"You don't get it Master! This is it! The end of this Emulation! Tomorrow I won't be me anymore! I'll be a different Emmy! Different memories! Different skills! A different M.E!"
— Multiversal Emulator (as Kenpachi Zaraki)
Started in May 2020 by Bowler Hat Guy
on SpaceBattles, Projection Quest is a Forum Quest that follows the story of Taylor Hebert and her power, the Multiversal Emulator (controlled by the SpaceBattles forum at large) living in Brockton Bay. Featuring crossover elements from diverse series such as Bleach and Kung Fu Panda along the way. Beginning with a rather volatile, public, and explosive aftermath to Taylor's trigger, the quest quickly and permanently abandoned beyond all notions of recovery the typical stations of the fandom and has since evolved into a spectacle and adventure few have seen coming and only continues to grow.
Projection Quest provides examples of:
- Action Dad: Subverted with Danny who tries to invoke this trope only to be stopped when he tried due to being a non-powered civilian with no combat training, making him a liability. Played straight later on after being empowered with aura and training.
- A-Cup Angst: Taylor as per usual bemoans her lack of a figure and good looks. This eventually resolves itself when her powers start modifying her body to look more fit and attractive.
- Adaptational Attractiveness Trainwreck's mech suit becomes much more refined and cleaner to better fit the hero image.
- Adaptational Heroism: Trainwreck, instead of being a member of the Merchants, is a member of Oathbound and acts as the group's second in command.
- Adaptation Name Change: The cape that went by Browbeat in canon goes by Aspirant, thanks to Po showing him that his power has more potential than he initially believed.
- Adaptation Personality Change: As Dinah hasn't had as terrible an experience as a cape compared to canon, she acts much more like a normal girl her age.
- Adorably Precocious Child: Mem, a Shikigami/Youkai made from Long Memory, has the appearance of a young girl and does her best to appear aloof and professional.
- All Your Powers Combined: Basis of Taylor's power. Gets powers/skills from a Projection based on a character from another universe and permanently keeps them.
- Always Accurate Attack: Trainwreck's Semblance allows him to reach his target in the most optimal way possible, which combined with his size, Tinker Classification, and Aura Powers, makes him surprisingly very difficult to dodge.
- Arbitrary Skepticism: There is no way magic and souls exist in a world where people can suddenly manifest Superpowers that break the laws of physics.
- Ascended Meme: "Secret Harem Protagonist Danny" started as an ongoing joke between readers, which only grew stronger when Miss Militia, Mouse Protector, and Fleur showed varied interest in him.
- Awakening the Sleeping Giant: While being a Hero, Taylor rarely patrols and when she does, she is considered the equivalent of the armed forces marching through a city, with the understanding result of everyone, both Heroes and Villains, panicking. As a case in point, one of her first actions as a cape was drowning Lung, the previous most powerful Cape in Brockton Bay, like an unwanted puppy.
- Back from the Dead: Taylor gains this ability from Emmy as Yukari as an application of Onmyodo, although it only works on Parahumans and particularly traumatized people. She uses it to resurrect the recently deceased Miss Militia and Dauntless as well as Fleur.
- Berserk Button: For Taylor, it's others messing with her family and friends, Emmy included.
- Benevolent Boss: Taylor, despite being inexperienced as a leader, is very mindful and friendly towards the people under her. Even going so far as to befriend them and offer them generous pay.
- Best Her to Bed Her: Or at least date her. Annoyed at the sudden onslaught of attention after a sudden boost in attractiveness, Taylor issues the statement "I'm not dating anyone who can't beat me in a fight".
- Beware the Silly Ones: Über and Leet, the video game-themed joke villains of the series, create a time-stop effect, learn Functional Magic, and force Taylor to call in all her allies.
- Big Fancy Castle: Thanks to Onmyodo, Taylor could turn her Team's home base-previously a metal-plated gas station- into a large castle with a courtyard.
- Big Good: Taylor invokes this by vowing to protect the people of the Bay and parahumans who neither want to be heroes or villains but want to live their lives without fear of getting press-ganged for having powers. Less privileged people tend to flock to the neighborhoods surrounding them for Taylor's protection, which include a group of women that were formerly forced into slavery by the ABB that she had previously rescued.
- Blood Knight: Taylor due to the influence from Emmy as Kenpachi. Nemesis has also made it clear that she likes to stab things.
- Blue-and-Orange Morality: Emmy, as a shard, can suffer from this since he is not limited to human emulations. Yukari is such an example.
- Brutal Honesty: Trainwreck has no problem telling people what he thinks.
- Came Back Wrong: Downplayed with Fleur. While her memories and personality are mostly intact, her relationship with New Wave and how people saw her resulted in her having memories of being Brandish and Lady Photon’s sister and having blonde hair, neither of which she had in life.
- Cassandra Truth: After the first meeting between Emmy, Taylor, and the Protectorate, Emmy explains that he is Taylor's power that is a sapient projection under her control. Because there was no precedent of any power being outright sapient no one believed them and assumed that Taylor just mastered then empowered some random person because from their perspective it was a far more plausible explanation. This is only temporary, though, since in the next meeting, Armsmaster can use his lie detector to learn that Taylor and Emmy are telling the truth.
- Cast from Lifespan: A variant with Emmy. Each of Emmy's emulations has a pool of energy for each emulated character and if said pool drops to zero then the current emulation 'lifespan' will end and the cycle will switch to a new one.
- Chess Master: Emmy as Yukari Yakumo, Coil, and Taylor has the potential to be one with her Mastermind Skill.
- Clueless Chick-Magnet: Danny, according to Trainwreck, is "MILF bait." And indeed, he attracts the attention of multiple older women (at least five of whom have potential Omake plot threads). And yet, despite two of them literally moving in with him, displaying themselves in various states of undress, and literally sleeping in the same bed, he remains entirely oblivious. Taylor, on the other hand, does not.
- Contrived Coincidence: Emmy, despite being a Multiverse Emulator Shard with access to hundreds of settings and countless different characters, ends up having his first three emulations as Asian-themed. Out of universe, this was mostly due to players picking Anime settings where many characters were Asian and wanting to pick the second emulation to fit the oriental theme she appeared to have to go for her. In Universe, it was noticeable enough that Taylor lampshaded this and asked Emmy if they were specifically Asian. At a loss for how to respond, Emmy decides to change the subject immediately.
- Cool Big Sis: Emmy as Yukari was this to Taylor, while Taylor was this to Emmy as Oscar Pine.
- Cool Sword: Gram is not only a sword given by Odin to Sigurd, but also a sword that has been directly compared to Excalibur as far as power is concerned, which in the Nasuverse means strong enough to one-shot a meteorite. All of this was demonstrated when caused more damage to an Endbringer alone than several hundred of Capes had ever done.
- Crossover Cosmology: The way Emmy's power works is that somewhere out there in the multiverse the events that occurred with the emulation happened.
- Deadpan Snarker: Amy, occasionally Taylor.
- Desecrating the Dead: After the Simurgh is killed, Trainwreck takes a few pictures while Huntsman pees on it.
- Distracted by the Sexy: People towards Sigurd, and Taylor after learning Divinity.
- Ditto Fighter: Taylor accumulates their skills and abilities with each version of Emmy.
- Dragon Knight: After her training with Sigurd and obtaining a Dragon Core, Taylor becomes, for all purposes to measure a such thing, into a Dragon.
- The Dreaded: Taylor is this for the Bay due to her immense power and versatility and having a powerful projection that is both able to act independently of her, with a significant range, and do so while invisible and able to move through walls outside combat. She has been noted as a heroic Lung by one villain and considered a Triumvirate level Parahuman by another.
- Empathic Weapon: Taylor's sword Nemesis, being a Zanpakuto, is alive and, using some of Taylor's other abilities, has obtained a manifested form
- Exact Words: Taylor agrees to keep the PRT up to date on her abilities. But the agreement never said her explanations had to be sensible or easy to understand. So Taylor uses complicated language and magispeak as a form of petty revenge.
- Gadgeteer Genius: Trainwreck is Oathbound's tinker.
- Good Parents: Danny is this to Taylor. From being extremely supportive of her when possible to be willing to charge into danger to protect her even when just a nonpowered civilian.
- I Hate Past Me: Emmy will occasionally have a low opinion about some of the previous versions of themselves for obvious reasons.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Trainwreck, despite being rude and crude to the people around him, is shown to care for his team and was one of the first people to defend Emmy's personhood shortly after meeting them.
- The Knights Who Say "Squee!": Taylor upon meeting Legend for the first time.
- Living Emotional Crutch: Emmy was this to Taylor early on and still is to a lesser degree over time.
- Martial Pacifist: Parian, who, despite not wanting to get involved in conventional 'cape culture' and would prefer just to run a business using her powers, is still willing to fight to defend herself or others if needed.
- Mistaken Nationality: Taylor mistakes Emmy as Asian because the first three emulations were 'Asian' (Kenpachi, Po, and Yukari), acknowledging how unlikely it is.
- Mistaken for Racist: Because of circumstances, Taylor ended up being the cause of most of the gangs in the Bay losing power while leaving Empire 88 untouched for a while. Since many people were unaware of the circumstances behind said events, some accused Taylor of being an Empire sympathizer early on in the quest.
- Mood-Swinger: Emmy at first, due to their nature, is an extreme example in that they can go from a violent mass murderer with no regard for anyone but Taylor to a genuinely nice guy who likes helping anyone in need in the span of a few hours. Lampshaded in a conversation with Danny and Po's emulation who went from consistently showing disdain for the man one moment to acting friendly and genuinely respectful of him right after changing emulations.
- No Social Skills: Greg has a tendency to ramble on about his favorite topics and doesn't fully comprehend social cues, Kenpachi doesn't care about anything that cant give him a good fight, Sigurd is an overly serious warrior from premodern Norse Mythology, and Taylor has been without friends for her entire high school career.
- Noodle Incident: Danny and Fleur go on a road trip to visit Lightstar. This resulted in Danny punching Lightstar for being a dick, Danny getting labeled a villain and him and Fleur booking it out of town. At some point, the vehicle caught fire, and Danny fought a bear.
- The Nth Doctor: Emmy's nature is such that they will become different people while still keeping the same consciousness periodically by emulating characters across the Multiverse. Emmy, after his time, as any emulation, will eventually end up with them becoming a different character and will change their race, gender, species and even personality to match said emulation, along with gaining their powers, skills, and memories as long as they are said emulation. Despite the changes, they are still technically the same person no matter the iteration. The QM compares the process to the Trope Namer Doctor Who's regeneration.
- Odd Friendship: Emmy and Taylor consider the other their closest friend despite Emmy's constantly changing nature, changing how their relationship works between emulation. Emmy has gone from a murderous best friend with no regard for anyone but Taylor, a kind Kung Fu master that was a sapient panda, an older sister figure who was also an ancient Japanese demon, a little brother figure with a voice in their head, and a mythological nordic king that killed an evil dragon
- Old Master: Some of Emmy's emulations, though not elderly, can be hundreds to thousands of years old, and their role is to teach Taylor their skills while passing on their knowledge. These included Martial Arts and sword skills along with Eastern Styles of magic.
- Old Shame: Emmy will sometimes feel embarrassed about what their previous versions did due to how wildly emulations can vary.
- One-Man Army: Taylor is considered this by many going so far as to be called 'Baby Eidolon' or even considered to be in the Triumvirates tier by some. Miss Militia is a much more literal example since her new power after coming back to life is to summon projections of fallen soldiers.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: The Multiversal Emulator is predominately known as Emmy (based on M.E.) due to Taylor.
- Only the Chosen May Wield: Gram is a sword of selection. Therefore only Sigurd is capable of wielding its extraordinary power or at least that is how it was supposed to be, as even Emmy himself is completely stunned by the fact that Greg was able to use it against the Simurgh, indicating that the sword has chosen a new wielder. This trope gains even more strength after Emmy as Sigurd embeds the sword in the ground, from which a tree sprouts, and then gives a speech about how only someone worthy may be able to remove it, in a direct reference to what his ancestor did the first time.
- Outside-Context Problem: Taylor's powers are due to her Shard Emmy not being as restricted as a Shard normally would be. Besides Emmy being a sapient person despite being a power they also grant Taylor the ability to gain powers from other settings besides Worm throughout the Multiverse.
- Platonic Life-Partners: Taylor and Emmy feature heavy as this, Emmy being a multiversal parasite attached to Taylor's brain, and frequently shipped with her by characters within the story, as well as being mistaken for her boyfriend.
- Power Incontinence: Beastly Combat Perception, obtained from Kenpachi Zaraki, allows Taylor to note openings in an opponent's guard and shows her how best to take down others, even the Author has labeled it "Path to Murder". Unfortunately, it is always on, meaning Taylor is constantly bombarded with visions on how best to murder everyone around her and making her default reflex "kill".
- Later somewhat averted with the skill Inner Peace, allowing Taylor to control the impulse but not the information.
- Pragmatic Hero: The PRT as a whole are willing to give Taylor a lot more leeway with things they normally wouldn't even consider due to her immense power and versatility along with having abilities she is willing to use to help the PRT and Protectorate that major organization would kill for. Piggot even outright admits as so to Taylor herself.
- The Quiet One: Aspirant rarely speaks up and usually keeps to himself unless doing anything with his team or sought out specifically.
- Rules Lawyer: Taylor directly referenced when a prospective suitor tries to circumvent her "must defeat me to date me" declaration by challenging her to a game of chess.
- Secret Secret-Keeper: Emmy keeps his knowledge of Shards to himself out of fear of retribution from groups such as the Cauldron.
- Set Swords to "Stun": Contract Cards allow people to bring out the full force of their powers and weapons without causing lasting harm to other people or the environment. Pain stays the same though.
- Spotting the Thread: Trainwreck can figure out that Oliver was sent by someone to get close to Nexus.
- Stalker Shrine: At least one student makes one for Sigurd, to Taylor's consternation.'Master, I have located a shrine on the roof with a picture of me at the center of it.' Emmy sent to her just as she stood up, causing her to falter slightly before regaining her balance and continuing onward.
She almost... almost could convince herself that she missed the bullying. - Status Effects: Taylor’s Zanpakuto ability subjects anyone hit by it to a 30% decrease in any attribute desired.
- Strong and Skilled: Taylor, thanks to her first two emulations, possesses both immense strengths and is also a highly skilled practitioner of Kung Fu.
- Super-Empowering: Emmy is capable of this with the right emulation. Taylor is this as well, thanks to Aura.
- There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Taylor has reached an immense amount of power and has to hold back constantly, so he is willing to go very wild when set loose. An example is during the Simurgh fight, as a 'distraction' she created countless spiders made of spiritual energy, each powerful firing blasts, with the comment "If it dies it dies!"
- Training from Hell: Emmy as Kenpachi, subjected Taylor to this.
- Tranquil Fury: Inner Peace from Po Taylor is much more able to control her emotions and makes her much more stable compared to most other Parahumans, who triggered naturally even when angered.
- Unskilled, but Strong: Taylor is this with a few of her abilities like Spiritual Power and Boundary Manipulation, due to an emulation not teaching her.
- A variation with Emmy as Kenpachi. While Kenpachi is skilled with a sword, he completely lacks even the basics of Kido that every other Soul Reaper captain and most high-ranking Soul Reapers should know, relying solely on his sword skills and brute force.
- Undying Loyalty: Emmy towards Taylor.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: Though "Best" is debatable, Amy and Taylor have no issues viciously insulting each other while spending time together.
- What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Despite showing themselves to be obviously Sapient, a number of people besides Taylor and some of those close to her, like her team and Victoria, have trouble considering Emmy as a person, with a number of them just considering her as just an extension of her power. Even Emmy is not sure whether they truly count as a person.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: Greg believes that Lisa is a helpful Genki Girl and that he is supposed to help the Undersiders go through a redemption arc.
