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Proceed to Safety

守炉部二十七 (Morobu-Niju-Nana)    

This is a story that I posted in a series of short chapters at the top of my posts, beginning with this prologue on NP1965. It tells the story of Morobu, another alter-ego (like Timborme) who finds himself on a slowly-unfolding journey of discovery in Japan. In takes place in the part of Japan where I have gone each of the three times I went there in real life: Fujinomiya prefecture, to the southwest of Mount Fuji.

Contents

Summary of Chapters

Glossary

Big Long-winded Spoiler Explanation

Other Links

      back to OTT index

      My Blitz Reports

      Q04B

Here is a map of most of the locations mentioned.

Summary of Chapters

(including some earlier events that we learn about during the story)

day ch description
14日5月 - ChronosDragon, an early pilgrim, ① on map, is at gorintō
15日5月 - ChronosDragon goes along Morobu's (future) route then turns up along Lucky's stream.
- adnapemit, ② on map, spiraling up and counterclockwise, before gravity distortion started
17日5月 - yappobiscuits, ⑧ on map, paces downhill on first stream
17日5月 - Sciscitor, ⑤ on map, paces downhill on 2nd stream and uphill on 1st
21日5月 - azule, ③ on map, begins wandering west of Toyatsuka
- p prologue
24日5月 1 (early morning) Morobu riding catbus
2 (morning) Morobu arrives at Temple of Cuelessness
3 (noon) waiting in courtyard
4 (early afternoon) still Waiting
5 film crew
6 ucim's story
7 (night) in the shinden
25日5月 8 (morning) fall into stream
9 with Lucky and HES
10 freeing Lucky
11 speaking with them
12 (afternoon) up to mountain-pond
13 talking with mscha
14 (overnight) Cloudy_the_Conqueror dream
26日5月 15 (morning) talking with Link
16 (noon) crossing first rice-fields
- mscha, ④ on map, witnesses a change in gravity
17 (afternoon) to second rice-fields
18 (evening) bamboo camp
27日5月 19 (midmorning) discover beach
20-2 talk with BlueCrab
23 (midmorning) find imagebot
24-6 talk with imagebot
27 say goodbye to imagebot
28-9 (late morning, afternoon) back most of way to gorintō
30 (overnight) dream with giant lobster
28日5月 31 (morning) decide to return to mountain-pond
32 meet MistyCat
33 talking with MistyCat
34 the revelation of the tiles
35-6 ChronosDragon tile
37 (still morning) deciding not to double back again
38 leaving first journal-tile
39-40 imagebot
41 at mountain-stream
42 back to pond
43 the tiles of 4 predecessors
44 visualizing the map
45 leaving a tile
46-50 on bridge, duck
29日5月 51-2 get up, leave pond
53 hiking-trail
54 meme signs
55 AUTOMOME church
56-8 with AUTOMOME
- (Here for a while I was on vacation and did not post chapters)
59 still with AUTOMOME
60-5 following mscha's route, more streams
66 january1may marker-tile
68-9 azule markers
70-3 at second pond; talking with lmjb1964
30日5月 74 what-if "fortunes"
75-6 mrob27 appears
77 they return to the Past


Morobu Glossary

afurika tairiku アフリカ大陸 = African continent

anata wa eigo o hanashite iru あなたは英語を話している = you're speaking English

anata to subete no gen'in ni kouun あなたとすべての原因に幸運 = good luck to all causes with you

ashitakayama 愛鷹山 - Mount Ashitaka

babiron no kuuchuu teien バビロンの空中庭園 = the Hanging Gardens of Babylon

basshefuru バッシュフル = Bashful (the name, i.e. one of the Seven Dwarfs)

biriya-dobo-ru ビリヤードボール = billiard ball

burittsu ブリッツ = blitz

burittsu on'nanoko ブリッツ女の子 = Blitz girl

dainanasho- 第七章 = chapter 7

dai tairu 大タイル = large tile

deetarinku-soo データリンク層 = data link

dengeki 電撃 = lightning

dinosaur = bird, a reference to xkcd 1211

doumo arigatou どうもありがとう = many thanks

fufu ふふ = giggle

fujisan 富士山 = Mount Fuji

fujisan gakkou kensaku ginou 富士山学校検索技能 = Fujisan school (of) search skills

fuji-shi 富士市 = Fuji City

fundo 憤怒 = rage, wrath

getsumen bēsu no shūmatsu o kōryo suru 月面ベースの週末を考慮する = consider the weekend of the moon base

hiko- robotto 飛行ロボット = flying robot

hokora 神庫 = small shrine (more commonly written 祠)

huíhui pào (Chinese) 回回炮 = trebuchet (lit. "Muslim cannon")

ichi 市 = city

itairu subete no tairu 一タイルすべてのタイル = all tiles unified into one (literal pronunciation "ichi tairu subete no tairu" means "all the tiles one tile")

jishin 地震 = earthquake

ka 科 = family

kazan 火山 = volcano

kaiju 怪獣 = giant monster (lit. "strange beast")

kenn 県 = prefecture (one of the 43 "normal" prefectures)

kouun o! 幸運を! = good luck!

kyodai monsuta- 巨大モンスター = huge monster

masanigedou まさに外道!!! = absolute heresy

masutaado マスタード = mustard

mi-gan ミーガン = Megan

mori-ro-bu niju-nana 守炉部二十七 = Mrob27

morobu-san 守炉部さん = "Mr. mrob"

motto masutaado もっとマスタード = more mustard

neko 猫 = cat

ohayou おはよう = good morning

o-mikuji 御御籤 = sacred lot, a fortune written on paper

ru-ku ルーク = rook

satoyama 里山 = mixed farmland and foothills (lit. "arable/livable mountain")

shatouifu シャトーイフ = Chateau d'If

tabidachi no daikichi 旅立ちの大吉 = good luck on your journey (nonstandard idiom)

taifu- 台風 = typhoon

takaashigani 高脚蟹 = Japanese spider crab (lit "tall-footed crab")

take ⽵ = bamboo

tankyu- 探究 = search

todoufuken 都道府県 = prefectures (main political divisions of Japan)

toyatsuka 塒塚 = Toyatsuka (a small mountain on the west slope of Mt. Fuji)

tozan 登山 = mountain-climbing

tsunami 津波 = tsunami

ungaii 運がいい = lucky

wakamore ワカモレ = guacamole

watashi wa tokubetsuna kanjō o motte iru 私は特別な感情を持っている = I have a special feeling

watashi wa watashi no kaeru to chāpu 私は私の蛙とチャープ = I chirp with my frog

zankurian kouzui ザンクリアンの洪水 = Zanclean flood


- — blank filler-text and spoiler warning — -

The section below has spoilers, so here is a bunch of blank space to make it less likely you'll see the spoilers unless you want to!










































































Big Long-Winded Spoiler Explanation

Don't read this until you get to about chapter 75 or 76.

Some readers didn't understand the end of the story, so I've written this which might seem over-obvious to some, and completely new to others. Either way, it's okay.

mrob27 and Morobu are the same character in the story, and they appear together in the last three chapters because mrob27 travelled back in Time to join himself.

Morobu was looking for the "Dojo of Searchfu", a "Dojo" is a place of training. If you look up Dojo you'll see the name is related to Tao/Dao, meaning way/path/route, and other deeper things that are tough to explain in a Western language. In the introduction on NP1973 and in my explanation on NP2006 I told everyone that the training consists of searching for the Dojo. I intended you to understand that this means that the search is more important than actually "finding the Dojo", assuming such a place actually exists physically.

This is something drawn from real life: you might think you're trying to get something, but it's the journey that matters. Hopefully before you reach the end of your life you'll see that most of life's "things" are MacGuffins: a driving force in the plot which in and of itself is unimportantU.

So Morobu (who is actually just mrob27 who has gone either forward or backward in Time to late May of some year or another to visit Japan) spends about 70 chapters looking for something, getting lost, and figuring out how to not get lost. Then mrob27 tells himself ("Morobu") in chapter 76 they he (they) have been in the Dojo for quite a while now. The search is the Dojo, and the Dogo is the search. In chapter 77 mrob27 says that there is important Blitzing to do, and they leave. If you think it was abrupt, then guess what: life sometimes ends abruptly, too. Remember a sudden unexpected death in some story you like: For me, the end of Harry Potter's book 5 comes to mind. Then look at the whole story-arc, and consider the role that person's life had in the entire grand plot. It's kind of like that, except that nobody died, not even fictionally.

UExcept that you need something to fill that role. Parents urge children to "pick a sport" because it's important to have a driving force. Which sport doesn't really matter, and the trophies will just collect dust. My sport was Computer Club, and I ended up with a bunch of trophies, books, and an opt-in scholarship to a university I decided not to attend, but those were all MacGuffins. All that really matters is that I played the game.


Links

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