#{tell me a story cinderella: Zezolla Basile}

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👁 for Honyo, 🍬 for Zolla, and ❤ for Ellen

👁 What song describes how your character sees the world?

Gonna cheat and put down two songs down because they’re both similar message wise but the Vibes are opposites of each other, and they both reflect Honyo pretty well

Hurricane ― Thirty Seconds to Mars

Run Like A Rebel ― The Score

🍬 Memories can be bittersweet. What's a song that plays while your character is having a thoughtful flashback?

Silhouette ― Aquilo

Zolla reflecting on their memories be like:

Even when the memories are about nice things

❤ Your character has found that special someone, either romantic or platonic. This character means a lot to them. What song plays as they realize their feelings?

Anywhere But Here ― SafetySuit

Is this the end of the moment Or just a beautiful unfolding Of a love that will never be' Or maybe be

Everything that I never thought could happen Or ever come to pass and I wonder if maybe, maybe I could be All you ever dreamed

It’s the perfect anthem of  “Don’t get your hopes up (but I’m hoping anyway in spite of myself).”

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🟢 and 💙? [Dorky-self-shipper]

@dorky-self-shipper

🟢/Emerald: Are either you or your f/o a good cook? Or is the kitchen being declared a disaster zone and you ordered out?

Look at this man

Sweet as he is, he is an absolute hazard to himself. He has a permanent ban from the kitchen. Zolla is passable as a cook so it's up to them to make food.

💙/Blue: Your f/o is having a bad day.. How do you cheer them up? (+ Reversed for the other way around !)

*places Zolla in his lap* And then they cuddled

These two are not ones of many words (despite the fact that one of them is a full on story teller/writer XD), so even just putting them near each other can get them to visibly relax.

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🌘, ❇, and 🎟 for whoever you'd like!

*sings off key* GIANT MAN TAKE THE WHEEEEEL!

🌘: Feels like their lullaby to you

Find You ― Mark Diamond

❇️: Reminds you of your S/I

I Found ― Amber Run

🎟: You can imagine your first date to

Saturn ― Sleeping At Last

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Presenting Zezolla Basile, cipher and story teller of the Donquixote pirates, lover to Rosinante, and user of the Yume Yume no Mi. 

Devil Fruit Powers: 

Yume Yume no Mi Aka, Dream Dream fruit 

It allows the user to put people to sleep, link with their subconscious, and create "rooms" which are various states of lucid dreaming. When linked then the user can also create imprints of their targets so that they can be linked at any time and even with other people. And as long as the imprint was made when a person was alive it can even preserve a piece of someone that has died.

The drawback though is that the user also has to fall asleep, leaving them vulnerable on the outside. And, if the targets also realize the implications/understand the full potential of lucid dreaming then the user's control can be stolen from them.

A couple general established effects of the Dream Dream fruit are as follow:

You can be hurt or wounded, or even killed in the dream, but when you wake up you will only feel an ache. 

You can eat and drink as much as you want and feel full, but when you wake your stomach will still be empty despite the contentment. 

Backstory:

Zezolla was the oldest child in a family of four and had a rocky relationship with their parents due to having to shoulder so much responsibility in order to keep them all from living on the streets; selling “dreams” with the devil fruit powers they had acquired when they were in their early teens was their main source of income. Although things weren’t nearly half as bad with their mother as they were with their father, it was still pretty tense for every day home life. They had a younger brother, Romeo, who they loved dearly though. They tried not to be too overbearing with him, but growing up having to play the “parent” made it difficult to say the least and the two would get on each other’s nerves pretty frequently.

One day, even though they were supposed to be watching him, Zezolla and Romeo got into an argument and they let him leave so they could both catch a break. Most of the day went by and they didn’t think too heavily on it― when he went outside he could be gone for hours and be fine ―but the later into the evening it got then the more concerned they became. So they went out looking for him.

What they found was a nightmare.

Romeo had gone and provoked one of the more violent gangs in town and in doing so had outnumbered himself drastically. When Zezolla finally found him they had thoroughly beat him and were in the process of drowning him in the local river. The next thing Zezolla was aware of were several groaning bodies on the ground and a few that made no sound. No movement. Not even a breath escaped them. 

But they were too late. Romeo wouldn’t wake up no matter how many times they tried to resuscitate him. He wouldn’t move. He wouldn’t breathe. And in their mind it was all their fault. 

Not long after they left home without a word, taking their guilt with them, and tried to find some sort of meaning to their life for which they could redeem themself of their crime. They traveled all over the North Blue, selling their “dreams”, writing, telling stories, learning secrets that would sell for a pretty penny. 

And that’s how Doflamingo happened upon them. He became intrigued by the things they could do and what they had to offer, and like the curator of all things rare that he was, he knew what a precious jewel could look like when properly cut and shined. So he offered them a place. A family. With nowhere else to go and, in their mind, nothing else to lose, they accepted.

Though they were cordial at best with the older members and standoffish at the worst, it was with the children that Zezolla was most open with. They grew up being the “parent”. It was what they were best at even with how much they butted heads with their brother. And guilt was most persuasive in that they swore to do better. To be more responsible. To never fail another child again. If anyone hurt those kids it was Zezolla they had to deal with. 

Naturally, this led to quite the clash between them and the captain’s brother and holder of the Heart title, Rosinante. If it weren’t for a certain mission together then they might never have come to understand one another at all...

Fun Facts:

Zezolla is named after the Cinderella in the Italian adaption ‘Cenerentola’ by Giambattista Basile, and their last name is a courtesy of the author as well.

During their time wandering and in the very beginning of their days as a Donquixote pirate they went by the pseudonym ‘Scribe’.

They hoped to one day become a novelist. 

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I’m gonna make you mine

―

I’ve been wanting to do something with The Wolf by Siamés for a long time now and inspiration finally struck! Also I’m glad I remembered Treasure Cruise exists, thank you Treasure Cruise cards for giving me the references to the first two pics asklfdjsalk *bows*

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The snow’s fall was gentle as it piled around them. 

It was almost funny, in a bitter sort of way, Zezolla thought then, how snow was always considered pure. And when something interfered with that purity it became tainted. Any other person who saw blood in the snow would think it was ruined, that the blood was to blame for corrupting the serenity of what was essentially nothing in the grand scheme of things. Truthfully, the snow was nothing more than a frozen blanket set on burying away that blood. On burying away the only pure thing slipping from their grasp.

They placed a shaking hand on Rosinante’s face and his eyes fluttered. Delicate flakes clung to his lashes. Each ragged breath he took sent a faint cloud into the air. 

“Sorry...” His voice cracked and he coughed, the sound rattling deep in his chest. “Sorry I... I won’t be able to help you find a new dream.”

The frost sunk its teeth in deeper. The universe hated them, Zezolla was certain of it.

“You were my new dream,” they whispered. 

A tear slipped from his eye, a wan smile pulling at his lips.

“Then I pray that you don’t lose the hope that lives within that dream, even if I cannot be in it anymore. You and Law... Take care of each other, ‘kay?” His eyes closed.

“I love you.”

+

Two hearts. One robbed of life, the other still shamefully beating. The snow buried them both that day.

[firebird-inkheart]

🙉 🎲 and 💗 for Zolla :0c

🙉 - what songs or sounds do you associate with your s/i? what sounds do they like? what sounds do they hate?

All Is Soft Inside ― Aurora (to no one’s surprise lmao)

Hello My Old Heart ― The Oh Hellos

One ― Dustcell

Wings of Glass ― La Reve

There’s a sort of drawn out sound/vibe that I associate with Zolla; it’s the exhaustion rooted in your bones that never quite goes away, the day to day motions you run through without a thought or care anymore, the persistent idea that you must move forward anyway. They are tired, but the world is still revolving, and so they will too. (And maybe one day the sun will warm them once again.)

🎲 - name a weird skill your s/i has that you don’t.

Idk how much this constitutes as a “weird” skill, but Zolla can do that really loud whistle that people do with their fingers. No matter how many tutorials I look at or how many people show me how to do it I could never lmao

💗 - what arcs does your s/i go through? what do they learn?

This has been kind of a recent thought, but I’ve been toying with the idea of Zolla appearing in like, the background of the Jaya arc. Like, perhaps they go there to sorta do a check in on Bellamy, see how he’s taking care of the little project Doflamingo gave him and all. And they’re just there around in the background of both instances where Bellamy and Luffy duke out their difference of opinions. And maybe something about Luffy being so shameless in his pursuit of his dreams strikes a chord within them and it resurfaces again in the Dressrosa arc.

And in the Dressrosa arc the thing of dreaming comes back. And they learn that it’s okay to want things again. And that in order to get to a place where they can have those things, they can and must cut the chains that have held them back all this time; chains of their own design and of others; chains that were, truthfully, no stronger than string all this time.

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Found a nice maker and was pleasantly surprised to be able to make both Honyo and Zolla in it

[Don’t turn my post into a picrew chain if you use the maker, please and thank you.]

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CROPS: WATERED ACNE: CLEARED LIFE: OWED

@sparkpoint thank you, this is beautiful and I can’t stop looking at it 💖

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📝 + Zezolla? :3c

Oh this is definitely an interesting twist :3c Most people tend to just shorten their name to Zolla. It’s quick, smooth, and rolls easily off the tongue, though there are a couple exceptions.

Since the name “Zezolla Basile” is based off of both the Italian Cinderella (Zezolla) and the author (Giambattista Basile), I’ve been thinking that it’d also be sweet if Rosi used a couple terms of endearment for them in Italian. I love the idea of him calling them Cuore mio or Tesoro, ”My heart” and “Treasure” respectively. 

Doflamingo refers to them as his little story teller every now and then. It’s probably the closest thing to a “nice” nickname coming from him. 

Recently I’ve been trying to figure out what Law would call them, as I’ve decided in the future after Rosinante’s sacrifice, he does finally commit himself to considering Zezolla as family. It then turned into a progression of how he viewed them/how much respect he had for them and ended up a little like this:

Red-ya >> Zol-ya >> Zolla

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Somehow I had never listened to FOB’s Uma Thurman until just recently and I am losing my goddamn mind over these lyrics

And I slept in last night's clothes and tomorrows dreams But they are not quite what they seem

Zezolla energies are off the charts folks