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rewatching Thou Must Live Die and Know aka the best cutscene of all time for an art thing, I'm reminded that my favorite part of Endwalker wasn't any of the epic setpeice moments or heartrending drama, it's this one pause.

It's this scene where Venat is arguing with a group of Zodiark worshippers about to make a large sacrifice to bring back things as they were, Venat is arguing against them by saying that we have to accept sorrow as a constant companion rather than causing more sorrow by repeating the cycle of sacrifice. They don't listen, and continue insisting that the world before the Final Days was a perfect paradise. Venat listens to them silently for a moment, then draws her sword and preforms the Sundering.

But, that little pause, why she hesitates when they insist things were perfect - it's because she knows they weren't. At this point she's the only one who remembers Hermes's despair, knows that it's the cause of all this, knows that it was caused by his existential crisis over the abuse of creation magic. She knows the flaws in the Ancient world too, because she's seen people's confusion at her choice not to return to the star, as well as presumably seen other problems in her work helping others as Azem. There's a terrible tragic irony too in the fact that she was an outlier in the Ancient world for choosing to continue to live past the end of her duty but by becoming Hydaelyn she's bound to her duty for even longer.

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me running roulettes in FF14 one day, fighting the boss Sephirot who has attacks named after all the branches of the Sephirot: hey isn't that some guy from Lobotomy Corporation me doing normal raids next, getting put in a party with a player named "Arbiter Binah": HEY, ISN'T THAT -

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Miss C______

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Phillip's Distortion being "Crying Children" feels like adding insult to injury, like on top of everything that happened to him he lost the symbolism lottery and the form that reflects the depths of his soul is just. A pathetic crying baby.

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first time fighting The Crying Children in LoR: oh man, how tragic :( after failing the fight all day: fuck them kids *punts a cherub across the room*

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shoutout to my Librarian Mason who woke up just five mintues before having to tank a five-phase-long Floor Realization, real MVP and also Dexter, who just barely survived the whole thing

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most miserable man in the world (all his problems are his own fault)

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farewell to Wuthering Heights

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still early on in Library of Ruina, I've seen some of the scenes of the Sephirah in despair over the Light they worked so hard to create being stolen by Angela, as well as flashbacks to her takeover. Angela's decision to be like "forget saving humanity, I want to live and be free", and to offer the same option to the Sephirah - I love that, and I love that for her, even if I can't forgive her for stealing the Light particularly since I've played all of LobCorp. But it's a complex sort of cognitive dissonance I find fascinating as a reader. It's just like how I liked and sympathized with Ayin while playing LobCorp, but am still like "what the fuck?" at many things he did, especially how he created Angela only to ignore and deny her

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playing Library of Ruina, the way each of these different Fixer offices keep coming in to the Library where the last group of Fixers failed and died makes me wonder if Fixers are genetically indistinct from lemmings

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I'm still a Canto behind, but it seems we're on a pattern now of getting new Sapling of Light powers every Canto, powers that are assciated with both the seven deadly sins and the branches of the Sephirot, in moments that have thematic overlap with the Sephirah of LobCorp and LoR.

And next up following the pattern would be Hong Lu's Canto + the Sephirah Chesed. It's a combination that works if you know Chesed - both he and Hong Lu have these personas of affected chill-ness, and are associated with the color blue and water symbolism (Hong Lu's Land of Illusion, Lin Daiyu's debt of tears; the rain screen effect during Chesed's suppression, "Rain is falling; this rain, the tears of all the employees. The downpour will never stop.")

Additionally the word "Chesed" is often translated in the bible as "loving kindness", and Chesed's suppression in LobCorp is associated with "Those who are Faithful and Trustworthy". It will be interesting to see how those themes play out with, or in contrast to, the story of Hong Lu and his family.

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try to keep your head screwed on a little tighter next time

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Ryoshu seems like the sort of person who, when the other Sinners are freaking out over an oversized spider scuttling around the bus, would catch it alive in her hands instead of crushing it, admire it's coloration for a moment - and then throw it at whoever is the most scared of it (presumably Sinclair)

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after reading some other Ryunosuke Akutagawa works along with Hell Screen, I'm convinced that Ryoshu's Canto can't go down without a reference to The Spider's Thread, what with Spiders Ryoshu over here with three different Spider Bud EGOs/IDs. the story of a sinner in the Buddhist hells getting a chance to escape by climbing a spider's thread because for all his sins, his one good deed was not crushing a spider, it does feel very Ryoshu-core.

wait a sec, sins and good deeds - One Sin and Hundreds of Good Deeds, that Red Eyes + Penitence Ryoshu also has it's EGO. interesting

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Manager and Assistant

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condolences to Doctor Arknights for being officially confirmed to be Ayin-core

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more fun with wierd Agent names