles in 2020. The collaboration between the firms to produce new off-road vehicles with electric alternatives is raising public awareness about the options available. As a result, market growth is expected to accelerate in the approaching years.
Moreover, an increasing use of all-terrain vehicles in military applications is further anticipated to boost the growth of the market. The army can be deployed in remote areas thanks to the all-terrain vehicle's mobility. They are designed for various weather and terrain conditions, increasing demand among army personnel. As a result, it is expected to drive the expansion of the all-terrain vehicle market by the end of 2035. The Indian Ministry of Defense recently requested a proposal for the procurement of 250 ATVs under emergency procurement in 2022.
Some of the major growth factors and challenges that are associated with the growth of the global all-terrain vehicle market are:
Growth Drivers:
· Surging Number of People Participating in Professional Sports
· Surge in the Growth of the Tourism Industry
Challenges:
One of the primary factors predicted to impede market growth of the global all-terrain vehicle during the forecast period is the growing worry about passenger safety. The increased speed of off-road vehicles is increasing the number of accidents. Furthermore, these vehicles are not designed to transport passengers because doing so may endanger the person's life. Moreover, high initial and maintenance cost of these vehicles are also expected to contributing to the restrain of the global all-terrain vehicle market.
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By application, the global all-terrain vehicle market is segmented into mountaineering, military, agriculture, and others. The agriculture segment is to garner a highest revenue by the end of 2035 by growing at a significant CAGR over the forecast period. These vehicles' small footprints, which do not impact agricultural areas, as well as their speed, making them suitable for agricultural work. ATVs are used in agriculture for a variety of tasks such as livestock management, weed removal, field ploughing, and others. Furthermore, ATVs make it simple to perform agricultural activities in desert areas. As a result, all of these factors are projected to boost the expansion of the agriculture segment in the market. According to projections, more than 35% of the world's food, including half of its cattle, were produced in arid places by 2021.
By region, the North America all-terrain vehicle market is to generate the highest revenue by the end of 2035. The presence of prominent all-terrain vehicle manufacturers in the region has contributed significantly to the market's growth. Furthermore, due to various factors such as upcoming electric vehicle projects and research and development on new and sophisticated technologies, the region has seen an increase in the adoption of all-terrain vehicles. Furthermore, people's increasing disposable income is increasing their investment in entertainment sectors such as off-roading and events. Various parks in the North American region use all-terrain vehicles to attract tourists. As a result, these factors are expected to boost the region's market growth. In 2020, more than 1 million people in the United States possessed ATVs, according to research.
This report also provides the existing competitive scenario of some of the key players of the global all-terrain vehicle market which includes company profiling of Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd., BRP, Kawasaki Heavy Industries. Ltd., KWANG YANG MOTOR CO., LTD., HISUN, KUBOTA Corporation, ZHEJIANG CFMOTO POWER CO., LTD, Polaris Inc., Textron Inc., and others.
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There are allergies that I bet none of you have heard of. A few seem common, like nuts or eggs, but other allergies, like water, you wouldn't expect to be possible. Right? And even if it were, how would anyone survive with that type of curse? It is real, and it's called aquagenic urticaria. There are only 50 medical instances known to science, and most of the people who have it have lived longer than you would expect. I'm not one of these people, but I have a condition far rarer. It is called Solisphobia pronusirrita. It is a condition, and I am the only documented human to have ever had it. When I was born, my mum told me that the moment the doctors put me in the nursery, the sun rays from the window hit my skin, and I immediately started to bawl my eyes out like I was about to die. While I was screaming, the doctors came and saw that my skin, where the sun had been exposed, was turning a light purple and grey. Immediately, they took me into a more closed area, and they diagnosed me with Xeroderma pigmentosum. It is a condition where you are irritated by sunlight. Not like what I have, more like you get sunburnt really easily. After around 3 days in the nursery, I was taken home with my loving mum and dad. As a baby, they said I was more silent than they expected. I only made noise when I needed something or had to go to the bathroom. They recounted my only experience as a baby when I cried, and that was when I accidentally went outside because they forgot to shut the baby gate. When I made it outside, they said they heard the most high-pitched, ear-piercing wail they had ever heard. When they rushed out, they found me on the ground covered in splotches of purple and grey. They immediately dialled 911, and I was rushed to the emergency room. When the doctor saw what had happened, he started to explain the severity of my condition. He said that with Xeroderma pigmentosum, some babies experience intense sunburns, and I was likely going to have to be treated with mild burns. When they took a closer look, however, they noticed I had no burns; my skin colour had just been altered. Obviously, this was nothing like they had seen before, so they started to document my state in case I had a new, undiscovered condition that needed to be documented for studies later on. When I was being treated, the doctor noted that the disease was hereditary. However, my dad quickly pointed out that nobody in either of our families had this condition. The doctor was obviously stunned and thought I had a new condition. After 3 days of treatment, they diagnosed me. I was allergic to sunlight. My parents immediately fought against this, stating that it simply could not be possible. They thought allergies were only related to pets or food. But the doctor calmed them down and explained to them what it was. "Your son does not have Xeroderma pigmentosum; it's purely hereditary, and he isn't showing any symptoms." What we have decided on is that your sun has an extremely severe skin sensitivity to sunlight. Xeroderma pigmentosum doesn't just apply to the sun; very bright and powerful light can have the same effect, even in cold environments. My parents were devastated. They had to take a break and leave the room while more tests were held to see what was truly wrong with me. Finally, after a full week, I was back home with mum and dad. I was around 2 by this point and had started to walk. The next three years were very uneventful for me. The only notable thing that happened was that my dog died. We held a small funeral for him and buried him in the backyard. I was 4 at the time and can vaguely remember choking on my tears as I sat inside and heard the shovel scraping against the soil and rock that became my best friend's tomb. I didn't go to preschool. My parents decided it was too dangerous, and the only preschool I could go to was around a 15-minute drive away. The school was much closer, however, so my parents thought it'd be safer and decided to let me go. They told me that they had a heavy argument over homeschooling but eventually agreed that if any incidents happened, I would be taken out of school and put in a damp room to be taught my ABCs by my own mum. On my first day, I sat in the room. My condition was only known by the teachers, and they made sure I stayed indoors away from any open windows on a sunny day. By the time the day was over, I felt upset already. I wanted to go outside and play; I wanted to have fun. Unfortunately, the choice of death or a few minutes of fun was completely different, so I managed to get over it after a few weeks. That's when the first incident happened, however. I was in my class when the teacher left, and out of curiosity, I followed her. Immediately, I felt a tingling on my arm, and then the numbness started to overflow my senses. I felt nothing at all as my arm started to turn a concrete grey, and I immediately ran into the room, crying as I rubbed my arm. The only thing I could feel was a slight tingle and an almost icey coldness from my touch. After around 30 seconds, the teacher came in and saw my arm. She let out an audible gasp, but before she could do much, the bell went off. She couldn't get me out of the room because of the sun, so she called a nurse. As the kids flocked in, they saw my condition and started laughing. I still remember the high-pitched voices squabbling among themselves. One of them came forwards, pointed at me, and said, "HE'S A VAMPIRE GUYS, GET AWAY." And everyone in the room sort of stepped back and kind of ran out of the class, either laughing, screaming, or even crying. That was the day the bullying started. I was eventually shielded with some loose blankets and taken home. I was crying in the car as I overheard mum and dad say, "We have to take him out of that fucking school. It must be hell for the little guy to be forced to stay inside and do nothing." My mum piped up and said, "Maybe we should give it one more chance. Hopefully it won't happen again. Please, Danny, he needs an education!" My dad sighed and pondered for a minute before replying: "Fine, 1 more chance. If it happens again, we will take him out of that school. I felt ecstatic as my dad said that I had another chance. However, I wasn't aware of the amount of harassment and bullying that was to come later down the line. After a week, I came back to school. I had been given an umbrella to walk around with in the sun. Sometimes small rays would hit my finger and it would sort of burn for a second before it faded, but apart from that, I had no issues. When I made it to class, I pulled my umbrella down and rested it on my leg. Instantly, one of the kids behind me picked it up and said loud enough for everybody to hear: "I didn't know vampires needed umbrellas; I thought they just lived in coffins." Everyone started to laugh as I cried. This went on for 8 years, until I was 14. The bullying had only gone as far as verbal harassment until I got to high school. I got lots of judgemental and even fearful looks as I walked around with the umbrella. It didn't take long till people called me a vampire or concrete, and it was devastating. I thought I would finally fit in at high school, only to be tormented on a daily basis and feel ashamed of my own body. After two weeks, my mind started going to dark places. I felt worthless and miserable, as if it were my own fault for being who I am. When I got home after another terrible day of harassment, I felt the urge to harm myself. I didn't attempt to fight it as I lined myself up at the window. When my arm reached into the piercing rays of light, my body tensed, and I felt anxious. The pain was mild at first but quickly started to elevate as I started to sweat intensely. After around 30 seconds, I pulled my arm away and saw that the part of it that was affected was almost black. I started to cry as the horrific sight stared back at me. Then panic set in as I realised the colour wasn't fading like before. In a panic, I got the biggest hoodie I could find and put it on. The pain stayed mild, like a buzz. It was the same feeling as a small needle going into your body over and over, constantly. When mum called for me to come to dinner, I started to panic even harder. How was I going to hide any of this?" I thought as I creeped down the stairs. Every squeal and creak of the wood made me more anxious as I was greeted with the smell of freshly cooked meat. When I sat on my chair, my mum noticed my expression and said, "Everything okay, hun?" Out of panic, she would find out, and I almost immediately replied, "Yeah, Mum, just school being stressful, y'know?" She nodded her head, and as we ate, I started to feel at peace. Maybe they wouldn't find out, and the marks would eventually go away. While I was eating my food, I went to reach for my glass of water, and I knocked my fork onto the ground. On instinct, I reached down and grabbed it. When I sat back up, my sleeve rolled down, revealing the mark. Immediately, my dad said, "James, What is that on your arm?" His tone was extremely threatening. I started to cry, and my mum forcefully grabbed my sleeve and rolled it up, revealing the mark. "NO STOP!" I screamed with tears in my eyes. "What is this, James?" WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT ON YOUR ARM?" It's a burn from the sun. "HOW DID YOU GET IT?" My mom's shrill screams made me sob louder as I choked out the answer: "I did it on purpose." My mum started to tear up as I ran to my room. That night, mum and dad argued. "IF JAMES IS GOING TO FUCKING BURN HIMSELF, WE HAVE TO TAKE HIM TO THERAPY!" My mum screamed. The walls made it muffled. "WHAT IS THAT GOING TO DO?" my father yelled back. "All that will do is make him feel like it's his fault for how people treat him." When I finally faded off to sleep, I had a nightmare about me stepping into the sun and fading to nothing but a shadow. When I woke up, Dad was gone, Mum had massive black bags under her eyes, and she was smoking at the dinner table while she was on the phone. "Danny left. He's at his mom's right now. James has been having a rough time." My mum choked on her tears. I went back up to my room as quietly as possible. I started to get ready for school. It took everything I had not to cry as I walked downstairs. My black scar was still there. I sighed in anxiety as I grabbed my umbrella and walked outside. I felt small tingles as small rays of sunshine hit me, but I ignored the pain as I walked to school. When I arrived, the usual fuckface that tormented me was out front. His name was Brayden. He immediately shoved me and noticed the scar. "What the fuck is that?" He grabbed my arm tightly as he investigated it. "You're a fucking freak, James. How do you even come to this school? I don't get it" Rage pitted in my stomach and mind as I shoved him. "Fuck you," I replied back in anger. "Oh, you want to go?" He put his fists up. I sighed; I didn't even care anymore. Life wasn't getting any better. Punches started getting thrown. I was hitting him hard, but he hit harder, and I started to feel dizzy. Like a sombre scene, rain started to pour as we fought. He managed to pin me on the ground and was pummelling me. As a last resort, I felt for a loose rock and found one. As the hard surface hit his head, I heard the sound of squishing and cracking. He fell off me unconscious, and when I got up, I noticed blood on my clothes. The rain has started to pour now. When I got up, I saw that there was a massive crack in his head. His eyes were open, but he wasn't breathing. I ran so fast that I felt my legs literally melting. As I finally turned a corner, I started to cry. The crying audibly stopped as I looked at my arm. The scar was gone, but the thing that had me in shock was that there were small droplets of rain with a black shade. The scar had been washed off. I didn't shower that morning or that night, so it had not been washed off. I stared at the sight and started to cry. What was happening anymore? I saw a massive semi come barrelling down the road in front of me, and that was when I made the life-changing decision to cut things short. I hoped I would reincarnate as something beautiful and live a normal life as I ran in front of it. The last thing I remembered I woke up in a white hospital bed. The lack of colour almost reminded me of heaven until I saw the doctors. The IV drips and my mum and dad crying next to me I couldn't speak; all I could do was sit there, barely able to see. I remember blacking out again. This time, I saw some things. I saw a bright light, and I remember feeling the same pain as the sunlight hitting my flesh. The smell of sulphur and heat filled my nostrils with a sour feeling. Then, out of nowhere, I blinked, and I was in front of this light. The smell and feeling were so intense that I started screaming, but no sound came out. The pain started to amplify as I moved closer, unwillingly. I heard a voice boom out of nowhere, spooking me. "You are my only weakness." It took me a minute to realise what was happening, but I figured it out. The light was speaking. "You are my only weakness," it repeated. This "entity" was speaking to me. I could understand it. "W-What are you?" I replied back. "I am sün. I am a god, which you all bow to. I provide your land with light in return for a host. I was so confused. None of this is real. The sun wasn't actually alive, right? "What do you need from me?" I replied shakingly. This entity replied back. "I want you to agree not to interfere with me in exchange for your curse being lifted." I sort of zoned out as it spoke like it was hypnosis. I snapped back, however. "Anything.. please! I want my life to be normal. I don't know what I've done to you, but I won't do anything, I swear." This all felt like a bad trip on acid; I didn't believe this was real for a second. This entity made the sound of someone going "mmm," and it said, "I agree. You will be healed when you wake up. Your curse will be lifted. These are the only words a mortal has spoken to me and is likely going to speak to me for eternity." A flash of light then flickered as I awoke. My parents noticed me waking up and immediately hugged me. "He's awake. My James is awake." They sounded much less happy, but I could tell they were holding in emotions. It's been 10 years since that day. I do not suffer from that "condition" anymore. I can be in the sun, but I still feel uncomfortable under the rays of that entity. I was sent to prison for the self-defence man slaughter of Brayden for six years. I don't know what life is anymore. Every day I ponder about that experience. The doctors said my condition must have been either cured or immunised. I don't know where to go at this point. I can't even say anything about it either. Whenever I try to tell someone, I feel my body tense and feel the sting of sunlight. That scar I had is still discoloured. It's not black, but that area of skin is much darker than the rest. Not all allergies are natural. Some are curses provided by higher forces that do not want to be recognised.

I recently purchased this warranty for my vehicle, and I thought it would be helpful to share my thoughts and insights with you all.
Firstly, let me give you a brief overview of what an extended car warranty is for those who may be unfamiliar. An extended car warranty is a service contract that provides coverage for certain repairs and replacements beyond the manufacturer's original warranty period. It can be a valuable investment, especially for older vehicles or those with high mileage.
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2. Affordable Pricing: One of the main reasons I chose it was their competitive pricing. Compared to other providers I looked into, their rates were quite reasonable, especially considering the level of coverage they offer. Additionally, they provided flexible payment options that made it easier for me to manage the cost.
3. Claim Process: I had a positive experience with NobleQuote's claim process. When I encountered an issue with my vehicle, I contacted their customer service, and they guided me through the steps to file a claim. They were responsive, efficient, and made sure I had all the necessary documentation. Once the claim was approved, the payment process was hassle-free, and the repairs were promptly taken care of.
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Overall, my experience with their Extended Car Warranty has been positive. Their coverage options, affordable pricing, efficient claim process, extensive repair network, and additional benefits make them a reputable choice in the market. However, it's important to note that individual experiences may vary, and it's crucial to thoroughly research and understand the terms and conditions before making a decision.
I hope this review helps those of you who are considering an extended car warranty. If you have any questions or if you've had experiences with NobleQuote, please feel free to share in the comments below!

Here's the second part of Act IV. Sorry for the double post but I had no choice due to the website's limitations.
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Act IV: The Clouds Burst (2/2)

To the Panic room
Frightened by the new attack, Biosyn's board of directors leave the auditorium and, guided by their escort, they head for the panic room. Meanwhile, the employees finally manage to rush out of the burning cafetaria and while some surrender to the Italians and the Austrians, others rush to the metro station or the garages in order to flee to the Biosyn village, and a fraction try to make a run for the panic room but their way is blocked by a group of guards.
On their way to the panic room, the board of directors is partly caught in a stampeding crowd. Zoe Murdoch is pushed on the ground, trampled and left behind while Nathan Quinn abandons his fellow board members.
The wage of treachery
While she also started heading to the garages, knowing that Dodgson must be there, Bigelow is attacked by Massoud. They fight but despite her skills, Massoud is a stronger opponent and he overpower Bigelow. But just as he is strangling her, the grey guard is tased by Kayla and falls unconscious. The smuggler helps the CIA agent get up and they hurry to the garages.
The raiders
Meanwhile, the mysterious soldiers have reached the laboratories, killing everyone in their path, be they Biosyn guards and mercenaries, scientists who tried to save their work, or besiegers (including Luis Olivares).
They cross the different labs. In Dr Lesser's, Wu hides from them as he is still locked up. The raiders ends up reaching their objective: The locusts' lab. When they see the nine empty rooms, the raiders seem worried and frustrated, implying they came to do something with the locusts. They then has the remaining group gassed and we see the locusts taking flight and then starting to drop dead on the floor. While some of the raiders then raid and destroy the rest of the Locusts' lab, other squad members then free the animals contained in the cages of another lab.
In the lower levels
While crawling and climbing in the vents towards the top of the Citadel, Claire sees Owen running past her as he rushes to the kennels. But the alarms' blare prevent The Raptor Whisperer from hearing his fiancée.
In the lower levels, Mia Everett is trying to capture Victoria, intending to save her from the chaos and Biosyn's clutches, but the young Achillobator attack her, biting and clawing at her throat. Grievously injured, the scientist fall and Victoria lets her bleeds to death. When Owen finds Mia, she just has the time of uttering a few words before passing away. The Raptor Whisperer sees a number of animals running in the hallways, including Victoria. But just as he plans to catch her, Biosyn employees are being chased by some of the most dangerous escapees (like the dilophosaurs). Some of those animals prevent The Raptor Whisperer from going after Victoria and he is forced to hide in the first room he can find.
Tu quoque mi fili
On their way to the garages, Ramsay and Dodgson have an argument, during which the first say he no longer want to follow the second due to his recent fits of madness (filling Maisie's head with lies; the locusts' threats; literally declaring war with the Italians and the Austrians; behaving like a dictator...), even though he believed in his vision when he was recruited years ago (Ramsay genuinely believed that Biosyn's breakthroughs could improve the world etc...). When Ramsay admits having helped Wu with discovering the truth about Charlotte's videos and breaking Maisie out of the Citadel, Dodgson seems genuinely hurt by the betrayal of his son-like figure. One too many, after those of Wu, Drummond, and Pellegrino. Their argument worsens, up until they come to blows. At one point Dodgson pulls out a pistol and shoots Ramsay in the belly by accident. While the younger man bleeds out, the CEO is dazed and runs away while predators' growls can be heard nearby.
Near the garages' entrance, Dodgson is found by Bigelow and Kayla. The CIA agent asks about Ramsay and he answers that he didn't make it due to an attack on the way. The three take the last available vehicle and exits the Citadel, driving into the valley. Their objective is the same mountain path towards which Maisie and Drummond are heading.
Duel
On the way to the courtyard, one of the mysterious soldiers has a sword fight with a grey guard (Cesare oand Papadopoulos). During it, his opponent tear a part of his sleeve, revealing a tattoo which depicts a snake hieroglyph (actually a symbol of the god Apep). The soldier manage to climb aboard their helicopter, which take off and leave the valley with one of the attack helicopters. Confused, the grey guard wonder who those attackers were.
The dam busters
Meanwhile, the other has moved to the other end of the valley, where it's in the middle of a fight with one of the Special Forces' helicopters, just by the dam. During their battle, the dilapidated dam is destroyed and its unleashed frozen waters follow the valley's main river, flooding everything in their path, including the battlefield on the road and the area just in front of the Citadel. A number of animals, Carabinieri and Biosyn employees aboard a fleeing vehicle are carried away and many of them drown while Dodgson's vehicle is almost caught by the waters.
The flood reaches the south-eastern limits of Biosyn's lands, where it's momentarily stopped by the wall found there and which separates the Sanctuary from the nearest village. But under so much pressure, the wall breaks down and the flood continues, destroying parts of a riverside village after that, catching some of the inhabitants.
With its main power source gone, the electricity goes off within Biosyn's lands and the surrounding areas, deactivating the invisible fences and stopping the metro full of passengers in the middle of the tunnels.
Road accident
While in the part of the valley spared by the flood, Dodgson's vehicle nearly collide with a loose black billy goat (the same which ran away in the prologue) and in its attempt to bypass it, it tumble down a slope (with Bigelow being ejected in the bushes in the process) and ends up on its roof (like the vehicle carrying the original trio and Maisie in Trevorrow's version).
Aftermath
The attackers gone and most of Biosyn troops neutralized or routing, Vuillier, Dougal, Nyamu, Viscontini, and the surviving grey guards, the officers of the Carabinieri and the Special Forces, along with Pellegrino and Nathan Quinn starts organizing the evacuation of the remaining Biosyn employees and taking the wounded (as the grey guards' medic, Papadopoulos will tend to them) to a provisional secure location within the Citadel (the auditorium could be such a place). In the control room, all the technicians but a few were killed or badly injured by the helicopter's attack while the grey guard's team dispatched there is in a hardly better state as Isabella Perez was also injured. Al-Damiri orders their comrade to take her out of the tower, and give similar orders to the uninjured technicians, asking only one to stay just in case. The Egyptian grey guard and the remaining technician then assess the damage.
As power need to be put back on for various purposes (allowing the three grey guards continue their search in the archives; deactivating the valley "aerial defense" to let helicopters come in the Citadel and evacuate people; reactivating the metro; reactivating the invisible fences to prevent the animals from leaving the valley...), people are sent activating the emergency generators.
They want to send men after Dodgson's but while the valley's known exits are watched, they fear he knows a secret one.
Dodgson's demise
When Bigelow awakes amidst the bushes, she notices that the vehicle is surrounded by a group of Nasutoceratops (or some other buffalo-sized herbivores). Inside the crashed vehicle, Dodgson and Kayla regain consciousness and know they have to wait for the herbivores to leave before exiting the vehicle. Suddenly, the herbivores get agitated and leave. They caught the scent of a predator and the latter shows itself: It's the InGen-bred Acrocanthosaurus.
Ensue a scene where Dodgson, just like his novel version with Sarah Harding, tries to save his own skin by pushing Kayla from the vehicle so the Acro can eat her instead of him, deeming her expendable, but the opposite happens. When the CEO is shaken between the jaws, his precious hard-drive falls on the ground and Bigelow sees this and tries to reach it before it's crushed by the animal. Kayla tries to hold the CIA agent back, saying she'll get herself killed and that the hard-drive isn't worth it. Bigelow rushes towards her objective anyway. When it takes a still screaming Dodgson in the woods, the acro steps on the hard-drive, destroying it.
The black billy goat responsible for the road accident watches Dodgson being devoured by the dinosaur.
Meanwhile, a depressed Bigelow is looking at the destroyed hard-drive and Kayla is forced to shake her so they can move away and head for the mountains in order to leave the valley.
Drummond's confession
Walking above the surface and not in the tunnels in order to not reiterate the traumatizing experience with the pectinodons even if it's equally dangerous due to the other valley's predators, Drummond and Maisie are heading eastward, following the peripheral rim of mountains.
During their trek, Drummond tells Maisie about the Hunting activity in the Sanctuary and how its profits financed his research at Biosyn, explaining part of his self-loathing. He admits he's glad that Claire put an end to it, even if he wished less blood was spilled.
To add some light amidst those dark hours, the teenager and the palaeontologist have a peaceful encounter with some dinosaurs (probably herbivores).
While watching them, Drummond tells Maisie about his late wife's wish of having children, implying to the teenager that she has a roof under which to sleep if she doesn't want to return to Orick and leave the Lockwood name behind her in order to finally have a normal life.
At the opposite end of the valley, they see fire and smoke rising from the Citadel and wonder what happened there.
Zobie la Mouche/Whac-a-Mole
Another danger is spotted near the Citadel. Coming from the now-flooded area at the base of the building, comes Brontes, one of the Argentinosaurus.
After the battle and the flood, he just seeks a place to have some rest and thinks the Citadel's courtyard would be a decent choice. The characters in the atrium hide as he crosses the now destroyed hall. It's seen during that scene that the sauropod has many scars on his skull, implying some human abuse (probably for medical experiments). The sauropod's suite of small carnivores take off from it and land in the atrium, investigating the hall as they caught the scent of dead or wounded humans.
On his way, Brontes sees something moving on the ground. It's Murdoch, who's trying to crawl away despite the injuries she got after being trampled by a crowd. Brontes looks at her with curiosity and then crushes her under his foot. Murdoch now squashed, Brontes loses interest in her and enters the courtyard while some members of his suite eat the remains of Biosyn's vice-president. The Argentinosaurus stands in the middle of the courtyard, just in front of the tower's entrance, and starts to sleep while standing (a bit like elephants). A part of his suite is on the lookout, hearing noise all around within the Citadel.
Distracting Brontes
Our protagonists are bothered as Brontes and his suite are preventing them from going after Dodgson by the shortest way and reaching the archives' entrance. They can either make a long detour through a series of hallways or confront the dinosaur. As time is running against them, they take the second option and while some of the grey guards (Cesare, Massoud, Kapakas) are attracting Brontes and his suite towards a ruined part of the Citadel (and from the control room, Al Damiri help them by shooting on the beast), Vuillier and Nyamu run to the tower and reach it in time. At the archives' entrance, they join Chapuy and his two comrades.
Burning the Hydra's heads
In the dark hallways, Claire stumbles upon Betty Chapman (or whatever her real name is), who's pushing a cart with hydrogen cyanide canisters. At that moment, the audience also notices for the first time that Chapman has the same snake hieroglyph tattoo on her arm as the soldier who had a sword fight with the grey guard.
Claire first intends to stop the guard and bring her to the invading force so she can be put with the other Biosyn employees, but Chapman tells her that they should be allies as she's also an enemy of Biosyn. Claire demands precisions and while pushing the cart, the guard reveal that she infiltrated the company and was the one who sabotaged the Sanctuary in the last few months, by temporarily deactivating the invisible fence and allowing one of the Quetzalcoatlus to escape in order to accelerate the destroying of Biosyn's reputation, and sending intel to the raiders, whose objective were to destroy the locusts before their shipping abroad. When Claire asks who she and the raider are, Chapman only gives an enigmatic answer (something like "Chaos in the service of a greater good"). When she tells Claire that Wu made those locusts, the former director of Jurassic World thinks about finding the geneticist and follow through with her threats from three years earlier.
On the way, Claire has to scare off some escaped predator which wanted to attack them. Chapman tells her she's heading to the panic room, where the board of directors so foolishly trapped itself. The felon guard explain Claire they can't take the risk of having the board members leaving the panic room and escaping the valley and that she could help her giving a deadly blow from which Biosyn will never recover while they still can. Claire agrees to help her and looking at the canisters, she remembers what Doctor Karim Depéret, one of InGen's geneticists, told her during the Lockwood Estate incident, that Hydrogen Cyanide is a poison.
The emergency generators
As having a full suspenseful scene dedicated to restoring power like in Trevorrow's version would be too much of a retread of JP's bunker scene, the scene where power is restored is either much shorter or happening off-screen.
However, the emergency generators alone are not enough to provide power for all the needed tasks (the invisible fences and the aerial defense system are quite energy-intensive) and another black-out occurs. Power is once again put back on but our protagonists are forced to make choices. In order to keep the invisible fences on and the archives' power running, they are forced to keep the "aerial defense" system on and stop the evacuation's helicopters from going and coming between the Citadel and the camp outside the valley in order to not trigger pterosaurs' attack.
Dracul
Reaching the part of the Citadel where the panic room is located, Claire and Chapman bring the cart to a maintenance tunnel, prepare the canisters and neutralize the guards in front of the panic room, using darkness to their advantage. They block the door, preventing the board members from escaping. They return to the maintenance tunnel and Chapman lets Claire introduce hydrogen cyanide in the panic room's aeration, poisoning the board members. Finally, the Chapman gives Claire a box of matches. She takes it, lights a match, throws it in the right vent and while the gas catches fire, the two women run away. The panic room is destroyed in a violent explosion which finishes the board members off. It's heard and felt within most of the Citadel.
A wounded Biosyn guard sees Claire fleeing the panic room's area and notices the blood on her clothes. When he discovers what's left of the panic room and the board members (charred corpses at best), he utters with dread the following word: Dracul (Dragon in Romanian. The guard, a minor character, is established to be a Romanian immigrant in an earlier scene depicting the daily life of the facility's employees).
Claire tries to find Chapman after that but the other woman disappeared like a ghost and is not seen for the rest of the Dolomites Incident.
In the Archives
Vuillier, Nyamu and the three grey guards with them are still searching the archives for every incriminating document.
Reuniting
After discovering that Victoria and other animals escaped the citadel through a door and are now in the valley, Owen heads for the control room, aware that it must have some sort of tracking system. On the way, he reunites with Claire and soon, they are found by Dougal. As the Argentinosaurus is still posing a threat in the central courtyard, they pass under it in order to access the tower. They climb to the control room, meet Al-Damiri and the last technician there, get access to the tracking system and Victoria's current coordinates. They find a tracking tablet and Claire volunteers to stay in the control room and be their eyes.
While Owen and Dougal grab some capture equipment in a room near the kennels, Claire searches through the CCTV footage and finds Wu in Maisie's cell, within Dr Lesser's lab. She heads for the laboratories, telling the others she found the geneticist.
Following Victoria's signal thanks to their tracking tablet, Owen and Dougal leave the Citadel and head for the nearby forest, crossing the flooded area between the two.
Wu-ing for redemption
Claire reaches Dr Lesser's lab and opens its cell. Wu steps out but his old enemy brutally grabs him and interrogates him about the locusts. As he once again fucked up, she's about to strike him when pity hold her hand back. Wu tells her that they can still cancel Dodgson's apocalypse, by passing as the CEO himself and giving Biosyn's abroad agents the order to destroy the locusts, and just begs her to offer his help. After a moment of hesitation, Claire help the geneticist stand and give him his cane, the one Lockwood offered to him at the end of TRQ. Together, they then head immediately to the central tower and once in Dodgson's office, Wu turns the CEO's computer on but discovers it's empty. Claire's aggressiveness starts to return when Wu remembers that Dodgson kept some of his most precious information on paper and not necessarily on his computer as he feared being hacked. They start searching the office and the adjacent bedroom. Wu notices a framed picture of Dodgson as a child with his mother at some science fair (in an earlier scene, before he sent the containers, Dodgson could be seen closing the frame while Wu just stepped in his office). Wu opens the back of the frame and discover that Dodgson hid small pieces of papers between the picture and the frame itself. When he sees one paper with Hexapod Allies written on the top; a series of names, phone numbers and email addresses below; and a series of secret codes for the different orders on the back; he knows they put their hands on the jackpot. Wu and Claire hack Dodgson's email account (the password is Liddell, the maiden name of Dodgson's mother) and write the message to the agents involved in the Hexapod Allies operation, including the secret code for the Destroy order, but when they want to send it, the computer notify them that they can't due to internet connection issues. Wu realizes it's because the antenna on top of the control room might have moved following the helicopter's attack. Someone has to climb on the roof to properly realign it and since Wu can't because of his lame leg, the task goes to Claire.
Tracking Victoria
In the woods, Owen and Dougal hear Victoria's calls for help. The young Achillobator still thinks her mother might show up.
They find her and try to capture her but fails. They wander deeper in the woods.
Realigning the antenna
Claire climbs on the control room's roof and communicates with Wu through the radio, she ends up finding the right antenna.
However, just as she begin fixing it, the Argentinosaurus' suite start harassing her as the sauropod is just below. From the auditorium's entrance, Viscontini notices that. Learning through Wu what Claire is doing, Viscontini orders the grey guards to attack the Argentinosaurus so his suite will turn away from Claire to instead defend him. Wu also urges the AISI head to send men after Theo, Maisie and Drummond, as they're carrying very important data about the locusts, enough to destroy Biosyn.
Defying a Titan
Round two between the grey guards and Brontes start, and most of Claire's harassers go help him. This time, the sauropod actively chases his human attackers across parts of the Citadel, destroying walls and roofs with his sheer weight, letting out deafening bellows, passing his neck and head into breaches to try get access to the characters while his suite can reach them where he can't. Massoud ends up grabbed by the herbivore mouth and then thrown against the tower or any other surface, killing him instantly. An additional idea could be the titanosaur provoking small "earthquakes" when he strikes the ground with his forefeet, destabilizing Claire on top of the tower (she even almost falls).
Depending on the pace, there could be at the same time a suspenseful scene in the archives involving some creatures from the labs or the kennels. If the archives are low enough, maybe they'll get inundated because of the flood and the threat could be a semi-aquatic creature contained in the Citadel or brought by the flood (like the temnospondyl; while Nothosaurus, which had a small appearance in my JW rewrite, could be an alternative choice, with individuals housed in the kennels).
Prometheus' fate
After giving a few kicks while repelling her last harassers, Claire manages to properly realign the antenna and Wu successfully transmit the Destroy order to the Hexapod Allies agents. We cut to them as they destroy the locusts in their containers. When he receives their confirmation, the geneticist is relieved. But just as Claire is about to return to Dodgson's office, she sees a *Variraptor (*if it's chosen as Brontes' suite. If not, it will be some relatively large feathered coelurosaurian from the labs in order to make the parallels with Prometheus work) getting to its entrance first. Wu just has the time to barricade himself in the bedroom adjacent to the office but he knows the door won't hold long. Something (Brontes passing his head through a window and trying to attack her?) prevents her from reaching the office. She tells Wu to hold while she tries to save him but he asks her to instead save herself, wishing her a long and happy life. He bids her farewell and wait for his death while Claire escapes the tower. The raptor ends up breaking through the door and it pounce on Wu. While the predator starts devouring him, his cane falls on the ground and its amber pommel shatters.
Owen's decision
Just as the Owen and Dougal are about to start a new attempt in capturing Victoria, a pack of Achillobators (the same one which allied with Claire in the previous night) shows up and our duo hide while the raptors spot Victoria. At first, Owen fears they'll hurt or even kill her. He thinks about intervening, even if he might risk his own life, but after sniffing the young and scared Achillobator, the pack leader gently guides her towards her pack. Owen and Dougal watch the raptors disappear in the darkness. Dougal ask Owen if he'll do something but the Raptor Whisperer says nothing, willing to let Victoria live with a pack and without unnecessary human interference in her life. They head back to the Citadel.
The tower and the tyrannosaur
Kayla and Bigelow arrive by one of the observation towers, the one closest from the mountain path they're heading to. Nearby, the Special Forces' helicopter shot down by that of the raiders and the surrounding vegetation still burns. Just as they are about to climb to its observation bay in order to raid the tower for anything useful before starting the mountains' ascent, they are surrounded by a pack of small carnivores (just like Claire with the dilophosaurs in Trevorrow's version). Before they attack, a horn blast is heard. It's Drummond and after the palaeontologist insists with his portable horn (similar to the one Nigel Marven use against the velociraptors in The Giant Claw), the small carnivores scatter. He asks the two women if they're friends or foes, if they count among Dodgson's friends. Kayla answers that since Dodgson tried to sacrifice her to an Acrocanthosaurus, the answer is no for her, before adding that it ate Dodgson instead. Drummond is glad to hear that and he tells Maisie she can come. The teenager, hidden until there amidst the vegetation, joins them. Having heard Dodgson complaining about Maisie's escape, Bigelow is aware she must be very important but still wary, Drummond whisper to Maisie to not say a single word about the flash drive she's carrying. The two duos talk about their objectives and discover that they're the same. For better chances of survival, they decide to head together for the mountain's path.
But a tyrannosaur, the same one which Claire released earlier, makes its appearance while they're walking away from the tower. It saw them and they know that they better seek refuge in the tower than attempt to run from the predator. At first, they try to stay still, in order to not trigger its attack, but when he notices that the predator wouldn't mind eat one or two of them, Drummond tells Maisie and the two women to run. While they rush to the tower, he distracts the rex by agitating a burning branch. Afraid of the fire, the rex seek to avoid the branch and see the three other humans climbing the tower's ladder. The predator bypass Drummond and in its dash towards the tower, it sends the palaeontologist flying away with its tail. As such thing would have easily killed someone, Maisie fears the worst for him and when his motionless body falls into a ravine, the audience think it's over for him. Maisie panics while the rex has its jaws locked around the ladder's protective cage. What follows is pretty much similar to the Giganotosaurus' attack on the tower scene from Trevorrow's version, except that the final outcome will be quite different. As the observation towers' power has been turned off from the control room in order to save power for more urgent systems, our three protagonists can't have the observation bay rise to the top of the tower, where they would be safe from the rex. To make matters worse, another threat arrive.
I haven't decided which yet but the idea I'm having now is a group of pterosaurs, probably pteranodons, which targets our trio and chase the rex away from the tower by pecking at his head. Another manages to grab Maisie and take her out of the tower. However, the pterosaur let her go before it can be above the canopy due to some incident (another harassing it probably) and Maisie falls into dense bushes at a certain distance from the tower, out of the two women's sight. In the meantime, a mist has started descending from the mountains. Bigelow and Kayla exit the tower and begin searching for Maisie in the area, fearing she got herself hurt in the fall. To cover a maximum of ground before the mist reaches them, they decide to split up.
The end of a line
We see Maisie managing to stand up and while she got bruises**,** she seems relatively fine and still in walking condition. Now lost and alone in the middle of the woods, she's very scared though and starts screaming to help. In the silent forest, Kayla hears her voice and follows it. Just as the mist is about to reach Maisie, the smuggler sees the teenager in the distance and calls for her. But when she hears heavy footsteps and a rumble coming from just behind Maisie, in the mist, her heart stops and she's aghast when she sees the tyrannosaur's silhouette closing to the girl's. Before Maisie can flee, the predator open its maws, grabs her and swallow her whole before disappearing in the forest's shadows (the scene is meant to be a mirror of one from my JW rewrite, where the death of a little girl during the pterosaurs' attack on the main hub is concealed by smoke while Claire watch helplessly). Thus ends Lockwood's line, indirectly destroyed by Claire Dearing.
Bigelow arrives in her turn and sees the smuggler kneeled on the ground, speechless, too shocked by the scene she just saw. Understanding what happened, the CIA agent has an "Oh. Shit..." face and tells Kayla they have to leave the valley while they still can, as she doesn't know what the Italians will do with it once it's taken, even fearing that it might be firebombed in order to destroy the perpetrators of the various incidents of the past months.
While the two women head for the mountain's path and the mist passes away, Drummond is seen climbing out of the ravine and starts to call for Maisie, in vain. Seeing the destroyed observation bay empty, he looks around for clues about Maisie's or the women's whereabouts. He ends up stumbling on the rex's tracks and follows them up to the spot where the teenager last stood. There he finds Wu's flash drive and seeing some blood stains around, he realizes she is no more. This deeply saddens him and this loss and failure just add another load on his self-loathing, as he would have gladly died between the jaws of the king of the dinosaurs if it could have saved Maisie's life. Instead of trying to follow Kayla and Bigelow, he goes in the opposite direction, towards the valley itself.
Leaving the Sanctuary
While looking to reach the auditorium, Claire is forced to hide in one of the labs from dilophosaurs roaming in the area.
In the archives, Vuillier and Nyamu finally put their hands on the documents they were looking for and take them. They and the grey guards' archives team then leave the room and head to the auditorium, in order to reunite with Viscontini and co. On the way, they have to pass between the legs of Brontes while he's distracted by the grey guards. When they reach the auditorium, Viscontini tells them that helicopters are waiting for them. One of the aircrafts is on its way to pick up the Owen and Dougal.
Escorted by the Carabinieri and the Special Forces, the surviving Biosyn employees are evacuated from the Citadel and when the grey guards retreat from their confrontation against Brontes, Vuillier asks them if they've seen Claire coming back but they answer that no. He contacts her and she tells him that she's being delayed.
We see her evading the dilophosaurs which were about to discover her and leaving the labs. Now, start for her an Uncharted-esque race through the Citadel where she has to cross various obstacles and avoid/outrun the loose creatures within it (including the dilophosaurs mentioned above). Still pissed, Brontes targets her and chases her up to her extraction point. Before the Argentinosaurus can close his mouth on her, she jumps into one of the helicopters where Owen and Dougal are waiting for her. The two men help her get inside and their helicopter fly away from the Citadel while the sauropod lets out a mighty bellow.
The protagonists leave the valley and the helicopters which drop them off at Biosyn employees' village, which has been taken over by the Italians and the Austrians in the meantime.
A bitter dawn
While the first sun rays reach the valley, Drummond stumble upon the monstrous Acrocanthosaurus Quasimodo in the area devastated by the flood, in sight of the now destroyed south-eastern wall. Surprised by the waters near the road battlefield, the predator was carried on a certain distance before ending up blocked by rocks and then impaled by a tree. When the palaeontologist finds him, he's dead. Disgusted by the animal, Drummond first tries to ignore him and continue towards the wall, intending to reach the village beyond it, but he turns back and carefully approach him. Tired from his night-long trek, Drummond sit on a rock just next to Quasimodo's head and still quite shaken by Maisie's death and the disaster, Drummond start to ramble about various topics (about the evolution of palaeontology since the San Diego incident, his wife, working at Biosyn, Theo's and Maisie's death...) before breaking down in tears and he can't hold himself from calling Quasimodo a Manmade abomination which deserved to be destroyed by Nature. While looking towards the destroyed wall, the palaeontologist start to regret those harsh words and pulls out a flask of whisky from his bag. After drinking a sip, he puts it back in the bag and just sit silently by the dead animal for a few minutes, up until some Quetzalcoatlus land nearby. The gigantic pterosaurs walk up to the dead Acrocanthosaurus and ignoring Drummond as a way bigger meal is just in front of them, they start feasting. While they do so, Drummond follows the flood's desolation towards the Citadel and he is soon spotted by the men tasked with finding him.
Of rivalries and world-saving
In the morning, Claire steps out of the accommodation assigned to her and Owen within Biosyn's Village. She sees Drummond giving Wu's flash drive to Vuillier before taking his leave. After joining her boss, Claire ponders about her relationship with Wu, on how both destroyed Jurassic World five years ago and how they pretty much saved the world that night. She and Vuillier have a respectful moment of silence for their deceased enemy.
In the abandoned citadel, it's revealed that one of the locusts survived. It's seen crawling on the ground, towards one of the vents. But just before it could reach it, a Mononykus (freed from one of the cages during the raid) swoops on it and devours it.
League of Dragons
As she is crossing the village, Claire passes by one of the remaining Biosyn guards. It's actually the Romanian one, the one who saw her by the panic room. Frightened as hell, he moves away from her while yelling "Dracul! Dracul!", still traumatized by the past night's events. Claire briefly wonders why he is yelling and running away before she gets surrounded by other Biosyn guards and Lucrezia Pellegrino. The Citadel's head of security explains that he called her a dragon because of what he saw and some of the guards start throwing insults at Claire, calling her a monster and a butcher, and she realize that they and their superior want to avenge those she killed. Pellegrino adds that by sending dinosaurs on people who oppose her, Claire is no better than Dodgson on that matter.
Nearby, Owen sees his fiancée surrounded and when one of the Biosyn guards throws a stone at Claire, he gets furious, tackles him on the ground and starts to beat him up. As another guard pulls out a knife (which he hid when they had to give their weapons to the authorities) and is about to stab Owen, the surviving grey guards suddenly intervene, getting the couple out of the Biosyn ambush and then confronting the attackers, standing by Claire's and Owen's side. The grey guards retort to their opponents that their comrades could have denounced the Sanctuary's illegal activities, surrendered, deserted or arrested Dodgson while they could but did nothing, before adding that without Claire, they would have all eaten nothing but locusts in a near future. The Biosyn guards feel insulted however and as an ugly fight is about to break out between both groups, the Carabinieri are forced to intervene and assign them to opposite parts of the village.
The press, who just entered the Biosyn's lands, has witnessed the confrontation and so did Vuillier and Nyamu. The latter tells the Frenchman that since Claire pretty much saved the world, Odegaard could give her a well-deserved break, literally and figuratively.
Debate
In the village's equivalent of a community centre, a meeting about the incident's consequences and what to do with the Sanctuary and its animals is held. Among the attendees, are:
- The WDMC and the people directly affiliated to it: Claire, Owen, Dougal, Vuillier, and Nyamu.
- Representatives of the Italian government: Viscontini, Giovanni Pazzi, and a few local politicians.
- The surviving Biosyn executives and top researchers: Drummond, Pellegrino, Quinn.
During the meeting, we learn that:
- Dodgson was found, or at least five or six pieces of him.
- Some of the Sanctuary's denizens managed to flee the valley and are now somewhere in the Italian countryside. Among the escapees are Victoria and her new pack of Achillobators.
- Exterminators led by the surviving grey guards are about to be sent in the amber mines to slaughter the pectinodons down to the last individual and the species will be soon classified as a pest in Italy, Austria and probably other countries.
Several solutions for the valley, its denizens and the Citadel are discussed:
- Cull the animals, cleanse the valley of Biosyn's traces, and give it back to the inhabitants expropriated by the corporation when it decided to have the entire valley and some of the surrounding lands for itself and no one else.
- Abandoning the valley, let the animals fend for themselves and hope that "life will find a way", even if it poses huge risks for the local populations and ecosystems.
- Dispatch the surviving animals to zoos and other entities which can legally house dangerous captive animals. Proceeding like this will allow de-extinct creatures to no longer be in the ownership of a single entity like Biosyn or InGen.
- Round up the loose animals, cleanse the battle's and the flood's damages, and turn the place into a real Sanctuary for de-extinct animals. Not a "Kruger with dinosaurs" like the Five Deaths but more like a non-profit place with enclosures (akin to many sanctuaries for wild animals across the globe). It will be a public-private joint-venture, with the sanctuary co-managed by the UN's WDMC and the Italian government while private partners will help finance it (Nathan Quinn propose to be one of those but Vuillier, Dougal and a few others distrust him and prefer to not have some of Dodgson's former collaborators on the project). And in order to ensure good relations with the local communities, jobs will be offered to the area's inhabitants and some lands given back to them. Shall this solution be adopted, Vuillier proposes to have Claire Dearing as its manager, Owen Grady its head warden, Rod Drummond its chief researcher, and Laurenzo Cesare as head of security, if they accept. Pellegrino storms off at this moment, disgusted that they're about to leave her without a job and rewarding Claire, an unrepentant psychopath in her eyes. In a moment of consultation amidst the meeting, Claire tells Vuillier she'll probably refuse becoming the sanctuary's manager if this solution is adopted, telling him that she has the feeling that her future lies elsewhere and that she'll continue work as a field agent if he don't mind. Vuillier, who clearly saw how Claire evolved since she started playing spies back in 2019 and decided to close his eyes on her exactions, suggest her to settle for a quieter less-violent life and declares that managing the Sanctuary could be the ultimate redemption for her. Still shaken by the amount of violence she had to commit in order to stop Biosyn and desiring to spend more time with her son, she ends up being persuaded and accept the idea.
The different solutions are being debated for weeks if not months within the Italian government and the UN.
​
End of Act IV.
See you tomorrow for the final Act and the Epilogue.

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It's every camper's worst nightmare. You're out there in the wilderness, and your phone dies. You're miles from your car. You can't use your maps, or flashlight, or play any music. This is a terrible situation for an outdoorsy person to be in, but it doesn't have to be that way.
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Understanding the OUPES Mega 5

The OUPES Mega 5 is a small power generator that can meet different power needs. Its battery can store 500Wh and offers various charging options, like outlets, USB ports, and a carport. You can even use it to charge different devices at the same time.

Powering Your Devices on the Go

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The USB ports on the OUPES Mega 5 are perfect for charging your everyday devices. You can plug in your smartphones, tablets, cameras, portable speakers, and other USB-powered gadgets.
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Recharging the Power Station

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Intelligent LCD Display and Safety Features

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Ideal Applications and Use Cases

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Reviewing the Benefits of the Home backup Power

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Hello,
I've been searching my local market in hopes of finding a first road bike and I came across an offer that features Cube Peleton Pro 2013, seller claims it has 4000km put into it. From the pictures bike looks likes it's in good condition. My only problem is I'm not sure if buying a bike from 2013 is a good idea. What do you guys think, would this bike be a good first road bike?

First Prev Next Royal Road Patreon
u/KieveKRS providing the Trash certification of quality! (with help from u/coldfireknight cuz this one needed it.)
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Nalah affixed the massive shield to her back, the rectangular form large enough for him to fit behind while only needing to crouch slightly. It was mostly ironwood, but the sides and front were metal-plated, so it still weighed a considerable amount. Despite that, the thing’s bulk hardly seemed to be noticed by the blonde-furred female, likely due to the constant construction work she involved herself in. It paired oddly with the long pike she insisted on using, but he couldn’t deny that poking at things while hiding behind a mobile wall sounded like a good idea.
Jax was wearing his new armour, the bulky chest-piece a mirror of his blond-furred pack mate’s. Though he forwent the protection a buckler or likewise would offer, he doubled up on gear. Gauntlets, vambraces, pauldrons, and anything else he could wear to compliment the massive axe he had taken a liking to.
Where Nalah was fitted to look like an apocalypse survivor—her protections limited to her torso, forearms, and shield—the black-furred male resembled a giant, if underfunded, paladin. All he needed now was some religious imagery and a penchant for exalting the qualities of their god. Joseph almost nudged the guy to suggest it for kicks.
On second thought, he decided that Jax absolutely did not need a reason to start yelling about the Human-turned-religious-figure, because there was no way in hell he wouldn’t. There was no telling what he would choose to say, and the Grand Hunter was perfectly happy never knowing.
Having been with the male as long as he had, it would probably involve ‘taming’ females or something else that would leave him groaning for weeks, if not just contemplating another high-dive from the cliff.
Joseph fixed his own equipment, the ‘Wraith armour’ worn over his own thin iron breastplate. He wasn’t thrilled to wear the extra weight, but it beat being mauled by the thing they were heading out to kill. The trips so far had been tolerable, fog and overcast skies keeping the temperature in check, but he didn’t want to go out in this on a hotter day as Summer really kicked back in. He was sweaty enough without baking inside all this crap.
He adjusted the wolf-skull mask, the rest of the hunting party having gotten over the worst of the unease it gave them. Though they’d needed to rotate people out for the sake of fairness, this would be their eighth consecutive scouting. Using the information that Raine and Faye provided, they narrowed down a likely stomping grounds for the creature and were systematically clearing sectors. It might have been discouraging to keep looking after so long, but the occasional marking on trees and the odd moss-wolf corpse tipped them off that they were getting close. There was still another week’s worth of searching left if today wasn’t the day, but somehow he doubted they wouldn’t need that long.
All in all, they numbered six; larger parties were attempted, but their efforts at stealth quickly became pointless between so many trudging through the forest and stopping for breaks. There was a bit of a scare where one of Mi’low’s pack went missing, but the guy had just stopped to relieve himself. Since the discovery was made by someone else knocking him over in the process by mistake, they decided that keeping the number smaller made communication easier. And lowered the amount of grumbling about needing a bath.
Jax, Nalah, two security members, one of the hunters, and him. Sure, grabbing Tel or the Wraiths would have been a bit more useful for cohesion, but they were all busy with things, and he didn’t want to grind everything in the settlement to a halt for nothing if the search turned up empty again. They were more suited to taking out their fellow Lilhun than some monster in the woods, as much as he disliked the thought.
Scarlet was spending a lot of time with Violet and the new Atmo, Faye was spending much of her recovery with the moss-wolves and moss-pup, and Tel was in the process of helping Harrow shore up the few security members that were slated to become snipers. Kaslin was still learning chemistry with Toril, and Raine was helping whoever needed a hand, so that marked off all of his usual accompaniment. He could have taken more of his direct pack, but they all had important things to take care of as well.
Sahari was managing the pack and putting people where people needed to be put, Pan was working with Idee and Heralt to make a line of armour for the whole pack, and Mi’low was...well, Mi’low. He was pretty sure she was unofficially the master of the hunter’s lodge and spent most of her time keeping track of what came in and out of it, while also making sure that everyone got their fair share. It needed to be done with the settlement growing as much as it had, and it kept Mi’low busy enough to stymie the flow of complaints, so he wasn’t about to complain.
They double checked that they had everything that was needed; food, water, arrows, bolts, and some bags to store anything that the snares had caught on the way back. Four ranged and two melee weapons meant that they would be mostly using Jax and Nalah to soak hits if it came down to it, the others peppering it with projectiles. Given that Harrow was insistent on the bear-thing being resistant to anything they could use at a distance, they also carried spare weapons for the ranged users, just in case. Nodding, Joseph gestured to the group finishing up their preparations for the day’s trip.
“A moment, sir?” Scarlet called to him as she approached the gate, the Wraith flanked by Rose and Cobalt. The two Atmo were decked-out in their own armour, which appeared to be almost entirely metal, save for the palm lining the inside for comfort. Each of their six legs were adorned with broad shields, their bases capped off with a flat storage carriage. They looked like someone had a little too much fun testing how much the insects could effortlessly carry and had ended up with sapient hexapedal tanks.
“Only if you explain why those two would look more at home if they had cannons installed on their backs,” he quipped, an expression somewhere between surprised, amused, and plain dumbfounded plastered on his face. The blackish red-furred female smirked for a split-second before resuming her usual servile presentation.
“The young mistress had extended her request for these two to accompany you.”
Joseph tilted his head incredulously. “Violet told you to send them?”
Scarlet nodded, gesturing to the outfitted Atmo. “They have been under her tutelage for some time now, and wish to be of assistance.”
The Grand Hunter snapped his mouth closed when he was about to ask why his daughter would teach them anything that might be useful for fighting a deadly beast. Of course she did; It was one of the first things he did for her. It would have been weirder for her not to pass on what she knew after all the hours she spent either seeing him coach the others, or being coached herself. With the time she had under her belt, she was the local Atmo Close Quarters Combat specialist, and no one else understood how the modified boxing she learned worked with their bodies like she did.
He wore a hesitant expression, shifting his weight to his other leg. “Well, they’ve certainly geared up.”
“It is a product our smith is rather proud of,” the Wraith affirmed confidently.
He exhaled slowly. “Seems a bit much.”
She seemed to be expecting the remark, barely pausing to register what he said before responding. “Your kit wishes you safe, yet understands you would not allow her to accompany you. These two wish to be of assistance.”
To punctuate her point, the two nodded in agreement, walking forward and slinging some of the backpacks onto their carriages. It seemed ‘no’ wasn’t something they were going to accept after Violet had said her piece. He sighed, conceding that they wouldn’t slow the party down with everyone carrying so much weight in equipment, regardless of the bags. They took breaks frequently enough to accommodate the Atmo, so that wouldn’t hinder anything either.
“Fine,” he relented with a wave of his hand. “We’ll take them. Not like they’d hurt anyway. But–” He put a warning into his tone. “–they’re not playing the hero and getting themselves killed. This isn’t going to work if they think any of us dying is still a net positive, got it?”
The two Atmo mimed their understanding, Scarlet replying with a victorious smile. Joseph couldn’t help but bemusedly roll his eyes. The female had taken rather well to baby-sitting, and that seems to have extended to humouring the young Queen’s schemes now. It wasn’t an unwelcome addition to their little sojourn. At least they could haul back any larger game without it tacking hours onto the return trip.
He thanked Scarlet for her trouble before dismissing her, confirming with the group that everything was accounted for, and set off before it grew too late. He wasn’t looking to get caught out in the woods during the night. The Lilhuns might be fine, but he was pretty well blind unless the moon felt generous.
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Jax watched the two Atmo quietly follow on the sides of the group, their heavily armoured forms posing no issues with their naturally soundless movements in the forest. In the den, they would make moderate clacks and clicks as their chitinous legs contacted the ground, but the soft dirt and foliage stifled all but the smallest report of their travel. With Scarlet supervising alongside Violet, he wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that the former Blade had influenced their movement with the goal in mind, though he had never paid much attention to how they walked before to compare.
He had to admit, having them carry the additional equipment was exceedingly useful. He had proposed having the group use the newly acquired platforms on their more arachnid-like abdomen to rest in shifts, but Joseph was quick to insist that the insects were of lesser stamina than even Lilhuns. The phrasing seemed like a comparative insult, but Jax had more than enough experience with the Human to know that he had simply spoken his mind. To him, everyone had sub-par stamina. Training had gone some way to remedy the discrepancy, but the Grand Hunter could still continue for longer than even the most well-conditioned of them.
The black-furred male rolled his shoulders, feeling the heft of his axe shift with the movement. It was an impressive size, the weight well-balanced and its edge sharp. He had once laid it to the ground out of curiosity and confirmed that it was about as tall as Pan from head to haft, though only if she stood to her full height. Regardless of its size, it was still lighter than the armour he chose to don.
Having only really worn leathers or a few sets of ironwood protections, the encumbering prominence of the iron equipment took getting used to. It wasn’t entirely restrictive, but did put a damper on any chances he had of sprinting from danger. That was fine, he supposed, since he was wearing it against a beast he had no experience with. It could very well outrun him regardless, and he would rather have the defences in either case.
Nalah seemed to be doing fine, the large barrier she kept on her back swaying slightly as she walked. She was unhindered by it, her movements barely affected by the bulk, which was reassuring. Joseph, however, seemed to be panting more than usual, the rolling cloud coverage easing as the sun progressively warmed the environment. The fog from earlier meant that it was rather humid, and that seemed to bore no well wishes for the male encased in dark leathers and thick plates. He had even flipped down his hood, the sweat beading on his skin adding a sheen to his visage.
“I liked this better when the sun didn’t exist,” the Human lamented quietly, just loud enough for Jax to hear. The black-furred male chuckled.
“It would be rather dark.”
Joseph glared at him for a moment before rolling his eyes. “I just don’t rank ‘heavily armoured hike through the woods’ high up on my list of things I want to do regularly.”
“I believe that list would be occupied by your mates, no?” he ribbed playfully, a smirk arising when the Grand Hunter shunted his eyes closed in a grimace.
“I hate you.”
“I can see your smile underneath your displeasure, Joseph,” Jax quipped, nudging the male with his elbow, then giving an apologetic smile when his friend almost fell. Joseph sighed, waving Cobalt over and fetching a water-skin from the luggage that the insect was ferrying without breaking stride—though he needed to be careful not to get stepped on.
The Atmo always amused Jax. Be it their passive demeanour hidden by their towering stature, or his interactions with the den-kit, they never failed to be curious people. Having the two that accompanied Volta with them was an unexpected development, but he couldn’t claim to disapprove. If they had been imparted the methods of combat that Violet had cultivated, then there was little worry of them being harmed by naught but perhaps their current target. At least not until there was a better reference of its strength than the single encounter the first-years had so long ago.
At the time, it had smashed pillars and pierced flesh effortlessly, claws proving to be little more than tempting ministrations of tender touch to the thick hide. Jax only had some of the pack’s recount to base the experience off of, but was content to take their word for it. He was, ashamedly, preoccupied taking care of baser needs when the event transpired, so he was woefully unprepared for the eventual encounter. Still, he was afforded the best the settlement had to offer so that he might serve his duty of protecting the Grand Hunter. Harrow would never forgive him if only he returned.
His thoughts were disturbed by Joseph calling for a rest, Jax’s legs thankful for the break from supporting the unusual weight for so long. The Human dispensed rations and water for the pack, the Atmo waiting until everyone else was supplied before accepting their portion. They rested on their base directly, instead of curling their legs beneath them like Jax had become accustomed. Perhaps the armour impeded such, or they wished to remain mobile in the event such was required. Regardless, they blocked what little breeze there was, forcing the Grand Hunter to walk beyond them to enjoy it in the shade. It was short-lived however, as Rose quickly repositioned to stay between the pack and whatever lay beyond their protections.
It was a futile effort, it seemed, because it repeated again twice before Joseph groaned loudly and threw himself atop the carriage to lay back, his legs dangling at the knee. He seemed perfectly content with the unorthodox arrangement, snorting his amusement along with a muttered comment about a ‘taxi.’
The entertaining sight was marred by a distant yelp, snapping the group to attention. Jax and Joseph traded looks, subtle nods and gestures given to move out while remaining quiet. Ignoring his earlier complaints, the Grand Hunter flicked his hood up and donned the mask, drawing his crossbow and readying a bolt. The hunter of the pack mimicked the preparation, the two security members loosely nocking their arrows while Rose, Cobalt, Jax, and Nalah took point.
They proceeded quietly for far longer than the proximity of the noise would have suggested, but marks and gashes upon the trees implied a moving conflict. Thoughts of it being a lost cause quickly became moot as a closer growl and bark shattered the careful silence they had been maintaining.
Motioning for the pack to stop, Joseph waved Jax forward, Nalah approaching the other side. Using the large shield as additional cover, they peered around a particularly thick tree. Locked in combat were two moss-wolves, both attacking a truly massive grey creature.
Twice the Human’s height, half that in width. Four pillars as legs—the muscular trunks sinewy and defined—supported the disturbing hunched figure, the wide base tapering slightly into a thick and extended torso. A singular eye-stalk replaced the head, the ocular organ atop it pitch black and free of any indication of its focus. Four arms with deadly claws parried and sliced the two yellow beasts as they attempted to drive off the predator, a sickeningly large maw gaping to catch any attempts at a lunge. The mouth of the creature almost occupied the entirety of the available surface area upon its front, the jagged bone tools of manduction undulating with the promise of sustenance.
Joseph pulled them back, cursing under his breath as he tried to fight off the tension. From Nalah’s worried expression, it seemed his caution was rather potent, the other members of the group smelling his reaction as well.
“So, what’s the plan, Jax?” the Human whispered, his grip on the crossbow alternating with his fingers stretching across the trigger lest his fidgeting cause a misfire.
“I thought that, with your record, you would wish to tame it for the settlement,” Jax replied while thinking through a plan of action. He was glad that his friend trusted him, but he wished he had known the true scale of the beast prior. Joseph grit his teeth, turning to glance past the tree again with sarcasm pouring out of his response.
“Can’t quite see Winnie-the-woodchipper there playing great with kids.”
“You say that after adopting an Atmo as kit, Grand Hunter,” he returned, nodding to himself when a plan formed. The Human smiled, the banter easing the tension somewhat. “Rose, Cobalt, you two are the most well defended of us. Circle around and drive the beast this way. You should be capable of such without noise, yes?”
The two insects nodded, emptying their luggage behind a tree so as not to lose any of it before disappearing into the trees. The slight glimmer of their iron armour was the only indication of their position through the dense forest. Jax hoped that the beast was not particularly curious about the dimly pulsing glare, nor finished with its current altercation in time to impede the pair.
Satisfied with their progress, he motioned for the two security members to scale a tree and gain a superior vantage point. Their weapons would be able to maintain a more rapid pace of sustained fire at longer ranges. Joseph and the hunter were instructed to hide behind trees nearby, though the Human would need to remain grounded as his lack of claws made scaling the large flora difficult with his equipment.
Finally, Nalah and he positioned themselves much closer, in order to flank the creature as it fled the Atmo and occupy it long enough for the others to bleed it out, if not outright dispose of it.
With the forms of the Atmo peeking through the brush opposite them, Jax raised his axe to signal the start.
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Joseph felt the hammering in his chest, his heart preparing him to fight for his life against the walking abomination that easily outclassed the only other predator that he had experience with. Sure, the moss-wolves were easy to take down once you had equipment and a plan, but that thing screamed danger.
He watched Jax and Nalah set up behind thick trees, their goal being for Jax to hopefully disable a leg or two with the war-axe while Nalah occupied it with the shield. As the two strongest members of his little family, he trusted both to do their job.
As a clusterfuck of animal and torture device, he had no faith in the creature playing along.
Swallowing his hesitation, he adjusted his grip on the crossbow again, mentally tallying his shots and cursing himself for not researching explosives. Sure, Toril didn’t want to be involved in that kind of weapon, but at the moment, the tailless white-furred male could suck it up and make one anyway. Joseph would give his left nut to see how quickly the chemist would make weapons of mass destruction just to annihilate whatever that thing called home.
Jax raised his axe, glinting the sunlight of it towards the Atmo. Receiving the start signal, the two clicked and loosed a deafening screech, the Human’s ears ringing even from this distance.
The beast seemed unperturbed by the noise, though the lack of visible ears may have had something to do with the lacklustre effect. Regardless, it did notice the two armour-clad insects charging at it, and smartly decided to extradite itself from the area. The moss-wolves, however, didn’t quite get the memo, mistaking the advancing assistance as yet another foe to defend themselves from.
He had to say, Violet taught the two well. They flashed their blades out in the same flicker jab that he had shown his daughter, and with an unceremonious squelch, the two bisected canines landed in four pieces, a vibrant green ichor now staining the weapon-like appendages of the Atmo. Undeterred by their first act of violence—as far as he was aware, anyway—they continued herding the beast.
It wasn’t as fast as they might have feared, its quadrupedal gait hindered by its proportions, but it was still quick enough to be damn intimidating. Its arms acted as a counter balance, constantly adjusting this way and that just to keep it stable. That thing was clearly never meant for sprinting, all its mobility being given to the overactive maw that pulsated with the exertion.
He readied his crossbow, the shaking in his hands not ruining his aim against such a large target. He eyeballed the distance between the creature and the ambush point, forcibly moving his finger off the trigger so that he didn’t fire early.
Closer. Come on. Almost.
Now.
Jax wound up like a particularly enthusiastic lumberjack, putting his full body into the rotation. The massive axe swung like a horizontal pendulum striking home with all the finality of a clock tolling midnight. It bit into the front leg of the beast, only sinking a few inches before momentum nearly wretched the weapon from the black-furred male. Luckily, the force and timing was enough to trip it, the creature crashing to the forest floor with a deafening roar of pain.
They could hurt it. That made him feel better.
His relief evaporated as the beast swiftly recovered, hauling itself from the ground faster than he thought possible, but his archers took it for an unspoken signal. Arrows and bolts peppered its thick hide, to no effect—it shrugged off the projectiles like they were nothing more than pine needles, none sinking far enough to gain notable purchase.
Jax hefted his axe for another strike, careful not to over-commit this time. Nalah prodded the beast wherever she could with her pike, the melee weapon sliced and skewered just past the surface of the hide, though not enough to do more than marr. It was, however, enough to gain the attention of the target, the creature swinging two of its four arms to rake across the shield that the blond-furred female held. The iron plating across the front let out an unearthly shriek as claws ripped and crumpled the metal.
Well, fuck.
Nalah was quick to react, treating the shield less as an immovable barrier and more like a slight distance buffer, dodging in and out of range to steal jabs with the polearm. The security members nocked another volley, picking different targets than before. An arrow bounced harmlessly off the black orb of an eye, another finding purchase in what passed for gums in its mouth.
The hint was received; aim for the mouth. Thankfully, that was a large target. Less thankfully, it realized that flashing its teeth was detrimental to its health, slamming the maw closed.
Jax managed another swing, this time into one of the rear legs. It wasn’t as effective as the first strike, but it did warrant a sweeping double back-fist from the creature, scoring Jax’s armour with shallow claw marks as he jumped backwards. Joseph let out a breath as he fired his second shot, only just narrowly missing the sliver of a gap between razor teeth that the enraged attack afforded. It couldn’t keep its mouth shut forever, each frenzied swipe pulling its form enough for glimpses of softer flesh within to appear. The hunter dropped from their tree, darting across to reposition for a wider angle to capitalize on. The creature noticed, lunging forward to eviscerate the easier target.
Joseph blinked as two armoured figures jumped in front of the Lilhun, raising their blades in a tight guard to block the four arms grabbing for a quick meal. The beast recoiled with a thunderous screech, two of its appendages sporting deep gashes that fountained blood, while the others managed to impact above the edged outside of the blades. Rose and Cobalt pressed forward, buying time and space for the hunter to collect themselves and scale up another perch. Taking advantage of its pain, two new arrows ripped through the air, smacking into exposed inner flesh. Two new protrusions joined the first in the mouth, one landing next to the existing projectile, while the other cleared the gateway of serration, driving deeply inside of it.
More flicker jabs and extended straights pushed and cut the beast as it tried to gain distance from the two that wounded it, every retaliatory strike earning it another gash in its grey hide.. Unencumbered by the constant barrage, Nalah thrust into its legs more vigorously, her body leaning into each attack to gain every inch of penetration she could into the muscle and thick hide.
Jax used the chance to score another chopping blow, doubling down on a previous wound to a back leg—striking bone this time, based on the unholy wail the beast uttered. Joseph raised his crossbow to land another shot into its mouth, but the beast flailed wildly to fend off the ambush.
Rose managed to block, Jax lunged backwards, Nalah deflected most of it with what remained of her shield, but Cobalt was caught by a strike, taking the hit to its torso. The Atmo flew backwards, rolling when it landed, the carriage and assorted armoured plates trailing behind it. Rose shifted instantly, covering the direction that their companion had been sent while Jax and Nalah focused on pulling the beast away from the downed combatant.
Joseph’s eyes flicked to the Atmo, waging an internal battle on whether helping the insect would be better or worse for the situation as a whole. He didn’t want to lighten up their assault if it would just mean more injuries, but Cobalt could be in dire need for a patch job. It was hard to tell from where he was.
Cursing, he bolted from his spot, firing off one last round into the gaping maw before clipping the crossbow onto his armour and sliding on his knees in front of Cobalt, healroot hastily retrieved from his pocket.
He paused, sighing in relief when none of the armour bore more than deep gashes, the carapace underneath unblemished by the attack. Cobalt clicked lightly, dazed, but otherwise seeming unhurt. Unlearned in the physiology relevant, he ushered the Atmo to remain out of the fight for fear of concussion or something similar. They could look at the insect back at the base to be sure later.
“Joseph!”
His head spun around at both Jax and Nalah screaming his name, a massive clawed hand sweeping at him—the monster's approach unnoticed while he focused on Cobalt. Lacking a better option, he lunged forward towards the underside of the beast to dodge the swipe, crashing to his shoulder on the dirt below.
The creature raised a leg above Joseph, pounding the earth scant inches from his head as he rolled sideways. Ignoring the kicked up dirt, he brought his fist to the underside of the beast, flicking the release on his bracer.
Blood spouted from the newly formed wound, the blade breaking at the mechanism as the massive animal lurched in pain, Joseph rolling out of the way of another attempted trampling. He scrambled to his feet, feeling the wind of another strike narrowly missing him.
Yeah, that would probably kill him.
Luckily, the injuries renewed the desire to flee in the monstrosity, the group of attackers proving too dangerous to continue challenging. It stumbled away from them, sparing Cobalt from its panicked trudging. Jax and Nalah started to run towards him, worry evident in their eyes, but he barked for them to finish it, redirecting the two to keep the pressure going. He didn’t want to mention the pain in the arm from where the bracer hitched. It didn’t feel broken, and thus was irrelevant.
Pressure applied, the grey beast picked a random direction free of opponents to escape, ignorant of the waiting security. When it was too close for them to shoot into its mouth at a decent angle, they slung the bows over their shoulders and drew the swords they had been afforded, patiently waiting with the blades turned down.
It passed below them, the two Lilhuns dropping from the branches to put their full weight into the plunging blades. Both landed on the large target, one sword sinking deep into a shoulder, while the other managed to pierce one of its hip joints. The beast spun haphazardly to dislodge the ‘new’ threats, both security members kicking off and finding new trees to set up in.
Whatever damage was actually done, it had lost the use of an arm, and its gait shifted awkwardly as the blade lodged in its hip worked more harm with each shambling step.. Emboldened, Jax picked up the pace, struggling to position himself with the amount of metal he wore. Ducking another swipe of its claws, he saw his chance and swung, pivoting with his axe as a counter weight. For the third time, his axe blade found the wound in its leg, adding a sickening crunch as the bone snapped from the impact.
The creature swung wildly, forced to favour its two remaining good legs, and the only other leg that could still support at least some of its weight. It was unstable now, the hunched figure swaying while unmoving. Unable to run, it decided to go down with as many of them as it could.
Rose caught up with the attack, drawing attention from the comparatively squishy Nalah as the blond-furred female deflected a wayward swing with her shield. The once iron-plated ironwood now sporting little more than jagged scraps of metal atop its silver wooden structure, a series of deep gouges marring the surface. Two lunging thrusts with the pike bit flesh, drawing new blood from the beast.
Joseph loaded his crossbow, getting off two bolts, but not managing to keep it steady enough to hit anything of use, his arm faltering under the weight of the weapon. Cursing, he decided to flank the beast and try his luck with the other bracer. If nothing else, the force in which the blade deployed was enough to pierce the thick hide, and the others were doing a good job of distracting it.
The red armoured Atmo let loose a series of directed swings, the fifth severing an arm in motion, the flying appendage forcing Nalah to raise her shield to block the unorthodox projectile. The female was sent sprawling from the weight of the impact, but the beast was too busy voicing its agony to take advantage of it. Jax worked another two chops into the broad legs, but neither managed to incapacitate it any more, and the prolonged exertion was slowing his reflexes.
As if cued into his waning energy, the beast flung Jax with another strike, the hunter of the group sinking a bolt deep into the cavernous flesh of its mouth to prevent an attempt at following up.
Joseph roared, desperate to finish it off before the creature could do the same to his downed pack. He sprinted at the monster's back and slid underneath it with as much speed as he could muster. Throwing his fist into the passing undercarriage, he let the deployed blade leave a long gash in its wake.
The grey monster lost its ability to stand, torn tendons, blood loss, and inflicted injuries taking their toll. The Grand Hunter kicked off his knees to fling himself out of the way of the collapsing figure, grimacing as the remaining bracer proved unable to support the abuse he had put it through. He looked back at the beast, the flailing body failing to right itself as teeth did little more than gouge dirt, its back exposed. Rose approached, raising their blades together and plunging it through the body over and over until it stopped moving.
Exhausted, the Atmo dropped where it was, breathing heavily. Joseph’s instinct to yell their victory was delayed as he hurried over to Jax and Nalah to confirm he didn't need to bring back bad news. Nalah seemed fine, if a bit sore from hitting the dirt and rolling, while Jax just asked to lay down when he heard that everything was over. Cobalt came over to the group, the armour that had come off collected atop the carriage it had managed to loosely affix to its base.
It was light, a chuckle originating from the Human as he slumped to the ground against a tree, but soon the entire group was roaring with laughter as victory settled in their minds. The two security members helped the hunter begin disassembling the beast, their contribution to the fight leaving them with more energy than the rest. They hadn’t been slacking off, that much was certain. The number of arrows jammed into the maw of the thing would have guaranteed a few extra seconds of survival and chances to escape if one of them had been forcibly tossed into there, and it had caused enough pause for the rest of them to get in a few hits up close.
Joseph rested across from Jax and Nalah, letting his heart rate slow from the rapid pace it had been pinned to since the start of the conflict. His arm continued its protests, but from the amount of movement he still had, he guessed that he had just strained the elbow. A few days taking it easy should straighten that right up.
Once the active members were about half way through processing the creature for hide and meat, Cobalt approached him, a mimed request for assistance putting their armour back on being redirected to Nalah since he doubted he could lift the damn pieces without hurting himself at the moment. She obliged, getting the blue Atmo back in full attire, though it took a while.
Rose stood first, stopping over to allow the hunter to place collected bits and pieces onto the carriage before securing it with whatever they could make due. A security member gathered the moss-wolf corpses for a similar treatment. Waste not, want not, he supposed.
Rose ended up carrying most of their spoils. When he was about to ask why, he, Jax, and Nalah were dragged to Cobalt and hefted onto the carriage. A series of confused questions revealed that the rest wanted to head back before it started getting dark, and it was pretty obvious who was the most exhausted of them. Lacking the will or energy to argue it, he flopped back on the Atmo as the trees passed them by, Nalah resting her legs across him as her head sat on Jax’s lap. The black-furred male didn’t so much as smirk, so it was clear he had pushed himself too far to quip about the arrangement as he laid down.
“The next time you wish to exhaust me this much, Joseph,” the Head of Security started after a long while of silence, tiredness in his voice, “I would prefer it to involve my mate and a bed.”
The Human snorted, closing his eyes and enjoying the lack of walking as the surprisingly stable Atmo carried the three of them. “Fuck off, Jax.”
“Of course, Grand Hunter.”
Next
A/N: Patreon is fixed!... aka new one cuz problems with the last. Check it out to support the story, get AI character art every now and then, or even preview sections of chapters as i write them! (aka, before kieve gets to fix them :D)

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Acceptance as a conditionality
You can't fully accept the life’s challenges because the response of the chitta (heart-mind) is not a choice. It is habitual. There is no choice. It is anatta. It simply follows what it is conditioned to do. This conditionality brings us to the purpose of meditative training which is to recognise and change the patterns of the chitta by observing conditions.
It takes effort to not accept. If you can not accept, then acknowledge this, notice the effort that underlies that resistance and soften/relax into that effort. Accept and own that you can not accept and this is perfectly okay.
Your mind has a problem because it has an expectation as to where it should be. Notice the effort that underlies that expectation and awareness will naturally rest within your body. Soften and relax any expectation now and see how it naturally sinks and abides there. You don't need a target. It is natural that awareness rests in the heart when all resistance is abandoned, even if that is for a short time. This can be known as true.
Kayagatasati
Kayagatasati is not about you, it is about training a the mind that is averse towards the heart, the mind that is scared of seeing its own reflection within the body.
Getting awareness to rest within the body rather than in the intellectual mind is like trying to force a cat to move from its safe place under a car on the side of the road to a mat you have placed next to the neighbour’s dog. Why would the cat want to rest here when it believes that its old resting place was safe and this one dangerous. You are trying to make the cat rest where you want it to sit, and this very act signals danger to the cat. Of course it will keep trying to run away towards what is known to be safe, even if that place truly isn't.
The mind and the heart are habitual: we get what we practice
You are an intellectual. You possibly therefore find pleasure in intellectual things. You have developed your intellectual muscle so that it has become very strong by delighting in mental weightlifting. You practice this every day for many years, it is valuable to you.
I find no pleasure in intellectual things, I find delight in finding a cool spot to sit under the shade of a tree, cool, calm, still. I find no delight in thinking about the world or in reading about it, I find delight in experiencing the world through my senses as if this was the first time I had done so. I particularly find joy in feeling my way through the world, through my body: kayagatasati.
Practice
Create boundaries for your mind regarding expected behavior. I find using doorways useful for this. Every doorway is a transition point that signals an expected change in behavior. The street, the front door of your home, bedroom, bathroom, nightclub door, each door defines expected behaviors. We are trained in this from childhood. The mind understands this. If it doesn’t, there is conflict in society.
Bundaries
Does your mind have boundaries?
Is there an appropriate times for intellectual activities or does your mind carry it from the university classroom into the hallway, from the hallway to the bathroom, from the bathroom out into the street, from the street into your home?
Like teaching a child boundaries and appropriate behavior in different situations, we need to create and teach boundaries to the mind. Now, in teaching a child you can do it by scolding them or by praising them. It’s better to help them to find joy in good behavior and praising their successes.
The mind inclines towards pleasure
Use doorways as a recognized reset point where you soften/relax all effort and allow awareness to rest/sense within your body. Don't give attention to bad behavior but instead gently bring awareness back to your body in a soft and gentle way when it habitually leaves it.
Take joy in short successes, find the pleasure and delight in short periods of presence. Smile into it with your eyes, teach your mind that kayagatsati is not what it needs to do, but rather something that is pleasurable to do.
Like the cat, awareness will naturally rest in your body when it finds it a safe and pleasurable thing to do. Any attempt to make it do this forcefully will only make it feel unsafe and it will find its safety in the old behavior. This is simply a matter of repetition and finding the pleasure in it, the joy of letting go of the effort that underlies intellectual activities.
Note: Stephen's response to my question was very thorough. It addressed the root cause of the issue and offered a practical solution. I found it so valuable that I slighted edited it for readability and saved it as my practice guide for kayagatasati. I realized that this response might be helpful for the whole MIDL community. So, I am sharing it here.

I look out in front of me, and perceive the sea lit up out to the horizon. I look around me: to my left and right, I see the limitless straight line of the beach, and behind it, the dunes -- all in space. With my gaze I make the space my own. The objects are clear and plain. I see the wind bend over to the ground, the reeds that keep the dunes in place.
I am at the center of this universe by means of my gaze, which sweeps across this space and lets me know everything in it. By combining these images of reality, I grasp it as a whole, and become a part of it as a result of my looking.
My sight constructs a universe for me. It reveals to me a directly perceivable reality composed of colorful, simple, harmonious images. But it also furnishes me with more subtle materials. I learn to read my brother’s or my enemy’s face. Transmitted images are superimposed on one another, and as a result, I now know that a given image belongs within a particular context of reality. It conjures up another image; I anticipate what I am going to see, but what is coming will in any case be located in space and will constitute part of reality -- deeper and hidden, in a sense, but still reality.
Such information is precise and pinpointed, and deals only with reality. Nothing else, no other dimension, is ever involved. …Sight has made me the center of the world because it situates me at the point from which I see everything, and causes me to see things relative to this point. My vision makes a circular sweep of space, working from this point: my point of view. But now I am tempted, as the center of the world, to act on this spectacle and transform this setting. What was missing in my vision was someone to act, and I am available.
Sight moves to action at the same time that it serves as the means of action. Again, without it, how could I act, since I wouldn’t even know what my hand was touching or what was within my reach? …I am a subject, not separated from what I look at. Rather, what I see becomes a part of me, as my action involves me in what I see. Images both permit and condition my action; they are always imperative. I lean out the window and look searchingly into the emptiness. Images of distance and depth thrust themselves on my consciousness. I know I mustn’t lean out any further.
The image defines and marks the boundaries of my action. The image does not induce my action, but establishes its conditions and possibilities. Without visual images my action is definitely blind, incoherent, and uncertain. Sight conveys certainties and pieces of information to me, as we have said. Such information is reliable. I perceive a gray ocean and an overcast skyline. This is unquestionable. The reality around me is a certainty in which I can be confident. It is neither incoherent nor deformed. I know, of course, that this is also something learned; there are no data coming directly from the senses, and the shapes and colors and distances I apprehend are perceptible to me because I learned them. My culture has furnished me with the very images I see. But however important this may be (and we must not push this idea too far!), it is still true that I see.
What a dreadful uneasiness takes hold of us when reality is submerged in fog…sight fails to furnish me with clear images and I can no longer act. The world loses its midpoint. It is off center because I cannot see it anymore. The center could be anywhere, but it is no longer located where I am.
In order for my sight to mislead me concerning reality, there must be some unusual phenomenon, like a mirage. The image is not ambiguous. This peach I am looking at is red and weighs heavily on the bending branch. This is absolutely certain. But the image is insignificant. It has no meaning in itself and must be interpreted. In the case of a fruit ripe for picking, the visual image gives me indisputable information, but if I stop there, nothing will happen. It must therefore be interpreted. In order to move from the vision of the fruit to "I should pick it" or "It can be picked," there must be an interpretation: an attribution of meaning to these real images of reality.
Another dimension must be added to sight: interpretation will come through speech. Thus the image contains within itself a deep contradiction. It is not ambiguous: it is coherent, reliable, and inclusive; but it is insignificant. It can have innumerable meanings, depending on culture, learning, or the intervention of some other dimension. For this reason I must learn to see, before looking at the image.
After seeing it, I must learn to interpret it. The image is clear, but this clarity does not imply certainty or comprehension. My certainty is limited to this directly perceived reality that my sight reveals to me. Nothing beyond that.
I call these images "vision" because they are connected with the other images I am accustomed to. I would be tempted to say in this case that the order is reversed. The visual image exists, and then I attribute a meaning to it; but the vision appears only as the illustration of a previously established meaning. No matter how insignificant it may be, the visual image is always rigorous, imperative, and irreversible. I saw what I saw. I cannot change the reality which is conveyed to me in this way, except through my action. There is no ambiguity at this point. Nor is there reversibility.
If I had only one "view" of my universe, I would be a participant in a totality which would be both terribly coherent and yet at the same time composed of fragments without any necessary relationship. The totality would be like a cloud of irrational dots which can form only the framework of an action, a change in the relationships between the points. But the cloud of dots cannot be used for understanding anything, because this pointillism of images is space but not duration. The image is present. It is only a presence. It bears witness to something "already there": the object I see was there before I opened my eyes.
I have a point of view, a location from which I see things, but it is situated within what I see and inseparable from it. Wherever I place myself, however I shift my position, I remain in the field of vision, I remain in the middle of what I see. I can never take my distance, act as if I were not present, or even begin to think independently of what I see.
At night, when I cannot see, a certain distance is established. This explains why the day’s events become so painful at night: the distance between me and the world around me allows for reflection and meditation. A flood of images overwhelms me, beckons me, and carries me along: an image I have seen follows immediately after the one I have just dismissed from my mind. I can never stop this movement of reality in space. I can never consider a given image like a diamond or a painting from which I can take my distance in order to be "myself," instead of being overwhelmed by the images composed of dots.
The image prevents me from taking my distance. And if I cannot establish a certain distance, I can neither judge nor criticize. Of course, I also feel pleasure or displeasure in what I see. I can find it beautiful or ugly. But this is not a critical process. No judgment is involved. Furthermore, what possible criticism or judgment can we make with respect to space and reality? In spite of the frailty we have all observed in a person’s testimony about what he has seen, everyone has the same certainty about anything he has seen. He has seen reality.
Sight involves a relationship with reality as established in space. It is an artificial construction. Medusa’s head transfixes whoever gazes at her. Whoever looks at the scenes on the shields of the Iliad is terror stricken. Sight introduces us to an unbearable shock. Reality when seen inspires horror. Terror is always visual. Horror stories play only on our visual sense and suggest representation.
In contrast, the spoken word can involve us in mystery or drama. It places us in situations of conflict and makes us conscious of tragedy. But it is never on its own terrifying or stupefying. We are dazed by sight -- by an image or a vision. The word takes us to the edge of terror only when descriptive and painting extremely precise images. Edgar Allan Poe’s short stories are an example. All the descriptions we have heard of Nazi death camps move us to revulsion and to a judgment that may be based more on strong feelings than anything else. The image of bulldozers pushing along mounds of skeletal corpses, which shortly before had been living beings, faces teetering from the machine’s pushing -- this image drawn from ‘Night and Fog’ moves us to abject horror. It terrifies us, because we see. Such terror results from the horror of reality.
Reality apprehended by sight is always unbearable, even when that reality is beauty. We have a horror of reality, perhaps because we depend on it so. Language, even when it is realistic, allows us to escape from this terrible reality. Sight locks us up with it and obliges us to look at it. There is no way out -- except by controlling and mastering the reality.
Images fall into a pattern with respect to each other, but sounds do not. Instead, sounds contradict each other and cancel each other out. I am listening to a Mozart concerto, and suddenly near me someone speaks. Or a visitor knocks at my door. Or someone starts noisily putting away dishes and silverware. Sounds produce incoherence. The noises I hear form no panorama of the world.
Alone among all other sounds there is one that is particularly important for us: the spoken word. It ushers us into another dimension: relationship with other living beings, with persons. The Word is the particularly human sound which differentiates us from everything else. In this connection a fundamental difference between seeing and hearing is immediately apparent. In seeing, the living being is one form among many. A human being has a special shape and color, but he is included with all the rest as part of the landscape: a discrete, moving speck. When I hear speech, however, the human being becomes qualitatively different from everything else.
The spoken word, even if it involves an essential proclamation or the thought of a genius, falls into the void, passes, and disappears, if it is not heard and recovered by someone. The ocean over there, even if no one contemplates it, remains what it is and what it was. I see it, and it produces a flurry of emotions in me. I leave. I go away, but it does not. The spoken sentence has sunk into nothingness; time has gone by, and there are no "frozen words" which can make themselves heard again later.
Thus speech is basically presence. It is something alive and is never an object. It cannot be thrown before me and remain there. Once spoken, the word ceases to exist, unless I have recovered it. Before it is spoken, the word places me in an expectant situation, in a future I await eagerly. The word does not exist on its own. It continues to exist only in its effect on the one who spoke it and on the one who recovered it. The word is never an object you can turn this way and that, grasp, and preserve for tomorrow or some distant day when you may have time to deal with it. The word exists now. It is something immediate and can never be manipulated. Either it exists or it doesn’t. It makes me what I am, establishes the speaking me and the listening me, so that my role is determined by the word itself rather than by its content. For the word to become an object, someone must transform it into writing. But then it is no longer speech. Yet even in that form, it requires time.
The word is, of necessity, spoken to someone. If no one is present, it is spoken to oneself or to God. It presupposes an ear; the Great Ear, if necessary. It calls for a response. Every word, even a swearword, an insult, an exclamation, or a soliloquy, begins a dialogue. The monologue is a dialogue in the future or the past, or else it is a dialogue incorporated into a monologue. Here again, time is involved. Dialogue develops according to a variable timetable, but dialogue cannot exist unless those engaging in it are inserted into time. Language is a call, an exchange. I avoid using the threadbare term "communication." It is not true that language exists only to communicate information.
Language never belongs to the order of evident things. It is a continuous movement between hiding and revealing. It makes of the play in human relationships something even more fine and complex than it would be without language. Language exists only for, in, and by virtue of this relationship.
Dialogue involves a certain distance. We must be separated as well as different. I do not speak to a person identical to me. I must have something to say which the other lacks, but he must also be different from me. Yet similarity is required as well. When Adam sees Eve he bursts into speech. He speaks because of her and for her. She was flesh of his flesh, bone of his bone; and yet different: a dissimilar similar person. Speech fills the infinite gap that separates us. But the difference is never removed.
Discourse begins again and again because the distance between us remains. I find I must repeatedly begin speaking again to restate what I have said. The result is an inevitable, yet rich and blessed, redundancy. The word is resumed and repeated because it is never fully explicit or an exact translation of what I have to say. It is never precisely received, never precisely understood.
The word reduced to the value of an algebraic formula with only one possible meaning would be useful for us in carrying out an identical superficial activity. But such language could never create meaning, and would never produce agreement and communication with another person. "Algebraic" language could never produce -- or suggest a story. Bees communicate pieces of information to each other, but do not produce anything like history.
The word can also obstruct and impede history, when mythical language immerses us in an ahistorical time that is repetitive and continually reduced to myth. Language is either historical or ahistorical, either a discourse on action to be undertaken or of a myth to listen to. According to the sort of language used, human history either arises and becomes a significant aspect of humanity’s existence, or else it remains on the level of everyday incoherence.
With insight, meaning becomes perfectly transparent. The other person’s words become mine; I receive them in my own mind. I experience utter intellectual delight, but a delight in my whole being as well, when I understand and am understood. The Word ushers us into time.
When I say that language normally deals with Truth rather than Reality, I only mean that there are two orders of knowledge, two kinds of references we use as human beings. There are references to the concrete, experienced reality around us, and others that come from the spoken universe. The spoken universe is our invention -- something we establish and originate by our words. We derive meaning and understanding from language, and it permits us to go beyond the reality of our lives to enter another universe, which we may call phantasmic, schizophrenic, imaginary, or any other name we choose.
I am certain that since the beginning, human beings have felt a pressing need to frame for themselves something different from the verifiable universe, and we have formed it through language. This universe is what we call truth.
The important thing is that the unique value of language lies in truth. Language is not bound to reality, but to its capacity to create this different universe, which you can call surreal, meta-real, or metaphysical. For the sake of convenience we will call it the order of truth. The word is the creator, founder, and producer of truth.
When it uses a loudspeaker and crushes others with its powerful equipment, when the television set speaks, the word is no longer involved, since no dialogue is possible. What we have in these cases is machines that use language as a way of asserting themselves. Their power is magnified, but language is reduced to a useless series of sounds which inspire only reflexes and animal instincts.
How often we have come up against a blank wall instead of a face, when the other person did not want to understand! How can we make him understand as long as he persists in that attitude? In reality, language is an extraordinary occurrence in which each person’s liberty is respected. I can oppose my word to the other person’s. Or I can turn a deaf ear. I remain free as I face someone who tries to define me, encircle me, or convince me.
In other words, of necessity I give my listener a choice to make. A situation where there is choice is a situation where there is freedom. But at the same time, I invite him to use the gift of liberty inherent in language, just as I have. He must speak in turn, consciously making use of his freedom. I invite him to start down the difficult road of self-knowledge and self-expression, of choice, self-exposure, and unveiling.
Language always involves the exercise of freedom. It is never mechanical, just as it is not an object! Subtle structural linguistic analyses are of course limited to texts; that is, to finite, fixed words rather than open-ended ones. Such analyses seem to account for everything…But they overlook one thing. Once the languages and lexicons, rhetorics, discourses, and narratives have been stripped of their mystery, one thing is left: language itself. It remains because it is history, and such linguistic analysis excludes history.
This is its second characteristic. The paradox, let us remember, is something situated beside or outside the doxa (opinion). The paradox is free of all doxa, but at the same time calls the doxa into question. Roland Barthes is right in showing that "the real instrument of censorship is the endoxa rather than the police."
Our civilization’s major temptation (a problem that comes from technique’s preponderant influence) is to confuse reality with truth. We are made to believe that reality is truth: the only truth. At the time of the controversy over universals, the realists believed that only truth is real. We have inverted the terms, believing that everything is limited to reality. We think that truth is contained within reality and expressed by it. Nothing more. Moreover, there is nothing left beyond reality any more. Nothing is Other; the Wholly Other no longer exists. Everything is reduced to this verifiable reality which is scientifically measurable and pragmatically modifiable. Praxis becomes the measure of all truth. Truth becomes limited to something that falls short of real truth. It is something that can be acted upon. The Word is related only to Truth. The image is related only to reality.
Of course, the word can also refer to reality! It can be perfectly pragmatic, used to command an action or to describe a factual situation. The word enters the world of concrete objects and refers to experiences of reality. It is the means of communication in everyday life, and as a result it fits precisely with all of reality. It conveys information about reality and takes part in the understanding of it. It can even create reality, producing effects that will become part of reality. Thus the word is ambivalent. But its specificity lies in the domain of truth, since this domain is not shared with anything else.
On the contrary, the image cannot leave the domain of reality. It is not ambivalent. At this point I can hear someone tempted to ask: "What is Truth?" I will carefully avoid answering by suggesting some specific content for the word. Such an answer would be challenged immediately, involving us in a long digression which would exceed my capacity. Without attempting this sort of definition, I can show what the object of truth can be, and this will serve to distinguish it clearly from reality. The very questions asked about truth can indicate its nature, replacing the answer that cannot be given. We can grant, then, that anything concerned with the ultimate destination of a human being belongs to the domain of Truth.
It does not matter if one can answer or not, nor does it matter whether the answer is personal or is objectified as philosophy or revelation. But when a person asks about his own life (consciously or unconsciously), then the real question of truth has been asked. And when anyone claims to have resolved it, he is lying.
When he tries to answer this question within the framework of reality alone, he has no answer to offer.
An individual can ask the question of truth and attempt to answer it only through language. The image, on the other hand, belongs to the domain of reality. It can in no way convey anything at all about the order of truth. It never grasps anything but an appearance or outward behavior. It is unable to convey a spiritual experience, a requirement of justice, a testimony to the deepest feelings of a person, or to bear witness to the truth. In all these areas the image will rely on a form. Images can convey a rite, and thus people have a tendency to confuse religious truth with religious rites.
An image can catch a psychological expression on someone’s face: ecstasy, for example. People will believe that they are seeing authentic faith, whereas all they have is a psychological state that can be utterly unrelated to faith. Such a state can be induced by a drug, for example. Faced with such a problem, those who identify reality with truth are so monumentally confused that they deny faith because a psychological state can be artificially induced! An image can show a body’s position, as in a photograph of clasped hands and bowed head, seeming to say that this is prayer. But in reality, no prayer is involved in this image; it could be only a joke. Even when no one is joking, an image is incapable of expressing the seriousness of truth.
…An image can report miracles, but only recorded miracles -- after they have taken place and grace has departed. The image can never penetrate as far as the holy place where the Word proclaims that an individual has become a new creation. The miracle is an expression of this new creation. No image is able to convey any truth at all. This explains in partly why all "spiritual" films are failures. When we insist on expressing spiritual matters this way through images, something other than truth is always perceived. Even more serious and alarming, truth tends to disappear behind all the lighting and makeup. It tends to vanish when squelched by images.
Our generation is characterized by the exclusive preeminence of reality, both at the factual level and in our preoccupations. We are moved in this direction by the marvels of technique, the prevailing tone of our time, the great concern about economic matters, etc. Our era is further characterized by an absolute identification of reality with truth. Marxism has prevailed absolutely in this matter, and science has finally convinced people that the only possible truth consists in knowing reality, and that the proof of truth is success relative to reality. Thus in the thinking of modern individuals the image is the means par excellence which communicates reality and truth at the same time.
This attitude concerning images can be held only if one confuses reality and truth to begin with, believing that a scientific hypothesis is true when it is confirmed by experiments. Such a hypothesis has nothing to do with truth, and is merely accurate. Of course, this preeminence of reality and this confusion coincide with the universal belief in the "fact," taken to be of ultimate value.
The image is an admirable tool for understanding reality. A documentary film of a riot enables us to penetrate the world of anger better than any speech could. But an image is explosive only if the spectator knows what it represents and if it is taken for what it is: a faithful representation of reality. An image becomes falsehood and illusion as soon as a person tries to see truth in it. At that moment, by means of an amazing reversal, the image loses all its explosive power.
When the image is understood to speak only of reality, however, it is explosive and terrible. At this point we discover a new problem. images in our society are always the product of a mechanical technique. Technique is truly an intermediary, since the universe of images is established for us by technique. But this is the equivalent of saying that we find ourselves in the presence of an artificial world, made by an outside force with artificial means. Therefore it is important to realize that stark reality is never conveyed to us in this universe of images. Instead we find a more or less arbitrary construction or reconstruction, with the result that we must constantly remind ourselves of the ambiguity behind the apparent objectivity of the image: it expresses a reality, but of necessity it presents us with an artifice. In this sense the image is deceptive: it passes itself off as reality when it is artifice; it pretends to be unilateral truth when it is a reflection of something that cannot be truth.

I look out in front of me, and perceive the sea lit up out to the horizon. I look around me: to my left and right, I see the limitless straight line of the beach, and behind it, the dunes -- all in space. With my gaze I make the space my own. The objects are clear and plain. I see the wind bend over to the ground, the reeds that keep the dunes in place.
I am at the center of this universe by means of my gaze, which sweeps across this space and lets me know everything in it. By combining these images of reality, I grasp it as a whole, and become a part of it as a result of my looking.
My sight constructs a universe for me. It reveals to me a directly perceivable reality composed of colorful, simple, harmonious images. But it also furnishes me with more subtle materials. I learn to read my brother’s or my enemy’s face. Transmitted images are superimposed on one another, and as a result, I now know that a given image belongs within a particular context of reality. It conjures up another image; I anticipate what I am going to see, but what is coming will in any case be located in space and will constitute part of reality -- deeper and hidden, in a sense, but still reality.
Such information is precise and pinpointed, and deals only with reality. Nothing else, no other dimension, is ever involved. …Sight has made me the center of the world because it situates me at the point from which I see everything, and causes me to see things relative to this point. My vision makes a circular sweep of space, working from this point: my point of view. But now I am tempted, as the center of the world, to act on this spectacle and transform this setting. What was missing in my vision was someone to act, and I am available.
Sight moves to action at the same time that it serves as the means of action. Again, without it, how could I act, since I wouldn’t even know what my hand was touching or what was within my reach? …I am a subject, not separated from what I look at. Rather, what I see becomes a part of me, as my action involves me in what I see. Images both permit and condition my action; they are always imperative. I lean out the window and look searchingly into the emptiness. Images of distance and depth thrust themselves on my consciousness. I know I mustn’t lean out any further.
The image defines and marks the boundaries of my action. The image does not induce my action, but establishes its conditions and possibilities. Without visual images my action is definitely blind, incoherent, and uncertain. Sight conveys certainties and pieces of information to me, as we have said. Such information is reliable. I perceive a gray ocean and an overcast skyline. This is unquestionable. The reality around me is a certainty in which I can be confident. It is neither incoherent nor deformed. I know, of course, that this is also something learned; there are no data coming directly from the senses, and the shapes and colors and distances I apprehend are perceptible to me because I learned them. My culture has furnished me with the very images I see. But however important this may be (and we must not push this idea too far!), it is still true that I see.
What a dreadful uneasiness takes hold of us when reality is submerged in fog…sight fails to furnish me with clear images and I can no longer act. The world loses its midpoint. It is off center because I cannot see it anymore. The center could be anywhere, but it is no longer located where I am.
In order for my sight to mislead me concerning reality, there must be some unusual phenomenon, like a mirage. The image is not ambiguous. This peach I am looking at is red and weighs heavily on the bending branch. This is absolutely certain. But the image is insignificant. It has no meaning in itself and must be interpreted. In the case of a fruit ripe for picking, the visual image gives me indisputable information, but if I stop there, nothing will happen. It must therefore be interpreted. In order to move from the vision of the fruit to "I should pick it" or "It can be picked," there must be an interpretation: an attribution of meaning to these real images of reality.
Another dimension must be added to sight: interpretation will come through speech. Thus the image contains within itself a deep contradiction. It is not ambiguous: it is coherent, reliable, and inclusive; but it is insignificant. It can have innumerable meanings, depending on culture, learning, or the intervention of some other dimension. For this reason I must learn to see, before looking at the image.
After seeing it, I must learn to interpret it. The image is clear, but this clarity does not imply certainty or comprehension. My certainty is limited to this directly perceived reality that my sight reveals to me. Nothing beyond that.
I call these images "vision" because they are connected with the other images I am accustomed to. I would be tempted to say in this case that the order is reversed. The visual image exists, and then I attribute a meaning to it; but the vision appears only as the illustration of a previously established meaning. No matter how insignificant it may be, the visual image is always rigorous, imperative, and irreversible. I saw what I saw. I cannot change the reality which is conveyed to me in this way, except through my action. There is no ambiguity at this point. Nor is there reversibility.
If I had only one "view" of my universe, I would be a participant in a totality which would be both terribly coherent and yet at the same time composed of fragments without any necessary relationship. The totality would be like a cloud of irrational dots which can form only the framework of an action, a change in the relationships between the points. But the cloud of dots cannot be used for understanding anything, because this pointillism of images is space but not duration. The image is present. It is only a presence. It bears witness to something "already there": the object I see was there before I opened my eyes.
I have a point of view, a location from which I see things, but it is situated within what I see and inseparable from it. Wherever I place myself, however I shift my position, I remain in the field of vision, I remain in the middle of what I see. I can never take my distance, act as if I were not present, or even begin to think independently of what I see.
At night, when I cannot see, a certain distance is established. This explains why the day’s events become so painful at night: the distance between me and the world around me allows for reflection and meditation. A flood of images overwhelms me, beckons me, and carries me along: an image I have seen follows immediately after the one I have just dismissed from my mind. I can never stop this movement of reality in space. I can never consider a given image like a diamond or a painting from which I can take my distance in order to be "myself," instead of being overwhelmed by the images composed of dots.
The image prevents me from taking my distance. And if I cannot establish a certain distance, I can neither judge nor criticize. Of course, I also feel pleasure or displeasure in what I see. I can find it beautiful or ugly. But this is not a critical process. No judgment is involved. Furthermore, what possible criticism or judgment can we make with respect to space and reality? In spite of the frailty we have all observed in a person’s testimony about what he has seen, everyone has the same certainty about anything he has seen. He has seen reality.
Sight involves a relationship with reality as established in space. It is an artificial construction. Medusa’s head transfixes whoever gazes at her. Whoever looks at the scenes on the shields of the Iliad is terror stricken. Sight introduces us to an unbearable shock. Reality when seen inspires horror. Terror is always visual. Horror stories play only on our visual sense and suggest representation.
In contrast, the spoken word can involve us in mystery or drama. It places us in situations of conflict and makes us conscious of tragedy. But it is never on its own terrifying or stupefying. We are dazed by sight -- by an image or a vision. The word takes us to the edge of terror only when descriptive and painting extremely precise images. Edgar Allan Poe’s short stories are an example. All the descriptions we have heard of Nazi death camps move us to revulsion and to a judgment that may be based more on strong feelings than anything else. The image of bulldozers pushing along mounds of skeletal corpses, which shortly before had been living beings, faces teetering from the machine’s pushing -- this image drawn from ‘Night and Fog’ moves us to abject horror. It terrifies us, because we see. Such terror results from the horror of reality.
Reality apprehended by sight is always unbearable, even when that reality is beauty. We have a horror of reality, perhaps because we depend on it so. Language, even when it is realistic, allows us to escape from this terrible reality. Sight locks us up with it and obliges us to look at it. There is no way out -- except by controlling and mastering the reality.
Images fall into a pattern with respect to each other, but sounds do not. Instead, sounds contradict each other and cancel each other out. I am listening to a Mozart concerto, and suddenly near me someone speaks. Or a visitor knocks at my door. Or someone starts noisily putting away dishes and silverware. Sounds produce incoherence. The noises I hear form no panorama of the world.
Alone among all other sounds there is one that is particularly important for us: the spoken word. It ushers us into another dimension: relationship with other living beings, with persons. The Word is the particularly human sound which differentiates us from everything else. In this connection a fundamental difference between seeing and hearing is immediately apparent. In seeing, the living being is one form among many. A human being has a special shape and color, but he is included with all the rest as part of the landscape: a discrete, moving speck. When I hear speech, however, the human being becomes qualitatively different from everything else.
The spoken word, even if it involves an essential proclamation or the thought of a genius, falls into the void, passes, and disappears, if it is not heard and recovered by someone. The ocean over there, even if no one contemplates it, remains what it is and what it was. I see it, and it produces a flurry of emotions in me. I leave. I go away, but it does not. The spoken sentence has sunk into nothingness; time has gone by, and there are no "frozen words" which can make themselves heard again later.
Thus speech is basically presence. It is something alive and is never an object. It cannot be thrown before me and remain there. Once spoken, the word ceases to exist, unless I have recovered it. Before it is spoken, the word places me in an expectant situation, in a future I await eagerly. The word does not exist on its own. It continues to exist only in its effect on the one who spoke it and on the one who recovered it. The word is never an object you can turn this way and that, grasp, and preserve for tomorrow or some distant day when you may have time to deal with it. The word exists now. It is something immediate and can never be manipulated. Either it exists or it doesn’t. It makes me what I am, establishes the speaking me and the listening me, so that my role is determined by the word itself rather than by its content. For the word to become an object, someone must transform it into writing. But then it is no longer speech. Yet even in that form, it requires time.
The word is, of necessity, spoken to someone. If no one is present, it is spoken to oneself or to God. It presupposes an ear; the Great Ear, if necessary. It calls for a response. Every word, even a swearword, an insult, an exclamation, or a soliloquy, begins a dialogue. The monologue is a dialogue in the future or the past, or else it is a dialogue incorporated into a monologue. Here again, time is involved. Dialogue develops according to a variable timetable, but dialogue cannot exist unless those engaging in it are inserted into time. Language is a call, an exchange. I avoid using the threadbare term "communication." It is not true that language exists only to communicate information.
Language never belongs to the order of evident things. It is a continuous movement between hiding and revealing. It makes of the play in human relationships something even more fine and complex than it would be without language. Language exists only for, in, and by virtue of this relationship.
Dialogue involves a certain distance. We must be separated as well as different. I do not speak to a person identical to me. I must have something to say which the other lacks, but he must also be different from me. Yet similarity is required as well. When Adam sees Eve he bursts into speech. He speaks because of her and for her. She was flesh of his flesh, bone of his bone; and yet different: a dissimilar similar person. Speech fills the infinite gap that separates us. But the difference is never removed.
Discourse begins again and again because the distance between us remains. I find I must repeatedly begin speaking again to restate what I have said. The result is an inevitable, yet rich and blessed, redundancy. The word is resumed and repeated because it is never fully explicit or an exact translation of what I have to say. It is never precisely received, never precisely understood.
The word reduced to the value of an algebraic formula with only one possible meaning would be useful for us in carrying out an identical superficial activity. But such language could never create meaning, and would never produce agreement and communication with another person. "Algebraic" language could never produce -- or suggest a story. Bees communicate pieces of information to each other, but do not produce anything like history.
The word can also obstruct and impede history, when mythical language immerses us in an ahistorical time that is repetitive and continually reduced to myth. Language is either historical or ahistorical, either a discourse on action to be undertaken or of a myth to listen to. According to the sort of language used, human history either arises and becomes a significant aspect of humanity’s existence, or else it remains on the level of everyday incoherence.
With insight, meaning becomes perfectly transparent. The other person’s words become mine; I receive them in my own mind. I experience utter intellectual delight, but a delight in my whole being as well, when I understand and am understood. The Word ushers us into time.
When I say that language normally deals with Truth rather than Reality, I only mean that there are two orders of knowledge, two kinds of references we use as human beings. There are references to the concrete, experienced reality around us, and others that come from the spoken universe. The spoken universe is our invention -- something we establish and originate by our words. We derive meaning and understanding from language, and it permits us to go beyond the reality of our lives to enter another universe, which we may call phantasmic, schizophrenic, imaginary, or any other name we choose.
I am certain that since the beginning, human beings have felt a pressing need to frame for themselves something different from the verifiable universe, and we have formed it through language. This universe is what we call truth.
The important thing is that the unique value of language lies in truth. Language is not bound to reality, but to its capacity to create this different universe, which you can call surreal, meta-real, or metaphysical. For the sake of convenience we will call it the order of truth. The word is the creator, founder, and producer of truth.
When it uses a loudspeaker and crushes others with its powerful equipment, when the television set speaks, the word is no longer involved, since no dialogue is possible. What we have in these cases is machines that use language as a way of asserting themselves. Their power is magnified, but language is reduced to a useless series of sounds which inspire only reflexes and animal instincts.
How often we have come up against a blank wall instead of a face, when the other person did not want to understand! How can we make him understand as long as he persists in that attitude? In reality, language is an extraordinary occurrence in which each person’s liberty is respected. I can oppose my word to the other person’s. Or I can turn a deaf ear. I remain free as I face someone who tries to define me, encircle me, or convince me.
In other words, of necessity I give my listener a choice to make. A situation where there is choice is a situation where there is freedom. But at the same time, I invite him to use the gift of liberty inherent in language, just as I have. He must speak in turn, consciously making use of his freedom. I invite him to start down the difficult road of self-knowledge and self-expression, of choice, self-exposure, and unveiling.
Language always involves the exercise of freedom. It is never mechanical, just as it is not an object! Subtle structural linguistic analyses are of course limited to texts; that is, to finite, fixed words rather than open-ended ones. Such analyses seem to account for everything…But they overlook one thing. Once the languages and lexicons, rhetorics, discourses, and narratives have been stripped of their mystery, one thing is left: language itself. It remains because it is history, and such linguistic analysis excludes history.
This is its second characteristic. The paradox, let us remember, is something situated beside or outside the doxa (opinion). The paradox is free of all doxa, but at the same time calls the doxa into question. Roland Barthes is right in showing that "the real instrument of censorship is the endoxa rather than the police."
Our civilization’s major temptation (a problem that comes from technique’s preponderant influence) is to confuse reality with truth. We are made to believe that reality is truth: the only truth. At the time of the controversy over universals, the realists believed that only truth is real. We have inverted the terms, believing that everything is limited to reality. We think that truth is contained within reality and expressed by it. Nothing more. Moreover, there is nothing left beyond reality any more. Nothing is Other; the Wholly Other no longer exists. Everything is reduced to this verifiable reality which is scientifically measurable and pragmatically modifiable. Praxis becomes the measure of all truth. Truth becomes limited to something that falls short of real truth. It is something that can be acted upon. The Word is related only to Truth. The image is related only to reality.
Of course, the word can also refer to reality! It can be perfectly pragmatic, used to command an action or to describe a factual situation. The word enters the world of concrete objects and refers to experiences of reality. It is the means of communication in everyday life, and as a result it fits precisely with all of reality. It conveys information about reality and takes part in the understanding of it. It can even create reality, producing effects that will become part of reality. Thus the word is ambivalent. But its specificity lies in the domain of truth, since this domain is not shared with anything else.
On the contrary, the image cannot leave the domain of reality. It is not ambivalent. At this point I can hear someone tempted to ask: "What is Truth?" I will carefully avoid answering by suggesting some specific content for the word. Such an answer would be challenged immediately, involving us in a long digression which would exceed my capacity. Without attempting this sort of definition, I can show what the object of truth can be, and this will serve to distinguish it clearly from reality. The very questions asked about truth can indicate its nature, replacing the answer that cannot be given. We can grant, then, that anything concerned with the ultimate destination of a human being belongs to the domain of Truth.
It does not matter if one can answer or not, nor does it matter whether the answer is personal or is objectified as philosophy or revelation. But when a person asks about his own life (consciously or unconsciously), then the real question of truth has been asked. And when anyone claims to have resolved it, he is lying.
When he tries to answer this question within the framework of reality alone, he has no answer to offer.
An individual can ask the question of truth and attempt to answer it only through language. The image, on the other hand, belongs to the domain of reality. It can in no way convey anything at all about the order of truth. It never grasps anything but an appearance or outward behavior. It is unable to convey a spiritual experience, a requirement of justice, a testimony to the deepest feelings of a person, or to bear witness to the truth. In all these areas the image will rely on a form. Images can convey a rite, and thus people have a tendency to confuse religious truth with religious rites.
An image can catch a psychological expression on someone’s face: ecstasy, for example. People will believe that they are seeing authentic faith, whereas all they have is a psychological state that can be utterly unrelated to faith. Such a state can be induced by a drug, for example. Faced with such a problem, those who identify reality with truth are so monumentally confused that they deny faith because a psychological state can be artificially induced! An image can show a body’s position, as in a photograph of clasped hands and bowed head, seeming to say that this is prayer. But in reality, no prayer is involved in this image; it could be only a joke. Even when no one is joking, an image is incapable of expressing the seriousness of truth.
…An image can report miracles, but only recorded miracles -- after they have taken place and grace has departed. The image can never penetrate as far as the holy place where the Word proclaims that an individual has become a new creation. The miracle is an expression of this new creation. No image is able to convey any truth at all. This explains in partly why all "spiritual" films are failures. When we insist on expressing spiritual matters this way through images, something other than truth is always perceived. Even more serious and alarming, truth tends to disappear behind all the lighting and makeup. It tends to vanish when squelched by images.
Our generation is characterized by the exclusive preeminence of reality, both at the factual level and in our preoccupations. We are moved in this direction by the marvels of technique, the prevailing tone of our time, the great concern about economic matters, etc. Our era is further characterized by an absolute identification of reality with truth. Marxism has prevailed absolutely in this matter, and science has finally convinced people that the only possible truth consists in knowing reality, and that the proof of truth is success relative to reality. Thus in the thinking of modern individuals the image is the means par excellence which communicates reality and truth at the same time.
This attitude concerning images can be held only if one confuses reality and truth to begin with, believing that a scientific hypothesis is true when it is confirmed by experiments. Such a hypothesis has nothing to do with truth, and is merely accurate. Of course, this preeminence of reality and this confusion coincide with the universal belief in the "fact," taken to be of ultimate value.
The image is an admirable tool for understanding reality. A documentary film of a riot enables us to penetrate the world of anger better than any speech could. But an image is explosive only if the spectator knows what it represents and if it is taken for what it is: a faithful representation of reality. An image becomes falsehood and illusion as soon as a person tries to see truth in it. At that moment, by means of an amazing reversal, the image loses all its explosive power.
When the image is understood to speak only of reality, however, it is explosive and terrible. At this point we discover a new problem. images in our society are always the product of a mechanical technique. Technique is truly an intermediary, since the universe of images is established for us by technique. But this is the equivalent of saying that we find ourselves in the presence of an artificial world, made by an outside force with artificial means. Therefore it is important to realize that stark reality is never conveyed to us in this universe of images. Instead we find a more or less arbitrary construction or reconstruction, with the result that we must constantly remind ourselves of the ambiguity behind the apparent objectivity of the image: it expresses a reality, but of necessity it presents us with an artifice. In this sense the image is deceptive: it passes itself off as reality when it is artifice; it pretends to be unilateral truth when it is a reflection of something that cannot be truth.

TLDR: Be liberal but pick a progressive running mate lmao to get exactly 306-232.
VP: Karen Bass (worst option at start, but that does mean it makes it extremely hard to get good RNG on states you don't want to win like OH, FL, but still leaves you with good room on the states you must win like PA, AZ, and NV)
Visits: Split between WI, PA & GA, you should try to get Georgia +2 at end, PA by like +5 or 6, and WI by +10
Difficulty: Normal
Q1: We're going to build back better than ever before. I'm going to work for every American, repairing our critical infrastructure at home and our standing in the world.
Q2: We're going to defeat COVID and get America working again. I'm going to push for this day and night from the moment I step into the White House.
Q3: I should be out there talking to the American people. That doesn't mean we do rallies with 10 thousand people, but we can't afford to just sit around in our basement for the next five months.
Q4: Who authorized this meeting? Did I authorize this meeting? We're telling Bernie Sanders that he'd better fall in line. We have an election to win.
Q5: I'm not going to spend the 2020 campaign focusing on 2019 issues. We need to talk about our plans to fight this COVID-19 epidemic and rebuild the economy.
Q6: I talked with a lot of people before I made my decision, and Karen Bass stood out as someone with the judgment and experience to work with me in the White House.
Q7: I'm proud of my son. He's overcome a lot to find success in life. This campaign is about the American people and their struggles and opportunities. I'm not going to spend my time talking about Trump and Ukraine.
Q8: Being a police officer is one of the hardest jobs there is, but they got it very wrong here. I have every confidence that Hennepin County will take the appropriate action against the officers involved in this case.
Q9: We need to put $2000 in the hands of every American, and we need to put forward a truly substantial relief package for our struggling small businesses and job creators.
Q10: Two of my old friends, Jimmy Carter and James Baker, came out with a great study on election integrity a few years ago, and it's time we put their recommendations into action. I think this would represent a reasonable compromise between making it easy to vote, while ensuring our elections are secure from fraud.
Q11: I'm proposing a pretty big bill, you might have noticed, around $2 trillion to rebuild our roads, develop mass transit and green energy, and repair critical human infrastructure needs as well. We must move forward as a country.
Q12: We're not going to have a national lockdown. That's just fear-mongering from the Republicans to distract from how they've mishandled the pandemic. This is something each locality can decide for themselves, based on local conditions.
Q13: The Court has had nine justices since 1869, and any attempt to change that is sure to destroy the Court's legitimacy even further. We must look at other kinds of reform.
Q14: We can sit around all day worrying about tactics, but the fact of the matter is, we need to win elections. If Democrats did a better job of appealing to all Americans, we wouldn't be in this predicament right now.
Q15: It's the debate, I don't care enough to look for best RNG lmao.
Q16: Jill and I are praying for a full and speedy recovery for President Trump. As someone who has dealt with tragedy, you never want to see this kind of thing happen to anyone.
Q17: We're going to be fair, but we're going to be tough. I've always supported the rule of law in my career, for decades now, regardless of what some right-wing websites try to say about me.
Q18: People know all about Donald Trump and the dozens of scandals that have unfolded around him. I think we're better off talking about solutions to the COVID-19 crisis and the economy.
Q19: The right-wing media wants to present me as some kind of a gun-grabber, when that couldn't be further from the truth. My only crime is not parroting the NRA's every last word on this issue.
Q20: These attacks are wrong and they should prosecuted to the full extent of the law. At the same time, we need more answers from China. Millions of lives and trillions of dollars have been lost, yet they continue to block any serious investigation into the origins of this virus.
Q21: We've got a small troop presence in Afghanistan right now, and we should probably keep it that way. I'm confident that country will continue to gradually stabilize over time, with a consistent but minimal investment from the United States.
Q22: Our relationship with China, depends on China. If they show a greater willingness to cooperate, then we can rebuild our relationship from the damage that Trump inflicted. If they continue to act in a hostile manner, we'll have to react accordingly.
Q23: If Trump thought he was going to win this election, he wouldn't be saying these kinds of things. I'm confident that we're going to win, and that the American people will have full faith in the outcome this year.
Q24: This is a fake laptop. End of story. I don't know how it got passed around, but you have to strongly suspect Russian intelligence or other nefarious actors here.
Q25: I want us to focus on Pennsylvania, with maybe a quick stop over the border in Ohio.

Just completed the 1247km long Carreta Austral in Chilean Patagonia on my rigid steel frame Breezer Radar X running 29 x 2.25 inch tyres tubeless. The bike is about 14kg (31 pounds with pedals and a Brooks B17 special saddle) unloaded and when fully loaded with my bikepacking gear (tent, clothes, tools, water, sleeping system, food etc) is about between 28 to 30kgs (61 to 66 pounds). The bike was very supple and comfortable on most of the trip including the 500kms of gravel (el ripio) and no complaints on ride feel on the washboard and the worst of the "ripio"(tennisball sized rocks on gravel against strong headwinds) when running lower pressures on the i25 WTB rims.
However on this trip I found myself wanting a lower granny gear a lot of the time on the much more steeper gradients especially on rocky gravel. The gearing is stock with an FSA direct mount 38T chain ring and an SRAM 11x 42 cassette. and Apex derailleur and shifters. The only times I used the 10th and 11th gear was on big downhill sections that were too fast (over 50kmph) to keep pedaling even at over 100 gear inches in highest gear. But some of those Patagonian climbs were so tough and steep that I had to walk the bike many times in order to save the quads and knees and my heart from getting into the dangerzone.
The stock gearing provides a granny gear of around 26 inches and the tallest gear was a bit over 100". Am considering doing the GDMBR and would love to get a lower gear to prevent having to walk and get off the bike. I have a 30T FSA direct mount chain ring as spare that came with the bike and that would get me almost two lower gears and bring the granny gear down to around 20.7 inches. I don't think I would miss the top end (because the bike would be loaded and it would be off-road). Because even on flat bitumen road and unloaded I find 9th gear (3rd smallest cassette cog is where I stay the most can get a good cadence and speed that feels right and optimum for cruising for many hours. This is roughly about 80 gear inches as being perfect for high end under flat normal conditions.
Dropping to a 30T chainring would mean my highest gear is about 80 gear inches (a seemingly worthwhile sacrifice), but this would be offroad (and loaded) and on lower pressure tyres and the lowest would be as mentioned before about 20.7".
Am I going to run into issues swapping out the direct mount FSA chain ring from 38T to 30T. Would it be as simple as changing the chain ring (with the right direct mount tool) and shortening the chain by a few links? Would there be any need to change spacing at the crank and chainring or it is just install and ride?
Forgive me for asking any silly questions but I am not that knowledgeable about derailleur setups after coming off a belt driven Shimano Alfine 11 IGH that I've used as a commuter bike for last 10 years.
I have read about some people running 11 x 46 cassettes on the Apex 1 with no issues apart from adjusting the B screw (but that seems more complicated and expensive to just changing the chain ring. But obviously if I can get as low as 19 gear inches with a 30T chainring and a 11x 46 cassette I am all ears.
Basically I am really wanting to find a much lower gearing for my groupset without too many changes and without breaking the bank as this bike is not built for racing but is a pack mule loaded to get me to where I need to go without killing these 48 year old knees.
Has anyone had experience of lowering the gearing on an SRAM Apex 1 for steeper gradient climbs and how did you go about it?
All and any advice appreciated?

Are you on the lookout for your dream home in the vibrant and upscale neighbourhood of Juhu? With its picturesque beach, renowned Bollywood connections, and a plethora of amenities, Juhu is a highly desirable location for homeowners. Whether you’re searching for a spacious flat or a luxurious4 BHK in Juhu, this guide will provide insider tips to help you easily navigate the real estate market.

Research the Real Estate Market

To kick-start your journey towards finding your dream home in Juhu, it's essential to conduct thorough research on the real estate market in the area. Understanding the current market trends, property prices, and upcoming developments will empower you with valuable knowledge to make informed decisions. Take the help of real estate listing websites that will provide comprehensive listings and insights into the Juhu real estate scene.
Determine Your Budget
Before embarking on your search, it's crucial to establish a realistic budget. Consider your financial situation, mortgage options, and additional costs like registration fees and maintenance charges. Setting a budget will help narrow your choices and prevent you from wasting time on properties beyond your means.
Engage a Reliable Real Estate Agent
Partnering with a trustworthy and experienced real estate agent can be a game-changer when it comes to finding your dream home in Juhu. They possess valuable local knowledge, access exclusive listings, and can negotiate on your behalf. Look for agents who specialise in Juhu properties and have a proven track record of successful transactions.
Visit Open Houses
Attending open houses is an excellent way to explore potential properties and get a feel for the neighbourhood. Take note of the property's condition, layout, natural lighting, and proximity to essential amenities. Open houses also provide an opportunity to interact with real estate agents and gather additional information about the property and its surroundings.
Consider the Location
When it comes to real estate, location is paramount. Juhu offers a prime location with its proximity to the beach, renowned schools, hospitals, entertainment venues, and transportation hubs. Consider your lifestyle preferences and choose a location that aligns with your needs. Juhu's vibrant atmosphere and easy accessibility make it an ideal place to call home.
Verify Legal Documentation
Before finalising any property, ensure that you verify all the legal documentation. Seek professional advice to review the title deeds, clearances, and encumbrance certificates. This step ensures that you are making a secure investment and protects you from any legal complications in the future.
Check Infrastructure and Amenities
Juhu boasts excellent infrastructure and a wide range of amenities that enhance the quality of life for its residents. From well-maintained roads and reliable utilities to recreational parks and fitness centres, Juhu has it all. Therefore, research the available amenities in the vicinity of the properties you are considering to ensure they align with your lifestyle preferences.
Evaluate Security Measures
Safety is a top priority when choosing your dream home. Look for properties prioritising security measures, such as gated communities, 24/7 surveillance systems, and trained security personnel. Peace of mind is invaluable; a secure living environment will provide just that.

Hi BAbike!
I've never biked in NorCal and am in charge of route planning for a small group of out-of-town folks for an upcoming weekend (Fri - Sun). We're an assorted bunch of people looking forward to trying out off-road bikepacking (we're all relatively new to both off-road and touring/bikepacking, but not entirely). I'm a the least fit and most newbie to gravel/ beginner mountain biking and want to make sure I'm planning something mostly reasonable. We're planning on starting in Fairfax and have a Friday night reservation at Coast Campground in Point Reyes.
Can anyone give me feedback on the route for day 1? https://www.strava.com/routes/3083205549276558224 I think day 2 will be low-ish mileage putzing around Point Reyes-adjacent areas and day 3 will mostly be a reversal of day 1. I tried to obsess over route details from various sources, but I'm worried about conditions after the very wet winter and also that I may have missed some key relevant details since it is alllll new to me.
I initially booked Saturday night at Hawk campground (with the intent of leaving from SF) but that just feels like too much, so I'm going to try to get another night in Point Reyes (maybe Wildcat?). If that doesn't work: (1) does Sam P Taylor really not turn away bikes? I don't think we would be rolling in particularly early, and it would be on a Saturday night... and (2) any opinion on Olema Campground? I'm open to other suggestions
We are all coming in from less treed areas and are excited for redwoods. I'd originally had us going through Muir Woods and am bummed that I had to cut that out in order to be reasonable. Are there other areas that would be recommended as spectacular for desert folks? Any cheese or ice cream recommendations if we get to spend day 2 putzing around?
Thank you so much!!