That's where I have to clarify that Faite refuses to accept that excuse. She believes the Hood is smart enough not to be a slave to his madness, and he only needs his thoughts provoked enough to understand his own slavery.

Of course with any deep enough obsession, what finally does it is usually one particularly humiliating failure, barring any sudden moments of clarity. But the danger to it happening *that* way is he then becomes obsessed with making someone pay.





Lara has two pieces of information, though: She *has* left the Parodyverse, and returned, and therefore has the best chance of making an educated guess at what's behind the wall, and she had someone more knowledgeable than her give her a hint.

She *has* heard something about artifacts similar to the Wonderwall from Shema. She was told never to violate protective artifact barriers like that, because they don't protect what's outside, they protect what's *inside*. On the outside of that barrier, she was told, she has no substance, and would simply disappear forever. That's about as close to the 4th wall as she gets.

She was also told that it's very insistent on protecting from that, so it's also possible she'd just mock the Hood and dare him to try breaking through it. He might be very suspicious of that dare, because he probably knows she's a little bit devious, and maybe she wants him to disappear.





I wonder how he would react though, if residents of the Parodyverse, including Faite, would keep urging him to stop, but the one person who *has* travelled through universes dares him to go ahead and see what happens. Would that make him start questioning whether his planning is enough?





The irony is that when an alien civilization comes here to investigate long-dead Earth, they'll probably find that story, see some of our massive skyscrapers, and then believe we never stopped trying to reach god.





So many people use "assault" incorrectly these days on TV and Youtube. Actually, Yuki would be open to battery charges. The entire group, including Hatman, are already guilty of assault by standing on the doorstep and making threats.





Yes, Yuki would know that, and while she is kind of an action junkie, years of working as a P.I. have taught her that sometimes the light touch works better. During the conversation with Mr. Sneek, she would have already figured out who the weak link is on the property - perhaps a gardner or a maid - and then visited again with some excuse of why she needs to come in and check something. The action part would be escaping once the staff figures the ruse out.





She also knows (part of the story I'm gradually posting) that the Psychic Samurai still has a lot of criminal underworld connections, and can seriously poison the Baroness' entire business model by making sure no one wants to touch anything from her.





Pretty much *everyone*, from that point of view.





It wouldn't be the first time. She probably still has active kill orders out there for her.








They do tend to buy up large quantities of resources and cornering the market when the opportunity comes up.








They might sub-contract, as long as it's not from someone too aggressive who can turn against them or hold the product hostage and cost more money. The Alliance Traders generally like to keep the upper hand.








If he pays enough and gives them a clear enough path to get it, sure.











The Galactic Government does that through taxing commerce among the Trading Alliance worlds. They've been piling up this tax money for eons, which is how they could afford to build a fleet so suddenly.








It's also something of a falsehood, because they then obliterated one of their own worlds over a trading dispute.








That kind of learning also creates a sort of cohesive bond, powered by fear - which is dangerous. If some faction boldly attacks a bunch of Trading Alliance civilian ships, the fear sets in among the Alliance that the savages have turned on them. The Galactic Government sends a fleet to completely crush them before they ever have a chance to fight back.

It does take a while to reach that point, though. If some faction attacks one or two Trader ships, generally the company that owns them will try to solve the problem themselves first - because it's worth a lot of money to show potential customers that they won't take that kind of crap on their trading routes. They'll send a dozen heavily armed civilian ships to crush the interference decisively. If *that* fails, then they'd give in and ask the government for assistance.