3 things (CONTAINS SPOILERS)...
1)
Just just wanted to put in a bit of shout out appreciation to the devs.
Even if this game (which gives us great scene after great scene and awesome dialogue) had somehow delivered nothing of value to us aside from sending Lirah to her humiliating and (hopefully) fertile fate (if she chose to remain a guard), it STILL would have been worth the trip.
The other option (to help Lirah quit and head out into the wastelands) is a good route, without a doubt, but the apology-to-humiliation route is GOD TIER. I only have a slight quibbles: that they should have given her a bit more cross-eyed/white eyed look when she climaxes, and probably had her cherry-pop and climax cries/moans be in all caps. Otherwise, they really understood the assignment.
Eventually, though, Lirah REALLY needs to end up in the Harem at some point. **Right next to Shani when she finally gets her 4ss fully there, which she really needs to, ASAP.**
2)
While we've seen a shotgun collar has anyone actually seen any GUNS in the game?
I don't recall seeing any guns anywhere but if you can maintain cars, which they've definitely got, you can definitely maintain guns. Even assuming you don't want to try using 400 year old ammo, Black Powder is not that hard to replicate and I'm sure someone out there knows how to do it: if we've got a whole industry to keep the oil refineries going I'm sure there could be arms and ammunition manufacturers.
3)
Now..
SKIP ALL THE REST IF YOU ARE DISINTERESTED IN THEORIZING BASED ON INGAME EVIDENCE WITH REAL-WORLD FACTS APPLIED.
ALSO: MASSIVE SPOILERS AHEAD!!
THE FOLLOWING **MASSIVE TEXTWALL** IS ENTIRELY CONJECTURE, AND I'M PROBABLY WRONG, but...
A REALLY sad thought arises, and there seems to be some evidence backing it up..
Does anyone else find it odd that our boy and his wife have been fvcking like bunnies for 20 years **but somehow only had TWO kids**?
OK, so...I realize the devs are probably just reflexively going off 21st century norms, without thinking it through, and probably didn't want to have to add any more NPCs to the roster. That's probably the real world reasons.
However, this still begs an answer IN-GAME, and there are some weird side issues that coincide with this problem w/these side issues actually helping answer the main one.
So...
In-game, the world is in a pre-industrial state (despite them probably being in the 25th or 26th century), especially in and around tech-rejecting Zeta) and, in pre-industrial societies, everyone pumped out as many kids as they could for pure survival: more kids meant more would survive into adulthood, as life was never certain and any number of things could wipe out your entire lineage if you didn't have enough kids. Also, entertainment venues were limited, so copulation was abt as fun as fun got.
MC's not away in the zones for years at a time, but only days or weeks, so that's not a reason they wouldn't be popping out kids. MC even has a discussion with Shani about how coming back from a fight or from the zones resulted in Zahra getting a sexual wave from him due to all that pent up adrenaline releasing into desire. So we know they've been going at it the whole time.
The MC also has to be thinking about wanting a MALE heir to take over as stalker, as it's definitely a better and safer choice: size REALLY DOES matter in a fight, actual real world experience has shown that women don't do as well in environmental torture tests as men (including some US Marine women who ended up going STERILE from all the punishment when they tried to do a male wilderness survival test), and attractive women will find what would always be just a nice easy neutral encounter for a man, can suddenly slide into sexual assault against them, because they, as women, are themselves inherently attractive commodities, the law is nowhere within reach, and men are men (Mandisa's advice to play possum and then attack when a man's guard was down was right, but it was absolutely not a guarantee of success and safety). Shani might be practically spec ops in her training, but the odds say she (as a LONE WOMAN of small stature and hot, cute appearance out beyond the reach of any backup) will almost certainly eventually get brutally graped (likely repeatedly), and very possibly bound into permanent sexual slavery, even if she does not outright just get flat-out murdered, eaten, or killed by exposure. Training only goes so far, it doesn't really change anything that she's basically a Lara Croft stand-in, and she has to sleep sometime, even if she sleeps light (which we know she doesn't, since her father is seconds away from sleep grape-ing a baby into her after her workout, until she FINALLY only wakes up AFTER he's been pounding her pvssy like a damn jackhammer for who knows how long).
So where is the expected horde of kids from our ever-horny Mom and Pop team? They're obviously still eager to go-go DECADES into the marriage, had two kids in quick succession, and he's clearly got the cash on hand to support more brats, because he keeps taking in stray pvssies to pump babies into.
We get it implied in MC's internal monologue that he sired SIX kids with Talia in the same 20 yr time period (although the queen flat-out states Talia fvcked pretty much every man in the palace, so the parentage of those kids is maybe not really all that certain, despite Talia clearly wishing it were so).
Sooo...
WHAT THE HELL GIVES WITH THEM ONLY HAVING 2 KIDS IN 20 YEARS???
Sadly, I think the most likely in-world answer, is that sometime after they had Ain, at least one of the pair became incapable of producing children.
It's theoretically possible our boy became sterile from radiation/biological/chemical exposure in the zones/cities.
Problem with this theory is that he's a pretty well-read individual of a very well-trained lineage, so would have known the risks, recognized the possible symptoms if those risks got him, and, if he had seen evidence that he was sterile, or that the risks were that high at all, probably would have pater-familias-style DEMANDED Shani pop out two or three kids (likely his own, unkess he's shooting blanks) before she ever went to her first Zone, so that idea seems a bit unlikely.
Alternately, Zahra could be a low fertility woman in general or could have had something like a catastrophic miscarriage which took out her ability to have kids ever after.
We know for a fact that Zahra was able to QUICKLY pop out two kids, so she is likely not a low-fertility woman. Rabiah, who only had her twins (who are not Omar's: are they also the MC's, on the down-low?), is being commented on as being behind schedule. Now, Rab probably had LESS time than Zahra, because Zahra straight-savage TOOK her man, kind of literally out from under her, and went to work on a family with him immediately, leaving Rabiah high and dry (appropriate, since Rab was leaving the MC high and dry with balls of purest azure). That said, Rab serms to LOATHE Omar, so maybe she just decided not to have kids with him. So let's nix the sisters being of low-fertility.
Most likely answer is that, although we weren't told this, sometime after Ain's birth, Zahra had a catastrophic miscarriage which caused permanent uterine damage (or maybe as a complication from Ain's birth causing same). This has an increased chance of probability in a society (Zeta) that has intentionally limited its medical technology. Miscarriages, which can happen randomly, can absolutely have (or at least coincide with and be caused by same) permanent negative consequences, especially if medical coverage is not adequate.
Zahra being rendered permanently barren by a miscarriage matches the evidence exactly. To wit:
The pair isn't arguing about why they haven't had kids. When people who want kids but can't, and haven't figured out the reason, they tend to agonize over it, possibly fight about it, and obsessively look for answers and alternatives. And yet, our pair are lovey-dovey and calm. If they have been trying to have more kids and failed, it sounds like they know the deal and have calmly settled on some sort of solution.
BTW, they clearly do try. A lot. Zahra's comment to Igor that if MC wants more kids he can w/her, was probably just covering up why they haven't had any, because he's clearly banging away.
Very importantly..
I don't think there's been more than a handful of mothers out there throughout all history who have been okay with their husbands fvcking their daughters. Not even Egypt or other similar cultures where siblings married was Daddy's delving into his daughters considered acceptable. Even in Greek myths, where young gods would kill their fathers and grape their goddess mothers, the idea of daddy banging daughter was still a no no. And even in sexually permissive Zeta, it doesn't sound like dads into daughters is happening as a general thing. And yet, Zahra's not only fully on board with it, she's ACTIVELY ENCOURAGING it. While she did say she was glad her husband shared her kinks, this seems a little bit beyond that, and begs the question of why she's going there.
Also, despite Zara looking like she's probably at least a decade away from menopause, she's PUSHING AIN TO CONSIDER TAKING OVER DUTIES AS THE NEW HEAD WIFE. Shani wants to be a desert stalker and is fighting her nascent but emerging urge to carry her father's children, so Ain is initially the only option.
Ain is far more sexually and socially trained than Shani, and is endlessly willing to go there with Daddy, while Shani watches from the sidelines, so Zahra is focusing on Ain as her replacement, with one caveat: Ain is irresponsible, selfish, and short-sighted. Zarah has resorted to BDSM punishments to try to discipline her into being more attentive and responsible. That, and Zahra clearly also likes the BDSM (if you've got Kyra in the cage next to Ain's basement punishment scene, she accuses as much).
More, Zahra would be aware that if her husband brings in an OUTSIDE new head wife (not concubine or slave), so for kids who will actually INHERIT from the MC, there's a chance Zahra and her children could find themselves out in the street/sands if the MC dies and the new wife disowns them, especially if that wife had "provided" a MALE heir, which Zahra never did.
So what's the logical choice for Zahra? And why does it match what we see?
Easy. She encourages our boy to fvck his own daughters (initially only Ain but eventually also Shani), who SHE ALREADY HAS LEVERAGE OVER since she's their mother, and she also further projects power over the girls by putting them to work eating her out every now and then, so establishing dominance.
Thus, she assures that her husband is only getting acknowledged and inheriting children with HER girls, WHO REMIND HIM OF HER, so he remains interested in and loyal to her as well, and everything's kept within her lineage while the daughters are disinclined to kick her out because they love her and feel loyalty to her.
It's sick and twisted, but makes complete sense as a desperate but highly calculated response to messed up circumstances from a very family-focused woman who was cruelly cut away from her primary asset in marriage, and doesn't want to end up out on her ass and losing her husband and everything else after a patient lifetime of striving within servitude.
BTW,
Ain's increasingly entitled attitude might be partially Zahra's fault, because she is too-quickly pushing Ain to consider taking over motherly duties ASAP. What the girl is of course getting out of it is the image of all the PRIVILEGES of motherhood in her head (ordering servants around and getting fvcked by her well-endowed father) but none of the attendant RESPONSIBILITIES. Thus, Zahra must keep reminding her of her place so that she doesn't accidentally create a monster by pushing her too fast: otherwise Ain might end up going full-bore narcissistic and kicking her mother out. This might explain why Zahra goes to such extreme measures to discipline her daughter.
Also, tho Zahra actually says Ain could possibly take over as someone else's wife, OR take over the household here, the reality is Zahra knows Ain only wants her father, so would not choose some other man, and it thus looks more to be a coy trap to get her to take over as head wife from Zahra, while LOOKING like she's leaving open the appearance of other choices. She also discusses Ain's options with the MC, but nothing comes of it on that end: Ain is endlessly encouraged to go after pregnacy w/her father and that's that. The only thing that changes here is when Shani finally opens her legs to daddy: Zahra suddenly laser focuses on getting her into the harem. As Shani is the eldest daughter, and a VERY RESPONSIBLE AND OBSERVANT woman, Zahra might actually start targeting HER for first wife, tho that would probably really piss Ain off, who's basically been training for exactly that role pretty much her whole life, when Shani specifically wasn't: Ain actually has a hell of a lot of identity issues specifically linked to this.
Anyway, that's the theory, and I've seen no evidence that could theoretically refute it. Feel free to chime in. Please keep it polite.
Obviously not proof itself and the devs probably just didn't consider the low baby count (despite commenting on it with Rebiah) but it's definitely something that would make sense if it were real world.
) more ethical than the Romans who had a religious obligation to leave unwanted babies at the local dump, girls were more often abandoned than boys because they were thought of as requiring more care, and slavers and slave owners who wanted a free slave would visit the dump to pick up what they could find, consequently some Roman fathers would mark their children before abandoning them to make sure they didn't fuck any of their own daughters at the local whore house.
