>>319699
>>319727
>>319732
The identity and motivations of the character who has only been depicted as a blue silhouette with minimal facial details near the start of the comic (assuming that the character is not in fact multiple characters) is one of the two major pending mysteries of the comic. The other mystery is the motivation and social connections of the weight gain cult (more on that later). From different characters that were present during scenes that the blue character was also present in, it can be deduced that the blue character is not Nikolia, Emma, Tanya, Nina, Mari, Elijas, Kia, Lene, Andre, Mine, Tine, Marianne, or Sarah (apparently Nikolia's ex-girlfriend who Nikolia has not spoken to since middle school). The blue character had always appeared slim, so assuming that Belt Bluster is not using visual trickery (basically lying), the character is not any of the plus-sized models in either Elija's modeling agency or the weight gain cult. While this character was usually referenced in the comic with non-specific, gender neutral terms, this character once speaks with Emma over a voice chat with the alias Dyriad, refers to *them-self as a "woman", and presumably has a feminine voice (although, that could just be the use of voice acting and a voice changer). My guess is that the blue character was Maja (Sarah's sister) the whole time. If that is wrong, then my second guess is that the blue character was either a currently unnamed, or otherwise barely relevant character who will later be revealed to be working for the weight gain cult. Regardless of my predictions, the identity of the blue character has been lingering for most of the comic, and the comic apparently has had no progress on that plot point ever since. Either this will lead to some sort of major reveal by the end of the comic, or is just another lose plot point that will never get any meaningful resolution.
As for the weight gain cult, I just think that it was a weak idea. As I already mentioned in the last thread, there was already plenty of mystery elements with the bully exposer group (so far known to consist of Kia, Maja, Sarah, recently Nina, and was once given assistance by Elijas), and whatever both Elijas and Marianne have going on in secret with their own plus-sized modeling agency. The additional inclusion of the weight gain cult just seemed unnecessary for this young-adult, weight-gain themed romance drama. This puts Belt Buster in a tough spot because now his seemingly best choices are to either dedicate even more pages focusing on the weight-gain cult to have some sort of narrative payoff for the effort that was put into it, or to just drop the entire plot point as it is.
I don't think Nikolia being unaware of all these plot points is necessarily bad writing. There is plenty of quality story media where the main character is unaware of key information that the audience and other characters know. The narrative payoff is how the main character interacts with other characters before becoming aware. It just has to be handeled carefully.
>>319740
>>319742
>>319747
>>319795
I don't think Belt is necessary a bad writer. I think the writing of The Domino Effect so far, overall is more than decent enough. While shifting the focus of the comic away from weight gain to a slow-burn romance drama with mystery elements was inevitably going to disappoint some fans, I think that makes the story more interesting. As many others have previously speculated, what I think is really killing attention of the comic is the abysmally slow upload schedule. This comic includes many extended scenes such as the exclusive New Years Eve dinner that Nikolia and Emma attended, the skiing incident with the American Tourist and his two American buddies (who, IMO, were ironically the funniest characters in the comic due to how they were handled), and then yet another party scene. Such slow plot progression, while fine enough on its own, only exacerbates Belt Buster's slow upload schedule.
It appears that the slowness is at least partly due to Belt Buster being jaded of making The Domino Effect for a long time. He seems to be more interested in both his other shorter form comic and his regular individual artwork. Still, from what I have seen, I strongly suspect that The Domino Effect is nearly completed, and that Belt Buster has long ago planned out the rest of the story. At this point, perhaps if Belt Buster had the motivation, he could push himself to finish this very long comic in the way he had intended (and not rush it) during the following months, and then finally move on to other stuff.