Discussion: what did Haley mean with "Elan, it turns out..."?

[yeetusmcgeetus]

Full quote: "Elan, it turns out I may not be exactly what you would call-" and then she gets cut off and we never hear the rest. My first thought was "straight" but she had already said that she had kissed multiple girls, so :smallconfused:
(Just to clarify, she was talking in cryptograms but that's what they say when decoded)

[brian 333]

I think it was intended to be along the lines of, "...not exactly a good girl," but Elan doesn't care.

[Squire Doodad]

I think it was intended to be along the lines of, "...not exactly a good girl," but Elan doesn't care.

The cryptograms cover a lot of Haley's secrets that the reader sees, but one more personal and non-plot relevant one could be that Haley's past is not merely "Chaotic Good with firm grey tints" but at times very bloody and rough. Greysky isn't known for its low mortality rates. "The first time I killed someone, I enjoyed it" would be a deeply personal secret that is relevant to Haley, and could plausibly scare away Elan in a worst case scenario.
Of course, it doesn't matter if she did, as she's had years of character development since then as well as since the aphasia arc.

As well as some obscure irrelevant trivia that is not important to her character in the slightest, and only exists to fill the slot of a mysterious secret. Like, uh, she found the Genie's Cave from Aladdin.

[Precure]

Back then, everyone was so sure that it's about being "virgin."

[brian 333]

Why would it refer to her sexual status, and if the exact same line was said by a male character, would we assume the secret was sexual in nature?

[Precure]

Why would it refer to her sexual status, and if the exact same line was said by a male character, would we assume the secret was sexual in nature?

1. Dunno
2. Probably no.

[Fyraltari]

Back then, everyone was so sure that it's about being "virgin."

https://s1.qwant.com/thumbr/474x338/b/e/ef087701c16d48b48f1d2290d9736578a3688503c7166bd6ce 96ff8786c3cb/th.jpg?u=https%3A%2F%2Ftse1.mm.bing.net%2Fth%3Fid% 3DOIP.MeA0x-H14uHBi_HhEmAx4gHaFS%26pid%3DApi&q=0&b=1&p=0&a=0

[hroþila]

Never heard the virgin thing before. The most common guess was always "...Good/...a good person", which never made much sense to me.

[Squire Doodad]

But who knows if it matters, really. Most of the long-running mysteries of the comic get brought up again from time to time to remind people of what we still don't know. This moment came and passed and has never come up since. Maybe there wasn't even a concrete idea of what the secret would be, just another thing she's embarrassed about and not keen to reveal.

"...what you would call a good stylist. I was goth for years, and then my answer to that was to put on the aesthetically blandest brown leather outfit I could find. The one aesthetic choice I've made in the last three years past makeup was passing on wearing green boots."

[B. Dandelion]

"...what you would call a good stylist. I was goth for years, and then my answer to that was to put on the aesthetically blandest brown leather outfit I could find. The one aesthetic choice I've made in the last three years past makeup was passing on wearing green boots."

I 100% buy this as plausibly humiliating enough.

[Synesthesy]

"...what you would call a good stylist. I was goth for years, and then my answer to that was to put on the aesthetically blandest brown leather outfit I could find. The one aesthetic choice I've made in the last three years past makeup was passing on wearing green boots."

This is my headcanon now. Even if I like goth girls :redface:

[Psyren]

The whole arc had to do with her being afraid to let people in for truly meaningful relationships because deep down, she didn't think she was good (or Good) enough to deserve one. The aphasia lifted when she announced (in a non-rescindable way) that she was willing to give into love anyway. (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0393.html)

Whatever she was about to say about her past, I'm fairly confident it got covered here (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0670.html) so it's a moot point now.

[tanonx]

Is everyone doing a bit, or did we stop saying it was that she was an Aasimar? I thought we were still confident about that one.

[FujinAkari]

Never heard the virgin thing before. The most common guess was always "...Good/...a good person", which never made much sense to me.

Yeah, I was VERY active back then and I can't remember anyone guessing virgin. 'Good' and 'Straight' were guessed pretty regularly. 'Human' got a lot of traction too, and a lot of people guessed she might be part dragon, up until the Draketooth massacre occured and all these part-dragons were killed with Haley being completely unaffected, then it stopped being postulated

[Kish]

Precure means "I" when they say "everyone," it appears.

My personal choice was and is "...a good person." It ties into Haley's deep-seated insecurity which has informed much of the comic--and I think the "massive hidden plot twist any strip now" some people were pushing for is a ship that's really sailed at this point.

[Metastachydium]

'Human' got a lot of traction too, and a lot of people guessed she might be part dragon, up until the Draketooth massacre occured and all these part-dragons were killed with Haley being completely unaffected, then it stopped being postulated

I wonder why. It's not like every dragon's a black dragon related to ABD, not to mention that she could easily have the draconic template or actually be three dragonwrought kobolds in a leather trenchcoat. (Origin mentions that she once descended into some caves choke full of kobolds; how do we know the creature that returned was really her? THAT MUST HAVE BEEN A GRIM FORESHADOWING!)

[Precure]

Precure means "I" when they say "everyone," it appears.

What a disgusting thing to say to someone you don't know.

[Kish]

What a disgusting thing to say to someone you don't know.
"Virgin" was a theory promoted by a tiny minority, and I can only think of one person who seemed to consider it particularly likely.

{Scrubbed}

[FujinAkari]

I wonder why. It's not like every dragon's a black dragon related to ABD, not to mention that she could easily have the draconic template or actually be three dragonwrought kobolds in a leather trenchcoat. (Origin mentions that she once descended into some caves choke full of kobolds; how do we know the creature that returned was really her? THAT MUST HAVE BEEN A GRIM FORESHADOWING!)

I think it had mostly to do with "We have this theory that Haley is part dragon. We have this event that affected a staggering amount of dragon, yet the event didn't affect Haley or anyone that Haley knows. It feels unlikely that there will be a SECOND dragon-based event that will lead to this revelation... so that likely isn't Haley's secret."

[brian 333]

I never gave the scene much thought. At the time I assumed it was a background reveal which was intentionally vague so that we would insert our darkest, most shameful secret in the blank and thereby be immensely relieved when Elan forgave us... Haley, yeah, Haley.

I have entertained the ideas presented, an I still believe my assumption is correct. Whether the author ever had a secret in mind is almost irrelevant. Unless it turns out that Haley is already married and her spouse or child is the IFCCs vessel, we are unlikely to ever have the answer.

[Synesthesy]

For me the answer is simple: it is something that she thinks it's really important, but it isn't at all, expecially for Elan.

That phrase is about she not being as self-confident as she seems when she's doing rogue things. The exact detail is probably something very silly that, as it isn't important at all for the story, we'll never know for sure.
In my opinion, it's "good person" or something like that.


Of course it isn't anything about sex. We can see thousands of time that OotSverse is very advanced from this point of view, they do not have any problem with real-world minorities and they aren't close-minded at all. I don't understand how could someone think that "virgin" or "straight" could be correct answers.

[hroþila]

The problem with the "good person" theory is that Haley says it's a secret she hasn't told anyone, not even V. That's a very weird way to frame something as vague as "I'm not exactly a good person". The secret would be whatever incident or character flaw that, in your opinion, disqualifies you as a good person, so while "good person" may have been the words that Haley was going to say next, in my opinion they can't be the secret itself and we're back to square 1.

I doubt it'll ever come up though. Maybe it was something about her abandonment issues, which were hinted at but never quite explored.

[Precure]

The problem with the "good person" theory is that Haley says it's a secret she hasn't told anyone, not even V. That's a very weird way to frame something as vague as "I'm not exactly a good person".

That's why we were arguing for "human" as the answer back then. It's the only thing that makes sense in that context.

[Metastachydium]

I think it had mostly to do with "We have this theory that Haley is part dragon. We have this event that affected a staggering amount of dragon, yet the event didn't affect Haley or anyone that Haley knows. It feels unlikely that there will be a SECOND dragon-based event that will lead to this revelation... so that likely isn't Haley's secret."

But, and hear me out, kobolds!

[The MunchKING]

I don't understand how could someone think that "virgin" or "straight" could be correct answers.

Especially since before that she was going on about how many girls she kissed.

[ti'esar]

This is one of those things that I'd love to hear from the Giant on someday, because I'm quite certain it's a non-issue as far as the rest of the comic goes, but it's not possible to put together from what we do have. I honestly have never been able to think of anything that 'sounds' quite as right here as "human", but I'm equally sure that's not it.

[Synesthesy]

The problem with the "good person" theory is that Haley says it's a secret she hasn't told anyone, not even V. That's a very weird way to frame something as vague as "I'm not exactly a good person". The secret would be whatever incident or character flaw that, in your opinion, disqualifies you as a good person, so while "good person" may have been the words that Haley was going to say next, in my opinion they can't be the secret itself and we're back to square 1.

I doubt it'll ever come up though. Maybe it was something about her abandonment issues, which were hinted at but never quite explored.

My opinion is that the secret is something related to her past that makes her feels like she isn't a good person. So I didn't want to say that she would have literally said "good person", but that she would tell an episode from her past wich means "I did X and that's why I'm not a good person"; and that X is something Elan wouldn't care about at all even if he knew, and as Elan we would neither, and that's why Rich didn't write it.
The exact episode is uninteresting for us, and that's why it's unknown. And it will stay unknown as we now have read about Haley's life and her past, and we know every interesting usefull part of the story. We know about her family, her past, and we know her darker side (and the gothic one!). We know that she wasn't exactly a good person back when she lived in the thieves' guild (even if not as bad as Crystal or others). We know a lot from the arguments between her and Celia. We know everything we need. The rest is probably something very important for her, and a little silly for us readers. And Elan.

[Peelee]

I never gave the scene much thought. At the time I assumed it was a background reveal which was intentionally vague so that we would insert our darkest, most shameful secret in the blank and thereby be immensely relieved when Elan forgave us... Haley, yeah, Haley.

I have entertained the ideas presented, an I still believe my assumption is correct. Whether the author ever had a secret in mind is almost irrelevant. Unless it turns out that Haley is already married and her spouse or child is the IFCCs vessel, we are unlikely to ever have the answer.

Agreed. What it is isn't important. It's only weight was that Haley thinks it's important.

[Kish]

The problem with the "good person" theory is that Haley says it's a secret she hasn't told anyone, not even V. That's a very weird way to frame something as vague as "I'm not exactly a good person". The secret would be whatever incident or character flaw that, in your opinion, disqualifies you as a good person, so while "good person" may have been the words that Haley was going to say next, in my opinion they can't be the secret itself and we're back to square 1.
Sure. If the "secret," the thing that made her go "Even V doesn't know that one," truly relates, it would then be something like "everyone I ever cared about left me, literally or by dying, because I'm scum, you see." But I think there's an excellent chance that Rich didn't bother to figure out what it was, just handwaving "something else on the level of having a tattoo Elan hasn't seen; she's freaked out by not having any secrets completely to herself, not by what any of those secrets actually is."

[BaronOfHell]

Could it have been related to her attempts at gathering enough gold to pay off her father's jailers? I don't think she had told anyone about that, it was something important to her, and it was something she was keeping a secret.

[Ruck]

Precure means "I" when they say "everyone," it appears.

My personal choice was and is "...a good person." It ties into Haley's deep-seated insecurity which has informed much of the comic--and I think the "massive hidden plot twist any strip now" some people were pushing for is a ship that's really sailed at this point.

I don't remember when exactly this last came up, or what Rich might have said about it, but I remember thinking it was either something along those lines or perhaps admitting she wasn't actually a card-carrying member of the Thieves Guild anymore.

In any case, I don't think it's the specifics that matter; it's that Haley is trying to figure out what secret she holds that is driving her aphasia.


Agreed. What it is isn't important. It's only weight was that Haley thinks it's important.

Aye, I kept reading through the thread after I started writing and then this said what I was getting at.

[Kish]

Both "my father's being held ransom by an evil dictator" and "I'm not really in the Thieves' Guild anymore" are cryptogram secrets she says in that strip.

[Ruck]

Ah, memory proves fallible once again. (Not just that I didn't remember that the Thieves' Guild was already known in the cryptograms, but also that I may have conflated that with Rich's comment on Haley and Sabine being opposites in another way, and the, uh, creative theories that stemmed from that.)

[Satohika]

"a woman" is what I hope.

[FujinAkari]

"a woman" is what I hope.

What would make you suspect that? O_o

[Liquor Box]

Is it possible that there is no specific secret? That the Giant had her make the comment, but didn't have anything particular in mind for her to say?

Things like her being a virgin, or her not being a good person and other theories don't seem to fit too well. Either because they are not sufficiently momentous, not definitive in the way you'd express it like that, or otherwise because they'd seem forced.

"I'm not exactly a women" would work in terms of being both momentous and particular, but it seems very unlikely to me.

[Ruck]

Is it possible that there is no specific secret? That the Giant had her make the comment, but didn't have anything particular in mind for her to say?
Certainly.

[woweedd]

"a woman" is what I hope.

...Que pasa?