#It’s such a good myth I want to consume it into my being

[ava-of-shenanigans]

Ahhhhhh I forgot how much I liked the Destruction of Mankind <333333

[apoloadonisandnarcissus]

Of Sauron [Hypothetical] Redemption

Is Sauron redeemable?

This question is particularly active in the Sauron x Galadriel fandom, for obvious reasons. But it can be of interest to any Tolkien fan, really. Brace yourselves, this is a long read and we are going deep into Tolkien legendarium, here.

To many, the idea that Sauron is redeemable is absurd in itself because of how Tolkien describes him as “the second visible incarnation of evil”; “reincarnation of Evil, and a thing lusting for Complete Power” (Letter 131); or “shadow of Morgoth” (The Silmarillion). All of this means that Sauron is absolute and pure evil, yes? And hence, he has no possibility of redemption, whatsoever? 

Not quite.

For starters, there’s an idea that needs to be deconstructed here: Tolkien lore being “black and white”, or pure Evil vs. pure Good. It isn’t.

And this was actually, a grievance Tolkien himself had ever since his work first got published. The critics and the public, seemed determined to judge his books on an absolute dichotomy, without any nuance. Ironic, many are doing the same until this day (and probably the reason why Christopher Tolkien hated the Peter Jackson adaptations so much).  

Some reviewers have called the whole thing simple-minded, just a plain fight between Good and Evil, with all the good just good, and the bad just bad. Pardonable, perhaps (though at least Boromir has been overlooked) in people in a hurry, and with only a fragment to read, and, of course, without the earlier written but unpublished Elvish histories. But the Elves are not wholly good or in the right. Not so much because they had flirted with Sauron; as because with or without his assistance they were 'embalmers'. They wanted to have their cake and eat it: to live in the mortal historical Middle-earth because they had become fond of it (and perhaps because they there had the advantages of a superior caste), and so tried to stop its change and history, stop its growth, keep it as a pleasaunce, even largely a desert, where they could be 'artists' – and they were overburdened with sadness and nostalgic regret.  Tolkien Letter 154

Tolkien admits his lore doesn’t deal with “absolute evil” because he doesn’t believe in such a thing:

In my story I do not deal in Absolute Evil. I do not think there is such a thing, since that is Zero. I do not think that at any rate any 'rational being' is wholly evil. Satan fell. In my myth Morgoth fell beasts and monsters, and the Unknown. The defence of the realm may then indeed become symbolic of the human situation. Before Creation of the physical world. Tolkien Letter 183

Tolkien's Sauron

Did Tolkien created Sauron as a nuanced villain in his lore? What does he say about him? 

And there is Sauron. In the Silmarillion and Tales of the First Age Sauron was a being of Valinor perverted to the service of the Enemy and becoming his chief captain and servant. He repents in fear when the First Enemy is utterly defeated, but in the end does not do as was commanded, return to the judgement of the gods. He lingers in Middle-earth. Very slowly, beginning with fair motives: the reorganising and rehabilitation of the ruin of Middle-earth, 'neglected by the gods', he becomes a reincarnation of Evil, and a thing lusting for Complete Power – and so consumed ever more fiercely with hate (especially of gods and Elves). All through the twilight of the Second Age the Shadow is growing in the East of Middle-earth, spreading its sway more and more over Men – who multiply as the Elves begin to fade. The three main themes are thus The Delaying Elves that lingered in Middle-earth; Sauron's growth to a new Dark Lord, master and god of Men; and Numenor-Atlantis. Tolkien Letter 131

Mairon, the Maia of Aulë, was not evil in the beginning (because nothing is, in Tolkien lore).  He was corrupted by Morgoth. He repents of his crimes under Morgoth but doesn’t do penitance. During the Second Age, he begins his rise to power, being a cautionary tale of “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”.

In Season 1 of "Rings of Power", we saw "repentant Mairon" aka Halbrand:

In Season 2, Annatar was introduced, and he symbolizes "Sauron the reformer", who wants to rebuilt Middle-earth with good intentions:

Sauron was of course not 'evil' in origin. He was a 'spirit' corrupted by the Prime Dark Lord (the Prime sub-creative Rebel) Morgoth. He was given an opportunity of repentance, when Morgoth was overcome, but could not face the humiliation of recantation, and suing for pardon; and so his temporary turn to good and 'benevolence' ended in a greater relapse, until he became the main representative of Evil of later ages. But at the beginning of the Second Age he was still beautiful to look at, or could still assume a beautiful visible shape – and was not indeed wholly evil, not unless all 'reformers' who want to hurry up with 'reconstruction' and 'reorganization' are wholly evil, even before pride and the lust to exert their will eat them up. Tolkien Letter 153

During the Second Age, Sauron begins his rise to power, with good intentions, at first. However, his pride and lust for power becomes too great, and he aspires to become a “God of Men” (no longer a mere Maia).

And this is probably Sauron's greater crime (sin) in the legendarium, since Eru himself is called to intervene: Sauron was first defeated by a 'miracle': a direct action of God the Creator, changing the fashion of the world, when appealed to by Manwë [...] reduced to 'a spirit of hatred borne on a dark wind', I do not think one need boggle at this spirit carrying off the One Ring, upon which his power of dominating minds now largely depended (Letter 211).

Because of his admiration of Strength he [Sauron] had become a follower of Morgoth and fell with him down into the depths of evil, becoming his chief agent in Middle Earth. When Morgoth was defeated by the Valar finally he forsook his allegiance; but out of fear only; he did not present himself to the Valar or sue for pardon, and remained in Middle Earth. When he found how greatly his knowledge was admired by all other rational creatures and how easy it was to influence them, his pride became boundless. By the end of the Second Age he assumed the position of Morgoth's representative. By the end of the Third Age (though actually much weaker than before) he claimed to be Morgoth returned. Tolkien Letter 183 (note)

Let's dig in the "Sauron the supervillain":

The corrupted, as was Melkor/Morgoth and his followers (of whom Sauron was one of the chief) saw in them the ideal material for subjects and slaves, to whom they could become masters and 'gods', envying the Children, and secretly hating them, in proportion as they became rebels against the One (and Manwë his Lieutenant in Eä). Tolkien Letter 212

In my story Sauron represents as near an approach to the wholly evil will as is possible. He had gone the way of all tyrants: beginning well, at least on the level that while desiring to order all things according to his own wisdom he still at first considered the (economic) well-being of other inhabitants of the Earth. But he went further than human tyrants in pride and the lust for domination, being in origin an immortal (angelic) spirit. In The Lord of the Rings the conflict is not basically about 'freedom', though that is naturally involved. It is about God, and His sole right to divine honour. The Eldar and the Númenóreans believed in The One, the true God, and held worship of any other person an abomination. Sauron desired to be a God-King, and was held to be this by his servants; if he had been victorious he would have demanded divine honour from all rational creatures and absolute temporal power over the whole world.   Tolkien Letter 183

What these quotes tell us, is this: while Sauron isn’t “absolute evil” (because Tolkien himself didn’t deal with this in his legendarium, nor did he believed such a thing exists), Sauron's will (desires; intentions; goals) came pretty close to “wholly evil”.

Sauron is unmistakable evil, obviously distinguishable from “good”: he’s not a grey character, nor an anti-hero in any way, shape or form. He’s a full-on villain, some might even say a "super-villain", really. However, he’s not pure irredeemably wicked evil in Tolkien lore.

Why?

Tolkien's Ideas of Redemption

This goes back to Tolkien’s religious beliefs (Christian-Catholic) and how they are present in his legendarium; in 1953, he wrote this about the Orcs: 

the Diabolus Morgoth did, and started making things 'for himself, to be their Lord', these would then 'be', even if Morgoth broke the supreme ban against making other 'rational' creatures like Elves or Men. They would at least 'be' real physical realities in the physical world, however evil they might prove, even 'mocking' the Children of God. They would be Morgoth's greatest Sins, abuses of his highest privilege, and would be creatures begotten of Sin, and naturally bad. (I nearly wrote 'irredeemably bad'; but that would be going too far. Because by accepting or tolerating their making – necessary to their actual existence – even Orcs would become part of the World, which is God's and ultimately good.)   I have represented at least the Orcs as pre-existing real beings on whom the Dark Lord has exerted the fullness of his power in remodeling and corrupting them, not making them. That God would 'tolerate' that, seems no worse theology than the toleration of the calculated dehumanizing of Men by tyrants that goes on today.  Tolkien Letter 153 

In 1965, W.H. Auden asked Tolkien if the notion of Orcs (an entire race that should be seen as irredeemably wicked) was not heretical:

With regard to The Lord of the Rings, I cannot claim to be a sufficient theologian to say whether my notion of Orcs is heretical or not. I don't feel under any obligation to make my story fit with formalized Christian theology, though I actually intended it to be consonant with Christian thought and belief, which is asserted somewhere, Book Five, page 190,1 where Frodo asserts that the orcs are not evil in origin.   Tolkien Letter 169 

And now you know the reason behind Orc families in "Rings of Power".

Tolkien himself went back and forward with this notion, or even if the Orcs had “souls”, to begin with, but in the end his faith probably got the best of him. We also see this with his thoughts on Gollum:  

In which case (as I believe) salvation from ruin will depend on something apparently unconnected: the general sanctity (and humility and mercy) of the sacrificial person [...] Gollum had had his chance of repentance, and of returning generosity with love; and had fallen off the knife-edge.  Tolkien Letter 191

On the importance of repentance, even among the Valar:

The Fall or corruption, therefore, of all things in it and all inhabitants of it, was a possibility if not inevitable. Trees may 'go bad' as in the Old Forest; Elves may turn into Orcs, and if this required the special perversive malice of Morgoth, still Elves themselves could do evil deeds. Even the 'good' Valar as inhabiting the World could at least err; as the Great Valar did in their dealings with the Elves; or as the lesser of their kind (as the Istari or wizards) could in various ways become self-seeking.   Aulë, for instance, one of the Great, in a sense 'fell'; for he so desired to see the Children, that he became impatient and tried to anticipate the will of the Creator. Being the greatest of all craftsmen he tried to make children according to his imperfect knowledge of their kind. When he had made thirteen, God spoke to him in anger, but not without pity: for Aulë had done this thing not out of evil desire to have slaves and subjects of his own, but out of impatient love, desiring children to talk to and teach, sharing with them the praise of Ilúvatar and his great love of the materials of which the world is made. The One rebuked Aulë, saying that he had tried to usurp the Creator's power; but he could not give independent life to his makings. He had only one life, his own derived from the One, and could at most only distribute it. 'Behold' said the One: 'these creatures of thine have only thy will, and thy movement. Though you have devised a language for them, they can only report to thee thine own thought. This is a mockery of me.'  Then Aulë in grief and repentance humbled himself and asked for pardon. And he said: 'I will destroy these images of my presumption, and wait upon thy will.' And he took a great hammer, raising it to smite the eldest of his images; but it flinched and cowered from him. And as he withheld his stroke, astonished, he heard the laughter of Ilúvatar. 'Do you wonder at this?' he said. 'Behold! thy creatures now live, free from thy will! For I have seen thy humility, and taken pity on your impatience. Thy making I have taken up into my design.'   This is the Elvish legend of the making of the Dwarves; but the Elves report that Iluvatar said thus also: 'Nonetheless I will not suffer my design to be forestalled: thy children shall not awake before mine own.' And he commanded Aule to lay the fathers of the Dwarves severally in deep places, each with his mate, save Dúrin the eldest who had none. There they should sleep long, until Ilúvatar bade them awake.   Nonetheless there has been for the most part little love between the Dwarves and the children of Iluvatar. And of the fate that Ilúvatar has set upon the children of Aulë beyond the Circles of the world Elves and men know nothing, and if Dwarves know they do not speak of it.  Tolkien Letter 212

This is pure Christian doctrine.

Even though Tolkien legendarium is not a copy-paste from the Bible (and it has several other inspirations), it’s pretty clear that Eru Ilúvatar represents the Christian God. And even though God himself had different interpretations throughout History, I think we should see it as the God from Tolkien’s time (and our time, too): “God the Father” (which makes sense with what Tolkien created on his lore).

In Catholicism (Tolkien’s religion), God is just (God’s justice) but he’s also merciful, and he loves all of his children, even those who fallen into sin. No one is unredeemable in the eyes of God (no matter how deep one has fallen), if one truly repents and makes amends for his sins ("the virtue of penance"). God is always willing to give their faithful a second chance, if they accept him as their one true God, and make penitence in His service (whatever that might be).

In the lore, we know that the Children of Ilúvatar are Elves and Men. However, all the deities (Valar and Maiar) were also created by Eru. From a Christian perspective, the Valar are archangels, and the Maiar are angels. This is an on-going debate within Theology, because some agree that angels are “sons of God”, while others don’t. For the sake of the argument, I’ll just add this: Job 38:7 - when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God [angels] shouted for joy. But more on that later.

This means that Sauron is, indeed, redeemable. But he has to make that choice, himself. "Free will"; another major theme in Tolkien lore.

And, the true question, here, isn’t “is Sauron redeemable?” but “is Sauron capable of repentance”? 

In Tolkien “canon”, meaning the events of “The Silmarillion”, “The Hobbit”, up until the end of “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy (First to the dawn of the Fourth Age) the answer is no.

After the One ring is destroyed by Frodo, Sauron’s spirit is left so diminished and weak, he can never rise to power, again, according to Gandalf:

If [the One Ring] is destroyed, then [Sauron] will fall; and his fall will be so low that none can foresee his arising ever again. For he will lose the best part of his strength that was native to him in his beginning, and all that made or begun with that power will crumble, and he will be maimed for ever, becoming a mere spirit of malice that gnaws itself in the shadows, but cannot again grow or take shape. And so a great evil of this world will be removed.  

However, this is not as simple. Sauron/Mairon is an immortal spirit by definition. He can’t never truly die, since he’s one of the spiritual forces that first helped shaped the world in the Ainulindalë (the Music of the Ainur), and no soul can be annihilated or reduced to zero (non-existent) in Tolkien legendarium.  

Sauron/Mairon’s whereabouts and fate after the dawn of Fourth Age are unaccounted for, because Tolkien didn’t get the chance to finish his story. We, truly, don’t know where he went, if we stayed on Middle-earth, or to the Undying Lands of Valinor (to finally face the judgement of the Valar for his crimes), because he could go whenever he wanted in Arda, really.  

One theory is that Manwë, the King of the Valar, might have come to Mordor to capture Sauron after the One ring is destroyed, based on this description from “Return of the King”: 

And as the Captain gazed south to the Land of Mordor, it seemed to them that, black against the pall of cloud, there rose a huge shape of shadow, impenetrable, lightning-crowned, filling all the sky. Enormous it reared above the world, and stretched out towards them a vast threatening hand, terrible but impotent [Sauron’s spirit]: for even as it leaned over them, a great wind took it, and it was all blown away, and passed, then a hush fell.” 

Basically this scene but a “great wind” carries away that shadow

Manwë is the one with the power over air and winds, and when Sauron repented the first time (after Morgoth’s defeat), he went to Eönwë, the herald of Manwë, to beg forgiveness for his past crimes. His fellow Maia told him that he couldn't be the one to grant him pardon, because that’s above his station, and he needs to face trial before the Valar, namely from Manwë.

Since we know that Sauron’s pride prevented him from doing this, it would actually make sense for Manwë himself to capture Sauron after his defeat, bringing him to Valinor.

When Thangorodrim was broken and Morgoth overthrown, Sauron put on his fair hue again and did obeisance to Eönwë, the herald of Manwë, and abjured all his evil deeds. And some hold that this was not at first falsely done, but that Sauron in truth repented, if only out of fear, being dismayed by the fall of Morgoth and the great wrath of the Lords of the West. But it was not within the power of Eönwë to pardon those of his own order, and he commanded Sauron to return to Aman and there receive the judgment of Manwë. Then Sauron was ashamed, and he was unwilling to return in humiliation and to receive from the Valar a sentence, in might be, of long servitude in proof of his good faith; for under Morgoth his power had been great. Therefore when Eönwë departed he hid himself in Middle-Earth; and he fell back into evil, for the bonds that Morgoth had laid upon him were very strong. The Silmarillion

Many use Gandalf’s quote as “proof” that Sauron remained on Middle-earth like a shadow of malice, or a ghost. However, Tolkien made the distinction between himself and what his characters say, in Letter 153: “There is, to me, a wide gulf between the two statements, so wide that Treebeard's statement could (in my world) have possibly been true [...] Treebeard is a character in my story, not me; and though he has a great memory and some earthy wisdom, he is not one of the Wise, and there is quite a lot he does not know or understand.”

Gandalf is wise, indeed, but he’s not of the same rank as the Valar (he’s a servant to them), nor he, like Eönwë, has either the power or the permission to pass sentences on other Maiar’s fates. Which means, his quote is his own opinion on the subject, and not actual "canon" on what happened to Sauron after the One was destroyed.

For the sake of argument, let’s assume Manwë captured Sauron: was he sent to the Void like his former master, Morgoth?

Based on The Silmarillion it could appear that way: 

Among those of his servants that have names the greatest was that spirit whom the Eldar called Sauron, or Gorthaur the Cruel. In his beginning he was of the Maia of Aulë, and he remained mighty in the lore of that people. In all the deeds of Melkor the Morgoth upon Arda, in his vast workds and in the deceits of his cunning, Sauron had a part, and was only less evil than his master in that for long he served another and not himself. But in after years he rose like a shadow of Morgoth and a ghost of his malice, and walked behind him on the same ruinous path down into the Void.  

However, this, again, is not that simple, because The Silmarillion was not only published by Christopher Tolkien, and it contains elements outdated and reviewed by Tolkien himself, but it’s also a tale written by the Eldar, and it contains “opinions” and “facts” from which the Eldar themselves had little knowledge about (namely everything that’s connected to the Maiar and the Valar).

This means, not everything that’s in The Silmarillion is true or actually happened (canon): it’s like “Fire & Blood” by George R.R. Martin, a collection of facts, opinions, gossip, myths, etc. written by the Elves. The truth is in Tolkien’s essays and letters, really. And this is why “Rings of Power” can afford to play with the events of this book. 

Tolkien did confirm, in his Letter 297, that Morgoth was overthrown and extruded from the World (the physical universe). But his crimes were far worse than Sauron's:

the Diabolus Morgoth did, and started making things 'for himself, to be their Lord', these would then 'be', even if Morgoth broke the supreme ban against making other 'rational' creatures like Elves or Men. They would at least 'be' real physical realities in the physical world, however evil they might prove, even 'mocking' the Children of God. They would be Morgoth's greatest Sins, abuses of his highest privilege. Tolkien, Letter 153

Morgoth is a Vala (God/archangel), and he did not only corrupted Elves into Orcs, but also Maiar (angels) into Balrogs and other servants of his (demons), including Mairon himself. Mairon, like all the other Maiar (including the fallen ones), was created by Eru, but got corrupted by Morgoth, which means, the way Eru sees him is key. Does he sees Mairon as "equal" to Morgoth, or as victim of Morgoth's corruption? Food for thought. Because if he's just a victim, the Void isn't his fate.

A lot of fans in the Tolkien fandom have the headcanon that the immortal servants of Morgoth were sent to the Void, alongside him, but Tolkien never wrote about this, and their fates are a mystery. I might be mistaken here, but I think only Ungoliant’s fate is mentioned in the legendarium, and very enigmatic, too: went to the forgotten south of the world before the (first) rising of the Sun, and there disappeared from history.

Then, we have the fact that Satan/Lucifer is Melkor/Morgoth because he’s the one who corrupts God’s creation and he’s the symbolic archangel (like Lucifer was). Him being dragged in chains and imprisoned until the end of time, also parallels a biblical event.

Sauron is a satanist, a follower of Satan/Morgoth. Tolkien also makes this distinction in his letters: Satanic rebellion and evil of Morgoth and his satellite Sauron; in which Evil is largely incarnate, and in which physical resistance to it is a major act of loyalty to God (Letter 156). Tolkien also calls Sauron "a reincarnation of Evil"; that "evil" being Morgoth (diabolus).

Sauron’s crimes 

His biggest crimes in Tolkien legendarium aren’t the forging of the One ring, nor the whole “rings of power” project to enslave the Free people’s of Middle-earth, nor even the Fall of Númenor. Because, as Tolkien, told us: “in The Lord of the Rings the conflict is not basically about 'freedom', though that is naturally involved. It is about God, and His sole right to divine honour” (Letter 183).

Sauron’s biggest sins in Tolkien lore are:

Pride

Idolatry (worship of false gods): Thou shall have no other Gods before me. Mairon turned his back on Eru (God) to serve Morgoth (Devil), and this act of treason is a crime against Eru himself;

Rebellion: against Eru’s authority, by siding with Morgoth;

Heresy: he forsake his worship of Eru (his creator) for Morgoth; and also converted many Númenoreans to his Morgoth cult, in the hopes of angering the Valar enough to destroy Númenor;

Blasphemy: he cut down Nimloth, the White Tree of Númenor, a symbol of the Faithful, and in its place raised a great Temple devoted to Morgoth in which human sacrifices were performed to asks for immortality, and persecuted the Faithful;

Usurpation of God’s authority: self-proclaim God. That’s why he’s called “shadow of Morgoth”; because Sauron is a mere Maia, a servant to a God, not an actual God.

Would any of these sins sent Sauron into the Void with his former master? Again, it would depend on how Eru judges him, really.

The Void is quite a mysterious place in the legendarium; it’s located outside Time and Space, it’s the absence of the Secret Fire of Eru (“the Flame Imperishable”), his power of Creation. We only know that Morgoth was imprisoned there, and set free at the end of time.

Eru already punished Sauron once, by removing his ability to take on physical form after the Fall of Númenor; and after the One ring was destroyed, Sauron himself is little more than a shadow of his former self, his spirit severely diminished, powerless, and unable to cause any damage, at all. That’s his punishment, already.

But in order to get any redemption, that choice would have to come from Mairon. He would have to truly and honestly repent for all of sins (confession), starting by forsaken Morgoth and recognizing Eru as his one true God, and, then, fulfill a fitting penitence for his crimes. We are talking about an immortal spirit here, this process can take thousands of years or even millenniums.   

[fakesimp]

Fiery Love

Warning !

Vox Akuma x Reader x Shu Yamino ; The use of Vox's 2.0 and 3.0 fit , Shu's 2.0 fit ; Unestablished Polyamorous Relationship

The world I created in this fic is not canon ! The world takes in the Past timeline !

A/n !

I see some wanted to see me write for these two again ! Yes again, I have wrote about these two in Polyamorous relationship before !

If you're new here, This is the first fic i wrote about them !

➶◜◝➴

One who's afraid of his own sorcery, never trusting his own powers. One who never talked about himself, also avoiding talking about his past.

There is some rumors going around the village said that if you ever went into the forbidden forest, you'll be eaten alive by demons, yokais, evil spirits.

Some said there is a Demon that have inhumane height, big wings, accompanied with a Sorcerer that have a high intelligence of dark magic. Some said that they're both are always together, if you see one, the other is definitely nearby.

And you were quite curious of that, some said it's a myth, some said it's true. You thought that it would be a good idea to see if it's true or not.

Here you are now, walking down the path, bought nothing but yourself and a lantern. You thought you'll just go through this forest for an hour or so before going back to the village, and everything goes according to plan !

Nothing happened,

You did got lost for quite awhile, but you manage to return back to the village in one piece. You're a bit disappointed upon the discovery, nothing happened when you entered the forbidden forest.

So you went to visit again the next day, the same exact hour, and again you walked out still disappointed. Nothing happened, you went on doing it for a whole week, and all of those days you wasted at night only filled with disappointment.

One day, you were having a quite hassle at your workplace. Not only that, even in your household. That is your worst day in the week, you went out to take a breather at night, you didn't even realize where your foot is taking you until you're standing in the middle of an open space in the fortunately familiar forest.

You turned, to see you're surrounded by trees, and trees. Of course, because you're in a forest, until you realized that a path slowly opens before you. The trees moved, opening a path for you leading to a well kept house at the distance. You hesitantly walked down the path, as you get closer, you didn't realize the trees behind you closed the path behind you.

The moon shines bright above you, shining down upon the house and you. Who' standing before the house, entranced by the beauty of the surroundings. Sakura trees bloomed around the house, rocky path before you leading to the sliding door, the side is a small wellspring where people usually wash their hands and mouth for to purify themselves before approaching the shrine.

You can hear the water flowing, the sakura trees rustling against each other. It was so peaceful, it made you don't want to leave this beautiful place.

Until you heard a loud thud behind you, soon followed with a low growl. Your body frozen, refuses to move, your feet refuses to take a step, you slowly turn around to see a tall, large being, staring down at you, his lips parted slightly, emitting smokes, and his large wings flapping slightly on his back made your body shiver.

Your eyes met with the beast, the Demon. It approaches you, oh so slowly. Making you falter, and fell down. Earning another growl from the Demon in front of you, soon you felt your back hit something. You look up to see a figure looming down over you, smiling.

"Well well, an unexpected guest..!" The male with a beautiful, long, raven hair slowly slides over from his shoulder, some hitting your shoulder, he leaned away and whispered an apology for his hair.

"Apologies, my hair is quite a hassle," He started as he kneeled next to you, looking at you curiously. "You know you could've got consumed if I came late" The male with a long raven hair, that have a rather unique iconic yellow hair at the left side.

His eyes are violet, it's so enchanting to stare at. The long raven haired male glanced over at the beast who had stopped moving, 10 feet away from you. "You should thank me for coming at the right moment before you're consumed by him" he chuckled before slowly standing back up again and stared down at you.

The demon took a step next to the long raven haired male, "I believe you already know what we are? Especially from those, rumors going on around your village" His violet eyes stares back into yours. He smiled, his smile is quite unique. It made your heart skipped a beat.

And then realization falls before you, you stared at the large figure behind this beautiful man who have such a long raven hair that's mixed with purple, pink and yellow.

These two are the two figures that the villagers mentioned,

The Demon and The Sorcerer.

"I, I'm sorry for disturbing you two, I," You glanced down upon yourself, "My head was in distraught, I had a bad day today. I didn't even realize where my foot is taking me" You started rambling. The two didn't say anything, they just silently stare at you.

"Shu" You glanced back up, "Huh?" "Shu Yamino, that's my name" He introduced himself. "And this," his hand extended to the side, pointing at the figure near him. "This is Vox Akuma." Shu introduced the other, "We'll let you stay, just for tonight since it's dangerous for someone like you, a human to wander around this forest at night"

Soon, the large figure behind Shu, Vox, slowly getting engulfed by smoke around him. And then when he stepped out, he is a whole different being. His golden eyes pierced into yours, his two horns on his forehead made him look appealing.

"Truly, I would've eaten you up if it was not for Shu stopping me from doing so." Your body shivers when you heard his low husky voice, "Go rest Human, Tomorrow morning you should be already in your room" Vox said before walking pass you, and stopped a few steps behind you.

"Don't think we don't know what you're doing last week" He said before disappearing into the house, Shu who had been standing quietly finally let out a small chuckle. "Apologies, he usually don't act that way, perhaps he just doesn't want to repeat the same incident" He said as he helped you get off from the ground.

"Incident?" The Sorcerer smiled agitatedly, "Whoops, I said too much," he said as he then start walking towards the house, "Come, I'll show you the room you're staying in for the night."

You hesitantly followed Shu, walking down the wooden floors, sometimes it creaked sometimes it doesn't. As you followed him, you noticed that this house is pretty decent, like how houses should normally be.

These type of houses usually would be owned by rich people, but to see such house in the forbidden forest made you wonder, your train of thoughts was come to a stop by a voice coming from the male before you.

"Stay curious, but try not to find out about your curiosity." The Sorcerer turned his head a bit, looking at you over his shoulder, his identic smile appeared once more. "You should be thankful you're alive right now, you could've been a whole feast for us" he chuckled softly at his questionable statement, "O, Okay" You replied, and then Shu slides the door next to him, "Here is your room, do avoid to wander around the house, okay?" He said as he wait for you to step into the room.

"Then again, humans are stubborn, if you want to wander around, go ahead," He said, his violet eyes no longer look friendly, "But this time I do not guarantee your safety." He said before his friendly face appeared again within a blink. "Well then, Goodbye, human" He said as he bow slightly before sliding the door close.

Leaving you alone in the room, it looks pretty cozy, with the table in the middle of the room, and then a vase on it, along with a futon folded up at the corner. The moon shines through the window, making the room look quite. Lonely.

You sat near the window and looked up at the night sky, at the moon who high up in the dark sky. Accompanied by the stars around it,

It's beautiful.

Your thoughts now goes back to those two, The demon and The Sorcerer. They look like they're not quite fond with humans, especially Vox, he seems to despise you.

Shu seems more friendlier, but he, there is something wrong with him that doesn't click right on you. It's like, he is physically there, but also not there.

Your eyes slowly gets drowsy, but before you fell asleep on the window, you get to the futon, opening them, and you just scoot into the futon. The moment your head hits the pillow, you're out cold.

. . .

Birds chirping outside, you opened your eyes to see a familiar ceiling, you looked around.

It's your room.

It's exactly like Vox said, you're now back into your room, you don't know how they did it, but one thing is that, You want to see them again, will fate let you see them again?

Will they let you see them again? Question after question kept on appearing one after another, you want to see them, but do they want to see you?

You sighed at the thought and went on your day with them plaguing your thoughts.

. . .

Night arrives and your stubborn self standing outside the forbidden forest, holding a latern. But before you step into the forest, you heard a familiar voice.

"Foolish human"

"Haha, you're a stubborn one, I thought the warning is enough, don't you value your life?"

You turned to see where the voice coming from, nowhere, and then you look up at one of the trees, you see a familiar raven purple hair dangling, then a violet eyes staring back into yours from the dark.

Then under the tree there's a piercing golden eyes looking back into yours too, but then those eyes slowly turned pink, and then there' smoke emits from the dark.

The familiar large figure looms out from the dark, you didn't realize your hands clenched onto your latern so tightly, "Do you know what you're getting yourself into, human?" The demon's voice growled as he stand tall under the shades.

"No, I don't, or maybe I do" You said as you look at these two who's in the shades, "Turn back, don't make things more difficult than it already is." Shu's enchanting voice demanded, "You wouldn't want to know what's going on inside this forest now" he continued and let out a chuckle.

"Let them be Shu, humans are stubborn, if they want to die then let them die." Vox turned around and walked away, soon Shu jumped down from the tree and stares at you, smiling. Though his eyes isn't.

And then you blinked, and Shu is standing right before you, his face right next to your ears, making your breath hitched. "You are nothing but food to those beings in the forest, if you want to be feasted on that badly then go ahead. Both I and Vox told you to stay away for your own safety." He leaned back a bit, you both stared at each other.

Shu's gloved hand touches your chin, "Someone like you doesn't belong in this hellish place," he whispered, his thumb glaze along the lines of your chin. "But Humans are stubborn by nature, when they want something, they will get them no matter what, no?" He leans dangerously close to your lips.

But then let out a small laugh as he stepped away and walked away from you like he did nothing wrong, leaving you breathless, dumbfounded on the spot.

"If you still insisting on going then go ahead, because this time they're no longer hiding." That is the last thing he said before leaving you alone, you looked around, your legs almost lost it's strength after what the Sorcerer did.

You couldn't forget his scent, he smells rather sweet, and intoxicatingly addictive.

. . .

That night you didn't enter the forest, you turned your back on the forest and walked away, you can't forget what Shu did to you that time.

It plays on loop on your head, he was so close to you, you can feel his breath, his scent strokes your nostrils to the addictive amount, his voice sounds enchanting.

Ugh, he is so intoxicating.

. . .

Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months. You didn't visit the forbidden forest like how they wanted you to be, but you'll be lying if you didn't miss them.

One night you went to the forest again, and the same incident happened once more.

"Just when I thought you'll stop coming back forever, of course you're going to return." A familiar husky voice echoed through your eardrums, you tilt your head to the owner of the voice. "Vox.." You whispered his name, as you do he walked out from the shades, taking a few steps before stopping a few feet before you.

His golden eyes bore into yours, he then approached you, closer, and closer. To the point he's so close to you that his figure is looming over you, "Leave," he started.

"While I asked nicely." His eyes soften a slightly, but it disappears as quick as it appeared. "Why do you keep insisting on me leaving, Vox?" You asked him, he' silent. He didn't say anything, instead he leaned his face closer to yours.

"You really want to waste your life? "

His golden eyes stared into yours, filled with so many emotions. He then take a step back and walked away, "We're just trying to not let you waste your life as food, but of course your kind doesn't care and proceed on coming here and become free food to feast on." He said before stopping on his tracks, he looked over his shoulder, "Though if you do want to be food that bad," he trailed off "I could feast on you, and you won't be feeling any pain."

"Ha, how ridiculous Vox" "Tsk, well nevermind then" Vox sighed softly as he eyed Shu who innocently walked out from the dark, smiling at you and then him, "Well, it's nice to see you again human, I thought you're already getting feasted on" he laughed softly.

"It's good to see you still in one piece" He glanced at you, "Though, you came at the worst timing" Shu said as she shove his hands into his sleeves, "Tonight is Red Moon, they're going out to find humans to feast on" he said casually, both his violet eyes glistens under the moonlight, along with Vox's golden eyes staring at yours.

"Well? Do you want to be feasted on? Or do you still want to live?"

"Turn and walk away if you still want to live, or You will be eaten alive right here and now"

"Haha, that sounds so brutal Vox, you could've been a bit more subtle about it"

"Hmh, ..So, what do you choose?"

But before you could have a moment to think, you hear footsteps coming closer to the three of you, all of you turned to see who's approaching.

"Oh.. Uninvited guests" Shu said as he took a step before you, shielding you away from the 'uninvited guests'. Vox at the other hand summoned his katana, "Well I have no plan on sharing." The demon said as he stared at the distance, "Haha, well at least you're sharing with me?"

Both of them talked about sharing and you have no idea what exactly are they talking about, both of them then stopped talking and look back at you.

Shu's violet eyes narrowed, as he smiled at you.

Vox's golden eyes coldly stares into yours, looking at you, like, you're his prey.

Oh dear, what's going to happen to you?

©fakesimp . 2023

Splitting this into parts, how are you guys feeling? Yaminions? Kindreds? How's the fic? You like it? And boy I did not intend to write the fic this long lol.

|| Part 2 ->

A/n !

Reblogs and Comments are always appreciated !

Get this fic to 300 notes, and I'll write the second part.

[punksocks]

Black Moon Lilith: And Your Untamable Femininity

*based on my experiences, please take this with a grain of salt

Lilith herself is from Judeo mythology, she was Adam’s first wife but she saw herself as his equal and that didn’t work out too well so Lilith got banished and Eve replaced her. Because this comes from a traditionally patriarchal perspective, Lilith was too much of a seductress and an unfit woman so she literally was cast out and became a demon. (Side note: it’s so interesting that the stories all demonize Lilith but Eve had too much receiving feminine energy herself and received the devil’s instructions and ate from the forbidden tree. It’s a very damned if you’re too feminine and damned if you’re not feminine enough sort of myth)

Lilith aspecting your planets and your houses will often charge the native with almost Plutonian energy. Like imo Pluto and Neptune combined, because you’re charged with this dark feminine energy that’s the opposite of light/traditional feminine energy and on top of that people tend to project on to you based off of this energy. You bring a lot of people’s biases to light.

So Lilith charges the native with energy they need to “tame” in order to be considered proper feminine women. Lilith’s interpretations have expanded the more autonomy women have gained.

Nowadays being being a naturally sultry woman is less shameful right? Well no. Never mind how progressive they may act, many people will expose their real behavior to that sort of energy. It really weeds out those who are actually well intentioned from those who aren’t. Even if you say that you want progress for all types of women you may not have done the internal work to become the person that truly acts that way. Do you actually respect women that carry that sexual/untraditional energy or are you only advocating for a traditional/untouchable feminine person?

With friends, family, possible love interests, peers, and even strangers this question is act every time someone with heavy Lilith energy interacts with them. Because of how these relationships tend to go in a patriarchal society that encourages one kind of good femininity, Lilith natives often find themselves being “tamed” (i.e. shamed) for having this energy.

A lot of Lilith natives get ashamed growing up “not acting like proper women”. Because of that Lilith natives tend to try to force a version of themselves that fits this feminine mold. It often doesn’t work and just gives people the impression that you’re hiding something from them. Like you’re acting as a wolf in sheeps clothing when you’re just trying to exist the way they told you you have to and you cannot fully mute your energy to do so.

Most interpretations of BM Lilith are of women/femmes/people reclaiming the power and alternative femininity they tried to stamp down for ages and embracing the often revealing effects that Lilith has for the shadow sides of other people. I think it’s no coincidence that interpreting Lilith as a more complex figure comes with waves of feminism and discourse around what femininity means exactly.

The real trick is balancing Lilith’s energy- being proud of the advantages and strength that can be found in her energy without being consumed by dark aspects of how her energy may manifest.

Lilith in Aries/1st House: You’re fire and passionate incarnate. You stand out as a leader in any room you’re in with your confident aura. You were probably shamed for being head strong and impulsive. But your braveness and how you embrace yourself at your core is admirable. You need to tame your me first behavior, and to be careful not to bully and bulldoze others while still standing in your strength.

Lilith in Taurus/2nd House: You’re so sensual and tactile. You live for the pleasures of food and luxury, whatever your idea of luxury may be. You may have been shamed for being “lazy” but you can be very grounded and sensual. You have to tame your inner hedonist and make sure you don’t get too lost in worldly pleasures and that you don’t use others to achieve these ends. (Don’t swing to other extreme and deny yourself any pleasure either, you deserve to have a good life, just not to be consumed by having one.)

Lilith in Gemini/3rd House: You’re a charmer with wit to spare. You think about everything and analyze all of your thoughts on what is good and what is bad. You were probably shamed for how you spoke and what you spoke about in your youth. You have to tame your desire to be the smartest one in the room and the impulse to reject all learning. We all have to learn from some source that knew better before us, otherwise knowledge would be empty and cyclic. You’re not lesser if you do not know everything.

Lilith in Cancer/4th House: You have an in depth relationship with your femininity. You may have grown up in an chaotic environment with family scandals and secrets and intense emotional dysfunction. You need to tame your desire for total emotional control over people in your life. Through your fear of feeling lonely you may have poor boundaries with others by way of doing too much and intern expecting too much emotional devotion/sacrifice. If you don’t manipulate others to be emotionally tied to you, you’ll open yourself up to genuine emotional connections and healing.

Lilith in Leo/5th House: You’re so fun and seductive. You’re a star that turns heads and knows how to have a good time. You were probably shamed for enjoying attention and affection you received in your youth and you could’ve been shamed for having crushes and such before you even began dating. You have to tame your desire to be the center of attention at all times and to escape away from the problems of life into frivolous affairs. (This another case of balance, which I’m finding a lot with fixed Lilith placements. Don’t run away from attention and close yourself off from affection either. It’s okay to receive attention and to enjoy it, the same with dating and healing and finding emotionally fulfilling relationships)

Lilith in Virgo/6th House: You’re a hard worker and a very efficient one at that. You rarely get enough credit for how many problems you solve and how many people you’ve saved with your smarts. You may have been shamed for being too uptight in your youth when no one was giving you any support to actually be able to relax. You have to tame your inner overworker. It’s okay to take a break, it’s okay to make a mistake, you work very hard but you’re human at the end of the day. It’s okay to take care of yourself. (And to be honest about your s*xual desires) Also watch out, your co-workers may not be trustworthy.

Lilith in Libra/7th House: You’re a beauty and a radiant individual, and you probably have a lot of admirers. You may have suffered a lot of injustice/unfair experiences at certain stages of your life. You need to tame your desire for balancing everything. I’ll explain lol, you probably attract a lot of people that have extreme personalities and you pour a lot of energy into them in order to help balance them out. You may also become anxious or vindictive if you’re rejected romantically. It’s okay to understand where the line can be drawn and to understand that harmony cannot be brought to every person/situation, especially not through the efforts of one person alone. And that’s okay.

Lilith in Scorpio/8th House: You ooze s*x appeal and you probably have a mesmerizing presence. You have a very powerful energy. You were probably shamed for your interest in s*x/sensuality throughout your life. You need to tame your desire to escape from your emotions/trauma into your s*xuality. You also need to tame your tendencies to become obsessed with the taboo. (This needs to be balanced of course. You shouldn’t deny your s*xuality or your interest in the taboo. It takes a special type of person to explore these sorts of ideas. Just make sure it doesn’t consume your inner world.)

Lilith in Sagittarius/9th House: You’re a firecracker with a sense of adventure and a need for freedom on your own terms. You were probably shamed for being outspoken and questioning the institutions around you throughout your life (heavy emphasis on higher education and/or your family’s religion). You need to tame your need for freedom to a degree. If you have interest in traveling to certain places but a fear of becoming too attached to that place you should still go and have that experience. If you have an interest in a certain religion but you’re afraid of being trapped in that setting you should still learn about that religion. Institutions are old and carry their own hierarchies but they shouldn’t scare you away from exploration. (Be careful not to become obsessive either)

Lilith in Capricorn/10th House: You’re a powerful person. You have a certain air about you that gives off dominant/authoritative energy. People in power tend to listen to you. But you were often shamed for having such a domineering presence, whether you were exerting power over others or they were just intimidated by the weight you held. You need to tame this desire for status and power and any urges to become cutthroat in order to social climb. I believe this is why this position can be prone to having a scandalous reputation. It’s important not to lose yourself to gain power because you’ll lose respect. (Saturn lessons bby)

Lilith in Aquarius/11th House: You’re the definition of a free spirit, you’re really a one of kind person in how you express yourself and your tastes. You could’ve been outcasted socially from a young age, and you may have dealt with bullies/groups turning against you. You need to tame your urge to disconnect from the humane. (Again it’s a lesson of balance, embracing what makes you unique and gives you your ability to think outside of the box, but also not going out of your way to socially detach from all people to the point of embracing truly bizzaro behaviors just to feel that freedom.)

Lilith in Pisces/12th House: You are a person with a deeply ethereal sense about you. You tend to ride the line between the hidden and the mundane in all things you experience. It’s the hardest placement to pinpoint where you were shamed exactly, it probably has to deal with your receptive energy and your sensitivity to other energies outside of yourself, and due to your conscious or subconscious experiences you carry effects of this negativity. You must tame you natural inclination to drift, to detach and separate yourself in an effort to escape. You must balance your understanding and acceptance of the spiritual and the internal with your experiences in the world in order to not be lost to the tumultuousness of this placement. (also stay empathetic but prioritize taking care of your mental health)

[vxm1tcxre]

Pvrging harm reduction masterpost (from someone who’s had severe bul1m14 for 3 years, and who wishes they’d gotten this advice)

I get asked a lot and see posts asking for “tips” around pvrging.

I absolutely do not condone it. It’s a horrendously dangerous, unpleasant, and addictive behavior, and often a slippery slope to full-swing bul1m14 (and trust me, that is not something you want, for the sake of your wallet and sanity).

However, I do acknowledge that that doesn’t get in the way of the urge to do it. It certainly didn’t for me. That’s not how 3ds work. Being told how dangerous and horrible something is often is just more enticing. I know people are going to try it regardless. And frankly, I’d much rather focus on tips to stay safe over just telling you “don’t do it” like a Christian parent preaching abstinence. Harm reduction is king, especially on a platform like 3dblr.

So, here is a list of things to help you stay safe.

1. I feel like I should reiterate this again- if you at all can, don’t start. It’s not the c4ls-be-gone magic spell it might seem to be. Starting is what ended my r3str1ct1v3 phase. I thought it’d just be a last resort for when I ate too much. Fast forward to now, it’s been 3 years since my first time and I consume a good 6k+ c4ls every single day, have g4ined a ton of w3ight, feel like shit all the time, have no control around food, am constantly broke, have done things that would make people gag, and have all the risk with no reward. Ultimately, you will not l0se w3ight with pvrging. It gets harder and less effective the longer you do it. While the “you can only get rid of 50%” you often hear is a myth, being bul1m1c destroys your control, and eating maintenance in addition to whatever c4ls you didn’t manage to pvrge will inevitably lead to w3ight gain over time. It simply isn’t worth it.

2. DO NOT USE FOREIGN OBJECTS. It is legitimately so dangerous. Massive choking hazard and generally terrible for your throat. If you can’t get a response with your fingers, don’t do it. I promise, getting rid of some chicken nuggets is not worth getting a plastic fork lodged down your throat and almost dying. (Yes, I am speaking from experience)

3. Some people are simply incapable of inducing v0m1t1ng. It’s more common than is talked about and is completely normal. Frankly, if you have urges to pvrge and find that you can’t do it, consider it a sign.

4. Do not brush your teeth directly after. This is because the bristles of your toothbrush will rub the acid into your enamel, increasing the chances of decay.

5. Baking soda is magic. Swish about a teaspoon with some water in your mouth to neutralize the acid. Swallowing some (significantly less- about 1/4 to 1/2 tsp) is also an easy remedy for acid reflux. Get checked and have your teeth cleaned at the dentist’s regularly- if damage starts occurring, you can catch and mitigate it early.

6. Maintain good dental health as much as you can. Continue to brush and floss regularly. Keep in mind, however, that you can’t avoid tooth decay forever. It’s inevitable with long-term pvrging.

7. One of the biggest risks is electrolyte deficiencies. You often hear of people dying from cardiac arrest. This is because thr0wing up depletes your potassium, which helps with muscle contraction. Your heart is a muscle. If it’s unable to contract, it will fail. After pvrging, replenish your electrolytes. Coconut water, Gatorade, pedialyte, anything that contains the nutrients you just got rid of.

8. Also remember to stay normally hydrated. Even just drinking water is better than nothing. pvrging dehydrates you.

9. DO NOT FLUSH. It’s one of the most dangerous games you can play.

10. Try and eat something safe after the fact, especially if you’re having symptoms of low blood sugar (shaking, dizziness, sweating, a rapid heartbeat). This can be easier said than done but it’s crucial to getting back to normal. Something easy on your stomach with some c4rbs is ideal- toast, rice cakes, crackers, etc.

11. Avoid hot showers or baths or exercising directly after. You will lose more water through sweating. Wash your hands and face- especially around your chin and mouth, pvrge-induced acne is a real thing- and rest for a while.

12. Warm drinks or cold foods like popsicles or ice cream are very soothing on the throat. Throat coat tea and hot chocolate are quite nice. The former may be best if your stomach isn’t feeling well.

13. You will bloat like crazy whenever you eat if you pvrge long term. It’s hell on your digestive tract in general. It’s one of my biggest struggles and pet peeves. Honestly, you can only really wait for it to go away. Remember that it will with time, and do something to distract yourself from it. Some things that in my experience have made it less severe are to eat at a reasonable pace, chew your food thoroughly, and sip drinks rather than chugging them.

14. L4x4t1v3s absolutely aren’t worth it. You don’t really get rid of anything and it’s a fast track to dependency and being horrifically constipated whenever you don’t use them. Stay away. If you must, opt for natural remedies like teas, fiber-rich foods, chia seeds, etc.

15. If you take medication, wait several hours before pvrging. It obviously won’t work if you just get rid of it.

Feel free to reblog this with any advice of your own. I hope this helps some of you; stay safe out there.

[drconstellation]

Once and Future Royalty

Just, stay with me on this one. I know its going to look crazy at the start, but trust me, I know where I'm going.

It all started with the 537AD scene in Wessex in the opening montage of "Hard Times," S1E3. Yeah, the one where Aziraphale is supposed to be a knight of the Round Table and Crowley is role-playing the Black Knight, and they are both so super-squeaky shiny clean - not a speck of dirt or mud on them. wtf! It looks out of place, unrealistic, and was bugging the crap out of me, like a stone in your shoe. It just didn't fit. I mean, why put a myth, a legend, into that sequence? Oh, OK, yeah, the preceding stories from the Bible, like the Garden of Eden and the Flood, aren't "myths" as well, you say? Hmm. In the context of the Good Omens AU, being a biblical based story, they belong there far more than the legend of King Arthur.

King Arthur, who supposedly united Britain under his rule during the late 5th century and early 6th century, was shown to have the divine right to rule by wielding the mighty sword Excalibur. Some stories tell of Arthur pulling Excalibur from a stone. Some tell of him receiving Excalibur from the Lady of the Lake. Either way, it was bestowed upon him by divine grace. Despite his triumph in battle, he left no heirs, as his queen, the fair Guinevere, was barren. She had a long-running love affair with the greatest knight of the court, Sir Lancelot, but despite this being an open secret in court Arthur would not put her aside. The knights of the Round Table in the court of Camelot were near-paragons of Christian virtue, and there are many tales of their search for the Holy Grail, the cup from the Last Supper of Jesus Christ.

In the end, mortally wounded in battle, Arthur was taken away for healing, and never seen again. It was said he would return when Britain was at it most direst hour to save the day once more. A "messianic" return.

The Once and Future King.

Now, I'm no Arthurian novice; I drank up all of T. H. White as a teenager, read the Dark is Rising multiple times, Marion Zimmer Bradley's interpretation and what ever else I could lay my hands on for a good couple of decades. And there is LOTS of King Arthur stuff around. You are not left wanting for anything new to read or consume. And I'll bet there are a fair few of you also out there who know a quite bit about the legend as well. Oh, and I can't tell you how many times I have watched Monty Python and the Holy Grail. I still walk around quoting it day-to-day, like the good little Gen-Xer I am, having grown up on that stuff. So I really should have listened to my intuition when bits of Monty Python kept popping up in my brain in response to other parts of GO I was thinking about. (Staaay, I said, stay with me here....)

I kept chewing away furiously on the Wessex problem, growling in feral frustration at it, but also kept reading and sorting out some other ideas and metas at the same time. Eventually I found the key in a tiny little post, about a small detail in the 1941 Blitz episode S2E4, of all places. I wanted to slap myself with how much was staring me in the face so obviously once the door opened. And the damn beauty of it is, that I already written about some it, out of context, without knowing the why.

OK. Where to start this journey...hmmm, back to Monty Python, because, guess what - the Wessex scene is actually riffing off one the more famous skits out the the Holy Grail. The scene is a masterpiece of political satire, from start to finish, but the relevant part here is this sequence:

In case you missed the salient points: Arthur claims he is king by divine providence, because he was given Excalibur by the Lady of the Lake. Dennis the peasant protests this waterlogged method of determination, mentioning ponds, watery tarts and a moistened... well, I hope you get the idea about where this is going.

Meanwhile, in 537AD, Wessex, as the mist swirls around them:

"It is a bit damp," complains a shiny silver Aziraphale.

Yes, Excalibur would be a bit damp after it emerged from the Lake. (vidavalor! Get your mind out of the gutter! I'm trying to have a serious discussion here! Please! And I wasn't even going to go anywhere near what the sword in the stone is really meant to be referring to...it's not even relevant to the discussion at hand, I swear! Well, there is going to be sexual relations mentioned but - oh, never mind...)

Right. Where were we. Lets leave those super-clean elite pretendy knights to swim off through the swirling mist back to their dry homes to write and file reports to head office, along with Patsy and the hired Igors, and Dennis can keep playing in his lovely muddy filth after he finishes protesting being repressed by the divinely-deluded Arthur. I've got a bit more to say about what Aziraphale and Crowley might represent here later but you need some more context first, so lets move on. I just needed to show you the first bit so you can see the Arthurian theme stretches across both S1 and S2, and will likely appear in S3 as well. More about that towards the end.

Ah, before I forget...another ref from the Holy Grail we need to cover:

This GIF, unfortunately, doesn't have the full exchange between the peasants, which is this:

P1: "Who's that then?" P2: "I don't know. Must be a king." P1: "How can you tell?" P2: "Because he doesn't have any shit on him."

Ah. Er. OH!

Have you made the connection?

Who have I been emphasizing as being unusually clean in their Arthurian setting? That's right, Aziraphale and Crowley.

What's this implying? That they are royalty. Celestial royalty. Maybe not kings, but how about princes? You know how we've been discussing whether Crowley was a once at least an Archangel, and there is even a hint that he was a fallen prince of Heaven given during the replay of Gabriel's trial? (Not the prince, but a prince - a seraphim) And that Aziraphale may have once been Raphael, and may be again in the future? Once and future royalty. To me it adds weight to the past discussion, and helps to explain the assumed authority expressed in these two scenes here: On the left, Aziraphale takes control inside the book shop as the angels and demons argue who is going to punish Gabriel and Beelzebub (finally found it after several months!) and on the right, Crowley is shouting at the assembling demons in the street that they are "out of order."

Onward, Patsy. (I hope you're still with me.)

1941, the Blitz part 2, minisode.

We've found Excalibur! On to Camelot!

[Edit note: I've added a few GIFs and screen shots into the sequence of parallels above because I was thinking over a few things since I posted and felt this actually sat better. To try and explain, as they don't exactly match as I would like, in the Holy Grail movie, King Arthur and the knights he has gathered rock up at the foot of Camelot and gaze up in awe at it. "Camelot!" Arthur declares to the party. "Camelot!" Galahad echoes in excitement. And a third "Camelot!" comes from Lancelot. What do we get in GO? Aziraphale leaps out of the Bentley (Crowley's black horse) and declares "The theater! Sophocles! Shakespeare!" I swear, if you put the two side by side, they would match. It's not just a reminder of how much time Aziraphale has seen pass by, or that we are seeing a tragedy play out. But damn it, I could so just see Aziraphale attending a Sophocles performance in Athens back in the day...]

Camelot was King Arthur's castle and home of his court. In S2 of GO the Windmill Theater is established as our court of Camelot where our 1941 Blitz-era Arthurian drama is to play out, involving Furfur and the zombies.

Yes, poor old Furfur. Two's company, three's a crowd, as they say. Now we know we're in Camelot, we need to be reminded of the central tragedy of the Arthurian story, that ultimately led to the golden kingdom's fall. Lady Guinevere, Arthur's queen, famously loved Sir Lancelot, and the two were passionate lovers. It was essentially a love-triangle at the top, with Arthur being jilted, but he wouldn't/couldn't discard his queen. Where do we see this playing out in 1941?

Furfur, pleased with himself for catching an angel and a demon in the act of consorting together (with the help of the zombies,) barges into the backstage dressing room, and confronts the lovers with their crime. But who is playing who in the Arthurian love triangle? I would say Furfur is clearly caught in the role of Arthur here. Consider the following exchange:

FURFUR: Hmm, well, well, well… What have we here? AZIRAPHALE: Sorry, have we met? FURFUR: Oh, no, you never had the pleasure, but… we have, haven't we? CROWLEY: Have we? FURFUR: What do you mean "have we?" You know we have. We were in the same legion. Just before the Fall. Doing dubious battle on the plains of Heaven. Remember? CROWLEY: I remember going into battle, I don't remember being there with you. Sorry. FURFUR: I was right next to you. We did loads together. You use to jump on me back, little monkey in the waistcoat. Anyway, whether you do or whether you don't, it doesn't matter. I'm here to inform you, as a representative of the Higher Powers of Hell, that you, Crowley, are in breach of the Infernal Code. Consulting and collaborating with an angel, Fell the Marvelous, aka… [opens book] Azirapalala. Azirapapap. Aziphapalala. AZIRAPHALE: [annoyed] Aziraphale

Furfur claims a past intimate relationship with Crowley, which Crowley spurns offhandedly. Crowley is playing Guinevere here, jilting Furfur/Arthur, which leaves the demon-smiting Aziraphale standing in for the handsome hero Lancelot (with his French connections, no less), and doesn't he make us weak at the knees when he drops his voice an octave in dominating disgust. (Is it suddenly getting hot in here...? Phew!)

Interestingly, looking back in S1 at 537AD Wessex, though, I would say that Crowley was Lancelot as the Black Knight, a role that Lancelot sometimes played in the legends, and Aziraphale would then be the fair maiden Guinevere. It certainly plays into Crowley's long term role of playing the knight who comes to the rescue of Aziraphale's princess in distress. Excalibur was no where in sight, perhaps still beneath the waters of the lake. Nor Arthur. Perhaps it was still too early in the story then...

I had originally suggested in my very first post that Furfur was given a stag as his demon avatar because he was wearing horns for being cuckolded by Crowley. But I wasn't quite thinking about it in context with the Arthurian legend! The stag is also often associated with royalty, plus while wandering around the medieval bestiary website that someone linked to, it interestingly notes that the enemy of the snake is the stag and the stork (Shax's avatar.) Ah ha!

So how can we extrapolate this knowledge into a possible appearance of the Arthurian theme in S3?

Will we see the love triangle of Arthur/Guinevere/Lancelot come back into play and cause more chaos? I'm wondering if it might have something to do with the Fall.

Or will our lovers bring down a divinely-appointed ruler via their committed behind-the-back defiance of expected propriety?

Will Excalibur appear from beneath the waters, perhaps in another form, to declare a new king?

Could it even be a combination Jesus/Arthur, King of the World, returned? And they turn out to be a very naughty boy, disappearing into the night clubs of Times Square, New York, and that's how they lose him? (Social media viral sensation, anyone?)

I wouldn't be half-surprised if Greasy Johnson's name turns out to be Arthur, actually.

And no, I haven't forgotten that Adam's dad was named Arthur as well.

Bring on S3!

**Bonus**

If you've made it this far and you're thinking:

Let me leave you with this last connection.

In the back stage change room, remember Furfur delivers these lines:

FURFUR: What do you mean "have we?" You know we have. We were in the same legion. Just before the Fall. Doing dubious battle on the plains of Heaven. Remember?

On the first level, he is referring the Great War in the Good Omens AU.

On the second level, Furfur is paraphrasing Milton's Paradise Lost.

On a third level, I can (and will in a future meta) connect this back to the training initiative paintball fight at Tadfield Manor in S1.

And even deeper on a fourth level, if you do know the Holy Grail movie well, you'll remember there is an odd little subplot in it, that infers that the whole King Arthur and his knights thing is merely a full-on violent cosplay that is murderously rampaging across the countryside in the present day with the police in hot pursuit. It's a strange juxtaposition between reality and dream, and you aren't quite sure what it is real or not. The ending is bizarrely and abruptly surreal as the two story lines collide in the heat of battle, as the police turn up and arrest the combatants. A bit like this:

[beetlewine-art]

I really love when Media based on Greek Mythology takes the time to explore the dynamics between the gods. Specialy the family interactions between them, even the little moments of affection between them make the series about greek gods munch more enjoyable to me. For example, in Blood of Zeus with Apollo's little interactions with Hermes and Dionysus, or the when Ares defended Hera from the other gods in the second season when she goes back to Olympus.

However, i just watched a short video on youtube, it was a combination of two clips from diferent series, one from an episode of Hercules: the Animated Series and the other from Justice League Unlimited. Both clips were interactions of Ares and Hephaesthus, it made me realise how little their possible dynamic and interactions are talked or explored outside of Aphrodite.

Meybe i need to consume (even) more greek mythology media, but i honestly can't think of any other series besides of those two clips (and Lore Olympus) that showed us some kind of dynamic between Ares and Heph, without mentioning the affair between Ares and Aphrodite. And i get it, because the affair is one, if not the most, popular myth for both gods.

But i think is such a missed oportunity that people don't talk munch about what kind of relationship could Hephaesthus have with Ares before the affair and how it affected their dynamic when he found out. Was their relationship non-existant before it? Or did Hephaesthus interacted a fair amount of times with Ares before he found out? Since Ares is the god of war and Hephaesthus is the Blacksmith of the gods, i imagine that they interacted at least a few times when Ares needed Hephaesthus to make or fix his weapons.

Both clips i mentioned have Ares talking to Hephaesthus while Heph works on a weapon for him and i really enjoy how their dialogs are written. The first clip, being from a Disney series, is munch more comedic and light-hearted but i honestly can see them interacting in a similar way before the affair incident. Hephaesthus looks so done and bored while Ares rants with enthusiasm about how he needs this cool and unique new weapon. When Heph finishes working, Ares grabs the bow before Hephaesthus can put it on water to cool it down, burning his hands and Heph just says "Careful, is a little bit hot".

Also, this dialog from The justice League clip is just so good:

Ares: You say "come back Thuesday, is Thuesday, i want my suit.

Hephaesthus: Patience brother, you know how much i care about the details.

Ares: It doesn't have to be pretty, Hephaesthus, where it's going, things aren't supposed to be pretty.

Hephaesthus: Present company excluded, of course.

Ares: Just hurry up!

This show is not even about Greek Mythology and it gave us one of the best interactions between them i've seen. And of course, i'm not trying to ignore or deminish Aphrodite's role or the effect she would have on their dynamic.

I just wish that more people would explore the dynamic between the two before the affair, i want more 1 on 1 interactions between this two because they have so much potential.

Or meybe i just want to see more of Hephaesthus interacting with other gods in general, that works too.

Tag list: @my-name-is-apollo @diioonysus @anniflamma

[wingsoffireexileau]

Weavewings/Widowings

Tis my fan tribe I made out of wanting both curled horns and a spider dragon :D

I'm working on a digital version for the base.

The dragon depicted on the left is named Arachnid, he's an animus, and he has the gift of speaking to the dead, so he enchanted a branch where if anyone blows onto it, either with fire, frost, or just regular breath, it was cause the branch to burn and smoke without the branch actually burning, and then the smoke will manifest into whoever you state you want to speak to if they're deceased. The animus touched object is known as the Soul Speaker. The spirit(s) being spoken to will only be able to be seen, heard, and physically there until someone choose to burn out the flame on the branch, of which the smoke manifestation will dissipate. Thus works for any spirit of the dead if the user knows which one they want to speak to, ie they knew them before death, has seen a painting of them with their name, in other words, a face and name. You can also ask for any nearby spirits who would like to speak to manifest, but that's only if the spirit chooses to.

Anyway in the bottom right of the image we have a dragonet and a clutch of eggs, which Weavewings bundle together with silk if they have multiple eggs. And the dragonets as they grow go through molts similarly to spiders, their first molt gives them an extra pair of limbs that have two talons on them, then the next gives them their first pair of wings, the third they get their extra pair of arms, and then the fourth they get their other pair of wings. They are born with the ability to spin silk however they don't fully master it until they're older.

These dragons have a pair of mandibles on the sides of their mouth with a fang on each that can deliver a toxin that can prevent clotting, and cause partial paralysis, both are temporary, so it's possible to survive if bitten.

They also have quills behind their ears and horns that have venom as well, however it's harmless aside from delivering an unpleasant sting, to protect the base of their neck and head. At hatching they have no quills and begin growing them after their first molt, when each quill first emerges, they are soft and rubbery, and slowly harden, their scales are also like this after they molt until they harden, much like actual spiders. And before their quills or scales harden, they appear pale and grow in color as they harden.

Their extra limbs with two talons are often used to handle and manipulate their silk threads. They also have the ability to recycle their silk back into their system via consuming it, their saliva able to dissolve their silk.

Their ears are large, and can hear very well for nocturnal hunting, their eyes also adept with night vison. Their sclera(white part of the eye) are hardly visible, their irises being large with pupils that can grow rather large or very small, having very good vision. Their sense of smell is average, but is oddly sensitive to the scent of blood, and hence can locate injured prey and follow them till exhaustion. They're often ambush predators, and sometimes use their silk in aiding the hunt, as a trap, or as restraints.

When reproducing, the females while carrying eggs, have to consume blood and meat in larger quantities, and if their needs aren't met, their urges/instincts will cause them to consume anything with flesh near them until satisfied, even against their better judgment and morality, which often causes them to consume their mate/or spouse or other dragons. This gave them a reputation, and were coined the name Widowings by other tribes.

This tribe isn't a naturally occurring one, they were made by an animus during the heat of the scorching. However any traces of them aside from myths, legends, and rumors were gone by the time of Darkstalker, their existence debated.

[genericpuff]

Uh weird question: Can someone who's from a community that hasn't been oppressed write a character that's from opressed community as long as it's well written? Like for example, a straight guy writing a lesbian couple or a white person writing POC characters.

If they couldn't then we'd have a lot less media out in the world LOL Need I remind y'all that I am a non-Greek person writing and drawing a retelling of a comic that's based on Greek myth ;p So all that said, the following is my opinion as a writer and someone who fits into certain minority groups, but bear in mind that I myself am someone who isn't part of a specific group writing about that group.

I see your question and I raise you a hypothetical. Which would you rather be - a writer who actually challenges themselves and engages with other topics and perspectives for the sake of telling a good story, or a writer who only exclusively writes about things limited by their own perspective and experiences?

Sorry if that's a bit of snark for the day, I understand that people get worried when it comes to writing about other groups that they don't "fit into", but there's a point where you can get so paranoid and over-correct too far that you don't actually branch out and that's how you wind up trapped in an echo chamber (or at the very least, trapped in a cycle of writing about the same stuff constantly lol) which can ironically lead to becoming more ignorant and offensive than if you had simply genuinely tried in the first place and maybe fumbled in a few areas. And white heterocis people aren't the only ones who are at risk of trapping themselves in those chambers, it can happen to anyone who's not willing to branch out. Making mistakes in and of itself is not the end of the world, you just have to be willing to learn.

Part of a very necessary process of writing is consuming content written by and for other people so that you can gain a sense of perspective, understanding, and empathy for others that don't live the same lives as you. Not doing those things out of fear of offending people is how you cause the opposite effect - trapping yourself in a bubble of misinformation because you never bothered to look outside of your own comfort zone and thought it was 'safer' to just keep reading and writing content that could only apply to you. Really all that accomplishes is narrowing your world view and stunting your writing capabilities.

The biggest thing you can do to write characters that don't align with yourself is just doing your research, being open to critique and feedback from the groups you're depicting (best way to write about a character who is not yourself is to ask for feedback from a person who IS reflected in that character!), and not writing from assumptions (as a lot of assumptions are rooted in stereotypes / prejudice / racism / etc.) There are loads of people from communities in need of representation who are willing to offer their help and feedback, don't be afraid to put out feelers for that sort of thing, it's why beta-readers are still so essential for a lot of writers.

And it also depends what your writing is trying to achieve. Are you actually trying to represent these groups, or are you just writing a character who you think is neat who happens to be from a specific group? What messages are you trying to send, what point are you trying to make, what do you want the reader to walk away with? Keep in mind that it's just as important to have characters who simply exist and aren't white/heterocis/etc. as it is to have characters who are fulfilling certain representations for the sake of sending a message / making a point. Because oppression comes in a variety of forms and not every single one will necessarily be as much a hurdle as the last; and just like not expanding your worldview through challenging yourself with new topics, it can be just as harmful to reduce people's identities to just a label and assuming that once they have that label they have to fulfill a specific 'role' within a story (that's how you end up with the "token black guy" tropes) or that if you don't share that same label, that means it's completely off-limits for you to depict in your writing or that they have to be depicted the exact same way every single time. People are not tags on AO3. People are what you're trying to write about. Don't restrict yourself by the labels.

Anyways, this turned into a big post, but yeah, just be willing to look for and listen to feedback, and remember that you're (I'm assuming) someone who's at the beginning of their journey, there's not as much pressure on you as you think there is. As much as I talk shit about people like Rachel front left and center here for all of her problems with representation, it's only because Rachel is someone who's taking credit for representation that just isn't there (or tries to be there and sucks immensely because it comes across as horribly misinformed and almost boomer-like). And then you've got the Cait Corrains and James Somertons of the world, people who literally try and silence the voices of those who belong to the groups they're claiming to be a part of (or aren't, in Cait's case with her review-bombing POC work) all for the sake of their ego. Cait Corrain and James Somerton don't actually care about 'representation', they just want to be the center of attention within the discussion and given all the credit for being progressive, even if it means literally stealing from or abusing the people who are on the same side as them.

All that said, I know I get intense here with how I discuss stories like LO and how they handle 'representation', but I don't ever want to give anyone the impression that they're not allowed to write about groups that they don't fit into or that the answer is "only write from your own perspective ever" because that's just not productive and will, if anything, have the opposite effect to what you're trying to achieve. Representation is complicated and oftentimes more nuanced than people give it credit for. Most average every day writers aren't getting in trouble just for writing characters outside of their demographic, even when they make the odd mistake or miss something in their research; the people who get in trouble are the ones who do it to an incredibly offensive degree and then double down when they get called out on it. Those are the scenarios that wind up being the loudest / most explosive and give budding writers the impression that they shouldn't try writing anything outside of their worldview ever but that's not the conclusion you should be coming to. Just be respectful and put in the effort like you would any other character, and don't use your character writing as an excuse to put yourself above voices from those groups. Be sincere, be humble, and always be willing to learn more.

[aylish91]

Do you have any pirate sans x siren reader story ideas that you don't want/ Don't mind being converted into a story?

OOOOOOOOO! Pirate Sans x Siren Reader! You are in luck, my friend. I have had a few ideas I will most likely never fully get around to. If you would like to use any of them, be my guest~ If you do, please make sure to send me a link so I can read!!!

~~~ (1)

Sans is betrayed by someone on his ship resulting in the death of his brother and most of the crew. He manages to escape but is gravely injured. Running from his enemies, he stumbles upon a cave. Inside is a pool with a certain imprisoned siren. It is both lucky but unfortunate in his eyes. 

Sirens/mermaids were stuff of myths and legends said to have the ability to grant those that catch them any wish they so desired. The stronger the siren, the more wishes they could grant. However, if you failed to catch or angered them, they would take your soul or lure you with their song to your death.

Fortunately, neither of them is strong enough to hurt the other, so a deal is made. You are strong enough to grant Sans the “Eye of the Judge” and “Karmic Retribution” in exchange for freedom. However, it is quickly deduced that that alone wasn’t enough. (Everyone was still dead, Sans was still dusting, and you were now weak enough that you wouldn’t be able to save yourself even free.) In conclusion, to save both parties, you propose one last final deal.

If Sans allows you to lure/drown him and take his soul, you would be able to turn back time exactly one year. He would maintain his new abilities to then protect his family and crew from whatever threat had almost dusted him. In return, he would come back and release you from your prison and keep you safe while you recovered. 

Agreements are made with binding magic, soul consumed, and time reversed. (maybe with a side effect of now both souls being slightly bonded to each other) Sans finds you again as soon as he can and wa-la! Adventure time! Revenge against those who harmed Sans’ crew along with those who imprisoned you? Maybe! Simply avoiding danger and keeping everyone safe? absolutely! It could also be how you two slowly come to love each other or form a kind of familial bond.

~~~ (2)

You guide ships of your choosing through Death Pass. You keep other nasties away and show them how to navigate many days inside the perilous rocks and crags. All this for a price of course~ Anyone unwilling to pay can either turn back or inevitably get eaten by you or others. (After sinking of course… ha ha…)

There may be a certain pirate that catches your attention. One that brings you nice things and tells you the most entertaining stories. One that makes you want to go on adventures too… 

It could be how you become fond of him and his crew through work. You could eventually help him through without payment to save him from those giving chase. You could ask for payment to be him taking you with him on his journeys… 

~~~ (3)

Sans rescues you from the black market. Naturally, honor binds you to him now even though he let you go and left. You spend your time following him, getting closer, and sneaking on board.

(You are quite terrible at using legs at first, but you manage somehow. Even if people look at you weird. Customs are also different...)

You may be good at sneaking around and watching/helping. It could also be you only think you are sneaky. haha

[looniecartooni]

Long, Scattered DGM theory- The Pillar of Heven in Chinese Mythology (Part 1?)

I've talked about a couple years ago how there are connections in D Gray Man with not only Christian creation myths but also (possibly) Māori and other creation myths (Tyki's name likely derives from the first man in Māori/Polynesian myth who is referred to as Tiki) (which relates to Mana being a type of spiritual energy found in many religions and Adam being the first man in Judeo-Christan beliefs).

Well- I was watching Lego Monkey Kid Season 5 where they were talking about the main character MK being "the harbinger of chaos" set to sacrifice himself into the Pillar of Heaven in order to "save everyone"/restart the thousand-year rebirth cycle. And in D Gray Man, we have the Pillar that destroyed the world and is supposedly inside the Earl, with he and the Noah claiming they are doing what they do for the sake of humanity despite actively destroying it and claiming to prepare for its destruction.

Now its been a good, long while since I read D Gray Man and my knowledge on Chinese Mythology is not great. But there are several characters that are Chinese (Bak, Komui, Lenalee, ect.) or part Chinese (Lavi I think. He also has a hammer that works a lot like the monkey king staff in the show- but that may or may not be unrelated) and China was a very important part of the story- that's where the entire Asian Branch of the Black Order is located. But what about Chinese creation mythos is applicable to D Gray Man?

Well according to this maybe not entirely reliable but interesting website (Nuwa: Goddess of Creation and the Female Emperor of Mankind (timelessmyths.com) , there are some parallels to Christan mythos.

On the seventh day of creating life, she made humans. Now according to Judo-Christan beliefs, God actually rested on the seventh day. But we also have Nuwa looking into her reflection, modelling humans after herself, and she apparently has a twin brother that may or may not have helped with the creation of life (sources vary on that one). This may be reaching- but the Millenium Earl mentions during the Alma Karma arc that Akuma are basically an extension of him which we see in multiple instances where he can actually see things through the akuma.

And Nea's well known for appearing in reflections.

Not to say Mana has not as well.

But none of this has to do with the Pillar or the Pillar of Heaven exactly. There are some other parallels to make with these creation myths, but that would be reaching and not get us where we want to go (and both are interpretable as ableist or racist in their respective mythologies that were not aware that they were being so exactly and we may not wanna discuss that here).

In D Gray Man, the Pillar has only appeared twice- once to talk to Allen in a nightmare and the second time when Road and Cross are discussing why the Noah are pretending to be a family for the Earl.

In the story of Nuwa, there are 4 pillars- each the legs of the creator god, Pangu (who according to Wikipedia was born of the cosmic egg provided by the formless primordial universe. And what's the source used in the creation of Akuma? The Akuma Egg. And what is the power Akuma and Noah use called? Dark matter. And what is dark matter supposedly a scientific term for? Something that makes up the universe that does not interact with light. Sorry- I got side tracked). Pangu was supposedly keeping the sky up after separating it from the Earth. However-

Fires raged and floods destroying the Earth not only relates to the story of Noah's ark (which the Noah are pretty much directly based off of), but also the Pillar of D Gray Man as well. Now in Monkie Kid, we see the interpretation of holes in the sky as cracks letting little bits of the universe, or rather little bits of chaos, into the world (which King Zhuanlun/the Nine Headed Demon claims all life comes from and returns to. And Nuwa says that it will consume everything if they don't complete the thousand-year rebirth cycle, it will consume all life- I will get back to that.) In D Gray Man, we see the Noahs' ark create a hole in the sky like pieces of a puzzle falling apart. It is not quite related to the pillar, but it likely was created in response to it and connects with the Noah.

(Lenalee also sees people she cares about as pieces of a puzzle, but that's a whole other theory probably. Her Innocence also has the power to turn into a pillar-like object that can protect her from the Earl's power.)

So how does Nuwa repair the Pillar of Heaven in Chinese Mythology? Well- there are a few different versions where a celestial turtle offers to cut its own leg, she takes five stones with her to secure it, but ultimately has to sacrifice herself in the end. But the version that seems to align most with DGM's narrative would be this:

According to Wisely (one of the Noah who has/had snake symbolism on him), all of humanity was descended from the Noah. And according to Road and Cross, the Noah are trying to stop the Pillar from rising again by pretending to be the Earl's family. The Earl supposedly will sacrifice them at some point like Abraham tried to do with Jacob in Judeo-Christian mythos, but that has only been mentioned once.

But what we do know is that the Earl had fought with or fought against the Heart of Innocence which caused the 3 days darkness and flood (if I recall correctly- I'm too tired to get more screenshots and make this longer than it already is). And in knowing that the Earl IS going to become the Pillar (and according to Apocreep- his defeat will let the Heart rise or something- it's like 2am right now), its interesting to think that either the Earl sacrificed himself like Nuwa to contain the Pillar with the use of innocence or the Pillar somehow got turned into him.

The Earl, according to what we hear from who we currently know as Past!Lavi (misinterpreted as Past!Allen) in his debut to the manga, is the consumer of life. All life stems from and returns to the Spiral of Life (which looks a lot like DNA).

(this translation is different than what I am used to. I don't quite remember the Earl consuming "souls" for say, but "life"...? I could be wrong. Either way, it fits into the context of this theory).

There are a lot more parallels including the primordial chaos Hundun possibly relating to water, but I'm going to let other people with perhaps better knowledge than me make the parallels. I just thought I'd get the ball rolling. If I got anything wrong or if you would like to add on, please do so nicely and be sure to tag me in whatever you find. I love learning about mythos and seeing/theorizing just how much thought Hoshino put into this series. And I apologize if I made any mistakes, had mistranslations, or really just had no idea what I was talking about. I feel like there is definitely something here that connects some rather confusing dots and possibly hints at the story more. Thank you for reading this far.

[esther-dot]

I was reading your comments about Jon's chivalry and protecting the vulnerable. This all brought to mind Jon's TV ending of stabbing Dany in the heart while kissing her. While we don't know whether or not this version of Dany's end is close to what will be the written version, it seems as though it's possible in part because of the Nissa Nissa legend. Jon doing that in the books (or something like it) would align with the Azor Ahai story, but in a warped sort of way, leaving events open to interpretation (as is usual with the prophecies and legends). But in any case, Jon killing a woman will be an act that is antithetical to so many of his values that it seems like it would come close to destroying him even if justified within Jon's universe. I wonder if Martin really plans to bring Jon this low, but also how it will be received. The optics of portraying such an ending for Dany given today's sensibilities could be viewed even more dimly than it would have been when Martin started writing the series?

(about this ask)

I'm so sorry that it's taken me this long to respond! I have finally reread some pertinent chapters to situate my thoughts.

First, I just want to acknowledge how upsetting this spec is to some, and remind everyone, no one wants this ending. We all think it's gross, we're just discussing the possibility, not merely because of the show, because it's an old theory. I looked around and saw posts about this starting in 2013 by Dany fans. So, the presence of this myth is substantial enough, even BNFs/Jonerys shippers felt like it had a strong chance of manifesting (although they believe Dany would willingly sacrifice herself) well before D&D committed their fuckery. I suppose all that answers your question. Man killing his lover is a gross trope, being forced to kill a loved one to save the world is overused, so now, I can't imagine anyone reading it and being happy about it.

In trying to look at the context in-canon Martin has created, he's taken it out of the strict man kills lover idea of the AA/NN myth, and is discussing the idea of sacrificing an innocent child to a god which fans have already compared to myth, Stannis & Shireen = Agamemnon & Iphigeneia. This sacrifice hasn't happened yet, but it's been confirmed as a Martin plot point. Stannis is already burning people alive, justifying kid killing, and Davos has already planted the Stannis=AA, kid=NN idea:

Davos was remembering a tale Salladhor Saan had told him, of how Azor Ahai tempered Lightbringer by thrusting it through the heart of the wife he loved. He slew his wife to fight the dark. If Stannis is Azor Ahai come again, does that mean Edric Storm must play the part of Nissa Nissa? (ASOS, Davos V)

Although, rather than this being a justified death, the fans will be horrified as we're meant to be. Davos' thoughts call into question the idea of killing another for your "magic sword":

A true sword of fire, now, that would be a wonder to behold. Yet at such a cost . . . When he thought of Nissa Nissa, it was his own Marya he pictured, a good-natured plump woman with sagging breasts and a kindly smile, the best woman in the world. He tried to picture himself driving a sword through her, and shuddered. I am not made of the stuff of heroes, he decided. If that was the price of a magic sword, it was more than he cared to pay. (ACOK, Davos I)

and Martin impresses upon us the value of each life:

"Your Grace," said Davos, "the cost . . ." "I know the cost! Last night, gazing into that hearth, I saw things in the flames as well. I saw a king, a crown of fire on his brows, burning . . . burning, Davos. His own crown consumed his flesh and turned him into ash. Do you think I need Melisandre to tell me what that means? Or you?" The king moved, so his shadow fell upon King's Landing. "If Joffrey should die . . . what is the life of one bastard boy against a kingdom?" "Everything," said Davos, softly. (ASOS, Davos V)

The talk of greater good/killing kids reminds me of AGOT in which Ned's story is inundated with the topic of child murder/protecting kids. We have Mycah, his memories of Aegon and Rhaenys, his promise to protect Jon, his guilt over his lies and treason bubbling up repeatedly, his fight against the assassination of Dany, his attempt to save Cersei's children from Robert...we all know, kid killing is wrong according to Martin, so we've already been told that this wannabe AA's actions are contemptible. The myth in which the sacrifice is happy to die, that sacrificing someone is heroic, it's being contradicted by what we're being shown in the Stannis storyline.

Now, while Stannis is being declared Azor Ahai, we're constantly being told he isn't. Jon calls the act a mummer's farce and comments on his cold sword and that is right before a Dany chapter, so the idea is, Dany is actually AA. @trinuviel is the first person I saw lay out the argument for that and contend that being AA is a bad thing (meta parts 1, 2, 3). People have said that Drogo kinda becomes her Nissa Nissa in that scenario. She burns him to get the dragons, and what are the dragons called?

"When I went to the Hall of a Thousand Thrones to beg the Pureborn for your life, I said that you were no more than a child," Xaro went on, "but Egon Emeros the Exquisite rose and said, 'She is a foolish child, mad and heedless and too dangerous to live.' When your dragons were small they were a wonder. Grown, they are death and devastation, a flaming sword above the world." He wiped away the tears. "I should have slain you in Qarth." (ADWD, Daenerys III)

That kinda makes us think, oh, the myth already has a canon counterpart, don't need to worry about it anymore. Only, we've also said Rhaegar impregnating a young Lyanna could be read as a play on Nissa Nissa, with him risking her life to get the prophecy baby, otherwise known as the third head of the dragon. And Jon is not only a kind of dragon, he repeatedly intones that fun little phrase about being a sword, and sometimes, that happens within an interesting context (for speculation purposes):

"I will." Do not fail me, he thought, or Stannis will have my head. "Do I have your word that you will keep our princess closely?" the king had said, and Jon had promised that he would. Val is no princess, though. I told him that half a hundred times. It was a feeble sort of evasion, a sad rag wrapped around his wounded word. His father would never have approved. I am the sword that guards the realm of men, Jon reminded himself, and in the end, that must be worth more than one man's honor. (ADWD, Jon VIII)

So, although there is one character that seems to be Azor Ahai (Dany), I am definitely open to the myth manifesting, or rather, being examined from multiple angles. IMO, that's what Martin is doing and we can use each variation to reassess what he's saying with it. We have Dany and Drogo (the official one/successful one), Rhaegar and Lyanna (not AA, but Jon is born), Stannis and Edric (denied), Stannis and Shireen (he will kill Shireen, but we don't know if he'll get what he wants and we do know he isn't AA)... lots of pics of a similar idea. To emphasize Stannis not being the dude and Dany being the "real" AA, we have that Jon passage and chapter transition:

Even though we have lots of contenders and commentary about this myth with the canon characters, none of it romanticizes human sacrifice, and all works towards the twist that what is said to be a hero/the weapon that will save people brings destruction. If we look back at it critically, Dany has a habit of accepting, or even causing, the suffering of others for her greater good, including sacrificing Mirri to get her dragons. We might even argue that Mirri is a Nissa Nissa for her, as Dany had taken Mirri under her protection before killing her to get dragons.

That being said, even though we're getting told this shit is bad in canon, the indictment of killing innocents and people who depend on you to protect them, it wouldn’t apply if someone were to kill Stannis or Dany. It isn’t on the same moral level as killing a child, or a spouse who loves and trusts you. It isn't the same as invading and then killing people who won't worship your god or accept you as a leader. It isn't the same as killing a slave, simply because, when their times come, Dany and Stannis will be guilty. After their actions, it would be justice for them to die. I think why other parts of the fandom entertain the idea of Dany as NN while also condemning us for entertaining it, is that Dany's vision does have her being grasped at by hands of her "children" and fans have this idea that she is sacrificing herself/her happiness for the greater good already, and in the AA/Nissa Nissa story, it does sound like she offers herself willingly for the tempering of the sword. So to them, it’s part of Dany’s heroism. Dany's death is inevitable to some, at the hands of Jon is ok, but her not dying a hero, that's unacceptable.

But thinking about how it's been discussed thus far, I can't imagine we're gonna get a romanticized version of the AA/NN myth in canon when so far, it's pretty dark/condemned. None of that precludes Jon killing Dany in what you described as a:

warped sort of way, leaving events open to interpretation (as is usual with the prophecies and legends).

which really sticks out to me as the important part of all this.

The idea that Jon might do it and characters recognize it as a tragic love story a la the myth, that fascinates me because of how Martin has written wild rumors into the story (rumors about Dany, Robb, and Sansa spring to mind), and some of us have written reality and what the public thinks into fic as two distinct things because it feels like a potential way the story might go. What is widely known to be true, like say, Jon being Ned's bastard, may not be the truth that we the readers come to know. There's no guarantee that Westeros will know what the readers know about past or future events. We may get a take on AA/NN, the characters in-world may not understand it the same way.

Jon is undeniably a hero, in a world where institutional corruption is rampant and ideals abandoned, he’s a standout in his values. We would expect, and we find, contrasts between him and these other characters (Dany, Rhaegar, Stannis), primarily, his practical actions that are about saving life/protecting life, even from Stannis, so the idea that he would abandon certain values, it's a tough one. The difference is, while Stannis, Rhaegar, and Dany were acting on these prophecies or visions or dreams, things we're repeatedly warned against trusting in the text, Jon would be taking action based on the fact that Dany is a mass-murderer, a threat to all of Westeros. It isn't a sacrifice to an unknown god for some promised mystical good, it's justice. The religious fanaticism wouldn't be a factor, the killing of an innocent wouldn't be a factor, killing a child wouldn't be a factor, killing to achieve a self-serving end wouldn't be a factor. All the things that have been criticized thus far aren't at play.

The moral quandary presented to the audience in AGOT is killing someone who might be a threat, but is a child at the moment, and Martin presents the sneaky assassination / child killing as abhorrent:

Grand Maester Pycelle cleared his throat, a process that seemed to take some minutes. "My order serves the realm, not the ruler. Once I counseled King Aerys as loyally as I counsel King Robert now, so I bear this girl child of his no ill will. Yet I ask you this—should war come again, how many soldiers will die? How many towns will burn? How many children will be ripped from their mothers to perish on the end of a spear?" He stroked his luxuriant white beard, infinitely sad, infinitely weary. "Is it not wiser, even kinder, that Daenerys Targaryen should die now so that tens of thousands might live?" "Kinder," Varys said. "Oh, well and truly spoken, Grand Maester. It is so true. Should the gods in their caprice grant Daenerys Targaryen a son, the realm must bleed." Littlefinger was the last. As Ned looked to him, Lord Petyr stifled a yawn. "When you find yourself in bed with an ugly woman, the best thing to do is close your eyes and get on with it," he declared. "Waiting won't make the maid any prettier. Kiss her and be done with it." "Kiss her?" Ser Barristan repeated, aghast. "A steel kiss," said Littlefinger. (AGOT, Eddard VIII)

which is all interesting context for Dany later being assassinated, especially because the first lesson Martin gives us on justice is one that Jon is there for, and then is reiterated in relation to Dany:

Ned had heard enough. "You send hired knives to kill a fourteen-year-old girl and still quibble about honor?" He pushed back his chair and stood. "Do it yourself, Robert. The man who passes the sentence should swing the sword. Look her in the eyes before you kill her. See her tears, hear her last words. You owe her that much at least." (AGOT, Eddard VIII)

The convo about killing Dany with LF is about a bedding and before that it was presented in terms of a wedding gift, which makes me squint now knowing the AA/NN stuff:

Yes, it's awful, and I do understand, almost agree with you here:

But in any case, Jon killing a woman will be an act that is antithetical to so many of his values that it seems like it would come close to destroying him even if justified within Jon's universe.

but the way it might tie together the initial discussion of killing Dany and the eventual act weighs heavily with me when determining what Martin might do and why/why not.

The other suggestion is that Arya kills Dany. If having dragons is Chechov's gun for KL burning then Arya being a trained assassin feels like a Chechov's gun for killing Dany. But in that scenario, there is no conflict. No inner struggle. We spent so much of AGOT weighing the morals of killing Dany, it's hard for me to believe when the time comes, it's presented without any moral complexity. Arya is already able and willing to take a life, even when it isn't justified. It doesn't feel right to me that killing Dany would be a presented without an inner struggle, that it would be done easily, as easily as Arya now kills. TBH, it removes the drama if someone other than Jon does it because it will be so highly necessary and just when the time comes. Jon is really the only character who can make it squeamish because of the guy killing a woman thing and because it will be kinslaying.

There is a lot of talk about poison, so I think it's totally possible Arya tries to kill Dany with poison first, but I think Jon is more likely to be the one to successfully kill her, and in a way that calls to mind Ned's opinion on it, See her tears, hear her last words. That would allow Martin to make sure we see it as just/moral, bring home the Targ v Targ issue, and it shades Ned's decisions and values in a very interesting way.

After s8 fans said Ned was wrong to fight against killing Dany in s1, but Martin thinks he was right to object to killing children, so for the two Targ children he was protecting in AGOT (Dany and Jon) to come face to face and one kill the other prevents the conclusion that Ned was wrong. It was the same mercy, the same refusal to see the child of an enemy as an enemy, that saved the boy who will in turn save Westeros. IMO, it's a way to uphold the belief in mercy. I tend to think it’s also Martin’s way of addressing one his questions about his beloved LOTR (what about orc babies etc).

If another person ends Dany, we still get dead Dany, but it doesn't say anything interesting? Killing her wouldn't be a sacrifice on anyone else's part, she won’t be loved and she has to go. But, Jon, who so desperately wants to have honor, if he kills her, it's right as well as an egregious "sin." Ned dishonors himself to protect Sansa (and obvy was committing treason to protect Jon), it feels like coming full circle for Jon, who so wants to be worthy of being a son to Ned to follow his path there too. Also, one thing I expect we’ll keep tracking is kinslaying. Kinslaying comes up with the AA/Nissa Nissa issue in the Stannis storyline, so I do expect that to be addressed in Jon chapters:

We have the whole baby switch to assure us, Jon values human life a great deal. All the same, that involves a moment of cruelty on Jon's side, so Martin isn't interested in keeping him perfectly pure. He likes those moments where doing the right thing is very difficult, even compromising in some way. It's why, while we say Ned committing treason for Jon is a no brainer, Martin writes Ned tortured by it. He likes the inner turmoil over decisions, placing a societal good (honor) against another obligation or ideal and asking what is right.

I wonder if Martin really plans to bring Jon this low, but also how it will be received. The optics of portraying such an ending for Dany given today's sensibilities could be viewed even more dimly than it would have been when Martin started writing the series?

Despite all the ways I think it makes sense, yes, I def think this is one of those areas that if he had finished the series as quickly as he'd hoped, would have gone over better. Dany has dragons, therefore, she will be an overwhelming threat to Westeros, so it isn't like Jon will just randomly kill a woman, yet it's distasteful all the same. Martin is looking at things from the context of his story and the ideas he’s already introduced/talking about though which is why I can wince but kinda understand it. There are other issues where my sensibilities diverge from his, so didn’t like it on the show, I don’t like it for the books, still think it’s probably gonna happen. 🤷🏻‍♀️

[were-bastard]

The Word “Chimera”

(where I ramble on about how I feel connected to calling myself a chimera. Beware, it’s a wee bit long)

I’m wondering again about my connection to the word “chimera”. In the same way that calling myself changeling feels correct, so too does chimera. Not in the sense that I am one in the lion, snake, goat-creature type way– moreso in how I’m a creature that takes great joy in peering over the edge of the abyss we call humanity.

As a werecat, I’m an animal raised by humans, birthed by humans, and often seen as human (with even my body mirroring them in some ways, despite its full inhumanity). I’m quite good at playing as human (at least, I would hope so), but I always feel like something that’s just slightly out of place. Though I know that my nonhumanity stems from my neurodivergency– and not from more spiritual sources– I frequently feel (and have felt since I was young) like a “something else” birthed in place of a human child.

As a neurodivergent and nonhuman child, feeling connected to the idea of “changelings” was somewhat expected. The pull to “chimera”, less so, but still explainable.

To properly explain this, I must preface it with the brief introduction of two stories– the Greek myth of the Minotaur and the Scandinavian folk-tale of “King Lindworm”.

In Greek mythology, the Minotaur is a bull-headed child borne to Pasiphaë– the queen of Crete– after a “union” with a bull given as a gift to her husband, as a gift from Poseidon. She only pursues the bull because of a curse (put upon her by Poseidon as punishment for her husband’s refuseal to sacrifice the bull).

In the Scandinavian story of “King Lindworm”, a queen in desperate want of children (but previously unsuccessful in producing them) heads to a witch for a solution. The witch gives her two roses– one red, one white– only one of which she is meant to consume, in order to birth a child. She instead eats both and gives birth to twins– one a human and one a lindworm.

In both of these stories, it isn’t the conception that’s important to this discussion, but the births. The reason I want to call myself a “chimera” is the way Pasiphaë and the Queen would have felt birthing their sons. With Pasiphaë, at first her child might have seemed to be more “normal” (which is, by the way, an incredibly loaded word)– with human limbs, fingers, and toes (what she might have expected). But over the course of the birth revealed to be something other– supplanting the idea of a plain, human child she held in her mind (very much changeling related, but also the idea of someone being a mixture/amalgam: something more animal than is deemed acceptable).

With the Queen of “King Lindworm”, she doesn’t get the mental “cushioning” of a partially human baby, instead she births something fully nonhuman– a serpent of a child, lacking those expected limbs and little newborn fingers. Despite that, he is still related by blood to his fully human brother and mother, which must, in some way lend him some humanity, right?

I was born a werecat, to a human mother, from a human family. And yet, the most human thing left was my hands– overshadowed by fur and teeth and sharp eyes and a tail.

The feelings of chimera-hood come from that idea of a human bearing something that is very much of their body (and sometimes carrying their image with it, even just in the sense that they were a provider of some of the necessary materials), but clearly not [fully] human.

It’s the feeling of nebulous humanity, but only in the context of profound inhumanity. As a simpler explanation, it’s like how werewolves, selkies, harpies, and things like that can still be fully and completely animals, despite their ties to humanity (often as seen through a folkloric or mythical lens).

Fuck, I just realized I might be folcintera.

[thoughtfullyrainynightmare]

Hiii :) I hope ur doing lovely! I have a request if that’s okay- it’s been over three years since I’ve sent a tumblr request so I hope I’m doing this right butttt,,,,

Fuegoleon with a Black Bulls dragonrider s/o? Pretty much all rest is up to you but I’ve had this idea in my brain for a while, a very strong independent dragonrider, who catches our dear Fue’s eye? Bonus points if she’s good friends with Mereo ? :o

Hey! I'm a tired, and uni is consuming me but aside of that I'm good :3 I hope you're too! And thanks for your patience!! I do hope you like this little ficlet

Pairing: Fuegoleon x f!reader Genre: General Fanfic type: Oneshot Length: ~0,7k Contains: A dragonrider reader, she is friends with Mereo, baffled Fuegoleon, an introductory fic

For a good while Fuegoleon assumed himself to be the only one in the kingdom with anything dragon seeming in his possession. Because dragons were a myth. Something that, perhaps, might have been real creatures that existed back in the day, but had now been reduced into creatures that only existed in stories. Why that was the case, he wasn’t sure. Nor did he particularly spend his time wondering about it, as it made no difference for daily life.

For the purposes that seemed relevant for Clover, he was the only one that could control a dragon, though only a spirit.

However, there was a day when Yami asked to have a meeting with him. On a day that was like any other. To which he agreed, because Yami didn’t request audiences for nothing. And as he waited for Yami to merely appear in the Crimson Lion Kings’ base via a portal, he was baffled to hear an alarm being sounded.

Because there was a large creature with claws and razor sharp teeth that wasn’t Salamander approaching the base.

It had been you, dropping Yami in, because Finral had been sent onto a mission.

And while it wasn’t exactly a first introduction, it did pique his interest; his curiosity. Because... who on earth was the person who controlled a dragon? A creature of fire and ashes from a time he thought was in the past.

So, once he came to seek you at the base, he bore a face that was filled with wonder. A raised eyebrow and questions he wasn’t quite sure if he could ask. But he did. In the most polite manner he knew how.

Which, quite honestly, made sense. After all, since he controlled the Elemental Spirit of Fire, it wasn’t uncalled for, for him to bear an interest for dragons.

“Would you like to meet him?” You asked with faint amusement in your tone. “But perhaps don’t start a fight like your sister did,” you added with a laugh, which caught him off guard.

Because he wasn’t aware that you had already had run-ins with Mereoleona. Not that she would necessarily mention such things.

“You know my sister?” He asked, even more bewildered.

“I do,” you chuckled. “We spend quite a lot of time around Yultim, so we ran into Mereo, who was very intrigued. Wanted to have a brawl,” you mused.

To which he blinked, and shrugged.

Pinched the bridge of his nose.

Because yeah... that sounded like Mereoleona-aneue.

“You never answered my question,” you noted after a moment of silence.

His eyes turned to you. A stern, attentive gaze. Eyes of fire and sheer power of will.

Which closed in a slow blink and a chuckle.

“I suppose I didn’t,” he agreed with amusement. “Yes, I would be delighted to meet him,” he admitted.

So you nodded and led him to the backyard of the base, where your beloved dragon companion was happily napping. Until you approached, which made him open his eyes, and look at the two of you. But mostly towards Fuegoleon.

Salamander appeared as well.

And as.... as you watched the man and the spirit approach your companion, there was a strange feeling. An inkling feeling of a kind. That this man, who was approaching your dragon, with his hand before him.

The man who was allowed to pet your dragon, by your dragon, might become something more. A friend at least. Because... there weren’t too many like you in the world. Nor were there particularly many like him, those that commanded an elemental spirit, around either. So... perhaps you could connect over it. Perhaps you might find something in common.

There was a look.

From him.

To you.

A look that you couldn’t quite decipher. But it wasn’t a look you minded. It was something of a mix of gratitude, awe, curiosity and... dare you guess affection? Or perhaps just understanding. Only time would tell.

[blenselche]

Why do you ship finn/fern? I want to know what you see in it. You don't have to answer if you don't want to, I think rare ships and why people like them are interesting.

how can i not when the show literally

ok but forreal, this is long so I'm throwing it under a cut, my fern brainworm really got away from me here...

Finn and Fern's story at its most bare bones is: someone incredibly damaged by abandonment is torn in half and those halves abandon each other. Fern does it literally, Finn more so emotionally. Only when it's too late does one half try to rectify the situation, showing unending patience and unconditional love and being met with vitriol and avoidance. And then... acceptance, and with that acceptance is the ultimate abandonment: death. Tragic, hurts just right. Add onto that-- their relationship references The Green Knight and the Narcissus Myth. The Narcissus myth comes through loudly in CAWM especially. My fav of Ovid's Metamorphoses and all Greek mythology, so that's def a factor. My dad said I cried when he read it to me for the first time lmao.

I don't ship them during/in canon. In canon all I can see is something nebulous and one sided, and we don't need to read into subtext for that, we can just appreciate the show as it's written: Finn helps create this person that 100% gets him after being the odd one out his whole life, Fern's existence even soothes his abandonment issues with a curse that binds them together forever, but he clings too close and doesn't give Fern space, reminding him of how he falls short. Ultimately this want to be "even closer" (very smooth, Finn) is what drives them apart. It's good where it is, it's a great starting point for shipping.

Where I ship them is past canon, blowing subtext up into large print font to pull Fern out of plot device hell into his own character, piggy backing off what we know about the grass demon.

The grass demon/blade was not made to serve the powers of good, but it actively changes/curbs its behavior for the approval of its hero wielder. It helps Finn with anything that deeply emotionally moves him (holding on to Martin, building the tower) keeps him out of unneeded conflict (refusing to attack the vamp king) helps impress his romantic interest (flute spell) it even reverses his arm nullification twice. The grass demon keeps him safe but it goes above and beyond its purpose for Finn's happiness. It reluctantly joins the fight against Bandit Princess because that sword is still Finn, and when its blade pierces/breaks the quillion it even cocoons the Finn Sword's essence safely away. Though, no matter how much good it might do it is still a demon. It has no morals, and doesn't understand them, all it cares about is Finn's safety and well being. When one of Finn's loved ones hurts him it doesn't hesitate to protect him, but (of course) Finn retaliates-- and so it creates a Finn of its own, one that won't hurt it for trying to keep him safe and happy. (OOPS! that backfired.) I love the grass demon, I love what we can glean about it because of its actions through the show and what that could mean for Fern and Fern's feelings surrounding Finn. This is the foundations of the ship to me.

I like to ship them when Fern remembers all of this/what he is (a demon that basically consumed half of Finn's soul), has accepted himself and has integrated his two ego states. We don't need to do any legwork on Finn's end. Dude's already weird enough about Fern canonically, but I do like to build his guilt up until he's a mess on the floor, crying over his past mistake of assuming Fern needed saving in the first place (the thing that leads Finn to ignorantly prompting/assisting in his suicide), haunted by the words of Fern's time echo from the The Beginning of The End comic, never truly being able to trust if he's actually helping someone again.

I like to play in that space of au/hc: a demon and the man he's bound to/he shares a soul with who loves him unconditionally, reunited somehow (a wish, diverging from canon, Penelope and Fern's next incarnation finding one another, etc) and coming to terms with the baggage of all the shit they inflicted on one another. Then maybe Fern can finally hear Finn out without the cloud of festering insecurity when he tells him again how he'd still like to be "even closer".

At its simplest I like finn/fern because I love Fern, and finally accepting and seeing Finn as a completely different person (enough to engage in a relationship, whether sexual/romantic/queer platonic/something that no label fits because of what they are, whatever) speaks to an ultimate form of self actualization, and Fern really deserves to feel that level of "himself" imo.

Hope that was adequately interesting.

[sleeps-muse-24]

Vore Pt. 1

Hi everyone! Hope everyone is having a good day! This is some Vessel worship in honor of their North American tour! Please enjoy!

MDNI!!!! Warning: Dom!Vesselxreader, Impact Play, pure nasty smut.

3k words

~~~~

They were barely through the door before he was on her, lips on her like a breathless man trying to consume her entire being. Pressing her up against the door, she met him with the same fervor.

For a brief moment, she wanted to kick herself for what she was doing. There were so many other places she could go if she wanted to take someone home. But picking up a man from her own bookstore seemed like a bad idea in a variety of different ways.

But when he came in at eleven-thirty p.m asking for any books on ancient myth, whatever culture, she couldn’t resist. Especially paired with the English accent, near pitch black hair, and deep brown eyes that pulled her in immediately, with the tight black jeans, the random band t-shirt that she vaguely recognized, and open dark grey flannel overtop. It made her core clench at wanting to see underneath. 

It was like she was suddenly under the spell of a vampire, and she didn’t want to get out.

His hands were large, scorching her skin through her clothes. As desperate for her as she was for him. He might’ve been lanky, but the sinews of his muscles were tightly corded like a swimmer. 

He pulled away from her mouth, pressing hard kisses to her neck sending pleasure down to her clit.

Winding her fingers into his inky locks, she moaned, “What even is your name?”

A hand replaced his mouth around her neck, squeezing ever so tightly, as he pulled away to look at her. A seductive smirk took over his face, showcasing the slightly misaligned white teeth. “Why do you need to know, pet?”

“What am I supposed to scream?”

His eyes turned almost black at the raspy nature of her response. He wet his full lips, leaning into her ear. He paused for a second letting his breath raise goosebumps on her skin before ordering, “Ves. You can call me Ves.” “What is that? A family name?” She snorted despite herself

The next thing she knew, she was pressed against her apartment door, hands locked above her head by one of his. His free hand trailed fingers tauntingly down her spine before rubbing the globes of her ass. “Is that really how you talk to the man who is about to worship you tonight?” Her legs shook in her boots.

Worship.

The way he said it, he meant it. There was a deep conviction from somewhere her lust-addled brain couldn’t comprehend. 

Swallowing, she doubled down. “If you can’t handle my mouth, what makes you think you can handle the rest of me?” Ves merely hummed, swift fingers reaching to the front of her jeans undoing the button and yanking them down in one fell swoop. His deep groan when her skin was exposed, grabbing a handful of it. It was hard enough to be almost painful, and it made her pussy pulse in need. She needed it hard…and soon.

“It’s cute how you think you can top me, pet.” He leaned forward, the heat of him warming her back. “But I know exactly how to handle a brat like you.”

Three sharp stinging slaps landed on her right asscheek.

“God! Fuck!” Despite the pain–and definitely because of it–she ached to rub her thighs together to give herself some friction. Something to release the pleasure coiling in her stomach tighter and tighter with each slap that rained down.

Eight slaps in total. Each one painful and oh so delicious.

“Please,” she begged, her normal mind slipping away only to be replaced with the submissive she was deep down.

“Please what, pet?” Ves chided behind her. Slipping a hand around her front, he hissed through his teeth when his long fingers parted her folds and found how soaked she was. “Do you think you’ve earned my forgiveness for that mouth?”

She was burning. She needed to cum more than she needed air, but he wasn’t going to let her if she didn’t work for it. She just knew it in her bones. Turning her head to look back at him, he looked like a dark God in her apartment. Backlit by the faint digital lights in her kitchen, he was sex, sin, and darkness all wrapped into one ready to consume her wholly. And she was willing to let him. “Let me go, and I can earn it. Please, I can earn it.”

Ves took a shuddering breath, visibly affected by her words. Dark eyes search her desperate ones for a moment, basking in the dominance powerplay happening, before nodding. “I control the pace.”

“Anything,” she whispered.

“Careful, pet. Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” He released her. She quickly turned around and dropped to her knees before him. He stroked the side of her face briefly before a hand tangled in her hair, giving it a controlled tug. “Green means you’re good. Yellow means slow down. Red is full stop no matter what. If you can’t speak then tap my thigh three times if you start to panic.”

She knew those terms well, it was normal to brief safe words and actions before, but there wasn’t anyone who had said it with so much conviction that she actually believed them. But with Ves’ hand tangled in her hair, staring down at her with something swimming in his eyes, she believed him. Nodding, she undid his pants and dragged them down his legs.

Her mouth watered at what he was hiding underneath those tight black jeans. A thick, long cock was her gift–one that wasn’t quite sure if she could manage.

But she damn well was going to try.

“Open, pet,” Ves, ordered.

Gripping his thighs for support, she opened her mouth wide. 

His cock slid home, gently at first, letting her get used to his size. Slowly, he worked it in until every thrust was hitting the back of her throat. Breathing through her nose the best she could, she ran her tongue on the sensitive part of his shaft. 

Ves hissed when her teeth gently scraped by accident. “Yes, pet. Just like that.”

Pain. He liked pain just like she did.

Tears stung her eyes as he thrusted harder, the hand gripping her head tightly so he could fuck her face. She moaned at the bite of pain. He groaned at the vibrations coating his dick. “Okay, pet,” he breathed, “Are you ready to take more?”

She gripped his thighs harder.

“Yeah.” Ves’ pace slowed enough that she inhaled deeply through her nose. Relaxing her throat, he inched back into her mouth only this time, not stopping at the back of her throat. Ves tightened his grip, ordering, “Breath for me. You have to breath for me.” She was trying. God, she was trying. Tears stung her eyes as he carefully inched down her throat. He was so big, almost bordering on too big.

“You can take it, pet,” he praised her groaning when she faux swallowed and her throat muscles tightened around him. Rubbing her tongue on the underside of his cock, she realized she wanted him to get off. “Gods, you take me so well.”

Closing her jaw slightly, her teeth hit him once again and that little bite of pain was Ves’ undoing. “Fuck!” He slammed his fist against the wall as he came down her throat.

She swallowed every drop like she would never drink again. 

He pulled out of her mouth with a pop.

She knelt there gasping for air, tears tracking unceremoniously down her face. Ves knelt immediately, pulling her into a warm embrace. “You did so good,” he cooed, stroking her back and cradling her head. She hiccuped. Why on earth was she crying? “You did so so good for me. I’m so proud of you.” She clutched him tightly, halfway noticing that the both of them had their shirts on but missing pants, as his praise lit her up from the inside out. It felt so good–to be praised. Not a lot of her previous partners did it, and it helped soothe something in her soul.

He held her as she calmed down, and cupped her face when her tears dried. “How’re you feeling?”

“Green,” she rasped.

Ves’ thumb rubbed her cheek, the dark pools of endless night that were his eyes drawing her in. “Are you sure? Because I can leave now and skip down the street clicking my heels. There is no pressure to continue.”

Her heart melted. Grasping his wrists, she leaned forward and pressed her lips gently to his. This was a different meeting than when they first got the apartment. They were so pent up from the back and forth at the bookstore, the flirting clouding their minds with lust.

No, this was different. Ves was slow, savoring each movement and matching her at every turn. Tracing the tip of her tongue along the seam of his lips, he groaned. The kiss got deeper, and Ves slid his hands under her ass.

She sucked in a breath. “I’ll take care of you, pet,” Ves promised into her. “I’ll take such good care of you, please let me.” The way he begged, pleaded with her sent shivers down to her clit. She nodded. “Yes, Ves.”

She was in his arms in a second, their lips never leaving for a moment. Somehow, they made it to her room, Ves kicking the door closed behind them.

Laying her down gently on her covers, he stripped off his shirt revealing those lean corded muscles she felt earlier. He wasn’t bulky but he was a work of art. Moonlight trickled in from her window, bathing him in shadows.

Sex and sin.

She took her own shirt off, letting him drink in her body to the fullest. The moment was filled with nothing but his increasingly heavy breathing as his eyes roamed her form. Ves wet his lips before kneeling in front of her. “The debt that I owe,” he whispered.

Her brows pinched. “What?”

“Touch yourself, pet,” he said, fisting his cock. “Show me how you like it.”

Her hand slid down her body of its own accord. Electricity shot through her when her fingers found her clit. The pressure that was building in her lower abdomen was like a powder keg ready to go off. Circles and circles drew on her clit, eyes never leaving Ves’. He pumped his cock in time with her hand, matching her in every way.

It was the most intimate thing she had ever experienced.

Her orgasm was close. It was just there, but she couldn’t get there. She whimpered in frustration.

Ves must have seen it on her face because he crawled to her getting right between her legs–so close that he inhaled deeply the scent between her thighs. “What do you need, pet?”

She only whimpered, applying more pressure to her clit. But it didn’t do what she thought it would.

His hands caressed her outer legs, soothing the frustration and keeping her focused on him. “Tell me what you need and I’ll give it you. I’ll give you anything.” “I don’t–” She threw her head back “--I don’t know.” Kisses blazed a trail up her inner thigh. He gently removed her hand from herself. “May I?”

She huffed a laugh. “Such a gentleman.” 

Ves chuckled, the sound soothing the rapid heartbeat in her ears. “For you, always.” Trying not to let the words pierce her heart, she wet her lips and nodded. 

Fingers spread her open, observing her most intimately. Then his thumb touched her clit and he blew on her hot sex.

She moaned as he began to draw circles–like she had done–but with a steady hand. It was there, she could taste her orgasm creeping up, she just needed...fuck what did she need!

“Shhhhhhhh,” he cooed, rubbing her clit faster. “Do you trust me to give you what you need?”

“Yes, Ves!” She cried. “Yes!”

“That’s my good girl.”

He plunged two fingers into her, pumping them fast before pinching her clit.

It was hot as her orgasm tore through her. Scalding her from the inside out, giving and taking from her. Through it all, Ves was there praising her and thrusting his fingers prolonging the high.

When she came back down, he crawled into bed next to her, stroking her face.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

He smiled, the sight beautiful and pure. “Thank you for sharing that with me.”

“You’re weird.” She chuckled.

Brushing a piece of sweaty hair from her forehead, he traced the lines of her face. “Why is that weird?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged. Feeling emboldened by his exploration, she placed a hand on his chest. He was warm to the touch, but it was his heart that drew her attention. It was beating like he ran a race. “It’s nothing special.” Ves stopped. Her words pierced something inside him. 

Then his hand enveloped her jaw making her look at him. The seriousness that etched his features was a drastic change to the sexual beast she had seen up until this point. “You letting me in your home, inside of you, is nothing short of special to me. You are special. Don’t downplay yourself because it’s what you think I want to hear.” Her foundation shook underneath the weight of his words. He meant every single one of them.

She wet her lips, and not knowing what else to say and not wanting to let Ves–a complete stranger–see how his words struck a cord, she pushed him on his back. Straddling him, she trailed kisses down his body. Each kiss was lingering marring his skin red.

Hickeys.

She was leaving a blazing trail of hickeys down Ves’ body marking him up as her own. Somewhere in the recesses of her mind, she knew he wasn’t hers, but for the night…the night he was all hers.

“Pet, if you keep this up…” the open-ended warning made her clench. Nipping at the spot she was working on, she hoped it would break his resolve.

And it did.

She was on her back before she could blink. Holding her arms above her head, he palmed her full breast. “They’re so perfect.” He rolled her nipple between his fingers. “Just perfect for me.” Whimpering, her hips rolled against his. Need pooling once again despite her monster orgasm a few minutes ago. Ves humed, getting comfortable between her open legs, his cock rubbing against her folds. “Is that what you need? Do you need my hard cock inside you?”

“Yes!” She all but screamed. 

Licking her nipple, she squirmed. She needed it so bad, ached for it in a way that she had never felt before. 

“You have been so good,” he mused, notching the head at her entrance. “Such a good girl for me.” “Please,” she begged, tugging at his hold on her hands.

“Ah ah ah. I need you to tell me something first.” “Anything, Ves. Please.” 

“What did I say about being careful with that word.” Ves planted a kiss to her shoulder. “Tell me your my good girl.”

Her brows pinched but she said, “I’m a good girl.”

He nipped her skin as punishment. “Wrong. You’re my good girl.” Her core clenched. He wanted ownership. To complete the dominance over her. She wet her lips…and let go. “I’m your good girl.”

Ves sank slowly home inside her. He was larger inside her than she thought, stretching her out deliciously. And he kept going until he was fully seated inside her, the tip kissing her cervix. He released his hold on her hands to plank above her, his arms shaking with exertion on his speed.

She wrapped her arms around his shoulders immediately, sinking her fingers into the inky blackness of his hair. The soft strands slick with sweat from the night. “Gods you’re so tight.”

Moaning, she also wrapped her legs around his trimmed waist. “Please, Ves.”

“I know, pet.” He dropped a kiss on her forehead. “I know.”

With that, he slowly thrusted into her. Every thrust was slow but with enough force that left her breathless. He hit every place inside her that made her toes curl.

Her orgasm was building, her legs shaking as he got faster. Their groans mixing together in a symphony of sounds. “You take me so well. Like you were made for me,” he praised her. 

“Yours, Ves,” She promised breathlessly.

He made a sound like a growl and sped up. Drilling her into her bed that she was sure it would leave a permanent mark. And she loved it. She met every thrust with her hips, taking him and owning him as much as he was owning her.

“That’s right,” he panted, sliding a hand to her neck. Not squeezing but dominating. “This pussy is mine. Only mine.”

“Yes, yes!”

“Gah!” The veins in his neck bulged. He was getting close. So was she. “I’m going to cum. I’m going to cum in my pussy.”

“Please!” She begged. Dragging a hand from his hair, she ranked her nails down his chest leaving five claw marks.

That did it.

“FUCK!” Ves slammed home, squeezing her neck. The lack of oxygen triggered her orgasm. They were cumming together.

They were everywhere together. Somewhere out of their bodies, their insides melding to one another. Everything lay bare to the other.

It was beautiful.

It was explosive.

It was scary.

Ves collapsed on her, panting. “Color?”

“Green.”

He nodded against her. Planting a kiss to her ear, he pulled out of her gently.

She sucked a sharp breath as he left her, the ache from his size and how deep he was already settling in. “Bathroom?”

Pointing a shaky hand to the door to the right, she fought to catch her breath.

The water turned on and there were some odd squishing sounds before Ves remerged with a washcloth in his hand.

“What’re you��”

Ves’ brow furrowed. “Aftercare?”

“Ah.”

His hand gripped her thigh making her refocus her attention on him. There was concern etched into his sharp features. It wove deep in her emotionally vulnerable heart. “Have you never had aftercare before?”

“I have.” 

His brow rose at her too-quick response. Shaking his head, he spread her legs and gently placed the washcloth on her sex. “You deserve better than me bolting out the door after that.”

The warm cloth felt amazing but she squirmed uncomfortably. “It’s really okay. It’s late, I know someone probably wants to know where you are.”

“This is the bare minimum, pet,” he told her vehemently. “We both need this.”

Swallowing, she nodded and let him clean her up, depositing the cloth in her hamper in the corner of her room before pulling the covers down on her bed and getting both of them underneath it. Tucking her face into his shoulder, their legs interweaved with each other.

She was warm, sated, and safe.

Her heart cracked open.

Ves shouldn’t stay. He couldn’t. It would break her to pieces. The emotional come down from sex like this was going to be intense. And it was going to be worse if he was there in the morning.

“Shhhhhhhh.” He stroked her suddenly tense back muscles. “Just for a minute.” A minute.

She could do a minute.

She could allow herself a minute of intimacy.

“One minute,” she agreed snuggling deeper into him.

Ves humed a tune that scratched familiarity in her brain. She knew that song but as soon as she focused on it, it fluttered away. Sleep was pulling her deeper and deeper down.

So far down, she barely noticed the slight black paint on her fingertips.