#Brain Check-in

[atalana]

the curse of adhd:

i will remember with absolute clarity, when the thought strikes me that i have a text to send someone, that this is the fourth time in three days i've attempted to send this specific text

i will forget, in the time it takes me to pick up my phone, that i picked it up intending to send a text

[someonestrawberry]

saw I trap: hey girlie! this guy is dead. but he has a key in his tummy!! could you get it out to save yourself??

saw traps II and up: preform brain surgery on yourself then eat your own arm then watch your wife be brutally murdered then melt all your skin off with this acid then kill 7 innocent bystanders. you have 45 seconds. now you'll think twice about taking antidepressants.

[beeabart]

murder wives

[egophiliac]

DOGS

IN

SPACE

[shadowtraveled]

"mithrun is the only real monsterfucker in dungeon meshi" is objectively the funniest bit you can get out of his everything, but in all seriousness i think his attraction to his love interest is deliberately overstated—and that makes sense, because romantic jealousy is a classic and digestible motive, which is explicitly what kabru was aiming for in condensing mithrun's backstory, and also because until chapter 94, mithrun wasn't willing to admit to the true nature of his desires.

but because romantic envy is both classic and digestible, it probably isn’t a unique enough or complicated enough desire to tempt a demon’s appetite. mithrun’s wish, as far as we can figure from kabru’s reduced retelling, was to have a life in which he had never become one of the canaries, and that carries like 3857 implications and desires within it. that’s delicious. his love interest acts as sort of a red herring to his motivation for making it, though. (side note: i'm saying "love interest" here because, keeping in mind that i barely speak japanese on a good day anymore, "想い人" is something i'd usually take as just kind of an old-fashioned and romantic way to refer to a lover, but in context i wonder if both the connotation of yearning and the vagueness are intentional, and i think this phrasing gets those aspects of it more effectively. anyway.)

mithrun considered his love interest to be untrustworthy. there was a minute where i thought that comment might be about a similar-looking elf (yugin, one of his squad members), but comparing the two…

the "sketchy" arrow is definitely referring to the elf we know as his love interest—the bangs go toward her right, she only has the one forehead ornament, and, most notably, her ears aren't notched.

every time she’s given a full-body depiction in his dungeon, she’s drawn as a chimera, with the body of a snake from the waist down. (side note: the “what if a dungeon has chimeras before reaching level 4?”/“then the dungeon lord is unstable” exchange just being mithrun grilling his past self alive is so funny. he’s so. but anyway) there are a couple things about this.

first, the snake part of the chimera appears to be modeled after some species of coral snake mimic

which, in the biology-for-fun manga, i… doubt is a coincidence, especially with the added context of the “untrustworthy” comment. the dungeon’s conjured illusion of mithrun’s love interest was a harmless copycat of a venomous original. for whatever reason, he felt this person was a threat and made up a "safe" version of her to be in a relationship with, and while it’s definitely possible to be attracted to or even love someone you find to be toxic and/or intimidating, when you take that into consideration alongside the configuration of her body, you get some interesting implications.

which brings us to our second point: if we assume that mithrun was not in fact fucking a snake, then sexual attraction, at least, was so far removed from his idea of a relationship with this person that he did not even bother to keep her dungeon copy human enough to maintain the illusion of the option of a sexual relationship. this is somewhat echoed in the depictions of their interactions, which also imply a frankly unexpected romantic distance. she kisses his cheek and he doesn't seem to react; she's at the edge of a narrow bed with only one set of pillows, on top of his blankets while he's underneath them.

the kiss is particularly interesting because it seems to contrast the text. kabru's narration tells us this was everything mithrun could have asked for, but mithrun is there looking unreadable to pensive, likely because this is right before the panel that makes it clear things in the dungeon are beginning to go wrong.

walking through this backwards for a minute, we have the physical barrier of his bedding and the spatial separation inherent in a bed made for one person, the emotional barrier of his mounting anxiety getting in the way of his ability to enjoy the affection he sought, and... the snake, which historically carries the connotation of temptation, yes, but also mistrust, barring physical intimacy. okay. ok. if a dungeon reflects the mentality of its lord, all of this might suggest that mithrun was not able to have any real desire for a relationship with this person. his unwillingness to be vulnerable or let another person in was insurmountable. but in that case, why was she such a focal point that she remained to the end, after his dungeon had stopped creating iterations of his friends to come and visit him? why would he get so upset over her meeting with his brother that he became lord of a dungeon about it?

well. mithrun's brother was also interested in her, probably genuinely. and mithrun had to win.

you have an older brother who your parents completely ignore, probably in part because he is chronically ill/disabled and almost definitely in part because he received a ton of recessive traits that resulted in rumors that he was an illegitimate child. you are aware, most likely because those same parents fucking told you, that you actually are an illegitimate child. but they keep you around because you had the good fortune of looking just like your mother. what can that possibly teach you but that you, like your brother, are disposable?

it's utterly unsurprising that mithrun, under these circumstances, developed a pathological need to be better than everyone around him. people don't keep you otherwise. i'd argue this is also why he says he looked down on everyone he knew while milsiril claims his dungeon reeked of feelings of inferiority—he sought out people's worst traits and prioritized them in his mind to protect his already extremely fragile sense of self-worth, and all the while he tried to be as likable and high-performing as he possibly could be. his parents disposed of him anyway, but even then he tried to keep up the performance. he was kind to everyone. he never once lost to a dungeon.

when he saw his "love interest" meeting up with his brother, what he saw was himself being replaced by a person his parents had always treated as worthless, and if that was what they thought of the child they'd kept, what value could anyone possibly see in the bastard they'd given away to die? mithrun and kabru tell the story like he wanted to win this unnamed elf's heart, but it was never about being with her. it was about cementing his worth, proving that he didn't deserve to be thrown away.

and so it's particularly cruel that his demon discarded him, too. but maybe it's also particularly gentle that, in the end, there was someone who refused to even consider giving up on him.

kui laid it out in three panels better than i could hope to.

yeah. it's love. you wanted to be loved, even when the only way you were able to understand it was through the desire to be wanted, and you wanted that so badly that the idea of being consumed felt like the promise of finally mattering to someone.

[xxplastic-cubexx]

[right to left]

STILL thinking about drunk chess actually

stupid as hell bonus:

[dykepaldi]

homestuck was so perfect for autistic teenagers bc it took characters being sorted into categories and having Attributes to its absolute extreme. forget four hogwarts houses, every character has their associated colour their zodiac sign their associated animal their dream planet their god tier class and aspect their typing quirk their pesterchum handle their weapon their planet of x and y, as well as each of them having a handful of other very quantifiable Personality Traits and Interests (e.g. this one is a clown this one is angry this one likes fashion this one is just rufio from hook for some reason) and THEN they all also have their respective ancestors and dancestors(?)(plucked that word from my memory) who have all of those things as WELL

and god not to mention the fucking quadrant system

as a 13-15 year old autistic kid i didnt even need homestuck to have a plot i just happily made a big big spreadsheet of character attributes in my brain

[rin-may-1103]

Just a Bite.

Master Post | Next

Danny stared out at the busy street from behind his dumpster.

or well, not his dumpster, but it might as well be his considering how many nights he's spent sitting behind it like some rabid raccoon.

Two months ago, he would have been sleeping in his own bed. His glow-in-the-dark stars vaguely lighting up his room in soft luminescent colors. The sound of Jazz snoring in her sleep just a room over, his parents still milling around in the basement.

he would have just finished fighting the box ghost and collapsed onto his bed, the sound of his home lulling him to sleep.

Oh, how things can change in a blink of an eye.

No, instead of sleeping on his bed with his cartoon ghost sheets and NASA poster covered room, he's out here in some random dirty city, sleeping behind dumpsters.

dirty, grimy, rusty dumpsters.

"did you hear?" some lady dressed in a light blue summer dress asked, turning to look at her friend as they started to walk past. "Mr. Wayne donated another lump sum to that charity." she huffed, shaking her head like she had just said the most ridiculous thing she'd ever heard.

her friend stopped in the middle of the alley opening, her graying hair splaying in an ark as she twisted to face the other women. "my word! again? what the hell is that man thinking?"

the woman huffed, then smirked in amusement. "it's like he's shouting for the world to hear how desperate he is for attention. he thinks if he donates enough money to those scoudrails they'll love him or something. With how he's acting lately, it's like he wants all the street rats to barge into his home asking for money, food, and clothes."

her friend clicked her tongue in disgust, "I'd believe it. he has so many kids now, it's like he's running an orphanage. someone, anyone really, with black hair and some tragic story could walk right in and not even be noticed. they'd blend right in with the others."

"I heard it's genetic, his father was the same way before he met Martha. Bruce's blood son, Damian I believe, acts just like his father. the boy's been spotted taking stray cats and dogs inside. It wouldn't surprise me if the paper posted about him convincing his father for another sibling at some point."

the women then turned and started to walk away, their conversation slowly bleeding into the surrounding city ruckus.

Danny leaned back, resting his head against the crumbling brick behind him.

walk right in and not be noticed? wouldn't that be grand. He had heard of Mr. wayne and his gaggle of black-haired children. What were their names again? he could have sworn Sam told him before, in one of her rants about rich society.

Richard Grayson was the first, Danny remembered because Tucker had been making none stop dick jokes for a few hours. Danny didn't understand why the man would willingly go by Dick, but then again, who was he to question someone's name when he fights ghosts like Skulker and Technis on a daily basis?

Next was... Jason? Sam had mentioned there was a whole conspiracy theory of how his death was a cover-up. how all the unsolved crime community swore it was Bruce who killed the kid, that or the kid had some terminal illness that Bruce didn't want the media to know about.

thennnnnn-

Danny glanced around, trying to dig through his memories of Sam's rant. Dick: the orphaned circus act taken in the night his parents died. he's romanie? maybe, Danny wasn't too sure on that one. Jason: taken off the streets, one of his parents was out of the picture and the other one died of a drug overdose.

and then there was..... Tim! Right, Tim, the one who was Mr. Wayne's neighbor before his mother died and his dad went into a coma, then died later on. right, right. he was the known tech genius, the one who took over the company while Mr. Wayne stepped back for a while.

there were others? like, four others? Damian, the lady said he was the blood son sooo, that would imply he was the only bio kid.

who else was there? hmmmm.

well, either way, Danny's tired brain agreed with the women. someone, anyone, who looked vaguely like the other kids could walk right into the house and no one would notice.

it was a bad idea. a terrible one really. but. Danny was hungry.

he's been sleeping behind dumpsters for a few weeks now, he hadn't had anything good to eat in forever, and he was tired. (not as exhausted as he was back home, but still tired. who would have guessed he'd sleep more while homeless?)

he wasn't going to steal from people, his core wouldn't allow him to. and well, he's pretty sure Dan would have stolen already, so there was no way Danny was going to. not unless his life was at risk, and well? it wasn't right now, so no stealing.

but this? walking right into a house and blatantly taking food? right in front of them?

it wouldn't be stealing if he just flat-out didn't try to hide it. they'd be able to stop him and send him away. heck, he doubted he'd even make it past the front gate before they turned him away.

...

was he really going to do this?

...

yes, yes he was.

standing up, Danny started making his way out of the alleyway and over to the tall building with Wayne's name on it. It was a good place to start, maybe he could even find one of the kids and walk with them. or, even better, he could find Mr. Wayne and walk with him. he liked that better than following some kid around.

suddenly, a car honked right next to him, the window rolling down to reveal a tired and disheveled man behind the wheel. glancing up, Danny made eye contact with the taxi driver.

the man yawned and gestured for him to get in, already speaking before Danny could decline. "Mr. Wayne! Your father," yawn, "Father already paid for me to take you home. just hop in."

Danny blinked then glanced around, looking to see if the Wayne the man was talking about was around. nope. turning back, Danny spotted a green sticky note on the back seat.

well, alright then. guess he was getting into the taxi and doing this after all. Clockwork obviously approved if he messed with the timing of things.

Next

[charcoaldustonmyfingers]

Part 2

[1][3][4]

Information overload might not have been the best course of action when trying to fix that same issue…

[caspervi]

Date time ⭐️

[jazzically]

okay but imagine you are a researcher at the magnus institute looking through the archives for a paper you're writing and one of the statements you're using as a source happens to be on tape so you put it into the tape recorder and this absolute THEATRE KID of a millenial starts girlbossing his way through a spooky story about a soldier being slowly hypnotized by a supernatural mythical representative of war and at the end he abruptly switches off his dramatic voice and returns to "snobby scholar" disses the account entirely and throws in a random but clearly gay snide remark about one of his coworkers for good measure and the tape clicks off after a dun-dun-DUN and at the end of it all youre just sat there completely baffled at this chad of an academic who is apparently so annoyed at the disorganization of his new position that he must mention it seven times per sentence (along with the side comments about that other case with the guy who was haunted by an immortal spider and ended up wrapped in spiderweb post-death TOTALLY COINCIDENTALLY) like "well i can sure use this in my research because it has lots of useful verified information in it and definitely does not exist just so a man can spout his poorly disguised homoerotic yearning out loud into an outdated device full of lo-fi charm"

[jackklinemybeloved]

[…]

Percy’s warning to fellow half-bloods in the audience, across different mediums.

The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan (2005) The Lighting Thief: The Percy Jackson Musical (2017) Percy Jackson and the Olympians Series Teaser (2023)

[dizzybizz]

my brain latched onto ratio in the span a day or two and i am. struggling with that. have a hsr magma dump about it.

these are in reverse chronological order so that it looks like i get more normal as the post goes on (it doesnt)

[zondearts]

More More doves

[clouvu]

Mother and Father 🫶

[xxplastic-cubexx]

pov: you are charles xavier and you have been invited onto asteroid m

bonus: