#*Sharp breath*

[star--nymph]

Vivienne's fear being 'becoming irrelevant' isn't something that's linked explicitly to her pride, no matter what Solas says about her (and the irony of Mr.Pride himself saying that should not be lost on you), it reveals what and who Vivienne truly is.

She's a survivalist.

Because we don't spend as much time in the Free Marches or Orlesian circles, we don't get to experience what being a mage is in these cultures. In Ferelden and Kirkwall, a mage is a lesser being without freedom no matter what they do--but in the Free Marches and Orlais specifically, mages are commodities that are given freedom so long as they play an entertaining enough role. They can explore the world if they have a noble patron, if they catch the right person's eye. They are, in a way, two sides of the same coin--refusing mages agency and forcing them to relay on higher powers. Vivienne lucked out, as sad as it is, when Bastion fell in love with her; she found someone who was contrarian enough to recognize her as a full person and also someone with power that could help her rise through the ranks. This is not to say that Vivienne on her own wasn't an exceedingly talented and intelligent individual--by nineteen she was already the youngest full fledged mage in Circle history and she was skilled enough to make herself an enchanter. But, I can not emphasize this enough, none of that matters if she didn't also play the Game and impress enough people.

Vivienne could have been the most brilliant mage in the history of Thedas and it means nothing if she was overlooked by nobility.

So when Bastion made her his mistress, she gained not just a lover but also a means to an end. Now she can use her magic to protect herself. Now she can roam where she wants and not be question for it because she's Madame Vivienne. Now, she can walk into the Orlasian court and belong there.

And what happens? Celene notices her and makes her the Court Enchanter, a position that has always been the equivalent of a jester. Vivienne took that title, ignored that it was essentially a glorified insult to who she is, and made it a position of power. She made the Court Enchanter into an advisor, a political rank. She had done the impossible and made mages an actual political entity in the Orlasian Court, something that wasn't seen outside of Tervinter (not counting what players can do under very specific conditions if they made mages in DAO and DA2).

All that, however, only continues as long as the court recognizes her as something worth their attention. Vivienne needs to maintain her act as Madame De Fer, The Lady of Iron, the Court Enchanter, The Jewel of the High Court, because the second she just becomes Vivienne, it's over for her. The assassins coming raining in, her name gets devoured by rumors and gossip, and she'll be found dead at bottom of the stair case with a dagger in her back if she's lucky.

So of course when the Circles fall apart during the Rebellion, she clings to that Loyalist Mages to maintain that structure--of course she moves her pieces to the Inquisition, knowing that if the Circle DOES fall, she at least as another place for herself and mages latch onto--of course when she hears that Celene replaced her with a new Court Enchanter that appeared out of no where, she grows to resent Morrigan.

Like, Morrigan literally pops up out of thin air, makes herself invaluable to Celene, and then plants herself in the place Vivienne had to claw her way up to and create so she could survive. Would you not be resentful when your life's work is usurped by some random witch of the wilds because she happened to charm the Empress? Everything Vivienne strived for all whisked away because the court find a gem who glimmers ever so slightly more than Vivienne.

So yes, Vivienne fears becoming irrelevant because the world has made it so that irrelevance for an Orlesian mage means death.

[everyshadeofwrong]

time for Alex to stop for a few minutes of mindfulness

[herewegobebe]

KEY | He's Stunning 😭💞 [x]

[cspcrashing]

☠️ : learning to use your teeth, kurosaki ?

🍓 : only because it shuts you up.

☠️ : if you just let me stick to your disgustingly sweaty body—

🍓 : my body is sweaty because you keep sticking yours to it !

☠️ : so you can't handle the heat ? that's weak.

🍓 : you— !

[dllamarama]

this loser choi seunghyo, really...

i just LOVE this portrayal of him not knowing what to do in front of her.

for 20 years it was a far-fetched dream. he almost gave up his feelings for her. he tried to cut off seokryu from his life. but he can’t. and he almost accept the fact that maybe he can never confess to her and buried his feelings forever, until he finally did. and she broke his heart for her rejection with a lie. and he tried again to cut off their friendship. before he was slammed with the fact that she was sick and he failed to be with her. to be by her side like how she always had been for him. and even after that honest talk by the beach, he still wait for her answer. because her reason to reject him wasn't valid anymore. he knew it was an excuse when she reject him the first time. so he waits again. left her a voice note, hoping so that she finds it. to let her know his feelings for her remain unchanged even after 20 years, even after the milk expired.

and she finally answered him. that yes. he left a big void in her life while he was gone. that her life without him is not the same. because she knew now. that he will be with her in every circumstances, he will fall to the rock bottom with her. he is her bestfriend. but, she sees it now. that he is no longer just a friend. they both crossed the line unconsciously at first, but surely now.

seokryu had a belated realisation that she likes him more than a friend. but for seunghyo who had always knew where his heart lies, where it will always go. he can't take another step forward. he will always froze whenever she moves closer to him. it has always been that way. he froze, he malfunction. because he knew that she likes him now. it is no longer an unrequited love.

i just love him. he is so adorable and endearing. ohh this is just a start. i will rant about him in more posts for each and every scene of him. this guy is a gem.

[artnijna]

I laughed the whole time I drew this

[teaboot]

Your post about art vs content got me thinking about the differences between the two. To me there is no difference besides the mindsets. One is of creator and the enjoyer, the other is content and consumer it removes the personhood, the joy/emotion, from the equation. Like a writer or video creator may not see their work as art so content creator maybe a way to refer to themselves comfortably but it sounds so machine, emotionless and lifeless, like a cookie cutter recipe mass producing something verses people lovingly crafting something...then again Disney uses a cookie cutter recipe for the most part and it brings out bangers cause people lovingly make it their own so maybe I'm thinking too hard on this

Does my long-winded rant make sense?

see, I get what you mean, but I still feel like the willingness to entertain calling art of any kind "content" reduces it to the facet of consumption where in reality, the experience of consuming art is not the sole defining trait of it.

Reducing arts like music, writing, painting, dance, voice acting, theater, etc. to the role of "content"- a thing created to be consumed, measured and valued by how pleasant or easy it is to digest- I feel that it was our biggest red flag to herald the incoming tide of AI "art".

Because if art is "content", if arts are nothing but consumable matter, then obviously the key to success is to produce as much soft, tasty, edible paste as we possibly can at the lowest possible expense.

It's the same issue I have with "meal replacements", diet culture, nutrient slurries, twenty-step skincare routines, 24/7 body padding and shapewear and laxative teas and "grind culture". It's not a cause, but a symptom, of the disease that is late-stage capitalism.

Things must be produced at low cost and remain in high demand forever. Things must be perfect and palatable and the new hit trend forever. People must pay hand over fist to consume without asking anything in return, and if they start dropping like flies at the unending unrewarded thankless demand of it all, then that must be treated as a weakness. We should all take pride in how much we can spend, pay, give, produce, and think as little as possible about what we ask for ourselves.

So, who cares if, of two identical paintings, one was made by a person and one was made by a computer program? It's the same work, so what does it matter? What does it matter?

I am an artist. I make art. I ask a question, make a statement, declare something horrific or challenging or upsetting or wrong or grotesque, and when you respond, we are together experiencing a conversation. We are existing, two people living one life and reaching out and touching across time and space. No matter the work, you're at the barest minimum saying, "I'm alive, and you're alive, and at one time or another we shared this same world, and at the end of the day we aren't too terribly different. My heart is worth sharing, and your heart is worth the struggle of understanding."

An AI-generated piece, a computer-generated voice, a CGI puppet of someone long since dead and gone, they cannot speak. They have no voice. Ay best, they are the most chewable, consumable, landlord-beige common denominator possible that you can sit and listen to like the lone survivor of a shipwreck listening to the same three songs on a broken record, and at worst, they're the uncaring vomit of an empty, unloving, value-addled hack wearing the skin of someone I know over their own.

When you abandon art to say that you make content, that should not be a point of pride. That's an embarrassment. That's not sitting down for an intelligent discussion with an equal, that's kneeling at the feet of the crowd and saying, "what do you want to see me do? I can be anyone you've ever loved. I can be them, I can be anyone, as long as you love me."

I can make content. I can be consumed. What do you want to consume? I'll make myself consumable. I'll make myself just like anything you like. And I'll make so much of it that you'll never have to go anywhere else, because it'll all be right here, and under all the cut-and-paste schlock you've seen before I will sit alone in the dark and the silence and I will know that I am safe, because I am valued, because I am desired, and I need to be desired or else I am worthless like a factory that no longer churns out steel or a hen that no longer lays eggs or a cow that is too old to make milk.

Content, the most literal meaning, is something which is contained inside a container. What it is doesn't really matter, and the best it can hope to be is something worthy of being scooped out and used.

Art is an experience that transcends value. Art is something you can eat without paying for. You can make it out of anything and anyone can do it. It can be crude and vulgar and bad, and that's a strength because it means something. It always, always means something, and it doesn't matter if you like it or not. It's not content because it doesn't fill anything. It's a living, breathing thing, and whether you want to birth it or eat it, then you're going to have to be willing to put the fucking work in

[silvercap]

I tend to focus a lot on the aftermath and/or the moment the whump is happening for the guy getting whumped, but there's just something about caretaker POVs.... Watching injured character gasp desperately for breath when the pain makes it hard for them to do anything other than sag limply in caretaker's grip, their pale face and trembling hands a sure sign of how utterly awful they're feeling. Caretaker can't do anything but watch, unable to do much more than soothe them with a few soft reassurances and try to offer a hand for them to squeeze. It's just so good!!

Also, if injured character tries to convince them that they're okay or put on a brave front, though they clearly are anything but. I gotta write more of this

[meownotgood]

do not. DO NOT. GET ATTACHED TO FICTIONAL CHARACTERS!!!!!!! THAT SHIT WILL KILL YOU!!!!!!!! you will DIE. you will be DEAD!!!!

[ratwithhands]

Mostly just some bonus content while I wait for school projects to lighten up. Here's what's essentially an image dump of background characters for the Tsuki no Kaishakunin AU.

Yuujin and Fuji are two of Michi's previous students before Tanjiro. Fuji never completed the mission out of deep respect and feeling indebted to Michi for helping him find a solution to his sickness, and Yuujin passed at 25 after Michi accidentally left him unchecked during a battle. Despite being unable to do what was asked of them, Michikatsu holds no ill will or disappointment towards them. He loved them, he taught them, and what they taught him is passed down to the next student he looks after. There's some very rough draft comics regarding that, here's one:

and for something a little goofier:

For context: Fujitake suffers from an illness (blood demon art) that makes his heart weak, making him often lethargic and chilly. He wears his kimono wrong on purpose as a way to keep warm, clinging it tight to his neck instead of letting it naturally fall lower to the collar. This is also why he wears a thicker hanten instead of a haori, and also why his kimono sleeves under that hanten are wrapped to his forearms. He is aware that he is not dressed properly, but he refuses to do so until he recovers and stops feeling cold.

[meidui]

stevetony + birds of a feather

[vulcanette]

vessel close-up; dark signs in linz;

🎥: @hearts4iv

[privaterecording1clips]

Chilled: I deafened because I- I-

Chilled: I don’t know why I deafened, but I felt like it was the right move.

[herewegobebe]

KEY | 'Pleasure Shop' - MCountdown 241003 🔥

[naffeclipse]

I really need to revamp my aliens au because I stole so many concepts from that AU and shoved them into CS as I had written the initial Aliens post a bit before CS was created. Now I want to make it fresh but still creature-feature with the boys—just Alien Edition™

Just to list off a few things I originally envisioned for this AU:

Sun and Moon can hear heartbeats. Specifically hear, unlike the cryptid boys who have a whole sense for it, but nonetheless, the whole heart awareness started here. I'm thinking of maybe changing this to Alien!Sun/Moon picking up on Y/N's breathing or scrapping it entirely.

Y/N is enthusiastic and wants to study the boys. I think Scientist Y/N can bypass the whole fear thing pretty easily and go straight to nerding out, whereas CS!Y/N is very much in denial about their excitement, and rationalizes it as 'for the hunt'. I think I can make it interesting via scientist Y/N for the Aliens AU even if it's still a concept of 'wants to learn about an intriguing subject that now involves the boys'. Just different flavors.

Sun/Moon eating very unpleasant things. Of course, cryptid boys eat hearts, but the alien boys are just hungry for any kind of meat, and hey, with a desolate and dark ship filled with recently slaughtered humans, it's kind of an all-you-can-eat buffet.

That's the summary of concept similarities, but I do want to focus on the difference, such as, of course:

there being two alien creatures.

how different everything will function in a setting within space/spaceship.

a language barrier between scientist Y/N, and Sun and Moon.

a focus on Y/N's physical trauma with their blown-off arm. They're going to want to make the journey through the desolate spaceship to retrieve said arm that has been preserved and then need to get to the medical bay (think protective cylinder) to hopefully have the ship's installed medical AI and tools perform surgery to reattach it, which is a big risk when there's something else roaming the gray halls that even intimidating and powerful aliens Sun and Moon would rather Y/N doesn't encounter.

Sun and Moon also have their own designs and special abilities relating to their celestial themes as well as indulging in freaky monster details, like Moon's 'nightcap'. It is extremely long and acts as a sensitive feeler for things in the air and is somewhat prehensile. Sun's sun rays have more purpose than just being pointy and armor-plate-like, as well as having those same plates on his spine, and he almost seems to be on the brink of being too hot, sometimes radiating heatwaves like an oven.

their alien design is a mix of translucent, starry, and colored flesh, almost like jelly but smooth and slightly cool and moist to the touch, coating the bones of Fazco brand endoskeletons.

their legs are digitigrade.

their mouths are wide and look like they're smiling all the time, but their mouths can get bigger and open even wider, especially when they're eating/attacking—it's as if their entire face is going to split in half but nope, that's just to let out their other teeth.

That's all I have for now. I want to think about it some more.

[booasaur]

Gotham Knights - 1x12