Vitalerium: Descent into the Void Part 2- Nicholas Keating Casbarro - Sci-fi Cyberpunk Dystopian Book

Hey Side Questers! We are back with part 2 of our discussion of Nicholas Keating Casbarro's Vitalerium: Descent into the Void.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Nearly six centuries have passed since humanity discovered vitalerium, which ushered in a golden age of space exploration and colonization. Planet Deorum’s society is centered around this illustrious, gravity-bending blue crystal. The year is 2701.

Following a near-fatal disaster, roughneck freelancer Roman Matthews becomes unwittingly trapped at the center of a harrowing conspiracy. Hunted by Deorum’s government, the Coalition for Prosperity, Roman must use his deadly skillset to survive against all odds.

Roman and his band of unlikely allies will discover that the Coalition’s indiscretions threaten the delicate balance of advanced civilization. As a sect of the Coalition prepares to implement its Machiavellian vision of utopia, the proverbial pendulum begins to swing toward chaos

Vitalerium World:
Website: https://vitaleriumseries.com/
Nick’s Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/InsideVitalerium 
YT: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkGe5mgjNnAl2VJ3E5TBmAg 
Insta: https://www.instagram.com/vitaleriumseries 
Twitter: https://x.com/vitalerium 
Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@vitaleriumseries 

-Publicist - Eve Bailey / Flo Agency: https://flo.agency/  
-Cosplayer 1 Shanice Foster: Luxsteez Cosplay - https://www.instagram.com/luxsteezcosplay/ 
-Cosplayer 2 Matthew Harden: MH Cosplay Design - https://www.instagram.com/mhcosplaydesign/ 
-Comic Illustrator - Francisco A. Hnilo: https://www.behance.net/fahilustracion 
-Comic Colorist - Chandran Ponnusamy: https://www.facebook.com/ponnusamychandran & https://www.deviantart.com/ponnusamychandran/gallery 
-Graphic Designer - Ahmed Geatar: https://www.behance.net/ahmedgad 


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If you’re a reader looking for something deeper or an indie author working on your book, The Side Quest Book Club is for you. We skip the usual book reviews and ratings. Each episode turns fun side quests into real lessons, so you’ll leave not just entertained, but with a better understanding of why storytelling matters.

I actually feel like Nick did a really great job writing both the drug scene and the sex scenes, but I would like to see him on drugs. Yeah, normal on drugs. I think he'd be a paranoid.

That's exactly why I want to see him when he was testing his newfound powers. Maybe use something harder than a soccer ball. I'm going to throw a plushie at you, defend yourself.

Kind of sounds like Locke and Jean. One last job. One last job.

This is the big one. But it's like the intro of the book, so you're like, yeah, I guess the rest is just him spending money and sleeping around doing drugs. All right, this episode is officially not safe for kids.

You don't have to engage with any of that. You can just do a bunch of band-aids if you're doing drug, selks, and alcohol and rock and roll, which, because there is pasta on the field. Proper phrases, sex, drugs, and rock and roll.

Coming to you from the Endless Library, where every book is read and every spoiler discussed. Join us as we dig into the lives of fictional people who cannot defend themselves. This is the SideQuest Book Club.

Welcome back, SideQuesters, to another day on Dioram. Hopefully that you've not been busy doing drugs and dancing the night away, but maybe you have. And if you have, Slava's judging you, and Spencer and I are not letting you know that we're judging you, but we also are judging you.

So welcome back. We got Spencer joining us today. Matt was unable to make it, so he'll be back on the next couple, but there was a conflict of schedules.

So let's get into it. It's actually just going to be me talking to you guys today, because Slava and Spencer are also sick, unfortunately. But the show must go on.

If you guys can't tell by my voice, I've done too much of the drug that Roman did in whatever chapter that happened, because it affects your memory, too. So chapters one through ten. Actually, before that, we start off with a little bit of a history of Dioram and a history of, well, the human race, really, from the beginning of 2083 or something like that, where they discovered... I won't quote you on the year, but that sounds right.

Perfect, perfect. The discovery of vitilarium and then its subsequent effect on humanity and research and the new technology that it provides for humanity to expand to the stars a little bit. So we kind of get the little history of that.

Then we meet Roman, where he is, I think he's like 13 or so, and opening scene of him getting done with kind of like a soccer game, you know, Dioram's version of soccer, and his parents have a run-in with the CP, and unfortunately his parents are killed. Roman becomes an orphan, ends up on the street for a minute, then ends up in a home where he is bullied, and then we find him a year later after that where he beats up his bully and then becomes a freelancer eventually, and then we kind of pick up there or so in the early chapters. And then Roman, after he becomes a freelancer, he has some run-ins with some... with a local gang that he kind of works for.

So Roman ends up getting contacted by Motus to take on a new job, and that is where we find ourselves entering here in chapter 11, as Roman starts to venture out on this new job. So we're about to find out what happens next. Jonathan, where do we find Roman as we pick up the story? So as we pick up the story this time around, it kicks off with a bang.

Literally. You're not gonna respond to that, Slava? Well it's more figurative than literal, but... But what if every time people listen to this episode and I talk about this part, there's like an exhaust that goes off, or a riot takes place in front of the people, or something like that. All right, Slava's just looking at me with the old stink eye.

I wouldn't call it a stink eye, that's a confused eye. An exhaust that goes off, that's the bang. It's a bang, right? I don't actually want the listeners to get hurt.

There's a rave, so there must be a bang airplane. Yeah, no, I get it. All the puns.

All the puns, very good. Thank you. I'm just looking for a little support on this Thanksgiving weekend.

You know, be thankful that you don't have a bang. Whatever. Oh, brother! Anyway, so this one starts off with a bang.

Roman goes to do this job for Motus, who hasn't reached out to him in a long time, because we find out that he actually left Motus's crew, the Wibitani. So we don't know why Roman left, but he did, and Roman's going to make a nice squeeze from this. Was it 2.2, right? Something like that, yeah.

Yeah, 2.2 credits. Yeah. Million, sorry.

Yeah. Kind of sounds like Locke and Jean. It's one last job.

One last job. One last job. This is the big, this is what's going to... The big one, but it's like the intro of the book, so you're like, man, I guess the rest is just him spending money and sleeping around and doing drugs.

That's only one chapter. Or two. Should be 10.

Should be just a full, like, rehashing The Beatles. Fifty Shades of Roman. Well, anyway.

Honestly, though. It's, I feel like, let's actually talk about this for a second. We're getting ahead of ourselves, but I actually feel like Nick did a really great job writing both the drug scene and the sex scenes, where it's like, you know what's going on, but he's not pulling a romanticy, and I've never read this, so I'm literally making assumptions, where he's like, he put his pulsing pants next to me, and I could feel every bit of him.

Obviously you've never read any of it. That's... I don't think the pants is what's pulsing, but... It's not. The pulsing is behind his pants.

Do I need to draw you a diagram? Yeah, put it on the screen. Show the audience, too. Jonathan wants a word-for-word description.

Jonathan just wants more. Jonathan wants more smut. This is what it's come down to.

Look, I conceded once I learned what Fourth Weekend was about, okay, Chief? I just thought it was about dragons. Well, it's about dragons banging, so... I didn't know it was about dragons sliding their tails and orifices through people's spirits or whatever thing takes place here, because I haven't read it. Great story.

Compelling and rich. But you're not that far off from what I've heard. This is my drawing.

Pulsing. Wow. Pants.

Keep us going, Spencer. I don't know. So, anyways, so Nick does a great job.

I think what... Pulsing pants. Those lines are to represent the pulsing. The veins.

The pulsing veins. All right, this episode's officially not safe for kids, starting now. Not before now.

No, it should be before now. Yeah, it's in the beginning. It starts off with a bang, which is not safe for anybody.

So Nick actually does a really good job of portraying Roman and what we know is going on, but without having to get all the steamy details about what's actually happening. So, yeah, Roman is just kind of living his life, doing his thing when he gets this job and sets out to find this $2.2 million vitilirium. I think it's a deposit or something like that.

A big shard. And, yeah, that's where we pick up. When he goes to the little junk shop, right, wherever this place is, out in the grind, and he's like, what's the phrase? Out of the fire, into the flame.

And Sam, the guy sitting there at the counter, is just like, just stares at him. Yeah, and Roman's like, that's the phrase I was given. Let me in, dude.

Sam's like, I don't know what you're talking about. Yep. That was a good one.

What's the actual line that he's supposed to say? Isn't it, isn't the original phrase something like out of the frying pan and into the fire? It's something, it's something like that. But Roman says flame instead of fire. Yeah, he says out of the frying pan and into the flames.

Yeah, and it's supposed to be fire. Yeah. Or something.

Yeah, either way. But he says the wrong word. So the guy won't let him in.

It's quite funny. And he starts screaming it because he gets so frustrated. On page 163 in the Kindle version here, it says, there it is, practically yelling out of the frying pan and into the flames.

Roman shouts in an almost robotic cadence. Sure. Say it again, dummy.

That'll make new things happen or they'll make something new happen. The man retorts, emotionless. All right, look at this guy.

Sam just coming in with the old sarcasm here. Yep. Yeah, I feel like I really like this scene just because honestly, right now I feel like Roman is still kind of, kind of a jerk.

And he's not, he's like, to me, he's not super likeable right now. And it just feels like this is perfect to suit like what he needs to sort of test his patience. And yeah, I don't know.

It was just, it was just a great scene. Yeah. And it kind of fits Roman, right? Because he has these adventures and it seems out some of the problems that he faces are kind of, of his own making, right? Like bad luck follows him in some sense.

So him not getting this, the way he gets the vitilirium into him is he has a hallucination of Jarek and then he throws a grenade and it explodes the shard and the shard gets into him. So it seems, I don't know how else to say it, but part and parcel for what we've seen Roman character as right now. He just is this rough freelancer who kind of has a laissez-faire attitude and he reacts to things maybe impulsively.

And here we are. What kind of a moron who freelances takes a grenade out when he's at a job site alone? That, that just, look, I know Roman's got anger issues. That's fine.

He's brash. He's quick tempered. Okay.

But you pull a grenade out? He hasn't pulled a grenade out anywhere else in the book. Is that his last grenade? Did he, did he, he couldn't afford another grenade at the grenade store? I just, that threw me, I was like, okay, now I know we need the story to move forward, but this is my hangup with this where it's like, he didn't throw a grenade when he saw Jarek in a nightmare before. And I'm sure he owned one at least prior to this moment, unless he went to the grenade store before the job, right? Like he didn't fire off a couple shots at Jarek when he was having his nightmares before.

So like in his nightmare, he was naked and then he woke up in a tent, right? I mean, your point stands. I'm just saying, I think he didn't throw the grenade the first time because he, it was the first time. So he's freaking out.

And the second time he's just pissed and now he wants to destroy whatever he's seen, but your point still stands. He's impulsive and brash. So that's not to take away from your point, but he didn't have the, not the wherewithal, but he didn't have the opportunity.

And I guess wherewithal would be the term here. He didn't have the opportunity or the wherewithal to attack Jarek grenade or not grenade his first time. So he's doing this job for the Wibitani.

He's brash. He's rash. Maybe he has a rash on his tushy.

After his encounter, he most certainly does. Absolutely. That would have been funny if Nick did him dirty where he's like, it exploded and he turned his back and he tried to hide, but he couldn't.

It makes him less cool on the front end. Cause I don't think that it would ricochet, but anyway, my point stands regarding the, the grenade. I want to see him.

And again, yep. Jonathan wants more. That's what we should change the podcast to show me him being brash again.

Like, let me see him take a swing at someone. Let me see him bust a kneecap of a CP officer. Like the grenade was just like a 15 out of 10.

It was like, Oh, okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. So that part threw me off a little bit. And I was like, well, I thought it was in character.

I thought it was in character for him. Cool. Yeah.

That's not the only scene that I feel like things will go from, or will be a 15 out of 10. Like, I feel like there are other times where all of a sudden we're just kind of in a, in a moment where things are escalated and you're like, Whoa, how did we, how do we get here? Give me some examples. What else? And you can get ahead, you know, cause we're, we're doing 11 through 20 here, but what else stands out to you in similar fashion? To me, one of the things that is a 15 out of 10 is we see him meet Monique first, but then the second time they meet, um, all of a sudden she just like, is it almost feels like she's already in love with him at this point.

And, um, it just feels a little bit hasty in my opinion of like, all of a sudden she's like flirting with him, giving him drugs. Like the escalation of the relationship felt really quick, really fast to me. So I definitely misheard you when you first said meet Monique, I heard you say eat Monique.

And I was like, wow, Spencer, that is, I didn't read that. That's certainly an escalation. No, that is.

Hey, nice to meet you. Really? Is that what you, is that how you envision it? That's not how that works. Jonathan.

I, I said, I misheard him. I admit fault. Slava.

Again, Jonathan wants more. Do you want to carry on? I'm not sure if you're saying sorry to God or the audience or the editors right there. The audience, I'm saying sorry to the audience.

Okay. For you on behalf of the SideQuest podcast book club, I apologize. We'll have HR talk to Jonathan later.

Slava, you know how we said we weren't going to read Romantici? We're writing our own. We're making our own. It's going to be fanfic Romantici.

So we're going to take whatever book we're reading and put our Romantici scene in the book at a 15 out of 10. So we can draw in a larger female audience. I don't think that's going to work.

But I don't think that's how it works. No. Well, uh, anyway, uh, so that's my, that's one of my examples of, uh, we go from a 15 out of 10, where all of a sudden they are like basically in love with each other.

It kind of feels like at this point. And there was, there wasn't much, uh, I feel like there wasn't much before that to kind of really get us into that relationship. All of a sudden, they're just kind of a thing.

Okay. All right. What about the fact that he saved her? So after a quick catch up for the audience, if you didn't read the book, um, he throws a grenade, gets hit with all the vitilirium shards, which we will talk about it shortly, tries to get back to Norval because his body's in excruciating pain, hits a CP checkpoint, sees a woman, helps her get through the checkpoint because she has a double ID, which you're not supposed to have.

And that happens to be Monique, who we meet later, that Spencer's talking about with the drug induced ecstasy. Um, but he's going back to Norval. So he goes back to Norval and Norval's like, what did you do? What's wrong? Norval starts testing him by throwing a soccer ball at him because he actually, sorry, I'm getting ahead of myself.

He fights a vorkrel on his way first, kills it with his newfound powers of the vitilirium crystals being lodged inside himself. Then he gets over to Norval on the way there. He meets Monique, who he doesn't know.

She's just some lady in clad leather and a helmet getting pulled over or getting stopped at the CP guard station. And he helps her get through. They both escape.

He goes back to see Norval. Then Norval starts testing his powers by throwing a soccer ball at him, which I'm just going to say it. Norval's not a coach.

He's not a good, he's not, you don't want him to be your coach. He's not the guy for that. Well, he's just a nerdy lab tech is what he is.

So he's not very good on the social side of things. No, his science experiments should not involve people is really what it boils down to. Uh, okay.

Roman get angry. Really, really do it this time. Roman just standing there like, yeah, Norval sounds good.

Dweeb. Anyway, you were talking about Monique and the escalation. So you don't think when he met her, so he met her, he saved her, you know, moment interaction one, they see each other at Modis's thing in this set of chapters moment two, she makes the connection that he is the guy that Modis keeps talking about, that she's heard a lot about.

That's not enough of an escalation for you. I'm not saying it should be. I'm just curious.

Yeah, no, not really. I mean, sure. Like their interaction when he saved her really wasn't that long as far as like them actually conversing with one another.

There wasn't a whole lot of dialogue there. And then, um, yeah, when, when, when they go, uh, to meet, let's see, do they meet Modis first, uh, before they start getting together? Oh yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Them going out on the trip on the town for a week, uh, happens directly after that meeting with Modis because they're at the club that Modis runs. That's right.

That's right. Um, so yeah, to me there's, yeah, there just wasn't much interaction between the two to really kind of develop this love story. Um, if that's what Nick's going, again, I'm only at chapter 20.

Uh, so maybe, maybe this is how they, you know, fall in love. Like maybe there's just burning passion there before, and that kind of sets up the love story. But, um, the way that he's kind of writing how, how Monique feels about him and how he, uh, kind of feels about her.

Um, I don't know, it just kind of felt like it moved a little too quick in my, my opinion, but, uh, maybe that's just, you've never trounced through a town and, uh, found love, um, in a, in a night of heated passion while you're doing drugs. Yeah. Uh, no, I can't, can't say that.

I can't say that. Slava, I'm going to need you to fly in cause we're going to have a night on the town. Good.

We good there. All right. Oh, I was supposed to give some to Spencer.

That's the last of it. It's going to be a great day for me though. Uh, stay hydrated out there folks.

If you're, uh, if you're using extracurriculars, it's what I like to call them. Extracurriculars. Extracurriculars.

It's not, it's not a required class. You have, you have the most interesting double entendres. Self-aggrandizing.

Extracurricular. It works though. Sure.

Does it not work? I mean, we all know what you're talking about. Yes. What am I talking about Slava? Please spell it out for the audience.

Drugs. Oh. D-R-U-G-S.

Oh my. Not in this book. I haven't seen one single reference to drugs in this book.

I don't know what you're talking about Slava. Or sex. Or anything.

Yeah. Weird. Is that what you think sex looks like Jonathan? Where do babies come from Jonathan? Well, mama always told me they come from the stalk.

When a mommy and daddy love each other, the bird flies over and goes, yeah, that's exactly how it happens. Pretty sure. You want to drop me a dive? Nope.

Okay. Nope. Nope.

He's going to leave that be. So let's rewind a minute. Norville, let's go back to Norville.

Roman going back to Norville. Norville is doing tests on Roman. Do you think that there were additional things he should have tried when he was testing his new found powers? Maybe use something harder than a soccer ball? I'm going to throw a plushie at you.

Defend yourself. Oh, okay. Thanks Norville.

Should have had Sam swing at him or come at him with a knife or something. Like really wanted to see Sam again. Don't feel like I got enough time with the stoic pawn shop owner.

The curmudgeon owner. Yeah. Yeah.

I'm hoping maybe he'll like, he'll be a guy we go see again out in the grind. Yeah. I thought it was interesting though that Norville kind of figured out how to get under Roman's skin.

It was like basically started taunting him and that's kind of what got Roman to be able to get his heart rate going, to be able to produce the vitilirium power effect. Whatever you want to call that. Yeah.

The powers. Yeah. Yeah.

The powers. But to me, it was, I enjoyed the part where Norville, yeah, he's really got under Roman's skin and purposely kept like egging him on and, um, oh man, I can't find words. Words are escaping me.

Extra curriculars. No, that's not what you want to say. That's not what Norville was doing.

But I would like to see him on drugs. Yeah. Norville on drugs.

He'd be a paranoid. That's exactly why I want to see him. I want to see Norville doing some sort of, uh, vitilirium style drug and then like, I just want to see how that unfolds.

Yes, absolutely. I want to see him on a really bad trip. Look, I didn't write it.

Nick did. Don't, don't look at me that way. I'm just suggesting it.

Book two. It'll be in book two. Hopefully.

Norville's bender. Chapter one. Bending with Norville.

Could mean a lot of things. Could start in the lab. Could end in the bedroom.

Who knows? Well, he hasn't been in his lab, so. Two for one is what you're telling me. There's your romanticy, Jonathan.

From lab tech to, um. To old New Fans model. Yeah.

To foot, I don't know. Help me out here. This episode, guys, it's not even 10 minutes in.

We're devolving quickly. But yeah, so Norville gets under Roman's skin, and that's what gets Roman agitated, worked up enough to. The adrenaline pumping.

The adrenaline pumping to get, to produce the power. So Norville actually does kind of know what he's doing in that sense of things. True scientist that he is.

Yep. Yep. So then Roman has to convince Norville to leave his science lab to go see Modus, because he knows Modus.

And if he doesn't go see Modus, Modus will kill him, basically, is the implication here. Because he screwed a job up. Well, Norville didn't screw the job up.

Roman did. But he blew up in his face. It's a real banger.

It's called a callback slava. So he somehow convinces Norville to do that because Norville has a gadget and a gizmo to help them get past the security detail. Which I thought was kind of fun.

I don't know how a bracelet, because they wear a bracelet, and it changes their, for lack of a word, their aura, their sound, not sound signature, what is it? Their frequency? Their signature. Because the cameras or whatever pick up on whatever it is, the signature or aura, whatever you want to call it, and identifies the citizen. But this bracelet emits something which confuses the system.

Yeah, it changes their appearance, doesn't it? Yeah, it changes their appearance too. But they appear themselves to everybody else, but on the camera, they appear different. They look different somehow.

Right. So interesting bit of tech there. It's true.

Did you guys like the tech or is it just kind of like, blend into the background of the story for you? To me, it kind of blends into the background a little bit. He doesn't explain much of it. You just kind of assume that it's all a result of the Vidalarium somehow.

And it's just all, you just have to assume that it works. There's some sort of nerdy explanation, really, behind the scenes. But I don't think that's the focus of what he's really trying to get across.

He just wants you to know, we're in this sci-fi world. We're in this world of cool tech powered because of Vidalarium. But what he really wants to focus on is the story.

So to me, it just kind of blends in the background. Yeah, same. And it's 2761 or whatever, right? It's way into the future.

So you assume there's going to be some fancy tech, fancy gizmos. And for me, it's enough. Although it blends into the background, it's enough.

I don't need two pages explaining how Norville created this thing and how it works with the system and how it jams the system and what happens and blah, blah, blah. It's 300 years in the future. I would hope to have some kind of tech that scrambles security cameras.

They have tech like that now. That's true. I think it would be cool.

I like kind of more of the nerdy stuff, the science aspect of things. I think it'd be cool to see how all this stuff was built. But then we'd have, the book would probably be twice the size if we had all of those descriptions of how things worked.

But as more of kind of like on the nerdy side, I think it would be kind of cool to see how some of that stuff works. I will say that I did get quite a bit from Nick in this book or this world because on his site, if you haven't checked it out, there's a map, there's a full rundown of the characters and each one gets their own page. What's the name of these groups? Each entity, each group entity has their own page and description and what they want.

So he did a lot of work. That's actually one of the reasons that I picked this book when he reached out and said, hey, we should read this to the team here, was because he put in quite a bit of world building. So definitely if you haven't checked that out, go check out, I think it's what, vitiliriumseries.com, we'll have it on the screen here as well.

Yeah, and we'll link it in the show notes. Yeah, vitiliriumseries.com slash codex if you want to go directly to it, but it is called the codex. You got the grind here, Argos, Luxenia, the dead zone.

You get to see like, okay, this is all the different places. So it's super cool. So earlier this week, I was thinking about story and I was thinking about how do we know a story is good? We've kind of talked about this on and off through the podcast and its entirety of when I started, but good stories reveal things to us through actions, through the POV of the main character oftentimes.

And so like, do we feel like we understand Roman's worldview and his goals up until this point? That's the first question that I want to ping both of you with. I won't throw a plushie at you, I promise. Too dangerous.

I think so because we see his backstory, his origin story, if you will. And then we see him as a freelancer. We see him as a guy who cares for the people who are impoverished or vulnerable.

He's saving the little girl from the whatever, the street urchins. Yep. And then we see him saving Monique.

And then later in the book, which I won't spoil it for Spencer, what drives him to do the things he does. That's the cleanest way I can say it, to do the things he does. The white picket fence with Monique, the two kids.

Yeah. Even him falling in love with Monique and finding some solace in her arms, all that good stuff and finding her appealing to him as a person more than just the sexual aspect of it. And then what he does two or three times, we see him later in chapters 20 on, or 21 on, 22 on, we see him make decisions that show him to be a more complex character than just a rugged freelancer, hell bent on making money and banging and just living life to the fullest.

So there's more to him than that. And we see that played out. So for me, yes.

Are you enjoying today's SideQuest? Make sure that you're subscribed so you never miss an episode. We're available on YouTube and all major platforms so that you can listen to us anywhere. Now, back to the show.

Yeah. I think from my perspective, only being on chapter 20, we do see that a little bit, obviously him saving the little girl, saving Monique. At this point, we have glimpses of who he is underneath the rough exterior.

But for me, I guess I still don't see what his overall goals are. What is he trying to accomplish? Why he's doing what he's doing? Yeah, we get the sense of who he is underneath, but he's been, because of his past and what happened, obviously he doesn't like the government. And for other obvious reasons, he don't like the government.

Who likes the government? Don't answer that. It's a trick question. Trick question, guys.

But as far as his overall, what Roman's trying to accomplish, I guess I don't really quite know yet. I don't think that we really get outside of like, hey, I'm a freelancer. I want to make a lot of money, which is every freelancer's goal.

Right, freelancers? The room was a freelancer. You're not a freelancer. You never freelanced in your life.

No, I'm talking about you. You're a company man. No, I'm talking about you.

I meant Slava, but yes. Slava's a company man. I freelanced once or twice on eBay.

That's not freelancing, but okay. That word doesn't mean what you think it means. Does it mean different in Russian? No.

Freelancer. Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's how you say that in Russian. There it is.

I think every episode, Slava, you should use one Russian word for us. Нет. He both did the thing and not the thing at the same time.

I love it. Thanks, Spencer. I appreciate you telling me what he did.

Yes, I know, but it was so funny. It was perfect. I couldn't put it together.

Slava, you need a little bump? Yeah, where's nails? Yeah. When you need them. He's busy.

He's preoccupied. We'll call it that. All right.

Fair enough. I think Roman is learning what he wants, actually, because I feel like... Yeah. That's a good way to put it.

Yeah. You know, midway through the book, this is kind of like hitting midway through the book, there are things that take place. He now has this superpower he has to deal with, which is kind of him, regardless of what he chooses, he's now thrust into the story in a way that is very different.

And he's also the crux of a lot of different things going on in Dioram, which he doesn't fully know yet, which we don't fully know yet. And that's going to play a big role. But he also can't just live a normal life now because he shrapneled himself with italyrium.

So, yeah, I want to add a caveat to what I said. So, does he really know what he wants? I think as a freelancer and as Roman, the guy that we've met, having his origin story, there are things that he wants. There probably are to make money, to survive, all that good stuff.

Underneath all of that, he has a desire for the world and for his surroundings, for the grind. He can't articulate it. He might not even be able to realize it at this moment in his life.

But he does have a desire. And then when he realizes that desire, it turns into a goal. That's a better way of saying it.

I don't think I articulated exactly what I wanted to in my first answer. But with that caveat, I think my answer is more full. That's where I stand.

Yeah, well, I think he's just getting by right now, right? He drinks a lot. He's quick tempered. Like we talked about earlier, his drinking a lot, though, comes from trauma.

It's his losing his parents. It's losing his best friend. It's the terrible things he's had to do to survive.

And he had to watch them all die. Yeah, he did. And at least one of them is his fault.

So we see that he is using it as a medication. And oftentimes people do that when they don't have, I guess I'll call it the maturity to and this isn't a like, well, why don't you just be more mature? It's like, no, emotional maturity is actually very difficult. We've talked about it a dozen times on this show.

Like, hey, I acted this way. Then I had an epiphany or revelation, however you want to call it. And I had to process like, oh, maybe acting that way makes me a really shitty person.

Huh? Maybe I should consider changing that. And then you confront yourself and go, do I want to change it or do I not? Like, how difficult is the thing that I'm trying to get over? Can I work through it? Things that are really difficult take longer to work through oftentimes. But you don't have to engage with any of that.

You can just do a bunch of band-aids if you're doing drug, selks, and alcohol and rock and roll, which because there is a pop star, I feel like that is relevant here. But the proper phrase is sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Not all at the same time, though, because that makes you a heathen.

But one at a time is okay. Thanks for that clarification. I wasn't sure.

At least two at a time. At least two at a time. But those are our thoughts.

What do you guys think that Roman is, his wants and needs are up to this point? Let's say chapter 15, right? 15 feels like a good, you know, it's like halfway through the book, 15, 16. So as the audience, what are your thoughts? What does Roman want? Is he just trying to forget his past? Like I said, is he, you know, moving forward, trying to learn his superpowers like Spencer said, or whatever Slava said, for those who are paying attention, because sometimes I don't listen to him, which makes the episodes harder, honestly, in case you didn't know. That was really well-timed.

His camera overheated. So Roman and Norville have made it past all the security checkpoints and didn't get caught. And now they're at the club, which do we ever learn the name of the club? You know, that's a good, good question.

I don't recall hearing a name. The Wibitani Club. That's what we're going to call it then.

Love it. So Motus is Roman's old boss when he was in the Wibitani, and he shows up with Norville and they have some bad news to deliver, which they're not looking forward to sharing. So they have a little chit-chat.

Motus sorts out whatever business he's dealing with beforehand. Roman sees some old guys that he knows, that he used to be the commanding officer for, if you will. And now they're all like leaders in the Wibitani.

But also when Roman walks in, who does he see, Spencer? I believe he sees Monique. That is correct. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.

And he's shocked to see her there. Shocked. Shocked.

Yeah, yeah, something like that. I'm pretty sure that's the face he made. He did the old cartoon coyote.

The heart. Slava, don't look at me like you haven't watched a cartoon in your life. It's where the heart comes out of his chest.

The eyes bulge out. Yes, exactly. You know exactly what I'm talking about.

Right. That's definitely the face Roman made. Obviously.

On the inside. Because on the outside, he looked like this. Yeah, he probably always looks like that.

Pretend that he has a blue crystal right here. Here. The other side.

Is it the other side? I don't know. You think Roman has a beard? I don't think he has a beard. No, I don't think so.

We're just going to awkwardly watch you try to get that off. Yeah, I did it. I did it.

Clap for me. Well, if any of you are looking to be guests on this show, don't expect much moral support when you are, because both of these guys. You won't get it.

Are jack wagons. Listen, 10 years in the grind have hardened us. Oh, hush.

You don't have. I'm going to. We don't have what? You don't have vitilirium in your face.

Back to it. Back to it. So they meet.

He sees Monique. And he's surprised because she's the mysterious love interest, right? Uh, that he got a, uh, the opportunity to save the damsel in distress. Although I don't know.

I guess she was in distress. The damsel. I wouldn't call her a damsel, though.

No. What do you? Okay. What do you think the word damsel means, Slava? A quiet meek.

Quiet weak. What'd you say? Quiet meek. Meek.

Uh, all right. I am hearing things, apparently. So.

So be it. So Roman walks into the club. He.

Bottle full of bub. Yep. His mom got what's he needs.

You know what, Jonathan? I was trying to help you out and you just derailed it again. He's not into making love. Uh, I don't know what to do.

50 cred. Oh, brother. This guy stinks.

Ah, well played. Well played. Roman is surprised to see Monique there.

He ends up sitting down with Modus and we start to see them discuss the, uh, why the vidilarium, uh, isn't fully recovered. Cause it's in Roman's ass. But not in the way you think.

It's like pods into a cheek, not. Nevermind. This is a really terrible episode.

You want to continue that thought, Jonathan? Nope. Nope. Nope.

Nope. So Modus dismisses everybody else, uh, after having a fight publicly with his daughter. And, um, he's like, you know, Roman.

And she's like, I know him pretty well. We go back a long way. I could know him better.

Nick. I apologize. Which will happen in the next chapter.

No other publisher will ever reach out to us after what we're doing to this freaking book. No, no. We've got, we had Callion.

We were absolutely raved about that. Yes, but okay. Please continue.

No, we're good. We're definitely, definitely doing justice to this book. We're, we're, we're having a good time.

That's what this book, this book, this book is the new, is the new book. Dude, what the f*** is going on? Uh, I'm leaving right now for some reason alone. Maybe we should just postpone this.

Oh, we're driving. We're already halfway, Matt. We really need to think of new co-hosts for our show.

Ooh. Ooh. Did that, uh, strike a nerve? Yeah.

Here, Matt, the guy who did a read and didn't, I mean schedules. So he was a schedule problem. Yeah.

Um, so Monique leaves angrily, right. And. As damsels do, right? Yes, Slava, as damsels do.

Uh, then the moment of truth, and I would be, maybe if I was Roman, not shaking my boots, but definitely like not, um, I'd not be happy about the moment I'm about to have with my ex-boss, right. Where I was going to get paid 2.2 million creds, which means that he was probably making 5 million creds, if we're being honest, um, which means that you lost him 2.5 million in vitilirium. So pulling out a dinky little canister and going, here you go, boss.

It's about the size of a dime. Enjoy. The rest of it's inside me.

And then going, I, uh, happened to have worn it, uh, permanently moving forward. So, sorry about that. I would not want to be the person saying that.

No. Yeah. That would be, that'd be tough.

And I would not throw it to Norval to explain better because that would go even more poorly. We see every time Norval tries, Roman's just like, you know what? You just need to stop. Let me take it from here.

Well, so what this means, uh, boss man is these are the statistics and here's a diagram of what it means in his body. And you're just gonna, you're going to get shot in the foot before it's all said and done because, you know, reasons. But Motus is pissed at the end of 17.

He is telling Roman, he's not allowed to leave the city because he owes him a lot. And then Roman throws Norval at, uh, at Motus like a treat, like, well, you can take him and indentured slave food. I got this guy.

And Norval's like, what are you doing? Wait, wait, wait, hold on. This wasn't part of the deal. Sorry, you just got to own it.

As he says something like that, like you couldn't fulfill it, so you just got to own it. See ya. It's like make, make Motus some fancy toys.

You'll get out of it soon enough. Right. He's reasonable.

Sort of. As long as you do what he says. True.

And don't screw up the job like Roman did. Yeah. The next chapter though, is what we've been hinting at all episode, which is the night of ecstasy.

Week of ecstasy. Week of ecstasy. Yeah, just keep doing that.

Yeah. Pantomime ecstasy for us, Jonathan. Because you've obviously done it before.

Right. The ecstasy. Jonathan has done the ecstasy.

Is it apparent? The drug, but not the other thing. Um, is it apparent in my movements? In my gyrations? Is that what you call those? Uh, so chapter 18, I think it's 18. Um, Roman goes downstairs.

He's about to have a drink. Monique walks up. Phrasing.

Huh? I don't, Spencer, do you get it? He gets it. Yeah, I think so. It's okay.

We'll tell you when we'll let you know when you grow up. I really don't. Big yellow question marks here for Jonathan.

Uh, I don't understand the reference. So audience, if you understand whatever Slava just said, can you let me know and educate me? Because clearly I'm an idiot. So that'd be great.

Thanks. Help me get a little more. Can you help me level up my street smarts? Just, uh, one more point.

That'd be lovely. Anyway, Roman has a drink. And then.

You should always. We killed Slava. You should always have your friends when they're sick.

And just make them laugh to help them get healthier quicker. Because Slava's not even going to need any Sudafed after this. He's going to just have coughed it all out with his laughing fit.

Oh my gosh. That's hilarious. So anyway, Roman goes downstairs for a drink.

Monique comes up to him with a few of her friends and goes, hey, let's go out on the town. And he's like, yeah, whatever. I just need to get drunk.

So they do. Fast forward, we see Roman waking up. And well, let me pause for a second, because this chapter is actually pretty cool, which I want to talk about where he has these like vignettes of time and moments where it's like they're at the club and then they're somewhere else.

And then he's seeing this thing and then they're somewhere else. And it's it feels like a trip. I've never been on a drug trip, as we're all aware by my motions.

I've never participated in the extracurriculars. But I have I have seen it in this book. And so I know that it's a drug trip.

That's my point of connection here. Yes, I too have done all of the drugs. So I definitely understand what a drug trip is.

Yep. Yeah, it was interesting. There's a cool, cool writing style where, you know, you get to see.

See bits and pieces of the trip, apparently of what he was on. And then like how it kind of comes back to him in flashes. Yeah, I feel like that's a. It almost feels like.

Yeah, it almost feels like a TV show kind of style where like if you, you know, you got the guy or the character wakes up. Then all of a sudden you see him recall the memories either by someone telling him or or just kind of the memories kind of just come back to him. But yeah, it's kind of an interesting, interesting writing style, because like it's almost as if you were the main character and you're trying to recall the bits like you're only seeing from his point of view.

So you have to have to get it from you have to get the story from him in a sense. So yeah, yeah, I liked it. It was it was a nice, nice way to kind of break things up a little bit.

Have you ever seen something like this in another person's writing where it's it doesn't necessarily have to be a drug trip, but I guess it's two questions. Have you ever seen a drug trip or drug incident sequence sequence? That's the word in another writing another book. Or have you ever seen or I guess it's and and or have you ever seen unique writing styles that you're like, oh, this is unique and it's different from the normal.

Here's a chapter next chapter, right? Like some sort of unique writing thing. And if so, what were those things? Three questions. So drug, not that I can recall, but memory coming back to you.

Project Hail Mary, where the main character, Rayland, Ryland or Rayland, Ryland Grace, his last name is Grace. He wakes up on a ship and then we get, you know, him trying to figure out what the hell is going on. Then the next chapter or half a chapter.

It's a memory of him in a on Earth. And then we go back to him trying to figure out where the hell he is and then. Going through the motions of being on the ship.

So the only thing that comes close as you know of memories coming back. Other than that, I can't think of anything on the spot that's done like this. And this is done so fast and in such a short amount of time, but so much is put there to make it, you know, enticing, captivating the events that are happening.

You're like, oh, oh, oh, holy crap. This guy is definitely in a bender and it happens to be a bender. It could be written for any other sort of situation, I suppose, but it was done well for me, but I can't think of anything besides Project Hail Mary on the memory part.

Did anybody do drugs in it? I thought that they did. No, no, no. I think I haven't read King, huh? Just King did the drugs and he was writing.

Yes. And mostly during Tommyknockers, like that's at least the rumors and online rumors are what they are. But what I read online is when he wrote Tommyknockers, he was coked out of his mind for what it's worth to this conversation.

Thanks for that. No, Jonathan, to your question. I yeah, Project Hail Mary for me as well, but I also don't recall anything else.

One thing I am reminded of is the Lies of Locke Lamora, where we kind of see bits and pieces of Locke's past. But that's not obviously a memory thing. That's just sort of kind of relating past instances to Locke's current instance, like how the storyline connects there from his past to his present.

But yeah, as far as memory stuff goes, I personally can't say that I've read anything like that. I feel like there's got to be other stuff out there, though. Doesn't the memory stuff I've seen before? I think those are both good instances.

I also feel like in not Choke. What's the other Palinuk book that we read? Yeah. Doesn't he do kill yourself? Yeah.

Doesn't he do memory recall in that? Or is it just flashbacks? I think it's just flashbacks. Oh, OK. Definitely Fight Club has memory recall stuff as well.

Yeah. Does... What's the survivor name? Character? Temperance? Tension? It's a weird name. Drop it in the comments if you remember who the main character survivor is.

Doesn't he do drugs, though? Does he? He's like part of a cult that is all prim and pristine. Oh, right. They don't even do caffeine.

It's the opposite. No drug trips for the other books that we've read, I guess, then. I was really scraping here.

So, Jonathan, then what's your... Obviously, you said you kind of liked this style where you get these little vignettes. But yeah, what about that do you like? I like when authors try new things. And this one succeeded because if you've ever been drunk before, then you know that there's a wishy-washiness to your memory.

There's a wishy-washiness to the moments where you're like, the lights are a little streaky and you can't really remember all the things. And it has that episodic vignette memory feel like this. Thank you, Spencer.

Something like that? Yeah. That's my impression since I've never been drunk. I only heard about it in D.A.R.E. videos.

I don't know what we're talking about. Yeah. Oh, did you know that D.A.R.E., there was an episode that came out that the reason D.A.R.E. got so big so quickly is because police got a stipend for everyone that they recruited.

It was basically an MLM. Yep. Interesting.

I heard that. Yeah. So fascinating.

Yeah. That's why it got so big and why they were like, don't do drugs in front of us. They didn't say the last part.

But no, I love when authors try and do something new. It's fun. Survivor did something like this too, where the book page numbers start backwards.

And so it starts at 316 or whatever. And then as the book ends, it ends it on page one. Unique things that you can do with the medium of the book is, I always love stuff like that.

Yeah. And the book starts at, let's say, 316 in the end of the book and works backwards towards the end of the book, if that makes sense. So it's almost like memento in book form.

Benjamin Button reminds me of too. Yeah. Yep.

Stuff like that. Anytime authors do something unique like that, I love it because there's not a lot of people trying something new and getting published. So that's like a two for one there.

So shout out to Nick for trying something unique, doing it, and succeeding, I'd say, in this instance. So that's the end. That's chapter 18-ish, right? So we got two more chapters to hit before we wind down here.

19... What happens in 19? Yeah. So 19 is, it's just politics. Oh yeah, the coup.

Oh, yep, yep, yep. Well, it's not really a coup. It's them realizing Zerus is f***ing insane and going, maybe we should take this guy out.

I mean, it's a coup if you're Zerus. It's not a coup if you're... That was chapter 14, where this governor... Yeah, that's right. It was chapter 14.

This chapter is... Zerus is... I don't know if they're in a room with a bunch of people. Oh, the hybrid. Yeah, yeah.

Another 50 glowworms, they call them. Yep. And Zerus also confronts this guy, Trike, about doing drugs.

Yeah. Trike does some sort of heroin style thing. Hell yeah.

Yeah, and then... He's super scared of Zerus finding out about it. And then Zerus is like, well, go do it. He's like, go do the drugs or whatever it is.

Yeah, just calm the f*** down, do the drugs, and we can talk again. Yeah. And he wasn't sure if it was a trap or not.

Yeah, I think that's kind of the essence. Yeah, they need to find these... What hybrids are called? Yep. So in chapter 19, we find ourselves... I think we're kind of in a room with Zerus and a few people.

And Jonathan, you might need to help me out a little bit here, but they're talking about trying to... They need 50 more glowworms or hybrids, right? To conduct their experiment. So yeah, do you remember what they need these people for? What's going on here? We don't know yet. We just know that Zerus is doing experiments on people in some capacity.

On hybrids specifically. Yes. Yep.

But I think it's fair to say that it probably has something to do with what happened to Roman, right? Like a good storyteller will tie things together. And so Norval even mentions when he's discussing with Roman originally that the vitilarium is working with his genetic structure because he was born on Diorum. And so it happens in the gestation period, something like that.

That it's because of the women who are born here rather than a genetic anomaly, if you will. It's an evolutionary type thing is the implication. Right.

So I believe that Zerus is grabbing hybrids to try to create an army to take over the IGB because he's sick of it. Because we do see, you mentioned this just before we started recording, Spencer, about the news center being a state-run propaganda machine, I think is what you said. Very much like 1984 where all the information coming out is not objective.

It's not whatever. We even see the small riots happening. And then in the background, it's like, cool, go deal with them.

You know, most aggressive commander that I have or whatever. And he deals with them. Right.

So collecting people as human test subjects. They continue to go missing, which is about to lead us into the next big job that Roman's going to do. Right.

So chapter 19 is the larger story at hand. A little bit of snippets behind the curtain there, which I also think that there's just enough layering where we get Roman, Roman, Roman, bigger picture of something that's going on, whether it's Zerus or whoever. And then Roman, Roman, Roman.

And we get this not ping pong effect, but it's a good cadence of a lot of Roman main character POV. Hey, this is what's going on in the background. And we get just enough of that that when Roman encounters things that are intersecting with that, we can go, oh, yeah, I've been seeing the build up.

Right. So. So who likes Zerus? Slava? That's her.

Well, if Roman's not likable, then we got to find somebody else to like. So it might as well be Zerus, right? Okay. Zerus is your pick, huh? Yeah.

I mean, he's working against an overlord character, right? As far as we can tell. Yeah. That's kind of what it appears.

Yeah. I mean, I like him as a bad guy. Yeah.

What does he want? Zerus wants full control of the galaxy, basically, or all of the planets currently that humans occupy. And he wants stability for his planet. I think he just wants control of the mining operation because it gives him control over the whole universe.

He then gets to make all the weapons. He gets to create this, you know, group of super soldiers, is my assumption, right? Like Roman and, you know, lead them to his big plan of whatever he's doing. Yeah, exactly.

Pretty much on the money. Yeah. I'm on the creds.

You're on the creds. Nice. Yeah.

One thing I just kind of wanted to mention is what kind of... I'm curious what you guys think of what kind of government this is. Obviously, it's a sort of total... It's a democracy. It's a totalitarian sort of... Or sounds like... Well, maybe currently, but it sounds like someone's, you know, trying to take over and make it into something different.

But yeah, what's your guys' opinion or view of what kind of government Zerus or even this other overseer or grand regent, I think they call him? Yeah, that sounds right. It seems like something akin to parliamentary because you have governors and then you have the head guy and then... Well, the head guy. I have a couple of head guys that have like a... They're state heads, basically.

Like a consortium of leaders or whatever. It's like Congress. Yeah, but more parliamentary than what we as Americans would think of as Congress.

What's the difference? I wouldn't pass the social studies test if you asked me right now. So what's the difference? Well, so parliamentary system is where you have different parties. There's more than two.

And one usually has more power, right? They have the majority of the votes. So then they, along with all the other parliamentary representatives, set the laws, set the cadence for the government. Whereas in a congressional Republican, you know, republic, not in the party system, you have state representatives that go and also there's a balance of power and then each one represents a state and then they enact the laws.

So you really think it's... Okay, all right. You really think it's more parliamentary rather than congressional? Because it feels like to me that this group of people that I can't even remember the guy's name at the moment who's like, hey, Zerus has been up to stuff. Here's the proof I have so far, whatever his name is, right? That guy.

That feels like they are state heads rather than heads of entities that would be more or groups. Yeah, it seems like each one of those, I think they're called governors in the book, where they each have like a region or a section of the city on Dioram that they each kind of oversee and then they have a party that they're representing. Yeah.

Well, to me, when I think of what you just said, congressional, I'm thinking of it in the framework of what we have in America, right? Where there's three branches of government and they're all delineated. They have powers and checks and balances. Here, everything's kind of mixed together and I'm not doing the parliamentary system any real justice because it's more complex than what I'm explaining it as.

But it seems more parliamentary to me because there is just a bunch of them together and yes, they have sections of the city or the planet that they're in charge of, but they're all in one room working together or trying to, there's concessions and quid pro quo kind of stuff, which is different than what we have in America. And maybe the lines are blurry there, but it's different to me. Yeah, that's why I was like, hey, can you explain this to me? Because I don't see it, right? Do you guys, as the audience, see more of a parliamentary system here or more of a congressional US version? Or if you're part of other countries in the world, is it more like your system? And if it is, can you explain your system to me? Because I don't understand it.

Leave us a note in the comments because I'm curious. Because to me, it felt more like state representatives, like Spencer said, where they're part of different entities, or sorry, they're part of different sections, geographic sections that they're like, hey, even on the map, I think it says that. Yeah, Luxania, Lydus, Dorok, Argos, Talos, Etonia.

Yeah, these look like geographic spaces to me. I'm not saying that you're wrong, because if you understood it as parliamentary, then that's interesting. I mean, I kind of want to ask Nick when he comes on.

Yeah, well, if I just did a... This is Google AI, so take it, you know, the grain, a large grain of salt possible. And it's pulling from... The AI is pulling from the VillariumSeries.com website. But according to Google AI, it's an oligarch structure.

The government is an oligarchy with an elected representative from seven city states making legislation. These representatives resides in upper levels of the central sanctum tower. So that's closer to parliamentary than congressional.

But because it's oligarchical, it means that all the rich folks who control businesses and different entities and... What's the word I'm looking for? Goodness. Like utilities, everything that's controlled by these rich folks. They're the ones in charge.

But the system seems to me, again, people who are smart enough, please comment below. Is this closer to parliamentary or what? But Gemini says this, but I'm okay to be wrong. That makes one of us.

I'm not okay to be wrong. You're not okay. You look like you're about to say something, Spencer.

I'm also okay to be wrong once in a while. I guess it's fine. So you're right, Jonathan, that only makes one of us.

Cool. Thanks, guys. Yep.

Just want to let you be in your own boat there. Yes. Perfect.

Oh, man. All right. Well, let's wind this guy down.

Chapter 20. Any final thoughts on Chapter 20? Chapter 20. Comes after 19.

Oh, oh, that 20. Okay. I know, I know.

It can be confusing sometimes. Well, the thing that stood out to me in Chapter 20 is he wakes up with Monique and Modus calls them and he's trying to hide the fact that he's with Monique and Monique calls out to, Hey, dad. Yeah, yeah.

We'll be there in 30 minutes. And he's like, what? So, no, he's not confused, though. He's like, he knew.

The Modus is not confused. Roman, I think, was a little confused. Oh, Roman figured it out.

Yeah. Well, because didn't Modus say something first before Monique did? He's like, oh, and tell Monique I said whatever. He's yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. And then Monique's like, oh, yeah.

Okay, dad will be there soon. Yeah. Yeah, that was a funny.

That was a funny scene. I like that. Yeah.

And this is where they get their new job, right? They're going to see Modus. He wants Roman to make up for what he lost him. Right.

So he needs another huge job. Turns out that the job is coming from, is it Valeria? Taylor Swift. Is that her name? Yes, the Taylor Swift equivalent.

Actually, if this is going to be sci-fi or dystopian, I imagine this being Lady Gaga of the world. Yeah, that does make more sense. And I like Lady Gaga better than Taylor Swift.

So I'm going to go with Lady Gaga. This is Lady Gaga. And Monique also apparently went to school with this.

Right. With this girl at some point or another. Yeah, wait.

So Jonathan, you're saying that you like Taylor better? No, no, no, no. I don't have a dog in that fight. But I was thinking that Lady Gaga is not even that experimental.

Lady Gaga is way mainstream. Anyway, in my mind, it's a lot more experimental, but it probably isn't because it's mainstream. So it's probably more Lady Gaga.

I concede. Well, then Taylor Swift. Taylor Swift is mainstream pop, right? I'm not knocking her or guessing her up.

No, but Lady Gaga's also got a massive following. Massive, massive. It's not as big as Taylor Swift, but it's big.

Right. But if we're trying to make an analogy in world to our real world, I think the pop star that calls Roman's old boss is more like Lady Gaga than Taylor Swift. All right.

All right, audience. Settle this one for us. Is it more T. Swift? Are you a Swifty or are you a Gaganite? I don't know what she calls her people.

Little. Sorry. Little monsters.

That's what she calls them. Little monsters. Are you a little monster or are you a Swifty? Which one? Which one are you? Or do you have a better recommendation like a 1990s Britney Spears? No, I get it.

I get it. We're making fun of mental illness. That's great.

They should hear you off cam. Got him. That, my friend, is an admittance of guilt in the court of law.

Plead the fifth over here. Oh, man. So they get their job.

What other key points happen in 20 before they take off? I can't think of anything. Yeah, I think that's I think that's pretty much it. I got to consult the book, which if you haven't picked it up.

You should pick it up. It's like absolutely solid read, especially again, as Nick's first time author, first time published author. I actually think that Roman opened up too quickly emotionally as someone who's had to work on himself emotionally.

I think that Roman was a little quick, a little quick to let her into the vault. So Roman matured faster than you did. Maybe you need some drugs in your life.

Extracurriculars. Well, that's kind of one of the things. I don't know if I brought this up on camera or not, but I was a little bit wary of Monique in the beginning because it just seemed like he got in too quickly with her.

And I'm wondering if she's somehow using him now. Slava, don't spoil this for me, but that's kind of where my head's at right now. In Chapter 20, you know, as they're setting off on this new job, like, is she somehow going to play him? You know, set him up for something.

You know, maybe she's connected to Zerus. I don't know. Oh, that would be a surprise.

That would be a surprise. But yeah, I don't know. I'm just speculating at this point.

Obviously, don't spoil it for me. I'll get there next week. Well, spoiler, they get to have white picket fence, two children.

They're both hybrids. Ironically, they're not hybrids. So they adopt.

Because Roman has Roman has issues. Actually, one of them's adopted. The other one's stolen from the job.

They just ran. That's actually they adopt that 10 year old little girl that he saved earlier. That's right.

There it is. She saved the audience now because they were going to buy another pack of it. And actually, those guys wouldn't be selling.

You guys want to talk just for a couple of seconds, maybe or a minute. About Norwell going off on Roman is the first time that Norwell does anything like this. And it's Roman calling him after promising to do all the stuff for him.

And he's been gone for a week. And even Norwell knows. And he says, everyone on Kairos knows you've been on a bender through this entire club district.

And so Norwell is like, for the first time, this weeby little guy. Calling him out. Calling him out, standing up to Roman.

I thought that was a pretty cool little bit in the book. I mean, I think you covered it. Yeah.

Oh, well, all right. Moving on. Norwell is Norwell.

Norwell, whatever his name is. Norvel is growing as a character as well, which I did like. I did like that Norvel also is going like, oh, hey, he's not just some dweeby guy.

He's like, oh, I can stand up to this guy a little bit. Um, well, he's obviously got enough smarts to kind of like he escaped from Zerus, like where he was a tower or whatever he was in earlier in the book. He escaped from Zerus's control.

So like he like it was like, obviously, a lot went wrong, but he managed to escape. He has enough sense to like, you know, not only is he this dweeby, you know, sort of nerdy character, but he definitely has some like enough sort of intelligence, I don't know, street smarts, if you will, to kind of survive, even though he can get himself into some awkward situations socially. But yeah, it is cool that there's other characters that are growing and we see a little bit of development there.

It's not just Roman. That's right. But that's all she wrote, folks.

Unless there's final thoughts here. Another 10 chapters in the books. Another 10 in the books.

History, history book, recording, another one in the recording. We're falling apart. I'm falling apart.

Same. But let us know in the comments how you're enjoying Videlirium, or if you absolutely hate it. I'm cool with that, too.

You know, I didn't write the book. So let us know. Drop it in the comments.

Next week, we will be tuning in for the final chapters. We'll wrap the book up. And then we have a special episode with our guest, the author, Nicholas Keating-Casbaro, if you haven't already checked out his author episode, which will have released already, I think.

Right, Slava? It should be already released. If not on our platform, you can probably check it out on his platform. We're going to share it with him.

Yep. So check that out if you haven't. And if you haven't checked it out, check it out.

And if you haven't checked it out, check it out. And if you haven't watched it yet, go ahead and watch it. And make sure that if you haven't watched it, watch it again.

Let me share it. Watch the episode. Where he's on as an author.

Right. That one. Yes.

Yep. Spencer, do you have any episodes we should check out? You should probably check out the first episode that we did. Also, check this one out.

And probably the one that we do with the author. If you haven't watched... You're telling them to check out the episode that they're watching? Be sure to check out this episode that you just finished. Rewind.

Just start over. Just pull it. Rewind.

Be kind. Rewind. Actually, that should be the teaser at the front end.

Be sure to check out this episode that you're watching right now. Yes, exactly. Because maybe they're only going to watch the first 20 minutes.

And they need to check out the full... That's about the time we all fall apart. It does get rowdy, though, this episode. A little bit.

A little bit. Well, we weren't going to go there. But it does, though.

But we need to be audienced. We need to be audienced? What? So that'll do it for this episode of SideQuest, everyone. Brought to you by DayQuil.

You can keep that. We're going to let that one roll. Love it.

All right, adventurers. All right, SideQuesters. We will see you on the next SideQuest.

Hey, I have a favor to ask. If you like what we're doing, the simplest way to support the show is to hit that subscribe button. In return, we'll keep leveling up.

We'll listen to your feedback and read the authors that you suggest. And of course, we'll take SideQuests along the way. Thank you for joining us, and we'll see you in the next one.