#[slurps milkshake through a bendy straw]

[lady-harrowhark]

I would love to hear the megatheorem

It's not ready for full publication and won't be for a while tbh, but like, maybe before the end of summer? If I'm being optimistic? It will definitely go up here when it's finished, although probably in parts because it's an absolute beast, currently weighing in at over 25 pages and nearly 13k words.

Here's a sneak peek at the table of contents though 😎⚔💀

Also I'm just now noticing that I have "Empty's as Good as Clean" from the draft version of the poem instead of the published version as a section title, whoops. Pretend that's on purpose. Maybe it's a nod to the like, three hours where we thought @torbooks was speaking to us in code. That sounds like both a regular thing to happen as well as to reference, right?

Some segments have stuff I've pulled in from things I've posted here before but off the top of my head I don't think any of the sections are fully anything I've posted here. That is to say, as the draft currently stands, every section has new analyses in addition to anything pulled in from previous posts, though I'd say most of the sections are things I've haven't posted. I believe the sections that have the most pulled from "old" content are Lyctorhood Lite, Resurrection vs Waking Up, and A Cavalier by Any Other Name, which would all be under my "tlt meta" tag - I'll tag this one for ease of navigation if you want to poke around.

But don't worry, when it's ready, I will make sure everyone is subjected to my theories.

[golvio]

Harby was just slurping up life juice like a starving man sucking a milkshake through a bendy straw just to keep himself alive and truckin’ in the general direction of his enemies, huh? He even had that little “Ahhhh! Refreshing! ����” pose in the last gif.

I still hope he’s going to turn out to be some kind of fucked-up energy vampire. Especially if his powers/their manifestation go in the “nature-oriented” direction that I think they’re going with the theme of the breakdown/digestion of living and dead matter.

[roomshxmbles]

What about Marco meeting dragon in the ex magic au? Marco works for white beard, who has to be a criminal, how does Marco react to finding out the dragon is his boyfriends dad?

ace was a little smarter than luffy and actually knew to tell marco in advance..even if it wasn’t the way he planned; he sips on his half of the milkshake they’re lazily sharing, marco adjusting his glasses and shuffling through the paper. “oh, yoi…looks like doflamingo’s spread his empire some more. got new offices springing up downtown…how he’s managed to keep them untouchable is anyone’s guess. not to mention he’s suspected of another kidnapping, but nobody will testify against him, including his captive – that caesar guy. ” he muses testily.

“you mean that’s news?” ace guffaws, pausing to very loudly slurp through his straw.

marco cocks an eyebrow at his boyfriend who is now recoiling from brain freeze. “…why wouldn’t it be?” he asks, suppressing a weak smile at the sight of ace clutching his head in his hands.

“we’ve known about doffy having his eyes on caesar for ages. and it’s not really a kidnapping, caesar’s just a bit fucked in the brain so someone probably saw him having another freakout and reported it. nothing’s gonna come of that one”  ace murmurs absentmindedly, twiddling the bendy straw between his thumbs.

 and then he drops it in his milkshake, kind of aware he’s let loose a fairly large bombshell.

“uh.” he blinks and offers a wide smile at marco, who has lowered his glasses, his mouth agape slightly.

“…ace…who’s “we”..and why on earth would you know that…?” marco queries warily, lowering his voice a touch.

“well, uh…funny thing is, marco, i was gonna tell you eventually, but…my dad…”

marco sighs heavily as ace pushes his thumbs together in a slightly adorably apologetic manner, kind of like a puppy that’s being scolded. “yes, ace…the father you won’t let me meet, yoi…?” he shuts his paper and folds his arms

“there’s a good reason for that, uh…my dad is…you ever heard of monkey d. dragon?”

“…ace. please say that again so i don’t feel like i’m dreaming.”

“my dad is monkey d - “

“okay no, i changed my mind, yoi…” marco exhales again, not knowing whether to be happy or cautious as fuck. whereas dragon hasn’t really given whitebeard’s assorted bunch of criminals any hassle - hell, he thinks back to it and remembers the old man saying something about once working with dragon on a couple of missions. maybe this…maybe it’d be good for protection? whilst whitebeard and dragon weren’t enemies, dragon definitely held the upper hand in terms of jurisdiction…if they interfered too much with revolutionary ops, they could be in trouble – otherwise…

well, marco couldn’t control who his boyfriend had as family…and he really did love the idiot, so how much of an issue was he going to let this be?

marco returns back to reality after being lost in thought and offers a gentle smile. “…it’s okay, ace.” he murmurs, seeing ace blinking myopically at him. “i’m not mad or anything, yoi.” 

and then he suddenly remembers dragon’s father – ace’s grandfather, by extension - has to be monkey d. garp. 

his face promptly goes pale as he recollects the copious, copious amounts of police sirens he’s heard over the years, slowly getting louder the more he thinks about the very real possibility of being thrown into the back of a cop car by ace’s grandfather

(as a whole marco has a lot less internal screaming than law, to be honest)

[lady-harrowhark]

Upon reading the Wikipedia synopsis for the 1997 Don Bluth Anastasia film, and then subsequently the Wiki page for the historical grand duchess Anastasia, I have learnt that the name ‘Anastasia’ is apparently derived from a Greek name meaning “of the resurrection”. And as I know you are a big TLT fan I’m coming to you asking… is this anything? What are the implications? Obviously everyone in the empire is ‘of the resurrection’, but why is Anastasia specifically given this meaningful name?

Fantastic question, and one I’ve been mulling over myself. I think there are two main pieces here, and there are undoubtedly people on here better suited to expounding upon both of them than myself, as both of these topics are beyond the scope of what I can give a super nuanced explanation of, but I’m out here doing my best!

The first is, as you said, in relation to “the resurrection” with roots in “anastasis.” Within the context of Christianity, this is almost always in reference to the Resurrection, that of Jesus. Gideon is the obvious Christ figure of the series, but in NtN, most of our main characters get a little sprinkle of Christ figure imagery at the very least. However, I actually think that the more salient thing here is that within Christian art, the Anastasis specifically refers to depictions of the Harrowing of Hell. Eagle-eyed readers may recall that Harrow herself is named specifically for the Harrowing of Hell. The Harrowing of Hell, in turn, refers to the period of time between Christ’s crucifixion and his Resurrection on the third day. During this period, he descended into Hell and brought salvation to the righteous souls there, leading them out of Hell. I’ll throw in here that the stoma is said by John to be the mouth to Hell. Make of that what you will.

Additionally, I’ll point out that the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is also known as the Church of the Anastasis. This is significant to our Anastasia because the Church of the Holy Sepulchre/Church of the Anastasis includes the site of Jesus’s crucifixion… and his tomb. Which sounds more than a little familiar, no?

So the second big thing is that within biology, “anastasis” has a similar but distinct meaning. Take a look at this quote which I’ve pulled from a journal article not really because of anything about the article itself but because the wording makes the comparison super easy: 

Anastasis is a natural cell recovery phenomenon that rescues cells from the brink of death. Programmed cell death such as apoptosis has been traditionally assumed to be an intrinsically irreversible cascade that commits cells to a rapid and massive demolition. Interestingly, recent studies have demonstrated recovery of dying cells even at the late stages generally considered immutable.

Was anyone else immediately reminded of this conversation, in which John asks Harrow to explain apopneumatism (which appears to be a play on apoptosis itself)?

“Thalergetic decay causes cellular death,” you said carefully, pressing the nail in harder, “which emits thanergy. The massive cell death that follows apopneumatism causes a thanergetic cascade, though the first bloom fades and the thanergy stabilises within thirty to sixty seconds.”

Because I sure was.

In this same conversation, they talk about the life force and communal soul of a planet, arising from “the accumulation of microbial life” and what happens when you kill a planet all at once: Resurrection Beasts. Alecto.

Taken together, I think we’re looking at some very significant imagery regarding not just Anastasia, but her relationships to Harrow and Alecto as well. We have a guardian of the Locked Tomb, in which lies the soul of a murdered planet and the ostensible source of necromancy. Given where we saw her last, Anastasia seems to have set some plans in motion to not only halt this death but bring her back. A resurrection, and perhaps salvation for those who have been trapped within the stoma, which is to say: Hell.