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dxxtruction · 2 months ago

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I'm genuinely concerned that iwtv (tv) spells out EXACTLY how Louis is unreliable in his narration, but people spin this into what they think unreliable narration more generally means to them, and not what it means to this narrative. Just to be clear here are the ways Louis IS unreliable (If I happened to have missed something feel free to add):

Louis shows signs of forgetting which are normal in people who've endured long term traumatic events. Any relevant pieces of information forgotten are however righted, and sought to be righted.

Like anyone recounting a personal narrative, Louis states how things occurred from this limited perspective and worldview of the personal. He has a personal idea of himself he'd like to get across, much like anyone. He is not omnipotent. But while most might be fine if the person receiving this story interprets their experiences differently, offering to wider perspective, Louis is often very particular about the ways it must be described fitting how he can already perceive it. Which makes for times of there being a rigid perception of events, where broader narrative introspection could've offered a more truthful telling. Though sometimes this actually keeps it more truthful. This character flaw, if you will, is what Daniel is around to challenge, and he's very successful at it, even when his challenging can push in the wrong directions and draw up the wrong conclusions. Bringing up latent memories, and digging out hard truths Louis has long not admitted. At least hitting on something real, in any case. Meaning, for us, the audience, we are still in relatively reliable hands even with this in play, and so are not actually that off from truth when it is being told by Louis, who is intentionally seeking to tell it, even get it. Merely, our narrative is being, in ways, restricted as to how much is being told, and, outside Louis control, obfuscated in its reliance deliberately. (which we'll return to).

To jump off from this, Louis does withhold. He can sometimes tell Daniel something then never explain or have an answer for it he's willing to say. But we see this most apparently in how the diaries exclude certain events. That he doesn't detail much of his time with Armand, especially sexually, is a more subtle way of this. He withholds narratively to protect others, and respect them and their histories from being exploited. Though in other instances he withholds moreso to protect himself from this, and the image he wishes to present to Daniel and thus the world. One could see the act of presenting he and Armand's relationship as, firstly one where Armand is his servant Rashid, but then one of far more affection than it really holds, at this point in time, as withholding the truth as well. One could go a step further and say he does this to preserve a sense of agency and control over his inner and personal life, not just over the interview, but over this relationship as a whole. In a sense, Louis editorializes because the reality of things is beyond what feels his right to tell, and otherwise be endangering to his sense of self to tell. Louis usage of language is another way he keeps a sense of agency, as he can still pick the words he chooses to describe his life, even if his life has been largely out of his control. He can't in ways tell the full truth without giving up something he's simply unwilling to give.

Related to this, how he defends things, or is defensive of things, portrays a distorted idea of reality, but an honest portrayal of his own perspective on it. Most starkly I'd say is his claim to consider himself not abused.

His complicated feelings, especially about loved ones, give rise contradictory statements about people and events. Where he can claim one thing, and likely claim it from his personal feelings about it, but we are then shown events where this claim doesn't exactly live up to itself in every way, in his or others actions.

However, the main way Louis narrative becomes unreliable is through the lies and distortions manufactured into it and the ways in which the interview is undermined by conflicts of interest in it. Louis story is in fact one containing lies, and active distortions of events/thoughts, beyond normal forgetting, because of Armand's conflict in letting the truth be told. Mind though, that by the end of the story, much like [1] these we can presume have all been corrected for. Or at the very least who this information truly pertains to, Louis, is shown to have no interest in questioning that it hasn't been. What is relevant to have been the full truth has all been said.

There's a bit of a cultural thing influencing the interview. By this I mean Louis and Armand together had created a culture of politeness and respect, which discouraged and fought down getting at the heat of conflict, or emotional and mental vulnerability. Setting aside differences. Leaving things unaddressed, or burying issues, making up quickly, and in incomplete ways, as a means of maintaining a peaceful environment, leads to a level of transactionally met falsehood of how either is portraying themselves, especially in relation to one another, playing into what seems beneficial to them, more than what would be confrontational of the truth between them. Armand offends far more aggressively in this, and one can only guess this comes more from a rearing much more solidified in this kind of culture where there is a multitude of rules around maintaining a facade of 'nice' behavior for a presumed benefit of the group. Whereas, even if Louis follows this in some ways, he is more often seen to push against this, actually. (see; 'acting out')

There was a period (post 2x05 especially) where he makes claims about Armand, with no real way to back them, but for the purpose of continually marking Armand as a traitor. So, making purely emotional claims as opposed to knowing he's getting the facts straight. Discrediting Armand, even if he might be telling the truth. (debatable, of course, but I feel the need to include it anyhow).

The only real thing left of Louis unreliability in our conclusion is some residual effects of his doing where things are then left unanswered, and the information to be found in other peoples perspectives, which Louis isn't held responsible to be knowing about. So it's highly doubtful these are to where Louis is ever to be discredited on his telling of things, more that he just simply can't account for everything without betraying himself, and can't be held responsible to what he simply can not have known, or others controlling his narrative either.

To summarize what this all then means is that Louis is not telling any sort of story, at any point along it, worth discrediting, let alone fully, and wherever he was swaying in that direction, past or presently, it has been corrected for, or at least questioned, to where we can draw all the reliable conclusions on it through inference and sound interpretation. Making what we are left with by the end of season 2 the most reliable version of events of Louis personal perspective, even if quite a good sum of it is still left to this inference. It is because of what is left to inference, and what is something outside the realm of his personal perspective, that makes us the more unreliable sources of determining these events. WE are more likely to be distorting it by this point in the story, than Louis is shown to be. Our judgments, can do more impeding on what ends up being Louis honest account, than Louis ever was.

What Louis unreliability is not, is ever entirely dishonest - is ever one making up events, or turning them into something they were not. Everything we are told is a personal account of things that actually happened. It's certainly not one where, by the end, you can point at anything, and claim there's an irreparable falsehood about it. Perspective on events change, but that they had happened and in a sequential way, does not. One might not like or be satisfied with his point of view, yet this changes nothing. Memory is a monster, but Louis', a monster himself, is still real. These are his true memories as he is remembering them.

Beyond that, the more imperative story told here is the emotional one. On this journey of truth telling, Louis is also relieved of being unreliable about his emotions, and in the conclusion, he's living shamelessly for who he is, past and presently. This opens new doors for his character to exist beyond memory. The interview was a journey of self acceptance, and one's fight for having and reclaiming a self. The true take away, frankly, is that Louis got this, and nothing we can infer and interpret otherwise about his truth, where it is left open, can take this away from him.

I guess this is all to say Louis 'unreliable narration' is actually something he works through, perhaps in its realistic entirely (we are always a little unreliable). It's something that gets righted as a major part of the resolved conflicts that happen over the course of the interviews events, as so we, like Louis, are also resolved of this unreliability if we hold it to that same level of being the truth. And that is also if we are inferring and interpreting things left open properly, which is hard to say, even for Louis. That is where all of that 'unreliability' rests on is the things left open to question still, or gain new perspective on, and not that any one part of what we were presented with is falsely constructed. As we have actually gotten it reconstructed out of that.

#iwtv #interview with the vampire #louis de pointe du lac #amc iwtv #long post #also one where I feel I just reiterate the same thing over and over #made this like on a whim so excuse that #Again feel open to add #putting this in the tags because I spell it out clearly as being for something else (agency) but Louis-#does NOT present himself like he does for the purpose of making himself look better. Or whenever he could be (hard to tell intentions) -#it seems to be for this agency I meantioned. Besides I think it's clear he doesn't really hide his faults deliberately #and when brought to his attention in the interview he does accept them as such almost to a fault #this also plays into whatever this one post was saying (which has always been my thought too) -#that as far as Armand goes he is actually being mostly truthful or we would simply have to say Louis conflict is not actually resolved here #Not just with the events of Paris which Armand is telling but with events after and during the interview deciding they are all false leads #to less of any conclusion actually.#Which would be fine if we were ever likely to return to any of it but I doubt it.#Lestat could confirm things are false or we have to accept what Armand was saying on events is true #which I think if it WAS this is particularly interesting for a variety of reasons

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sscullysglasses · 8 days ago

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as much as i love lafleur as an episode, ill never get over how that’s the only episode we get of the dharma years. like yes ok i get it. its incredible how much they’re able to convey in a single episode. but we had a season of flash forwards showing the oceanic six off island and how their lives crumbled without each other. i so wish we’d even had one more on island episode leading into kate, jack, hurley, and sayid’s return. it would have been so juicy to get a deeper juxtaposition between the oceanic six and the time travelers. bc they were both living lies!!! AND YET the implied found family, sawyer’s growth as a leader, and suliet is so so so rich in comparison. especially when you consider that they were also experiencing hauntings from the island and their circumstances. like miles living alongside his parents (and being around for his birth!!), juliet with a younger ben, and the looming date of sawyer’s parents’ deaths. and the difference between the island haunting the oceanic six and the time travelers is that they’d be going through these things together. they’d be living a lie in dharmaville to their community but not to one another. and that’s how they’re able to be so settled and happy regardless of the circumstances.

#the oceanic six had soooo much strain between one another #yet there’s a group of people on island that weren’t particularly close #(ig aside from sawyer and jin bonding on the raft and with the dharma van)#but it’s just so good considering the ultimate ending of the show focusing on the time they shared on island #to think about how different the 70s were for those left behind #even the parallel between jack/kate getting engaged and sawyer hiding the ring for juliet under the floors #just ahhhh makes me crazy #ive been haunted by the dharma years for so long ill never recover #i just have so many thoughts #tv: lost #lost abc #lost 2004

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aquaaquila · 9 months ago

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She was grounded, not banned from a ball. And if Ella is willing to do anything for those she loves as she states in "get your hands dirty", she would go to the ball regardless of the ban for Bridget's sake. There is a set up and there is a pay-off, it's just not as satisfying and you're looking at this point at stereotype of subverting expectations, where's satisfaction in that? Nothing new is happening because we are in the past. The very thing that is new is prank not happening and Bridget and Ella meeting two girls that soon will look like their daughters.

We're not supposed to witness the prank, we're supposed to prevent it long before it happens. We didn't came here to dance. And Chloe explains perfectly: without the book, the very prank that traumatised Brudget won't happen, so no point in wasting their time in the past anymore.

My bad, missed that part, got distracted + I already seen too many "Ella did it", so a force of habit. And Ella did hurt Bridget but once again, it was not the prank that was an issue. Bridget said herself "stupid I would forgive". Like seriously, no prank that ELLA would pull be anything serious as Ella would not hurt her best friend, and even if it do south, Ella would apologize profusely and Bridget would forgive as mistakes happen, even Bridget said she once mate gingerbread people that bite. So no, narratively it doesn't make sense since Ella is too close to bother doing harm to Bridget. The only way she hurt is by "abandoning" her which really can tie back to "must be home before midnight". Making a character act OOC to make plot work does not serve narrative. And mind you, Ella is kind, but not necessarily nice. There's a difference between the two and while Ella acts kindly towards Chloe in the past, she also does give her attitude due to Chloe's privilege, which isn't exactly "nice". So Chloe already has a reality check that morality isn't simple.

Honestly about no. ASTV still has clear lose threads whereas D4 achieved its initial goal. The point of the movie was to change the past and change the heart of Bridget. Consequences of such actions were not part of the narrative. If QoH remained unchanged, there would be zero payoff. If the future is however too different then there's also no real payoff. The movie ended with its objective, QoH remained sweet and that's what mattered to the plot.

Or maybe you expected something else?

It isn't. We didn't saw how Maleficent grew into a villain in the first film while arguing with her mother in spite of being told as such in Evil Like Me. We were never told how Mal figured out Hades is her dad. The characters have their lives outside of the movie and we as the fan base should have a chance to imagine what happens outside of the focus of the camera. Like seriously, we literally have Audrey singing in D3 "there's nothing to lose when you're lonely and friendless" and it's not as if we saw how exactly Audrey became friendless but saud motivation did reasonate with people because being alone can hurt a lot and Bridget was alone and bitter for 40 years. And said dance number also included VKs dancing along, in musicals you dance with anyone regardless who they are. Said number is introduction to the world through Bridget's rose-tinted glasses.

The movie was still released and for all we know that's all we have. As life sometimes is unfair and Disney likes to cancel nice things if they don't do right by the executives. The movie can be said is more complete because sequel just may not be guaranteed, so good the story at least has some resolution that Red achieved her goal of this movie.

Descendants: The Rise of Red is kind of a bizarre movie to talk about critically because, imo, it almost doesn't make sense to talk about it in the usual terms of good vs bad or enjoyable vs not enjoyable when the way more obvious tension is finished vs unfinished.

Because, more than any other movie I've ever seen, it does *not* read as a full movie. And I don't mean in a "this movie has a cliffhanger" kind of way. The Empire Strikes Back and Across the Spiderverse fit that description. They end on big dramatic cliffhangers that point to a resolution in the third installment.

But Rise of Red just sets all this stuff up and then...ends without concluding anything. It doesn't feel like the first movie in a trilogy (or duology). It feels like the first act of a two-act musical. It very specifically reminds me of the end of the first act of Into the Woods where all the main characters sing the song Ever After about how they all fixed their problems with magic and nothing bad will ever happen to them again and then the narrator ominously says "To be continued" before the curtain drops. But in Into the Woods you know there's a second act and this movie wasn't sold as the first act of a bigger story. Like sure, it has the, "You didn't think this was the end" tag at the end like all the other movies, but those movies were complete, self-contained stories even though they had sequels. This was NOT a full story. It's half of one story.

Like, if we're supposed to take this as a full story, there are so many bizarre choices:

Why did they make sure to mention that Cinderella and Charming fell in love at the ball at the top if it wasn't meant to set up Back to the Future style, "Oh no, I accidentally got my mom banned from the ball so she's not gonna fall in love with Dad and I won't be born" shenanigans?

Why did Maddox very pointedly have that bit about "you could lose your mom completely" if that was never going to come into play? Red never did anything to endanger Bridget or endanger her own birth so it doesn't make sense as a warning in that way.

Why was there all this focus on this Carrie on prom night moment for Bridget if we LITERALLY NEVER SAW CASTLECOMING? Why dance around this moment and talk about it all cloak and dagger with no specificity if they weren't building up to some big reveal that it wasn't as straightforward as it seemed? And like, they leaned in HARD with making Bridget the nicest, sweetest, cotton candy princess as a teen so I need WAY more than, "She got pranked by known bullies she's been enduring with a smile very handily up to this point" to buy that she went from that to "murderous dictator". And even if she did become murderous, I find it insanely hard to believe that she'd include her best and only friend on the list of people she wants to suffer unless there was a betrayal. I find it INSANE that there wasn't a falling out scene at any point in this movie with how thickly they were laying on the admiration and camaraderie.

(Note: And adult Cinderella def has guilty vibes re: the Queen at orientation. Which I know I'm not imagining because it's literally spelled out in the Jr Novelization!)

Before the time travel element of the movie started, I thought they were going for something like they go to the past and realize that Bridget was bullied not by the VKs but by the spoiled royals, and Ella ends up joining in the bullying once she gets with Charming, betraying Bridget and justifying her whole "Love Ain't It" philosophy. Or Ella ditching her at the last minute to be with Charming meaning she has to deal with the monster prank alone and it was the being alone rather than the prank itself that hurt her (though that is NOT a good enough reason to go all off with their heads on your subjects). The fact that, as far as we know right now, it literally was just a relatively mild and reversible prank that caused all of this is just, such flat storytelling, you know?

But! All of this makes way more sense if this is meant to be the first act of a single contained story. And I don't wanna be all "Pepe Silvia, secret good 4th episode of Sherlock" about this but I did see this picture:

Which seems to indicate that this was written as a Part One. Which, if so, idk why they wouldn't advertise it that way but whatever. The point is, if that's the case then it means that we're potentially in bad pacing territory rather than straight up bad storytelling territory. Because this isn't a bad place to be halfway through your story:

The heroes, warned that time travel is dangerous, have gone back in time to change the heart of a brutal tyrant before she can stage a coup. They seemingly succeed in their mission and when they come home, everything is great! But then, the side effects of time travel start to catch up with them. Chloe realizes that, in breaking the vase, she prevented her mother from going to the ball and falling in love with her dad (who was conspicuously absent from the final scene btw) which means she's starting to be forgotten and erased from the timeline. And Red realizes that though this new version of her mom is as sweet and kind as the teen she once met, she's a complete stranger to her (fulfilling the Hatter's warning that she could lose her mom completely). So they have to go back in time once more to make sure the Ella and Charming fall in love again, perhaps at the cost of whatever bad thing that happened to Bridget happening again and bringing back the original version of her future self. But, now with more context of how her mom became that way, Red can now talk to her mother and persuade her to give people another chance.

Boom, that gives us time to go back and hit everything we haven't yet hit. We can pay off the time travel tropes that were set up but not explored. We can go to Castlecoming which feels so obviously set up to be the centerpiece of this story (like, come on, Back to the Future literally does the school dance thing. This is Time Travel Storytelling 101). We can actually get info about what the prank was and why it affected Bridget so completely.

(Note: This is a side thing but it really strikes me as so crazy that Bridget would so SUCH a big 180 here. Like, I know the Queen of Hearts is a silly, goofy, campy villain, but she straight up murders people and there's no way to get around that if we're taking her out of the surreal story she comes from and putting her in a (comparatively) grounded story. If I wasn't doing a betrayal plot, I would make the twist that the spell that turned Bridget into a "monster" didn't just have a physical effect, it had a mental effect and it magically twisted her personality to be the way it is now. So they broke the physical half of the curse, but neglected the other half and it's been festering the whole time, turning her as evil as she was sweet. Because like, a simple physical transformation isn't that big of a deal to have such heavy security--Bridget made cupcakes with a transformative effect and that was totally fine. I'm not saying that that's what's gonna be the case. I just think it would be an explanation that makes sense for why she changed so crazy much that makes more sense than a simple prank or even a betrayal. Her mom wasn't even evil! How did she go from zero to murder without even an evil mom to push her onto the path? But I'm super digressing right now.)

(Note #2: OK, one last thing. The trap on the book presumably would have hit the VK's and trapped them in Merlin's office regardless of what Chloe and Red did, right? That's like, net zero influence on the timeline. I genuinely can't tell if that's a straight up plot hole or set up to be like, "Oh no. Actually when she said that she was turned into a monster in front of everyone it was meant in a less literal way." Like she was just made to look bad and that was the real thing that pushed her over the edge. Like idk. It really feels like the only thing they really did that would change the timeline was get Ella banned from the dance and presumably out of the way where she couldn't hurt Bridget. OK NOW I'm done.)

Anyway, my point is that this is not how I would have structured my movie and I think this was a super weird way to go into the second era of Descendants movies, but they can still tell a complete story if that's their plan. I'm genuinely really curious to see if this pans out to be a fairly competently told story that just happens to be split over two movies or a complete fumbling of the narrative bag because it could really be either at this point and it's fascinating to me.

#Seriously the pay-off is supposed to be nice queen of hearts #Not a dance number that is just ruby rose turner and people in the background #Then believe in such world because Red precisely grew up with a mother deadset on making Red her mini-me #The one who kept telling her that love ain't it #Like the woman had ages to cool down after the prank after she left Merlin Academy #And disney properties normally don't teach nuances between good and evil until about recently #It's just not that era anymore #And descendants also are not once upon a time no matter how alike they seem and how cool it would be #Descendants is its own thing altogether #Always was and always will be #And do tell me #How do you go from emotionally manipulating your daughter to suddenly listening to what she says #When red's drama is that her mom doesn't care #And is not particularly hiding it?#I disagree the story was boring as you still had to get your shit together to do it right #And if you didn't do it right the first time then freaking return or ensure it will workout #Don't waste time like that #The girls ensured prank won't happen #That's enough #Now there's no snowball effect in motion tyat turns into avalanche #And if she would still be upset with Ella she wouldn't become evil as it was both prank and abandonment #Not just one of those things #It may be boring but at least it's more believable than BS speech or twist villain no one asked for

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starscelly · 6 months ago

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uh huh………..

#i fear it should be illegal for him to be hiding all that ass in oversized shirts all the time 😞#i know it’s not particularly impressive for the nhl but . well #also hair . anyways #hi esa as well sorry #esa lindell #miro heiskanen #dallas stars

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lbhslefttiddie · 9 months ago

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im so fucking mad. why did i work so hard on this. there isnt even a single gay bitch in this image all i have is latticework and osmanthus studies

#arts #mottau #i mean i did enjoy drawing it. but also what the fuck #this is even sy's actual room yet this is a concept design for a room he will get later #like this is vaguely something i started drawing to conceptualize certain aspects of omega room design in this setting #but like at this point i could have explained more in three regular sentences #due to the potency of an omega's scent particularly in their living quarters certain aspects of their rooms are specially tailored #to contain their scent to the more personal parts of their living space. one could think of it as degrees of intimacy #with their bed area being the place their scent is allowed to fully saturate the space. the room divider here encloses the furniture needed #for dressing and whatnot as well for similar reasons and the curtain falling over it mimicking the canopy of the bed serves two functions #partially trapping in the scent and also adding an additional layer of 'hiding' to the nest area which makes it feel more secure #see? three sentences. that took five minutes to explain #i mean certainly the art looks niceys and all but im just so fucking perplexed. why did i do that

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mendelsohnben · 22 days ago

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Nathan Page as Kosta Krilich in Hiding (2015) [1/3]

#hiding #nathan page #tv #my edits #bringing you hq-ish hiding gifs in the year 2k25!#no i didn't watch it lmao #is it explained why this man is like... allergic to clothes #look i usually don't particularly care about muscle definition but phew 😔#one post was not enough to contain the thirst 😔😔

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ki1ldeer · 1 month ago

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OUTFIT!!! CLOTHES!!!

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serpentface · 2 months ago

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Do you have any information on the root scholars that you can share? They’ve always been a cool cult/organization to me

Ok it’s a facet of the Eterhimhamdli religion, which is The most widespread single belief system east of the inner seaway (which isn't saying much in terms of scale but it's still pretty significant) and also one I've barely introduced so I'll go over it a bit here.

Eterhimhamdli has spread past its initial sphere of old (~500 years BP) southern Lowlands Yuroma kingdoms, has many folk practices, and has schismed a few times, so there's a good deal of cultural variation. But its basic tenants/tendencies are:

-Creator deities are wholly rejected, the universe is an interplay between non-personified dualistic forces of Body(evil)/Mind(good). In one schism, the interplay of these two forces is the Dream, in others dreaming is an aspect of Mind.

-Deities in general are not wholly at odds with Eterhimhamdli, but their importance is de-emphasized and worship is usually discouraged in favor of making them objects of contemplation and/or tutelary figures.

-The Mind of the universe exists as a collective soul from which human souls emanate

-every person has two souls: an egoistic soul that animates the body and an ethereal soul that animates the mind. The latter is conceptualized as a single drop from a greater sea of the collective soul.

-belief that true wisdom is derived through access to this collective soul.

-belief that the trappings of the the ego-soul and the body's demands inhibits access to said collective soul.

-belief in the concept of enlightened beings who gain full experiential knowledge of the collective soul while remaining in a body, thus becoming capable of directly communicating aspects of their wisdom to the masses.

the biggest schism in this religion is over whether enlightenment just means experiencing full knowledge of the collective before you die, or whether it means transcending the limits of the body entirely and functionally becoming an immortal, godlike being.

deities of older/other religions absorbed by Eterhimhamdli are often reframed as enlightened mortals.

-most sects believe that only sophont life (or sometimes Only humans) have a etherial-soul along with the ego-soul, while animals exclusively have the ego-soul. Plants and inanimate objects Usually aren't ascribed souls outsides of heavily syncretic folk practices.

-belief in a fundamental good-evil cosmic dualism, though in a fairly complex way (evil is a necessity for life that is to be tempered and grappled with, rather than outright vanquished from the world entirely). The notion of 'evil' here is most associated with bodily desires (this includes all bodily needs like hunger and thirst, necessary to support life but viewed dangerous in excess, and being the root of conflict and pain).

the evil nature of bodily desire is not About sex, but does translate to non-procreative sex being frowned upon to varying extents.

-belief that life is a state of internal warfare between the evil ego-soul and the good ethereal-soul, with the former being more powerful and influential. To lead a good life is to bring the ego-soul into equilibrium with the ethereal soul. To live a wise and venerable life is to fully tip the balance in the latter's favor (this is not an expectation for lay followers, as it is considered profoundly difficult and requires separation from worldly life).

-lay followers practice forms of temperance to bring these forces into equilibrium, priests practice forms of asceticism to subdue the ego-soul and gain experiential wisdom in the process.

-The way you balance your life has consequences for the afterlife. An evil life causes an eternal death (this is usually posited as an underworld), a life in equilibrium causes one to be reborn into a new human body (a neutral fate), and a good life results in full return to the collective soul (this is a state of complete peace and contentedness and access to infinite wisdom).

-A selection of hallucinogenic plants are central to the monastic/priestly aspects of the religion, being seen as the key method through which the body can be transcended and the ego-soul can be quieted in order to tap into the collective. Lay followers do not participate in this facet on a regular basis.

-Priests also participate in self-flagellation, as the struggle with physical pain is a key microcosm of the broader internal war with the ego-soul, and can be a source of wisdom and contemplation. They are extensively tattooed for partly related purposes. Laymen are not expected to flagellate as a practice but rather to apply teachings to/learn from struggles with everyday pain.

-Very complicated relations with violence as a concept. Some strains of Eterhimhamdli philosophy see violence as an exclusive result of evil to be avoided whenever possible (usually more completely by priesthoods than the wider societies they live in), others see it as a neutral tool in of itself that Can be a force for good when used wisely. (Large scale 'wise usages of violence for the sake of good', shockingly, tend to favor the in-group's position in preexisting ethnic/religious/territorial conflicts).

-Most sects are proselytizing and see conversion as a necessity to create a better world, and have broadly unfavorable views of other religious practices.

This does not extend to seeing all societies that practice Eterhimhamdli or even The Same Schism Of Eterhimhamdli in a positive light (the birthplace of this religion is currently about 60 semi independent city-states organized into leagues that are frequently at war with each other)

-Highly favors education, literacy, rhetoric, debate, and the acquisition of material knowledge along with deeper spiritual wisdom. Knowledge and wisdom are venerable traits and societies should be led by the learned, or at least by people under their guidance.

---

The Scholarly Order of the Root is one order of Lowlands Eterhimhamdli monastics, functioning as a closed cult/mystery religion. They’re based out of Suurota (one of the biggest Yuroma city-states and dominant member of its league). They're at the top of the league's hierarchy of monastics, very wealthy, and have some involvement in governance (being an advisory body to the magistrate).

The Scholars primarily interact with the general public by hosting many of the league's institutions of scholarship and philosophy, and some of the biggest libraries in this part of the world. Their institutions are used by laymen Suurota citizens and members of government for study, and they host monks and priests (uninitiated to the inner cult) in their halls.

Actual membership to the Scholars cult is limited, they neither expect nor want associates to participate in their rituals. Rather, they position themselves as teachers- revealing small aspects of their secret knowledge to laymen and the lesser monastics as a form of guidance, while keeping dangerous knowledge for only the trusted inner circle.

Their baseline belief system aligns with the general schema of Lowlands Eterhimhamdli (one of three major schisms of this belief system), but their closed cult practices revolve around fairly unique interpretations, understood to be the ultimate underlying truths of this worldview.

The Scholars focus on an extention the Mind-Body model of the universe where their synthesis is the Dream (this itself is not unique to this cult, but the depths of their focus is). Under this model, the world is the dream of the collective consciousness, and achieving enlightenment or even temporary lucidity can allow the dream to be shaped to one's will.

One of their most secretive practices is god-building, in which they utilize altered mental states to shape the fabric of the dream into entities they can use as personal teachers of secret knowledge (also as a type of magic in general, they use it to 'build' guardians and curses and the like).

The process involves using mild doses of Ur-Root brew (mostly derived from roots of the clonal Ur-Wood colony, whose bark has notable concentrations of dimethyltryptamine and also hosts milder fungal hallucinogens) while maintaining an object and concept as a focal point of concentration. The altered state provided by the Root allows the user some access to the wisdom of the collective soul, and they will experience secret knowledge and revelations about this object, how it can best be used (this will be supplemented by material knowledge about the subject). This process is repeated until the user experiences a sense of Presence in the object, which must be interacted with, given a name and a face. Through more repetition, the object is believed to be shaped into a sort of thoughtform god which has come into material existence via manipulation of the dream.

This is considered to take immense time and effort to come to completion, god-building projects can last for years and be the combined effort of multiple Scholars. In the end, you have shaped an entity to your will that can operate independently of you.

The Ur-Wood itself is the center of Scholar cult practice, as it is both the purveyor of their most important hallucinogen and believed to have been the first god ever shaped by this form of lucid dreaming (it's a pilgrimage site for Eterhimhamdli where thousands of followers have undergone Ur-Root trips over the past four centuries, using the woods as an object of contemplation). To them the Ur-Tree is the ultimate teacher of their cult, an extremely powerful built-god that has been involved in almost every journey to enlightenment and contains all these journeys within its substance.

They believe that communing with the tree via Ur-Root can grant access to all enlightened mortals- full trips (with a DMT breakthrough type experience) will often involve sensations of encountering entities, which they interpret to be these historical figures. Within their religious framework, they're kind of speedrunning enlightenment. Under most conventional frameworks, the teachings of wise and/or enlightened people are conveyed in writing or speech as things to Contemplate on one's own journey- you might be able to understand them Conceptually but true understanding is Experiential, a process that can take a lifetime. In their framework, they're both receiving these teachings directly AND embodying states in which they can experientially comprehend them.

That summarizes most of their secret practices, and the rest of their practice is pretty standard for devout Lowlands Eterhimhamdlist priests. They live a partly ascetic lifestyle, they bear extensive tattoos as a contemplation of pain and marker of their journeys, they flagellate, they use tutelary hallucinogens, they refine their non-experiential body of knowledge through debate and rhetoric, they work to accumulate both worldly and spiritual knowledge, they work as scribes, etc.

#When I say 'cult' I'm using the 'specific form of veneration within a broader religion' definition. These people are very well known #and established in the religious framework of the Suurota league and not like a weird fringe thing.#The practice of upper priesthoods retaining secret knowledge is pretty standard for this religious sphere. The general public knows #they are Hiding Knowledge and this isn't an issue.#A lot of their secret practices would be questioned or viewed as potentially heretical by other Eterhimhamdlists though #Particularly their speedrunning brute-force approach to acquiring wisdom and perception that they are directly communicating #with enlightened mortals. A lot of the philosophy of this religion focuses on the journey to arrive to these truths across the span #of a lifetime. Most historical figures though to have achieved enlightenment did so on their deathbeds after a lifetime of work #and communicated the most important parts of their knowledge with the little time they had left. That's kind of the point.#Also it would have to be rewritten from the fucking ground up but the story that Whitecalf was originally a prequel to involved #the Scholarly Order of the Root attempting to godbuild a person into a weapon against a 30+ years down the line beefed up #Imperial Wardin in an expansionist period and at war with the Suurotan league #The original story still had all the magic stuff so they actually kind of did turn a kid into a magic weapon of mass destruction #These places aren't right next to each other btw and they've had pretty minimal direct interaction until recent history due to #having a Massive Fucking Mountain Range between them #(and also a good deal of space between themselves and said mountain range)#The Yuroma-Wardi population does originally descend from the general area of Eterhimhamdli's birth but the group that #Established this population arrived after a couple generations of moving place to place (some settling) in exodus after being driven #from their homelands in an ethnic/religious conflict with one of the earliest Eterhimhamdli states #Yuroma-Wardi is also a kind of placeholder name that I need to change. They derive from speakers of the Yuroma language family #but would not consider themselves related to the contemporary ethnic groups that are called Yuroma

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