Bartoli Miranda's Notes (Excerpt)

Bartoli Miranda's Notes (Excerpt)

... Sentient beings have a pathological craving to "be seen." It's not just the imagenae who live off attention. Carbon-based and silicon-based life forms are the same. They scream and shout when they're angry because they want to be seen. They sob quietly when they're sad because they want to be seen. They go on TV, star in movies, sing, debate, and govern... All because they want to be seen. I want to be seen too. But there's a fundamental difference between me and most people. Most people WANT to be seen, while I SHOULD be seen. The world ought to look toward people like me, not the fleeting idiots paraded across television screens. Back in 1986, when I was still a medical intern, I helped develop the "Stonar Protocol" for treating Narrative Structure Fragility in imagenae. Newspapers hailed it as "the greatest medical advancement of Planarcadia's second millennium." If you ask me, it should've been called the "Bartoli Protocol". Stonar only reached his conclusions with my hints. And let's not forget I was the one fetching coffee for the research team all those years. But I'm not gonna make things hard for Stonar. He was, after all, still someone worth noticing. Just slightly below my level, that's all. Not that anyone cares about him. His later years were pretty bleak, not that he was poor, he was actually quite wealthy. It's just that I've never seen such a shriveled ploo. All imagenae who go unseen end up like that. I refuse to become like him. I will reclaim what's rightfully mine. I will take back my rightful place at the center of attention. From the hands of those fleeting fools. ... The medical training I originally received and imagenae cosmetic reconstruction are basically two entirely different disciplines. Fortunately, I am far more intelligent than the average person. I can master both. Imagenae cannot create imagenae, this is an iron law established when The Laughter created this world. As such, the so-called imagenae cosmetic surgeons are already defying the natural law of the Aeon, establishing their own doctrine of creation. I can't create imagenae out of thin air. Wishpower can't flow from my body and condense into another individual. But I can reforge the forms of other imagenae. Change the shape of a horn, alter lip color, add vivid patterns to skin, extend wings from the ribs... With such minute adjustments, I can bring forth magnificent miracles. Organs altered in this way are often unstable. Like balloons filled with air, their cores are hollow, unsupported by any narrative structure. In time, they'll inevitably wither and collapse. For example, I could extend a horn atop an orch's head. But without structural support, that horn would soon disappear, leaving behind nothing but a bald green forehead. But if that horn were to command the center of attention, Wishpower would gradually fill it, granting it a stable structure and permanently integrating it into the orch's physiology. It will no longer be a fragile shell. In theory, if I were to cultivate enough imagenae components in this manner, allow them to become saturated with Wishpower, then strip them away and assemble them into a new individual, there would be no question that I would be defying the law that imagenae cannot create imagenae, thus creating an entirely new imagenae. But there is little value in doing so. It is far more worthwhile to transplant them all into myself. ... If I worked in a cosmetic surgery clinic, I would be forced to follow their schedules and operate on every fool who walked through the door. That would defeat the purpose. First, not every imagenae can attract sufficient attention after surgery. Without it, the newly imagenated organ cannot be filled with Wishpower. Second, neither these people nor the parts they wish to alter necessarily share my textual lineage. Among imagenae, only those with identical textual lineage can potentially fuse with one another. Izol's clinic proved to be an ideal workplace. He had no interest in imagenae cosmetic procedures himself, and he turned a blind eye to my side hustle. This gave me the freedom to seek out my own clients: individuals prominent enough (but not too prominent), and compatible with my textual lineage. This is a long-term endeavor. One sows in spring and reaps in autumn, and now's the time to sow. My first "crop" has already taken the bait. A streamer named Embervox, a ploo who does beauty content, long languishing in obscurity. Until I told her she needed more attractive lips. I did not deceive her. She truly did need them. I simply needed them more. Next, I need to plan ahead for the harvesting. I'm thinking, if I make a house call under the guise of a follow-up examination, that should lower their guard. When that time comes, I should ██████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████ (The rest of the text has been heavily redacted by the Department of Aberration Defense. It is presumed unsuitable for public disclosure.) ... One question remains. When my entire body is covered with parts taken from other imagenae, I will likewise require vast amounts of Wishpower to fully stabilize these structures and truly make them mine. So once all harvesting is complete, I will have no choice but to expose myself to the public eye. That may mean arrest. Or death. It does not matter. I am not particularly concerned with how long I live. In the modern age, everyone can get their fifteen minutes of fame. I only want my fifteen minutes. ...