#KNOWING HOW EVERYTHING WILL END BEFORE YOU EVEN BEGIN IS NOT A VALID CRITICISM

[miraculouslbcnreactions]

Granted, tumblr’s search function may broken but I can’t find a post on your blog centered on Alya’s writing. As a person constantly on the look out for critical examination of Alya’s role in the narrative and the compromises on her principles, relationships and competences made to artificially engineer the episode’s story, I’d be very interested to see your thoughts

I use Alya's writing as an example of a character done dirty all the time, but I don't think I've ever done a sugar post focused on her and I totally should. Before we get into it, I will openly admit that her bad writing bothers me more than Marinette's or Adrien's because she is best girl and we stan her. What can I say, I'm a writer whose best friend is an artist with a diagnosed anxiety disorder. I like characters who are writers and with artsy, anxiety-ridden best friends. They are my people and that gives us a great starting point for this post.

Marinette is the unambiguous main character of the show, so it makes sense to design both her hero partner and her best friend around balancing her out, giving them strengths to fill out the spots where she is weak. It's how you make a strong cast. When Alya is allowed the shine, she fills that balance role wonderfully and I love it! Some of my favorite moments are when Marinette goes on one of her rants and cool-headed Alya drags her back down to Earth:

Marinette: We're gonna stroll over there real cool as if we just happened to be passing by. Alya: Then what? Marinette: Then? I'll invite him out for a fruit smoothie at the end of the photo shoot! Then, we'll get married! Live happily ever after in a beautiful house and have two kids? No, three. And a dog! Maybe a cat? Nah, forget the cat. A hamster! I love hamsters! Alya: Let's just start with just happen to be passing by and see if we can get to that smoothie.

This banter from Stormy Weather is fantastic. It's exactly the type of thing I want to see from these two as it gives Alya a very different flavor of supporting role from Adrien. While Alya and Adrien are both card holding members of the Marinette hype squad, Alya is more of a voice of reason while Adrien is there to validate Marinette and follow her crazy schemes without question.

This brings us to the first issue with Alya's writing: when the plot demands it, they make her a gullible tabloid journalist even though it goes against everything her character should stand for. The reasons I'm comfortable saying this are many. The first one is that Alya is very clearly supposed to be seen as a serious journalist. That's why you get scenes like this one from Feast:

Alya: Now you know back in the day sculptures were painted, right? Most of the paint vanished over time, but tiny microscopic pigments still remain. Thanks to this special app, witness how it originally looked. But here's the big thing. All these works of art have something in common. It's the same symbol! Look, everywhere. It's like some kind of secret society emblem. As if a kind of Order of the Guardians has been watching over the superheroes since the beginning of time!

This scene would not exist if Alya was supposed to be the kind of person who only cared about getting blog hits because this type of content isn't where the money is. But money and clout aren't what Alya cares about. She's just a passionate reporter (or fan girl) who wants to know everything she can and who is having fun sharing her obsession with the world. This is an extremely important aspect of her character because it brings us to reason two that she clearly wasn't meant to be a clout chaser: if she was a tabloid journalist who only cared about hits, then she should have never been given a miraculous.

I could go on a rant her about how poorly Alya's blog is used after she becomes Rena Rouge, but I'll spare you the word count and just say that, as soon as she joined the team, she should have stopped sharing secrets on the blog. It makes sense that a blog would initially fill her need to share the fine details of her obsession, but once she's on the team, the blog should have been replaced by her teammates. She could still have the blog, but it shouldn't have things like the freaking guide to how the miraculous work that we see in the season four episode Gabriel Agreste:

Alya: The Miraculous are magical jewels that give powers to superheroes, like Ladybug's earrings and Cat Noir's ring. But supervillain Shadow Moth also has two Miraculousbrooches in his possession, and they will give him his powers. We can figure out from this that the Miraculous can either make a superhero or a supervillain. It's all riding on who wears it, which is why these jewels can't fall into just anybody's hands.

Alya, you are supposed to be Marinette's sole confidante at this point. Why are you giving the world this information? The writers are doing you dirty, my dear, and I'm so sorry. The best I can do is to promise to never treat you like this in my stuff.

Now, to be fair, there is some nuance to this. Alya is a human being. She's allowed to have flaws, so I can absolutely forgive her for getting caught up in the moment and posting scoops to her blog without thinking (see: Oblivio). That's honestly a great weakness for her character to have as it makes perfect sense for a fan girl to fan girl. At the same time, if you want to have a fan girl character who becomes part of the things she's a fan of, then you usually need to give that character something that will tone them down and make full fan girl mode something other than the standard setting.

Making your fan girl a serious reporter is a great way to do that! It allows you to have that initial bust of fan girl hype that quickly switches into serious get-the-details mode. Without that kind of complexity, Alya would just be another Wayhem and one Wayhem is already one too many.

While I will give Alya some grace on this topic and even call it a good thing for her character, the same cannot be said for her writing because the writers fail to embrace her hype as an in-the-moment weakness and it ruins her character. To put it another way, a lapse in judgement about posting a photo is excusable as a photo is quickly acquired and posted. A lapse in judgement about a full interview with a total rando who is claiming to be Ladybug's best friend is not excusable (see: Volpina). It's a completely different flavor of poor judgement as - at a minimum - it requires Alya to stand there talking to a person for several minutes and never once question what that person is saying. Those are not the behaviors of a good journalist.

Of course, this brings us to the most glaring example of Alya's character assassination: the Lila thing. Almost everything about this arc paints Alya as a terrible friend, which is a massive missed opportunity as Lila is the perfect antagonist for Alya! Who better to take down a liar than a truth seeker? It's such an easy way to give Alya her own mission to focus on, especially if you make Lila more subtle. You don't even need to have Alya believe Marinette without question. Just have her be an investigative journalist who is like, "You know what, this new girl clearly bothers Marinette and I know Marinette can get caught up in her own head, but it doesn't usually last this long. I think something is up, so I'm going to use my skills to see if Lila is telling the truth that way I know if I'm supporting the right person here." Don't have your character claim that she checks her sources and does research if you're going to turn around and have her believe whatever she hears without checking any of it!

Even outside of the Lila thing, I wish we saw more of Alya's research skills! They were such a good thing to give Marinette's best friend as Marinette is great at focusing on a clear task, but research is the kind of thing that would overwhelm her, so it makes perfect sense to make her best friend a researcher as that lets the team have someone to help track down whatever Gabriel is calling himself this week. The writers even understood this to some extent as we saw in Mr. Pigeon 72:

Alya: Marinette, how long have you been working on this? Ladybug: I dunno, six-seven days, maybe ten. Now that we're on spring break, I finally have time to put my whole heart into it! Alya: When was the last time you worked on one of your own designs? Ladybug: I do loads of designing! Look! (pointing to the contraption at her door) I designed a security system so that nobody can enter my room when I'm not in it. And if I put on this hat (puts on modified hat) I hear everything that's going on in here, even when I'm out of the room. Alya: I'm gonna have to break it to you because I'm the only one who can. THIS IS TOTALLY INSANE! Girl, trust your BFF. When I'm researching something obsessively and I can't think of anything else, that's when my mind can get really blocked. You know what you need most right now? A break! Ladybug: No way! No breaks until I find out how to keep Shadow Moth from reakumatizing people!

Remember who ultimately figures out how to keep Shadow Moth from reakumatizing people in this episode? Alya! Because her creative style is all about researching and looking at the evidence. You know, the classic skill set of a reporter?

I really do mean it when I say that the show has a fantastic setup for telling a good story. Alya's character should have been a perfect addition to Marinette's team. My favorite lineup is the line up from season two with Kagami and Luka in non-love-interest bonus roles that I won't get into here since it's a little too deviant from canon to make sense without explanation. Instead, I'll just give you the clear roles they perfectly set up and then squandered for the original miraculous five:

Ladybug: Battlefield commander

Rena Rouge: Big Picture Strategist (basically Marinette excels at reactive thinking/leading during a battle while Alya excels more at proactive thinking/long-term tactics)

Chat Noir: Peacekeeper/Heart/Hype Man

Carapace: Protector/Stop Button (much like Alya and Marinette, Nino and Adrien should have been two sides of the same coin with Adrien being focused on making everyone happy while Nino focuses on keeping everyone safe)

Queen Bee: Wild Card/Chaos Element (I love a good chaos element who is there to suggest the options that won't occur to people who have been raised to follow the rules.)

I'll also point out that this lineup would show that the characters weren't interchangeable and make the two main couples feel more unique and meant for each other. For example, Nino's tendency to encourage others to stay safe would pair terribly with Marinette's need to not get too caught up in her own thoughts. The second Nino second guesses one of her plans she'd fall apart, so she needs Adrien to be her Chat Noir. Similarly, Alya's impulsivity weakness would make her a terrible match for go, go, go Hype Noir! She needs a partner who makes her take two seconds to second guess herself. There was so much potential here you guys! So much potential! It could have been beautiful! Instead, we got canon...

There you go, my broad love letter to Alya. I could keep going, but you didn't request a specific topic, so I'm just going to end it there. Feel free to ask for more, but please do it in another ask as this is already super long and - out of kindness to my followers- I try to avoid essay after essay on the same post unless they really need to be connected.

[allmannerofmalady]

In continuation of my clownery, I started a new DATV playthrough because my beloved Inquisitor looked so jarring I had to remake her and replay like 20 hours of the game. But hey, I made peace with the fact that I am playing DATV to wrap up Inquisition and get an ending scene at this point, I'm not currently foreseeing a second playthrough, so I gotta do it right, y'know?

Spoilers, and me complaining at extreme length, yet again, about my own personal expectations vs reality into the void. Please ignore if DATV negativity is something you prefer to stay away from, protect your peace & what you enjoy.

So I replay HOURS. I'm having fun killing everything as fast as I can - I don't know what it is about playing as a rogue in this game that has tickled my ADHD brain so much, but I'm surprisingly really good at the arrow bonanza and relentless enemy aggro?! This turn based bitch? I digress.

I see my bb Inquisitor Lavellan - she still doesn't look like herself, but I can live with it. She got some ill-advised fillers in Tevinter, she's been through a lot, let her LIVE.

This time around my strategy is pure lore hunting. I'm getting every codex, I'm SQUEEZING this playthrough for whatever lore/easter eggs I can get because idk if I'm going to play again. I got all of Solas' murals early on, got Mythal's essence before Weisshaupt even, I think. BUT WAIT! I have one more treat! The locked room in the Lighthouse! Solas' study! There must be something juicy for all the effort, right? RIGHT? :'D

I know it's been beaten to death, but PERSONALLY, the game still feels incredibly flat to me, jarringly so. If I'm in the Dreadwolf's home, I want to snoop. I want Rook to look through his library, his books, his garbage bin. I even remember the devs saying they wanted being in the Lighthouse to feel an old friends house, or something? I could be wrong, my brain is fried. It's not just a Solas thing - I'm playing this game because I'm desperate for info about the characters I love, but as Rook, we are IN Solas' HQ and I want to rip open the floorboards. I'm trying to RP as much as I can RP in this G.

Anyway, I was so thirsty for something more, something deeper than just these lovely environments I cant do much with, and notes on how Solas hoards raisins - so I collected the wisps and did all the things to unlock the second door in the Lighthouse, forever booboo the fool, thinking I would get some juicy content or something. Trying to stay positive.

No. NO. I got some gear, another empty room Rook has no comments on, and fine, some of Solas' observations on the anchor. It does seem to confirm he kept the Inquisitor’s arm aaaand I love him your honour.

Back to backflipping and shooting arrows in the air, and wanting to grab Emmrich by the beautiful lapels to shake him and ask about the Pentaghast family. Where's my WIFE --

On to the Weisshaupt mission, which was actually ridiculously fun to play - until I was told Weisshaupt is gone haha wow great love that at least the Inquisitor & gang are keeping Southern Thedas safe *subtle foreshadowing* 😃🤞 weeee

I was SO MAD at myself for expecting more like the clown that I am, it was something dumb but just annoyed me all over again and got me all… opinionated 🫠

So, I'm mad again. I cannot begin to articulate my feelings about the incredible amount of storylines and lore we've lost with the decisions made in DATV's writing - they've already been written so eloquently by much greater minds than myself. SO I'm just laughing my way through the pain 🤡

People pleaser that I am, I see other creators I've followed and loved for ages defend the game's choices, tell others they lack media literacy, that your criticisms mean you have rose tinted glasses about the previous games - whatever, your opinion can be valid without tearing others down. So, I genuinely thought something was wrong with me for being so hung up on details. But I can't even engage in fan theories anymore because I'm so jaded at this point. When I see new deep dives into lore-based theories on the game, 99% of the time my mind goes "There is no deeper meaning. They just wanted to wrap it up." Why do you think this thing happened? What do you think that thing is hinting? Nothing. And this is coming from someone who played all the games, owns all the novels, art books, World of Thedas I and II, the bloody Inquisitor lamp from the BioWare store LOL, I was primed and ready to engage in these conversations, but I can't. I have nothing to say that won't end in a cynical answer, and maybe that's because I'm also jaded by working in the game-adjacent VFX industry.

The factions are, yet again, fun but shallow, the logic confusing, and lack much of a backstory for Rook (I think Grey Wardens and Mourn Watchers seem to be the best developed from other reviews and playthroughs, I've only played extensively as a Shadow Dragon, to be fair). Why are you a mage in this one faction? Why are you a rogue in another when it doesn't make sense without a story to support it? It's all this beautiful candy floss that melts away the minute I stop and think about it. And then the cynic in me thinks - these are probably vestiges of the live service part of the game that EA was pushing for. I have to slap myself and stop looking for deeper meaning within corporate decisionsssss there is no swimming pool behind that closed door you needed 7 wisps for 😃

I desperately did not want this to be the case. I was hyped. I preordered the game and organized vacation around it, I'm too old and dealing with way too many crappy personal things to just be a hater for the sake of being a hater. Gaming and Dragon Age are my comfort spaces. But for the LIFE of me, I can't imagine playing DATV again once I finish, let alone more times than I can count like the previous games. Or imagine listening to 4 hours of Youtube videos of party banter to analyze, or even imagine how companions would react to certain things because they feel so stiff. Everything is beautiful, but sterile.

I do love Emmrich - I'm enjoying his storyline and romance, it's like the loveliest most whimsical Vincent Price Pixar romance, but still, something is always missing with the characters even as some do grow on me. I can't imagine anything close to just the party banter ALONE between Solas and Iron Bull. Cole. Fenris and Anders. And to be clear - the whole DA was GRITTY and DARK, DAO supremacy - NOT ME. I love all the games but they have always been whimsical and silly, cringey at times, and did not take themselves seriously. I remember doing the quest where Hawke is running around trying to keep Aveline's date with Donnic from going south, cracking up at how ridiculous it was, and just thinking - gods I LOVE this game.

Speaking of romance, while I'm enjoying how sweet the romance with Emmrich is, when I see others complaining about lack of spice... ahem. I still cannot get over the art style when it comes to characters. This is subjective, and a me problem - I still find it jarring. I don't like the proportions, the bloom, how smooth everyone looks. They still mostly look like cartoons to me, with no body hair and the big heads, and I find everyone's hands so distracting because they look like plasticine. I'm ok with no spice between these characters with their current designs lol let me leave it at that. Ok, except for Felassan and Solas, chef's kiss, no notes.

Solas and story elements directly around him still mostly hold the familiar weight, for the most part. I think credit goes to his amazing VA and the strength of what was likely written for his arc from the very start, before the rewrites and dev hell the game went through. I still have opinions, obviously, but even as a ride or die Solavellan I don't like having the Solavellan angle hijack conversations, so I'm not going to go there. If I'm going to criticize stuff I'll do it as a gamer/DA fan first, egg lover and apologist second.

As I reach the end of Act 2, the game continues to makes me feel like I'm stripped of all agency after a lifetime of playing choice-based games. I talk to companions when it allows me to, then they are relegated to set dressing. My conversation choices all feel the same, or don't match what I'm choosing sometimes. The Lighthouse does not feel like the vibrant hub it was sold as. I am on quests I mostly cannot accept or reject. I cannot interact with my surroundings unless it is gameified (light a candle, move a crystal). The companions abilities are all just - platforming? I know I sound hyperbolic, but it's all I can see currently.

I played Persona 5 from end to end, twice. I played FFXVI. I loved both, had no issues with their linear storytelling, and how the game led you to their end points. Those games are not DA, they did not have the expectations you would have from a BioWare title 10 years in the making. You were not lured in by tales of an incredible character creator, teased about what might be coming from previous games, told this was a sequel to an immersive fantasy RPG series in a beloved fantasy world where the defining studio mechanic was CHOICES MATTER, even when they changed a lot of other things from title to title. In P5/FFXVI you were Clive, you were Joker, you were playing out their story. They were not direct sequels to anything. I'm loathe to be seen as a mindless critic who just wants to shit on things, but a part of me does feel emotionally manipulated for $$$. I still resent how much hype was built for the game by maligning the previous ones (we're fixing Inquisition's mistakes!!).

I'm back to my mission of finishing the game I paid for, enjoy what I can, and get my Solavellan ending scene cause I'm down BAD for literally the only ship I have ever shipped🧍🏻‍♀️I appreciate that it was included. But also - wow does it exacerbate what wasn't included for everyone else's choices.

Something I hate is how everyone immediately jumped on the Baldur's Gate 3 comparisons - BG3 was a life changing game for me, but it's not perfect, and the comparisons are not fair. The one thing I will say is that when I first played BG3, despite its issues and the later criticisms of how Larian reacted to pressure from fans, I remember my earliest impression was - it feels good to be respected as a player. I didn't feel the game was talking down to me, and I got SO much for what I paid for (700 hours baybeee). Jaheira and Minsc were included as companions in homage to the previous games. Yes, they did Viconia dirty, nothing is perfect - but for example, Jaheira would tell you about her husband Khalid from the original games, which came out in 1998 and 2000. There was a lot of world building/easter eggs that not everyone was familiar with or even noticed, because not every player played BG1 and 2, or were familiar with DND 5e - but it was included. Drizzt Do’urden was mentioned ffs, they didn’t overthink about who read those books or not. I’m aware of my biases and I may very well be looking through rose tinted glasses, but I did not feel like the information was presented like I was dumb, or "ah they'll never understand this - SCRAP IT". It just feels like it’s there to honour the past and out of love for the world Larian were playing in.

—> edit to say that I do notice and enjoy the codex entries, callbacks to Tevinter Nights, Masked Empire, the older games. I wish that care and detail was woven into the main story and overall end product and not just background fluff. I know others are satisfied with those additions, wish that were me. I saw a tweet saying that every callback to a previous game or storyline actually pissed them off even more lol, I relate.

I don't feel that respect for the player in DATV, I'm sorry. There is love there, but as hard as I try, it feels like it's there despite of the overall design of the game, not part of it. I keep remembering interviews before the game was released and things that were promised, and I don't see it. At all. No more meaningless fetch quests!! Most companion-focused game! The quests are largely boring or formulaic, but addictive and fun because they are so packed with mindless combat that my brain enjoys. Sometimes it feels like filler - we didn't know what to add here, FIGHT! You unlocked a poignantly named gate in the Crossroads? NO STORY MORE FIGHT! And I'm eating it up, let me not be a hypocrite, I have 80 hours in the game. But personally, it feels designed to pad out this beautiful, sometimes fun, but bitterly shallow game. I can't even go into companion specifics because I have nothing to say, no story I want to analyze. Some have grown on me, but there is no bite or nuance to the writing that compels me and I have no urge to know more. In the previous DA games I would take the long route wherever I went just to get more banter from my companions, and I was instantly interested in them, even if I disliked them. I've seen the comments, I tried, I don't think it's because "I haven't spent enough time" with the DATV companions.

The level design of long narrow corridors, which do remind me of DA2 and FFXVI, has become so predictable to me that I almost always know exactly where I'm going to find loot. So it becomes this admittedly satisfying run of grabbing and fighting to the end point, getting the dopamine hits of collecting pointless stuff, but not really taking in the environments and enjoying the adventure. The level design is not immersive. These do not feel like real cities or real people, and that was intentional. It feels like “levels”, not a World. No one reacts to a single thing you do. Even in the ultra minimalist style of Zelda BOTW, townspeople would react to things you did. Sometimes I walk up to yet another obvious fight arena where the enemies are just chilling, waiting for me while standing still - almost like they're on shift at a haunted house LOL. I can imagine the Venatori stubbing out a cigarette, "C'mon guys, she's here, showtime". The funny part is this has all been seen before in older games, and it never bothered me. My own expectations and overhype might be to blame, but it feels like a big step back when so many games are stepping forward. Me = clown

I keep going back to my first reaction when the disappointment hit me. It feels like being given Persona 5 Strikers or Hyrule Warriors, and told that it's the sequel to the actual RPG. It's fun, it wears the skin of the thing you like that makes you happy, but stops there.

Other things I shake my fist at

Cheap ass The 6th Sense ass Varric death. Yes, yes, Solas villain arc whatever - it was cheap. Way to honour a multi-game beloved character and the player, even if the time had come for him to die in the story.

No, I cannot find a single redeeming reaction from a companion that makes Varric dying make sense in hindsight, except that they are all made of cardboard. I saw comments saying on a second playthrough it's clear Harding is in mourning - sorry, I don't see it.

So. Dorian, the Inquisitor, Charter, Harding, your party, Maevaris, Isabella, list goes on - not a single one of them asks about Varric or mentions his death? Expresses condolences? Nothing? Cheap. Even if Solas was playing with your mind, doesn't it make the overall characters in the game seem even more wooden and unrealistic to the player? It was not the gotcha they seem to think it is.

When the novelty of the cameos and the emotion associated wore off, they were just flat and felt random. Cassandra should have been there, doing Seeker shit (my WIFE). Ok no cameo? Casual dialogue with Emmrich about having a Nevarran in the Inquisition (or as the Divine?!) Lucanis info dumping about Josephine as an Antivan, Zevran as a Crow, nvm, time for a coffee joke. Merrill, eluvian queen, how is she a nonentity? Habibi Fenris should have been in the Shadow Dragons, spitting on the ground after being approached by Solas to join his uprising (lol what uprising amirite). Ok I'm cooking hire me Bioware 🍳 but at least they can remain untainted by the Isabella Treatment (tm)

This leads into the yeeting of the Keep, world states, choices, and hypocrisy around claiming to want to level the playing field for new players. No, all I can see is - it was treated as a buffet that they picked from as it suited. This is the one disappointment I will never let go of. Facsimile's of beloved character cameos were tossed in, you could not really talk to them outside of what limited dialogue you were allowed. Certain world states are now canon apparently - Dorian being recruited in the Inquisition, Morrigan drinking from the Well etc. You want a reboot and you've committed to tossing the choices and burning down Thedas (literally)? Go down with GLORY! Have all the previous main characters/companions alive. Have them all mentioned, even in passing. A portrait on a wall. Say goodbye to them, get your reboot. Honour what you built your business on. But yeah, Emmrich and Harding get to have their picnic in Fereldan fml bye

The argument of: well, the games are old now, it shouldn't matter. Ah - not too old to capitalize on the IP and DA name? Not too old to use some cameos to lure old players? The argument of - it was too many choices to track. Ok cut them down, but don't go scorched earth? 3 choices, mostly irrelevant to those who don't care about Solas (could never be me), and then literally telling you everything else in the South and Weisshaupt is now razed to the ground. But also the illuminati did everything.

FINALLY - the Inquisition should have been in charge of the hunt for Solas, hill I will die on. Fine, have Rook, but Inquisitor should have been the other protagonist. The people... who knew Solas best and betrayed by him... who were in an organization to save the world... Why did we have that cunty dagger stabbed into the map of Tevinter cliffhanger to have the Inquisitor reduced to a pyjama wearing husk BIOWAAAAAAAARE

It's this stuff that builds up, and makes me think - does this game hate its fanbase and source material that much? I very obviously need to go touch some grass 🤠

I keep engaging with Reddit, Tumblr, Twitter - all to my detriment because it makes me feel like there's something wrong with me for not loving it, all over again. I also desperately have a fic in me I would love to write, an ode to the story in my head from years of loving the world of Thedas, a love letter to my Lavellan and others - but idk what to do with the post-DATV world atp. I just want to get through Act 2/3, get my Solavellan smooch, ignore the ~secret Illuminati ending, and be grateful I'm not a Mass Effect fan so I don't have to go through this again 🐣

[corelas-veyari]

Seeing the (valid) complaints about the ending of Veilguard reminds me of the ending of ME3. Thoughts on the overall game below: (spoilers for ME2 & 3 slightly)

I hated having to sacrifice this or that and ended up modding it to be the best scenario in ME3, but did I replay and enjoy the actual game even knowing the ending? Absolutely.

Did I enjoy having to do faction/character quests in ME2 to “save” the character later on? Sometimes, though I wished there was more of how it affected the characters.

Am I 30/40+ hrs into Veilguard and enjoying it? 100%.

Do I like everything they do lore-wise? No. But at the end of the day, everyone’s world state is different.

In my world state, Warden Mahariel is the cousin to Inquisitor Lavellan and Rook Aldwir. I made my Inquisitor and Rook twins and explained away the different last names with a backstory.

If the ending is what I’m seeing, I’m changing it in my head. Will it affect my game? Nah, I’ll enjoy it as an AU or something.

This game is a great way to make your own story, it’s not the game dev’s world state you’re forced to have. It’s unfortunate they cant anticipate or make everything, but that goes for every RPG I’ve played.

Overall, this game seems really repayable in the BGIII way of just never fully completing the game and just going back and testing other routes. Then again, I’m somewhat playing it like a dating sim lol. I’m finding the characters compelling and, trying not to compare them too much to the BGIII companions, realistic to having banter.

I saw someone complain there is no tension between characters and I can’t help but be confused. Neve and Bellara have tension in the celebrity-fan way at the very beginning. Lucanis and Davrin chafe because of their values. Emmerich and Taash start off not vibing because they care for their own passions and can’t understand why someone else can’t see how cool X is.

Are criticisms valid? YES! That’s what people do.

Should this game be dictated on complaining that it isn’t DAO? No. The three games before Veilguard were all different imo - playing each one felt like it’s in the same places but with different views (think a Dalish warden, a human fereldan, and a Dalish hunter all see the world differently) Veilguard reconning is like when DnD editions recon - you chose what you want to use and shed the rest.

[psychewritesbs]

I'm waiting for what happens next with megumi's character to decide whether I like the yorozu vs sukuna fight. I could really see myself liking it if he plays it off by showing us the tragedy of how tsumiki's death was made a mockery considering reggie's curse, and how he couldn't even have a last talk with her you know? It still surprises me that he's one of the few who didn't at least speak to his loved one before they died and for now, how tsumiki and her relationship to megumi was done still seems lazy to me. In addition, i think if tsumiki was always dead from the beginning of the story and we knew of that, it would have settled more for me because then megumi really was a fool for chasing an impossible goal, and you know maybe we would be given some flashbacks of the kind of person she was, but at least i wouldn't think she was wasted as much now. Personally, the fact that he wants this story to end does have me worried for how he'll handle these characters, and he's valid in wanting it since his conditions probably aren't good, but well, I can still dislike those choices he makes, but I do try to have the patience to continue reading anyway, and now that's on me lol

I do love that we saw him cry though. I don't care that he didn't do something like Maki or Yuji with fighting back, so that criticism doesn't bother me so much, but I love it because tsumiki was and still is his person and sometimes that's enough to make me emotional over him, but knowing why or when that started would have given it that good push. Plus, a character like megumi crying of all things hits me good, but I understand why people wouldn't like the moment, but I'm patient and considerate enough to wait to see how it plays out

My own wish, but I would love it if gege would delve into and point out how a lack of responsible adults in megumi's life who cared about the siblings' wellbeing affected how he grew up. I know tsumiki filled that role, but I feel that because she was a child too, there were gaps in how megumi's mind was shaped in the end because I do believe adults add value to the minds of children to guide and help them experience good and bad things you know. Plus, it seems more probable to me that megumi was never told words of wisdom from adults by the time hes a tween because how do you end up on that type of the morality scale with self sacrificial tendencies. Plus, Tsumiki, my girl, how did shouldering that weight make her feel. She was still a child too, so there must have been things she couldnt answer or do and end up frustrated as a result, so, I guess I want to know how it affected them both, but that's a dream

Also, I'm iffy on sukuna vs yorozu simply because I did not like how either of the two were written here. I personally felt annoyed with yorozu and her sayings and she felt so hollow to me. I know perhaps it was gege's intention, but I hated how bored sukuna was. He wasn't taking her seriously enough for me to care about what she said and did either, and he clearly has opinions over the topic of love and the such so it annoyed me how gege treated her like some joke when he could have had sukuna act more condescending, but still engaging with the topic to balance it out, but it felt like yorozu was talking to a wall. I don't even think he had to be interested with her, but having them both engage with this theme of love and loneliness could have led me to enjoy the fight more. But, again, if these were his intentions with the mockery and everything, I'll respect those choices anyways

YO! Welcome to JJK-Sunday Confessionals (published not on a Sunday). I have been getting asks from people telling me about how much they don't like jjk and I feel like I'm holding JJK-Sunday Confessionals as a result 🤣.

Ehem. First, I feel like I've rewritten my response several times. So as per usual, thanks for the patience. I also suck at time management (clearly), so.... again, thanks for your patience anon.

Second, thanks for stopping by and sharing your #thoughts. I agree with a lot, and not that I necessarily disagree with other things, I just feel like it comes back to personal taste and preference.

I think with how long it's taken me to answer your ask (soooorryyyyy), a lot of things have changed. Anyways, here we go.

Word vomit under the cut.

Re the whole ordeal with Tsumiki

I totally get where you're coming from because I personally still don't know how I feel about Tsumiki and what happened to her.

I mean... I can mental gymnastics the hell out of it as a way to make meaning of what happened honestly, have we met?, but in the end, I also wanted to know the real Tsumiki, not Megumi's imagination or perception of Tsumiki, but the flawed girl who got sucked into this mess.

I mean just look at how she's depicted in Megumi's memory:

She's surrounded by Japanese White Lilies (which symbolize purity) against a sparkly background, her cheeks are blushed... she's straight out of a Shojo manga.

Honestly, one of the things I love about Gege's character work is that his characters are flawed. As she stands, as a character, Tsumiki is an incredibly 1-dimensional, self-insert type character. So I can totally see why you feel like it was a lazy execution.

Not only did she get fridged, her role is also basically that of a plot device for Megumi's development. As a result, she's literally just this Sleeping Beauty whose ideal and morals have to be protected because, in Megumi's eyes, she can't do it herself. Her one flaw is nagging on Megumi because "she cares".

And this is not to hate on Tsumiki or Gege's writing... rather, I wonder if the audience never getting to see the real Tsumiki or get more insight into their relationship isn't part of THE point Gege is trying to make given Megumi's lack of psychoemotional maturity.

In other words, he fucked up royally when it comes to Tsumiki and he's not going to be able to fulfill his "fantasy" of being the Knight in shining armor that protects her and makes everything right by apologizing.

That's a though pill Megumi will have to swallow.

To your point of waiting to see more to make up your mind about Sukuna vs Yorozu, I get it.

But look at it this way.

I wonder if part of the reason people are not vibing with the manga as much anymore is because Gege is relying on irony quite a bit, and sometimes people don't vibe with it because it can be very deadpan.

That's just my best guess since I've noticed Gege seems to like using irony quite a bit.

Irony.

Thing is, you can think of how "poetic justice" failed to be served in Tsumiki's situation.

You have aaaaaaall of this crescendo, all of this lead up to saving Tsumiki--

from Megumi's monologues about his regret regarding his behavior towards her and wanting to apologize for it,

to Megumi manifesting a domain because he decided to challenge himself in a situation that directly involved trying to protect her,

To "Tsumiki" waking up because of Kenny,

to Megumi asking others to risk their lives to help him save her,

to Megumi's willingness to do whatever it takes to reach his goal including killing people,

to Tsumiki entering the colony so that she could declaring participation in the CG,

to BAM!

Irony.

As another example on irony in jjk, @linkspooky writes a lot about how characters who think of themselves as the hero/protagonist of the story get punished in jjk, and Megumi utterly and miserably failing to save Tsumiki is definitely a case of that.

Now, according to Writers.com, "irony occurs when a moment of dialogue or plot contradicts what the audience expects from a character or story."

I think it was expected that tragedy would happen at some point or another, but with all of that lead up that Gege set up regarding Tsumiki, and it looking like everything was going to work out in her favor, Gege delivered a heavy dose of irony when he said jk she's been ded 💀.

To your point about Megumi being the only one who didn't get to speak to her before she died unlike other characters, yes. I totally get you. I know several of us wanted to see him apologize to her.

What makes this tragic for me is that...

This is why earlier I said he fucked up royally when it comes to her. It sucks he didn't get to apologize to the real Tsumiki but.. sometimes in life there are no second chances no matter how much you want them. It's a harsh fact of life.

Is there a better character than Megumi who believes that life is unfair to have to face this particular predicament?

2. I love the panel above for several reasons. I have a propensity to overthink, right? And to me, this panel tells a story in the subtext. What if he did apologize but Yorozu was amused by him and just made a fool of him by pretending to be Tsumiki the whole time?

After all, Yorozu could have joined the Culling Game if she wanted to. Instead she played along for her own gain--she got enough points transferred and she used the points to set a rule that would benefit her and her goal of finding Sukuna.

Is all of this cope? Yeah totally 😂.

So anyways. If that helps you see a little deeper into what might have happened and change your mind about it, great; if not, then that's great too because now you know that no matter how much Mental Gymnastics anyone can spin, you don't like Gege's sense of irony.

On JJK ending soon

Personally, the fact that he wants this story to end does have me worried for how he'll handle these characters

OH MAI GAH! I'm assuming you've seen the announcement (from I think the editor) that there's still quite a bit of story left and how jjk is not ending any time soon... omg thank the anime gods!

There was a lot of people making fun of others for being freaked out about jjk's pacing and Gege announcing he wants to end the story "this year" but like... when the mangaka says "I want to finish this story this year" what am I supposed to think?

"Oh, he means to say he has a lot of story left so it most definitively won't be over before some date far into the future"?

NO!

I take the mangaka's words as fact ffs 😂.

Anyways. Please excuse the rant lol. Turns out this might happen quite frequently in the manga industry?

Ma 🍒, @justafrenchlondoner, kept telling me that something similar happened with Naruto but that the manga did not end within the expected timeline.

And not to long ago CLAMP announced that they are not ending Card Captor Sakura Clear Card just yet as they had previously announced.

THAT SAID.

I did share your concern. See... I think that Gege's announcement at the beginning of this year planted a seed in fandom's collective brain. As a result, some of us started perceiving jjk as moving faster than usual.

This is how powerful the power of perception is. Basically, we see the world as we are and not as it is.

This tells me that I need to be more self-aware about my expectations when I read jjk moving forward and I love that you share your own moments.

Megumi

Everything you said about Megumi. YES.

✅ I do love that we saw him cry though

✅ I don't care that he didn't do something like Maki or Yuji with fighting back

✅ I love it because tsumiki was and still is his person

✅ but knowing why or when that started would have given it that good push

✅ Plus, a character like megumi crying of all things hits me good

Ok.

Well, almost everything.

❌ I understand why people wouldn't like the moment

I refuse 😂.

I'll be petty all day long about it because I'm insufferable like that.

So I'm going to officially be obnoxious and gatekeep that moment as a very poignant execution of the event that would usher Megumi's growth. Symbollically, metaphorically, narratively blablabla.

To me, the people who don't like the moment for whatever reason, it just means people don't get Megumi.

Ok I'm done being insufferable and obnoxious.

In the end, it comes back to personal taste, right? 😂

To each their own lol.

ANYWAYS...

My own wish, but I would love it if gege would delve into and point out how a lack of responsible adults in megumi's life

I love this. All of it.

That's what I love about how Megumi is written. His backstory sort of tells you why he is who he is--his character walks a fine line between nature vs. nurture. It's like Gege gets Psychology or something.

So thank you for sharing your thoughts on the Fushigs being forced to grow up and how this experience shapes their sense of self.

Man, sometimes when the brainrot goes deep I get really emotional about Megumi. I swear.

Re: Sukuna vs. Yorozu: having them both engage with this theme of love and loneliness could have led me to enjoy the fight more

Yeah, Yorozu is just such a polarizing character. I can see why people don't like her, but I just found her amusing and loved how deluded she is.

I'm not sure if you know that in Sufism, being in love is another method of "enlightenment". Not sure if that's what Gege was going for, of course, but so far he's given us a nice little tour of comparative religion.

That said, it's nice to see this theme of love and loneliness come back around in chapter 230.

I think a lot of people are worried about the execution of it because when the topic of romantic love is brought up, people seem to think...

But romantic love is not love per se. Romantic love is the fireworks you see when you feel butterflies for the Beloved, sure, but it is really about inner divinity projected upon another human. jjk does not talk about divinity per se, but it does talk about the soul.

As the story continues to unfold, I like what Gege is saying about the love principle. Thing is, psychologically, an overwhelming sense of self does not allow for the relational principle to flourish because ego is by default "separate from" and does not see itself as part of a unifying force that includes the soul, which is itself part of the all (divinity).

Hope that made sense lol.

For that reason I think this motif will continue to unfold and I am curious how that will change Sukuna's character who has no regard for others as a result of an overwhelming sense of self.

Mind you, I don't think he'll become besties with anyone, I just want to see him realize there's a spiritual realm beyond hedonism and ego-driven pursuits... or whatever it is that Gege has in mind for him.

Anyways. That's my hc. Thanks for stopping by and my apologies once again. I need to get better at time management 😭.

[yourpediaglobal]

EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT INTERNATIONAL STUDENT VISA

A visa is essentially a document that allows a person to stay in another country for a specified amount of time. A student visa, thus, is a document permitting a student to stay in another country for educational purposes. At times, the visa also permits the student to stay for some months or years after the education, depending upon various factors.

Types of Student Visas

There are several kinds of education visas, depending upon the country you wish to pursue your education in. The UK, for example, has primarily two kinds of student visas: a short-term and a Tier 4 student visa, which is also referred to as the general student visa. Short-term would mean less than 6 months while Tier 4 tends to study longer than 6 months.

In some countries, the type of student visa is determined by your citizenship, educational status, and whether you are pursuing a technical education or a non-technical degree.

Requirements to Apply for Student Visa

The requirements also vary depending on the country you are applying to, for instance, student visa USA requirements differ from the visa requirements for the UK.

Passport

Primarily, you will need a valid passport. Now, the requirement of its validity would differ from country to country. Some countries require a passport which must be valid even till the end of your course while some do not have that requirement. Furthermore, if you are a travel enthusiast, ensure that your passport has at least two blank pages left for the visa.

Admit Letter

Next, you will need an admission letter from the university you are heading to. It must be a document that explicitly confirms your admission to a course at their university.

Language Proficiency Test

you will essentially need to prove that you are proficient in their native language. If you are planning to head to an English-speaking country, then the most commonly accepted language proficiency tests are TOEFL, IELTS and PTE. If you wish to go to Germany for your education, you must be certified with their CEFR Certified Levels.

Before you register for a language proficiency test, make sure you check their validity in the country you are going to.

Financial Requirements

Most countries ask for proof that you are financially capable of studying in the country as well as managing your living expenses. Some countries provide a specific number for living expenses while some provide ambiguous guidelines. So, before you begin the education visa process, make sure you have your finances in order.

How to Apply for a Student Visa?

Once you have all the documents in place, visit the embassy website to apply for a study abroad visa and fill out the application form carefully. Consider your options and answer the questions meticulously. The application and its answers play a pivotal role in the acceptance/rejection/delay of your educational visa. Before you submit the application form and the required documents, you will need to pay a Visa Application Fee to book the appointment at the consulate. Having applied and booked the appointment, you will need to visit the consulate/embassy and appear for an interview with the Visa Officer.

Student Visa Interview Process

The visa interview questions and their corresponding answers are critically important and they decide the fate of your visa results. The questions are fairly straightforward and are intended to test your capability of living and studying abroad. The visa questions you face will primarily interrogate your finances, the reason for choosing a particular course, your educational and professional background, your plans after the degree in the intended country, possibly your family background, and your future goals.

Visit this website for complete details...

YourPedia Global

[brillmindz1]

I have a great mobile app idea. What do I do next?

Thoughts are surely perhaps of the most powerful tools on earth. At the point when an extraordinary thought is upheld with consistent execution — great things begin to unfold. If you have an idea for an app, it’s time to let it out.

With over 8.9 million apps already on the internet, mobile app development is at its peak.

In the same way as other business visionaries, in the event that you are thinking, 'Hello, I have an application thought. Now what?‘ then you’re in the right place. ThrougThrough this blog, we will impart to you the right game-plan that follows each effective application development thought. If that sounds exciting, stay with us.

Also read: Mobile app development companies in uae

What to Do With Your App Idea?

So you have an amazing idea for an app but don’t know how to turn it into a tappable reality? Relax; you're in good company; who states, "I have an excellent app concept; now what?" Practically all fruitful application makers have gone through this dilemma before to building their first application. Here, we will set out every one of the fundamental stages for changing your mobile application thought into an successful application that conveys value to its clients. Toward the finish of this post, you will be prepared to adapt your amazing mobile  application thought. Here we go.

Also read: Mobile app development companies in Dubai

Where to Start?

Every successful app solves a challenge for many. The question is, which problem is your app going to solve; and for whom? Creating an app from scratch isn’t an easy job. It takes a lot of time, energy, and resources. The last thing you want  is to end up with is an app that only serves a handful of people.

That is the reason it's critical to assess your thought completely prior to putting resources into it. You can start with comprehensive market research. Contemplate how your application elements will make its clients' life easier. What number of individuals really need this kind of solution, and how gravely do they require it?

Understanding what challenges your application will settle can assist you with saving from falling into any traps even prior to getting everything rolling. The next step is to patent your idea after conducting a thorough evaluation.

Conduct Market Research

Don’t assume your application will be a success since you have an extraordinary thought for an application. Conducting market research is essential to determine its potential for success.

Find out who your competitors are and observe their app features, reviews, monetization methods, downloads, and marketing strategies.

Learn about the demand for your app. You can utilize devices like Google Patterns, Application Annie, and Sensor Pinnacle to determine  the search  volume, downloads, and income of comparative applications.

Also read: Mobile app development companies in abu dhabi

Validate Your App Idea

Validating your app idea is certainly one of the most important steps in an app development process. There are multiple ways you can approach identifying the value incentive of your application. Let’s look at three of them:

1. Define Your Target Audience

Who will use your app? Defining your ideal clients can be a difficult job. However, it’s absolutely worth it. Put yourself in the shoes of your end clients. Start thinking their way. Gather as much information as you can about your ideal users. It will help you design features tailored to their needs.

2. Determine Your App’s Usability

How will your app help its users? How useful will your app be in their day to day life? How often will they need it? Try to live their day. It will assist you with maximize the ease of use of your application. At this stage, you can easily add/remove features based on your observations.

3. Interview Your Potential Users

Interviewing potential customers will not only assist you in validating your business concept, but it will also significantly contribute to the development stage of the app. Gather users who would like to use your app. You could find them on different social media networks like LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, or on gatherings like Quora, and Reddit. Attempt to ignite a discussion, take part in existing strings — this way you will actually want to attract your ideal prospects to you.

Protect Your App Idea

Thinking "I have a thought for an application" and expecting to make an successful application can demonstrate hurtful. Protecting your application thought is all around as significant as making it in any place. All things considered, you have done all the hard work, be it the time spent in social event thoughts, or brainstorming the highlights, and tracking down the right resources to turn it all genuine. The very thought of losing everything can be nothing short of a nightmare. However, there are certain measures you can take to safeguard your app idea. he three things you can do to safeguard your application thought:

1. Sign an NDA

One of the most widely recognized approaches to safeguarding any  protecting any intellectual property — be it a thought for an application or a business plan — is a Non-exposure understanding. In straightforward terms, a NDA is an arrangement between you and your application developer. This implies, by no means, can your application developers disclose any data about your project to any third party.

2. Pick a Trustworthy Development Partner

 if you have an app idea but no programming skills then choose mobile app development company as an NDA. Ensure the partner you are working with is credible and dependable. Before hiring a development team for your project, here are some things to think about.

3. Keep it Up to You Until It’s Not Live

While you shouldn't talk about your thought with the stakeholders, it's alright to straightforwardly examine it with friends, and different associates, isn't that so? Wrong. As humans, we have this natural tendency to share ideas and insights with others. The more you talk about your thought, the more vulnerable it becomes to being taken away.

[dailymommybrain]

Gentle parenting is a controversial topic, many don’t believe in it, but it’s becoming a much more popular parenting method as a lot of parents want to break free of generational practices. It can be extremely effective, however, the main goal in any positive parenting technique is to raise happy, healthy, confident children.

This parenting style can have a very positive impact on your child’s life. While it may not be for everyone, it is a great parenting technique to try. At the end of the day, uninvolved parenting is the least effective way to parent, so there’s no harm in trying out gentle parenting.

There are 4 key components to gentle parenting; empathy, respect, understanding, and boundaries. When you choose your actions based on those qualities, you are also fostering your child to have those qualities themselves. You must be compassionate with your child, and allow them to explain themselves in situations. Ask them why something happened, did they feel a certain way about something someone said or did? Did they lose something?

I’ve come to find with my own son that many times he has pent up feelings about something that happened the day before or even weeks before. It’s like he randomly remembers things that happened and gets upset about them again. So you should always try to talk to them and see what’s bothering them, but be sure you listen to them and validate their feelings, as that is how you would want to feel if you were to confide in someone you trust.

Sometimes you may encounter a situation or a reaction that you don’t know how to handle, that’s okay! Just make sure to calm yourself first. You won’t be able to properly handle a situation and calm your child unless you calm yourself first. You are teaching them with your actions, be a reflection of how you want them to be.

Any parenting technique can be overwhelming, however gentle parenting can be very intense and time consuming. You must prepare yourself for consistent one on one time with your children to get the most out of this technique. Children learn best when given visual instructions rather than verbal ones. You can get through most situations with nothing but visual instructions, you just need to mirror how you want them act.

You need to be very hands on, and involve your children in daily decisions like what to have for lunch or where to go. It’s easy to look at your children as something other than their own person. We often do this when we have to go somewhere. You generally just pack them up in the car and go, but try having a conversation prior to leaving, tell then where you’re going and what you’re going to do. This can help them feel included in the decision making while also preparing them for the day. When things start to go wrong, or tantrums arise, try redirecting them by working alongside them.

Talk with your toddler about their feelings and how to properly express them. TAKE THEM SERIOUSLY! Their feelings and emotions are completely valid, even if they don’t make sense to us. Work with them on critical thinking and problem solving. These are key life skills that will help them succeed later on in life.

Say your child were to throw their food on the floor, or spill a drink. Some parents will just clean it up, others will discipline their children for the actions, but try working with them instead. You would be surprised the difference it will make. If they are throwing food, inform them that throwing the food means they are done and do not want anymore, then have them help you clean it up and put everything where it goes. But try not to get irritated with them, listen to their reasoning. With my son personally, even in the beginning, I found that he would usually end up apologizing over what happened, before we really talk about it much.

How to handle Toddler Tantrums step by step:

1.) Stay Calm. Talk with them to reconnect with them, be compassionate and use empathy. Take their concerns seriously and try to redirect their energy into something positive.

2.) Soothe them. Remember, you don’t want to escalate the issue further, so try to calm them when you can. However, do not remove or lessen your boundaries, stay firm with them. Children mirror your actions and habits, if you set clear boundaries and stick with them, they will learn to do so and will use that skill later on in life.

3.) Prevent/Avoid triggers. What is bothering them and why? How can you avoid these things or prevent them from happening? If you are unsure, try speaking with your child. See if something is making them sad or mad, or maybe even just bad. They might not understand the feeling, but they will understand if it is something that they do not like.

4.) Offer them your full love and attention! Remember, they are small people with big feelings that they do not know how to handle properly. You must show them, don’t tell them. They learn from your actions better than from your words.

5.) Offer positive reinforcement. Discipline your child may cover the bad actions, but you also need to praise them for the good ones if you want them to keep doing them - again - children learn better from your actions, showing them or offering them something positive for good behavior can go a very long way and can help when it comes to discipline the bad behavior as it is initiative for them do choose to make good choices.

Gentle parenting can be difficult and challenging at times, especially if you have trouble calming yourself - and let’s be honest here, we all have problems with this at time - but that’s no reason to avoid or give up on it. At the end of the day, we are all trying to do what’s best for our kids and for ourselves. This parenting style is amazing, because it can prevent various anxiety and confidence issues later on in life. You’d be so surprised about how big of an effect the small actions we make have on our kids. Something small to us, can completely traumatize them later on in life, it can cause separation and depression issues, boundary issues, and lack of self love. Our children are no different than us, it is just easier to hurt them both physically and mentally. We are all trying our best, and if your only able to offer 60% some days, but you’re using 100% of your effort to prove the 60%, then you are giving 100%. ❤️

[entoman-created-by-the-tallgreys]

💎💎💎✨🎇 Pretty 🎇✨💎💎💎

There's a big difference between a reptilian woman and a human woman I just want to, Let you know a few things.

A human woman wants to be called pre because they're usually extremely fucking narcissistic, But women also like compliments and they like to live off the looking glass, Usually women really need to live in high regards of other people usually men. I need someone to give them validation. Because they're always in the negative of validation but unlike a man when they get criticism they go completely and absolutely fucking ballistic.

What, I've learned about reptilian women is they don't want to be called pretty they don't give a fuck about their physical appearance, ( Even though I try to look good, and feminine, The reptilian way of being feminine ) They want to be called Strong and aggressive only if you're honest with it and only if it's true do not call her strong and when she's weak it will come off as an insult and will be an insult. - She wants to be told She's Powerful, She wants to be told She's Dominant She wants to be told that, She's basically God. What is disgusting in the eyes of a human is normal in the eyes of an alien.

The human woman is extremely physically weak in comparison to the male counterpart She has shitty stamina unbelievably shitty muscle system and a much more fragile skeletal system.

The Reptilian woman is the opposite strong bones strong muscles but seeing the one the Earth the human hybrid they have a massive reduction in strength but doesn't make them weak by any means they're still stronger than a human male Usually. - They have a lot of stamina They have a lot of power and they're extremely fucking aggressive There is no you can't find a woman with more aggression and more rage no matter what woman what humans female you had to go through None of them will have an emotion of rage higher than that of a Reptilian woman.

Human women drive their men nuts, human women are also not very well not all of them but a lot of human women are very but how do I say this without being a dick It's kind of impossible cuz women are fucking narcissist and everything gets narcissistic injury, LISTEN ! - human men did not breed with women for their intelligence strength or athletic or intellectual abilities They've read to them because they were pretty in feminine, HUMAN MAN DIDN'T EVEN WANT TO HAVE SEX WITH WOMEN THAT HAD GOOD CHARACTER THEY DIDN'T CARE ABOUT THE CHARACTER THEY JUST CARED ABOUT THE LITERALLY JUST THE APPEARANCE ! SO IF A HUMAN WOMAN HAS A REALLY SHITTY PERSONALITY YOU CAN THINK SOME SELFISH MALE ANCESTOR IN THE FAR PAST I JUST WANT TO GET A DICK WET ! - And if you don't understand where I'm coming by I'm trying to stay in the most polite way the word bimbo, The men didn't care that the women were giving birth to dumber men and dumber women They didn't care about the ramifications of their actions They just that they couldn't comprehend it and they couldn't care They could comprehend it It was only when they became a severe problem that they try to begin at the comprehend that that having sex with the dumb woman gave birth to dumb babies, But men being selfish as fuck didn't really care in the slightest bit and they just kept having sex whatever gave them pleasure They just didn't care If it was good for them of the time the short end that was good enough. . . . 🤦🏻‍♂️ . . . And stupid men gave birth to stupid dumber men to the women because after she gave birth to one dumbass man that dumbass man wanted to get back with it with it with a female of his intelligence and then before you know it it was a slow decline of intelligence down the ages Some men cared about the quality of women most men do not care about the quality of women they just care about the quality of pussy . . . 🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️ . . . Humanity will be just another race that went extinct in the vast trillions upon trillions of galaxies in the universe.

I'm telling women are strong powerful hypo aggressive nastiest fuck when they go to mate with a fucking male They want to if they want to see power string porosity intelligence They want to see a whole bunch of shit This is why there's always a physical fight because the women want to test the men and the men want to test the women They want to see what they're getting something into There's nothing soft about the reptilian people Everything is hard hardcore brutal epic intense violent, Ultra Aggressive, reptilians like to go by pheromones they like to go by cents they like to send Mark a lot Yeah they like to Piss on everything ! . . . AND REPTILIAN WOMEN ARE GOING TO FUCKING EAT YOU ! ! ! - Italian women eat people for a whole list of reason There are so many reasons for why she would want to eat somebody You could write a damn book on just by making a list of reasons. + She'll eat you in the name of love she'll eat you because she's done with you she'll eat you because you no longer useful she'll eat you because you fucking stupid Yeah they they recite they'll just eat you because you're weak and your thumb and you're a burden on the land she'll eat you beat the show dominant she'll eat you because she's horny she'll eat you because she's hungry she'll eat you because you just doesn't give a fuck and she's just down in the mood right now she'll eat you because it's just it's a primal instinct and she wasn't even thinking about it It just kind of fucking happened, SO EAT YOU BECAUSE SHE'S IN A DARK MOOD, Show each you forget to take pleasure Just to feel you suffer and dying her stomach and get all the energy out of it, both spiritual and chemical, SHE'LL EAT YOU, Right after she got done having sex, she'll eat you by giving you a fucking love bite and then continue with the love bites and before you know it before she even knows that she ate the entire fucking man one love bite after the next, . . . SHOW FUCKING EAT YOU BECAUSE SHE'S REPTILIAN THAT'S HOW REPTILIANS ROLL ?

The human woman, It's going to take all your fucking money, claim that everything that you own is hers, and on top of it all, drive your ass to MGTOW !

The reptilian woman this part I'm not 100% perfect on so my information is going to be shaky on this part, But they're not the worst button women so what it's so forward I've seen or loyal intelligent strong fast powerful dimensional with loyal but they're loyal and the reptilian way which makes them seem like they're not loyal, They having it They have an alien brain They have a reptilian brain They don't have a human brain they're not going to act human. - But they are loyal in their own way, They also don't love like a damn human being They love like a reptilian which is not human in a human brain can't understand what's not human They can't understand anything not human They're so fucking stupid Most people are so fucking stupid They think something that looks human that's not human that acts and not human way is just broken no you're fucking stupid what it is and not broken You're just stupid.

Human woman . . . Human woman has sex with a lot of goddamn men and somehow that's extremely taboo in the human world and human society that women have sex with other men Men love to shame the fuck out of them as they get done fucking them apparently, but not right away,

In the reptilian world what I've learned is that they're not monogamous returns are not monogamous, I mean you could but it's going to have no effect It's like calling a man a whore It doesn't really have any effect because men are men for generations accelerate being whores were women for generations have been shamed for being whores Men could get married and still have sex with multiple women but women could not have sex in multiple men, in the reptilian world there is no such thing as a whore there's just sex or having a powerful sex drive That's all there is to it There's no such thing I don't think reptons get married Far as I can see I don't think they have that kind of system, They're not monogamous, But the women do get possessive and, THIS IS ANOTHER REASON THEY'RE GOING TO EAT YOU, And when I learned in some places that they will actually kidnap and capture men and use them or hold on to them and I think from what I've gathered as a theory I think they have sex dungeons or prisoners are romantic prisoners that they're not going to let go because what is theirs is theirs. - AGAIN ! - The last part's not perfect but I've gathered a lot of stuff that I think that the reptilian women who do have sexual prisoners that eventually after they get done having as much hardcore sex with them you guessed it they're just going to eat them They're going to collect their soul into their soul or they're going to embrace their energy and before you fucking know it they're going to try you It's a long complicated process, I'm not going to make this goddamn post a trillion fucking pages, I don't want to get into the whole VORE, Thing In this ,in this post.

[autumnslance]

I was wondering if I could get your opinion on something from the Ultima Thule part of Endwalker? The way I understand it, each of the beings the scions come across represent a reason to yearn for the sweet embrace of death, and their sacrifices are them standing defiant against it (Thancred's "survive" to Metion's "die," Estinien's "keep fighting for a future full of hope" to Al End's "we have failed, there is no use fighting because the fighting might never end," the twin's "you don't have to carry this burden alone, people love you" to Metion's "i must hide my pain to protect the people I love") but I get a little confused around Urianger/Y'shtola's sacrifices, and everything about G'raha and the Omicrons.

So I'm like 60% sure Urianger's is about knowing that the end is coming but doing what you can now to make life good, but I have no idea about Y'shtola, and I don't understand how G'raha taught the robots to dream again? Is that when what his sacrifice was about?

(I also love the fact that it was Metion that accidentally brought about the ends of these worlds with her overwhelming negative dynamis because the statistic improbably of Elpis being the only life in the universe kinda took me out of the story for a bit, but the explanation pulled me right back in with a punch to the gut.)

Anyways sorry to bother you, it just seems like you understand the nuances of Endwalker's story a lot better than I. Hope you're having a good day!

There's a long note to be said in here about how these are still just my interpretations and readings of the text; while I've played multiple times and kept the raw text for my own records (and know where to look for it elsewhere too to back myself up), sometimes another perspective will differ but be just as valid. But that's it's own post about how literary criticism and textual readings works. Cuz trust me, this gets long enough. Hopefully it makes sense, and is if nothing else a springboard into one's own ideas and understanding of these answers.

We'll start with Krile's words to her fellow Scions as they left the Baldesion Annex that last morning:

"You must triumph. What that means will differ for each of you. To make it back home, or to simply avert doom, or perhaps something else altogether... Yet whatever it is that drives you, I have faith in its power to see you through. So please─triumph. Triumph, as we who remain behind believe you will."

So much of Ultima Thule is not just the culmination of WoL's journey so far, but our companions' as well, as bit by bit they tear down Meteion's preconceptions, leading to the WoL's final truth.

-- EDIT: Adding to the bottom of the post the brief reblog comment I added about 10 days later about how each of these five sacrifices (counting the Urianger & Y'shtola, and the twins, as 1 each) can also fit onto Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, none of which were really met for Meteion before, and how the Scions represent and prove each level so the WoL can finally get through to her and summon the Scions back.

Also added commentary in Urianger’s section about Hermes and things learned in the Rising 2022 short story about Meteion’s creation. --

A quick summary of the mentioned Scions, though trust me I could go on about each of these all day as well:

Thancred's determination to survive is there, yes--but also how he takes care of others. He is determined that the other Scions succeed; he even makes it so Y'shtola can see in what should be a realm impossible for her to do so. He triumphs by taking care of his family he finally understood in Shadowbringers that he has, and ensuring their continuation, fighting for them even after he's been pulled apart. Meteion sees his darkest thoughts and feelings, which he admitted to and accepted about himself, but she cannot understand how his wish for life yet remains despite that, why he keeps fighting the inevitable. He's the beginning of how the Scions will challenge Meteion's beliefs in the universe, and herself.

Estinien's triumph is in bridging the understanding of revenge and justice, hate and love; he's been demonstrating his emotional growth the entire expansion, and Hydaelyn even points it out, but that matter of fact acceptance of his past and how that lets him empathize with the dragons' grief, and call out Meteion's corruption of it, is what allows him to ensure his friends' survival and success. As a lifelong soldier, ensuring the mission succeeds is likely in his mind, but for Estinien it's really about his capacity to think of and feel for others, after so long consumed by his self-centered rage and grief--a realization Meteion has not made yet, so cannot stand against.

The twins are strongest together, yet also know how to stand on their own, to be their own persons, in a way the Meteia cannot comprehend. The collective mind is many, yet only one, and alone for it. The twins understand that bewildered, naive fear at realizing the world--the universe--is bigger, more complicated, so different from what one expected. They meet Meteion as peers, children who've grown into young adults and learned from those stumbles and failures, to face their fears, rather than give into them. Whose greatest wish is the happiness of another's future, when she cannot see beyond herself.

So where do G'raha, Urianger, and Y'shtola fit in?

Let's begin with G'raha, as I find him a bit easier. The conversation with the Omicron is where I'll start:

M-017: The Omicrons will never leave this star. M-017: They will stand by until their reserves of energy are spent. For I have no path to offer them. None.

G'raha Tia: It is not our place to pass judgment on the deeds of the Omicrons. G'raha Tia: But surely this does not have to spell the end of your people? G'raha Tia: With your power and knowledge, the possibilities are endless. Why not seek out a new purpose?

M-017: That is impossible. M-017: In the beginning, we had a higher purpose than our pursuit of power. M-017: But we lost sight of it when we so irrevocably altered our fundamental forms. M-017: When we cast aside our flesh, so too did we cast aside all that defined us. Nothing remains of who we once were. M-017: I have no aspirations. No longer can I dream. The vital spark is lost. M-017: Lost amidst circuitry and code and commands...

It's not only "we can't dream" (as in, have ambitions and goals that aren't "grow stronger through warfare"), it's the fear that in turning themselves into machines, they have lost their very souls, the "vital spark" that marks them as living, thinking, feeling beings who could imagine a life beyond this existence. They deal in concrete, in physical, in absolutes. We see this in the side quests where they struggle with things such as relationships and creativity. The ephemeral, they believe, is beyond them.

The G'raha Tia we knew in the original Crystal Tower story woke to a world 200 years past a Calamity. Everyone he knew was dead through violence and time, the civilizations he remembered had collapsed, and many despaired there was no way out, no future, and so were willing to let go of that world on the chance it could be averted. He agreed to a wild plan to send himself back in space and time to change history--and in so doing, changed himself. There was no way back, once he merged with the Tower. So he thought. No way to save the WoL from the corrupted Light except by sacrificing himself to the Rift. So he thought.

And he was proven wrong. He began to look for alternatives, because the Scions showed him compassion and friendship and their own sheer stubborn refusal to accept loss when there's a sliver of a chance of success. So for them he found a new way. And in so doing, decided to seek and find his own happiness.

G'raha figures out how to defeat the despair, but his decision is framed so differently from how he approached what he assumed was his end in Shadowbringers. Where the Exarch was quietly fatalistic and mysterious, assuming there was nothing in his future but a sacrifice he had to protect his people from the pain of, G'raha in Ultima Thule makes the WoL promise they'll go on more adventures together, making plans the whole time. He doesn't know if it'll happen, if this will work--but there's a sliver of a chance, and so he will cling to that hope as the other Scions have taught him (else Alisaie may flick him again).

A crystallized Exarch stands atop the First's Tower. But G'raha had changed himself yet again, merging his soul and memories with his younger, pre-Calamity self still in the Source's Tower. Memories of two worlds, two lives. A confusing situation for anyone. But G'raha spent the later Shadowbringers patches reconciling those two versions of himself--and we see the results through Endwalker in those moments of goofy awkwardness, and those moments when the music and his stance shifts and the Exarch comes out, as it does again with the Omicrons:

G'raha Tia: If you would humor me a moment─when we awaken each morning, how can we prove that we're the same individual who retired the night before? G'raha Tia: Through the remembrance of past events, we might say. We have our memories. Yet there are times when we forget, or recall incorrectly. G'raha Tia: What of our bodies, then? It is the same one, we might say. Yet technically speaking, as living beings, our bodies are constantly changing. It will never be as it was at an earlier point in time. G'raha Tia: Our souls are no more immutable. On our star, people are known to inherit the souls of others, yet they are decidedly different beings. G'raha Tia: For my part, I've subjected my totality to much and more. I've made my body into an extension of a tower. Blended my soul and memories with those of another self. G'raha Tia: And each time, I would ask myself: what is it that makes me, me?

M-017: Were you able to determine an answer?

G'raha Tia: No. But that doesn't mean I'm confused. It simply means I'm the same as everyone else. G'raha Tia: So I posit this: who we were need not prescribe what we now hold in our hearts. G'raha Tia: Whatever came before, what matters most is the present. G'raha Tia: For me, that is being here with my friends. Full proud of how much we've grown together. G'raha Tia: So I urge you to not give up. Heed your heart's desire, and hope that the future you long for shall be realized!

M-017: I...cannot. We cannot. M-017: We cannot understand desire, nor comprehend hope. We do not know how to create such things.

G'raha Tia: We're not unalike, you and I... I too have struggled to find the courage to express and embrace my wants. G'raha Tia: If you like, I will tell you a tale. A tale of a world on the brink. Of a people who never gave up on the future. G'raha Tia: Of a man who realized his grandest dreams, and then awakened to a grander reality.

Is G'raha talking about the 8th Umbral Source, or the First under the Flood when he speaks of "A tale of a world on the brink. Of a people who never gave up on the future"? I think both. While the characters have no way of knowing, we players know from the Tales from the Shadows that the 8th Umbral timeline did continue on--if anything, the Ironworks' success heralds a new Astral Era for them, another chance for their future, after they spent 200 years struggling for it. And the people of the First came together to help the Scions save their world, never giving in to the Light's tyranny (even if some of them had to be woken from their own indolence first).

However G'raha, as the Exarch, had given up. He hadn't known a way forward for himself, in finding one for the First and the Scions, for the WoL. Until he was made to consider the possibility.

A possibility he passes on to the Omicrons. He is a proof that Meteion had not met, could not consider. He defies the idea that changing into something else (as Meteion herself has changed) means one has lost oneself forever. That one can change again, for the better this time.

And as she does not know how to counter that hope, our Crystal Exarch creates for us a crystalline bridge to move forward.

Urianger is who we'll puzzle out next.

Our funny-talking fortune teller started as a mysterious prophet, making himself Garlemald's most wanted, and trolling Hildibrand into attempting to fly to the moon back in 1.x. Urianger ever worked behind the scenes, to the side, as a supporting figure, continuing in that role in ARR and its expansions. The trusty librarian and liaison with the Students of Baldesion and Sharlayan, the one who kept the lights on in the Waking Sands, the one who used Moenbryda's research to give us a leg up at random times.

The one who listened to the whisperings of an Ascian, and decided to take a dangerous path on his own without communication or support to learn more, bargaining Minfilia's life in the process. The one who listened to the Exarch's fatalistic plans and went along with them, lying to his dearest friends in order to save them.

These decisions tore at him, his regrets obvious both times, and both times he was forgiven, for the others understood--perhaps better than he did.

Urianger gets a lot of good moments in Endwalker, one of them on the moon, when the loporrits are trying to coerce him into their own secrets, but Urianger confides in the WoL, and for once, instead of following logic for the greater good, he follows his heart and refuses to play along, this time not only communicating with his friends, but also convincing the loporrits to look for another way.

In Ultima Thule, he draws WoL and G'raha into one last secret, as our wizard can't help himself to a bit of mischief; WoL, due to his promise to never betray their trust again, and G'raha...as payback for the Exarch's schemes. Urianger puts forth his idea on how Meteion unwittingly unleashed the end upon many worlds, mistaking their own despair for her own, as she had confused others' feelings in Elpis. And then Urianger tells us:

Urianger: Yet even if I must needs go to such lengths, I cannot well feign ignorance of the answer I have found within... Urianger: The answer to the question: in what moment might I stand strongest?

Urianger is never the first to challenge an enemy; that's for the others to do. He uses his magic to support them, to heal them. His knowledge is for their benefit. While he can fight as fiercely for his beliefs, his is a gentle soul more at home in contemplation. And he worries his will is not equal to that of his dear Moen, or of Thancred and Y'shtola, or Papalymo and Louisoix. His beloved friends who face fear head on to succeed, even at the cost to themselves.

But none of those friends have ever doubted Urianger's heart. It's why they forgave him those other times. Urianger's love is why Elidibus was unable to sway him with logic. Love was why the Exarch was able to coerce Urianger.

Urianger: That, most assuredly, is the Ascians' belief. 'Twas in the hope of opening mine eyes to said revelation that they first came unto me, imagining it sufficient to secure mine allegiance. Urianger: Nor would they have been mistaken─were my heart a temple to truth alone. But as a devoted follower of Master Louisoix's teachings, and for the love I bear him and his, I hearkened not to their words. (An Ending to Mark a New Beginning, Heavensward patches)

The times he stood alone and apart, the times he kept secrets, though it was Logical and things turned out in the end for the Greater Good, those were the hardest moments for Urianger, and they caused much grief for his dearest friends. It nearly led to Alisaie dying of a poisoned arrow, it led to the tragedies of the many Minfilias upon the First, led to the loss of their dear Antecedent, and nearly cost the WoL their life, along with G'raha's.

So when the time comes, it is in facing honestly his own failings and what he learned through them, and in support of someone he loves, that Urianger finds his answer. To shore up another, to bend his mind and emotions to solving the problem in collaboration with a fellow researcher. As a healer, as a support role, Urianger is part of the glue that holds the Scions together as a team. Where he stands strongest is in not letting a dear friend stand alone against overwhelming despair, to aid her in proving her own hypothesis, while accepting all of himself as well.

If the Ea could have turned their minds to supporting each other, instead of isolating themselves in their research, perhaps they may have been able to stand up to Meteion. If Hermes had been able to open up to anyone else, admit his own need for aid, to find the support and collaboration he needed in her creation and her mission. As it is, she doesn't understand the honesty and love Urianger is made of, to sacrifice himself in support of another, in the hope that those they leave behind will continue on.

EDIT: According to the Rising 2022 story Tales from the Dawn - A Question of Life, Hermes did get some input on Meteion’s creation from his colleagues; but only of her visual design and aesthetic, as he specifically noted that was not his forte. Her abilities, her mission, how she was to carry that out, remained his secret, and his fellows did not know of his internal struggle. That no one knew the full details of his “personal project” are made clear in the MSQ, nor did he get input on the questions she was to ask, as Emet-Selch’s response and Hermes reaction to it made obvious as well.

Y'shtola: Keep calm, and listen well. Y'shtola: Though my body will soon dissipate, there may be a way to restore it. Y'shtola: Azem's magick. So long as our souls remain, you can use it to summon us back. Y'shtola: But you mustn't, for it would mean losing our way forward. This, I only reveal so that you can promise not to invoke the magick. Y'shtola: We came here knowing what victory may cost, so press on. Press on, and do not look back.

Urianger: I shall join thee. As subterfuge is not required, thou shalt not suffer for mine absence.

Y'shtola: Urianger...

Urianger: My resolve hath never been as strong as thine. Full oft have I wavered in my decisions, and afterwards been stricken with regret. Urianger: In spite of this, I may still stand with my comrades, supporting them as they attempt the greatest of feats. Urianger: This truth, I have learned in the course of our journey. Urianger: And many though my shortcomings may be, I may also claim to excel in prophecies. My studies into which have granted me the flexibility of mind needed to bend this malleable reality. Urianger: Thus shall I hope... That thou mayest have the strength to resist, and our comrades the strength to continue.

Y'shtola: With you to urge us on, how could we possibly fail?

Which finally brings us to Y'shtola.

Our sassy cat hasn't gotten much focus, not the way the twins have over every expac alongside WoL, or Lyse in Stormblood, Thancred in Shadowbringers, Urianger in Endwalker; Shtola's overdue some story focus, in my opinion. Yet I don't know that she needs to grow or change in that focus. Some people know who they are and are happy with that, and Y'shtola strikes me as in that camp.

She also strikes me as being different than her beloved master, even while bemoaning the ways in which she's grown alike. Matoya hides herself in a cave, using familiars for various things, grousing about the state of the Forum while doing naught to change it. Grousing about people visiting and their disruptions to her solitude. She does care, in her own way, but you've got to earn it through sheer persistence with that old misanthrope.

Y'shtola, in contrast, lives in the world and seeks to make it better. She fights Merlwyb, the Forum, her fellow Scions, and anyone else who doesn't stand for decency and caring about others. She adopts the entire Night's Blessed, becoming one of their leaders, in Endwalker still using their traditions for her own and others' comfort. She nearly sacrifices herself with Flow again to save them. Even when being harsh and misunderstanding Thancred (cuz he wasn't communicating, so was she trying to make him?), she had the best of intentions, and confidence in his own heart and willpower. "Giving up (on people)" is not a phrase in Y'shtola's vocabulary. You will do better, if she has her way. And she likely will, sooner or later *looks at 5.4 and the Melee Role Quest.*

But like Matoya, Y'shtola is consumed with an overwhelming need to Know. To puzzle out the secrets of creation, to find the answer to every burning question, and there are oh so many questions! Not content with the many secrets of the Source, she is determined to find a means of traversing the Rift to visit the other reflections to plumb their secrets as well!

Yet she is all too aware of her finite time. It's an ongoing joke that Y'shtola lies about her age, claiming to still be twenty-two when she is, by pure mathematics, somewhere between Papalymo and Thancred, perhaps of an age with F'lhaminn (EDIT: As of the 6.x patches, it's indicated Y'shtola is closer to Thancred in age). Some of it is sheer vanity maybe--but given Y'shtola's drive for answers, and how long it will take to puzzle out even a fraction of them, perhaps it is more a bid to maintain the fire, the drive, the impatience, the time of youth.

So to meet the Ea, a people who had attained what she would consider the ultimate goal, and find their ghosts in despair, is an affront. They had defined goals. They had the time to see them through. They lost all will, due to finding an answer they didn't like. As a scientist, how galling, that that would be their response! That instead of looking beyond it to other answers, they simply stopped.

The Ea could not comprehend a reason to continue. Y'shtola can't comprehend their willingness to end. An answer is simply the start of a new question, after all.

(and I don't know about you, but when "Thunderer" kicked in for Y'shtola, I got chills and went "ohcrap!")

Y'shtola: So that's your story. Y'shtola: While I appreciate your advice, I will not heed it. Y'shtola: Convinced though you may be of this truth, it is yours and not mine. Indeed truth, I have ever believed, is in the eye of the beholder.

Coph-coodg: Are you suggesting that we have reached a faulty conclusion? That our science failed us?

Y'shtola: Hardly. As you yourself said, the subject matter is beyond my comprehension. Y'shtola: And that, I accept, is true. I do not possess the knowledge to prove or disprove your conclusion. Y'shtola: In my mortal years, I doubt I could even approach the wisdom of the Ea. Y'shtola: But of one thing am I absolutely certain: I would not be happier in ignorance.

Y'shtola: The most important lesson I've learned...is that learning isn't simply passing one's eyes over words. Y'shtola: Nay... 'Tis when understood for oneself that knowledge attains its true value. Y'shtola: This is what has sustained me. Driven me onward in joy and wonder. In anger and sorrow. Y'shtola: The universe may end, and all may be for naught. But I will live as I always have. Y'shtola: I will always seek out new knowledge. And no conclusion of yours, no matter how grim, can dampen my desire.

Y'shtola is righteous anger, a fierce fire--but also brittle, in her way. She relies so much on her drive, on her single passion, she hasn't left room for much else. This is where Urianger's malleability complements her hardness, his ability to bend supporting her rigidity.

And she is grateful for his aid. She accepts it, with no questions, no deflections, no insistence he save himself, no remorse. She does not order it, as she did Thancred in the Sil'dihn tunnel (and tried to save him anyway); Urianger comes of his own volition, and she allows it. She has stood alone often, in imitation of her master--but she is not Matoya. Y'shtola doesn't hide from people; she lets them into her heart, takes care of them, heals them, challenges them. While she doesn't need anyone to complete her, she has learned to allow others to take care of her, too. To let them heal, challenge, and love her, in a way Matoya cannot.

So she accepts a loved one's help in this terrifying moment, and together they challenge the idea that learning must end, that an answer is conclusive. That their passion for knowledge can be dimmed.

Meteion was sent to find an answer to a question. She thought she found it, and so stopped looking, giving into what she believed was inevitability. Y'shtola defies that response, asking new questions, demanding different answers. Y'shtola accepts help and support, as Meteion did not at any point in the journey. That passion undoes Meteion's naive understanding, her own fear, and a way lights for the others to move forward--to not stop seeking, asking, learning, and in so doing, triumph over despair.

--

That's what I'm taking from these moments, anyway. At least in this moment. In response to others opinions and pointing out of textual moments, on another play through, on a dev interview, on life changes in a year, I might read them differently. But for now, this is what I'm taking from our Scions' sacrifices at the edge of the universe, and how they allowed their own journey over the expansions at the WoL's side to ready them for these moments, and decide, as Krile asked, what Triumph meant to them.

--

EDIT: MY REBLOG ADDITION - MASLOW’S HIERARCHY & THE SCIONS Also now thinking about how the Scions' answers could each correspond to a level in Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, letting the WoL go a step beyond them at the end once the others show Meteion how she's come to the wrong conclusion about life, as her needs were never met/actualized, leading to her (and the rest of the universe's) downfall.

Five levels of the pyramid, five sacrifices made.

1. Physiological needs - Thancred (need to provide survival for his family) 2. Safety needs - Estinien (end of the war and the changes that wrought in him & Ishgard) 3. Love/Belonging - Y'shtola & Urianger (what I already said above) 4. Esteem - G'raha (all those changes & growing into his own hero) 5. Self-Actualization (The twins pretty much embody this)

This is what happens when I'm trawling very old posts on my main blog and get hit with old psych writing references.

Anyway just chewing on this in addition to what I said before under the cut in the original post

[zachsreaderinserts]

sapnap, dream, tommy, and c! techno x s/o who cried while arguing headcannons

FIRST REQUEST OOGA BOOGA OOGA BOOGA 

also im about to hit 100 followers! thank y’all sm!!!

edit: so uh, i didnt know tommy didn’t like to be written in romantic x readers, that was on me 100% so i changed it to platonic!!

wc: 1,285

SAPNAP

as we all know, sapnap is a little bitch when he’s arguing with someone, compiled with lots of yelling, screaming, and probably physical gestures.

so, it was no surprise that when you had brought up the fact that he had been neglecting his chores around your house, that he retaliated almost instantly

“i’ve been sitting in the office the last few days working! i don’t know what you want from me!”

somehow, with you being you and sapnap being sapnap, the argument escalates really fucking fast

to the point where his voice is starting to get hoarse and you’re pretty much shaking in retaliation, regretting ever bringing up the entire argument

sapnap’s too blinded by his anger to realize that you were not fine and were backing yourself into the dining room table in attempt to seperate yourself from the situation

and when he turned to glare at you and continue his point, he paused when he saw the tears building up in your eyes and the fearful look you had

he dropped the argument almost instantly and darted over to you, holding you by the shoulders. you couldn’t even form any words, just blubbering as he squeezed you close

you apologized for crying, but he didn’t want to hear shit. he felt guilty for letting the argument escalate like that and the both of you said sorry for the entire situation as a whole.

at the end of the day, you still love each other, y’know?

DREAM

dream’s biggest problem when arguing is that he can’t truly decipher what is an insult and what is a light jab to his ego.

it was during a stream that you had made a joke, something about dream resembling his smp! rendition of his character and that irked dream automatically

after the stream, he came into your room and addressed it, but anyone could see how quietly pissed off he was. and already, you were angry because he was angry

so, you bit back. told him that you were sorry about how he felt and how you pressed his buttons, but not sorry for making the joke. it wasn’t meant to be taken the way he did and that was his fault for stewing over it

mans is angry

so, a shouting match starts up, naturally and it gets heated real fucking quick

“you don’t get to decide whether or not i should blow over a joke!”

(wanted to say that in this argument, you’re both valid, but the way you went about it is not)

it gets to the point where dream’s all up in your face, shouting about how annoying it is for you to be making jokes like that and how he found it unfunny and shit.

which isn’t a bad criticism but also, with how he’s yelling it to your face, it hits a little different but not in a good way. you’re practically swallowing back the tears as he keeps ranting about it.

and when he pauses to let you argue back and speak and you respond with a voice crack that gave away how you truly felt. dream looked back over at you to see you wiping at your eyes, trying to push the emotions back

the vibes shift into something calmer, still heated, but not as bad as it was. he walked back to you and hugged you, letting you let all the emotion out.

from then on, you two talked about it quietly and respectfully, making sure to keep the intense emotions on standby.

and hey! you’re still holding his hand by the end of it.

TOMMY

this fucking rat of a man has a hard time trying to keep his emotions on standby and not go ape shit. knowing tommy, it’s probably a longstanding problem that’s been around his entire life

so, you’re pissed at him first for him blowing up your house on the smp. i mean, i can’t blame you, i’d be just as pissed. that house had been around since the beginning and it held everything you worked for on the server

tommy found it dumb that you had such an angry reaction and began to argue back that it truly didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things and that you were being out of pocket

“c’mon, you know that i didn’t mean for it to hurt you like this and this isn’t a reaction you should be having.”

he keeps mostly level headed the entire argument, but you can tell by how he’s gritting his teeth and how his eyebrows are furrowed that he’s getting annoyed

and then he raises his voice, the coil keeping his frustration snapping along with it. you’re shocked to say the least and start to feel invalidated for him reacting the way he is. while his frustration is all anger, yours is more sad.

tommy stops his harsh tone when he notices the sorrowful look on your face and reels back, taking control of himself. he says that you two need a moment to recollect so you can discuss this again at a later time

despite the argument still lingering hours later, tommy is just as kind as he was before it, making sure to let you know that he still appreciates you no matter what the situation was

and whenever you did discuss it again, tommy and you made a little system to let him know whenever he took it too far. he felt better knowing that you were no longer upset with him and you feel better knowing that he was willing to try and understand you.

C! TECHNOBLADE

techno is fucking notorious for being an especially condescending little arsehole, it’s canon both in his character and irl

so, he takes on a more emotionless and rough approach at the sign of any sort of criticism. he’d rather you think of him as a bitch than let you see that he was any sort of empathetic.

it was when you got onto him for never sleeping that he showed this side of himself. you couldn’t even see it in his body language that he was upset and that made you angrier.

techno was pissed, 100%, but he wanted the upper hand. he refused to let you see him vulnerable.

“i don’t think it’s as big of a deal as you’re making it out to be. why can’t you just ignore it?”

he keeps drawing out the arguing, somehow countering your very valid points to about how disorganized or lazy you were. rather than accepting the criticism, he forced it onto you.

and with every point he spoke, you felt your heart hurt just a little more. he was nitpicking at that point and that hurt more than anything else. he knew you felt insecure about certain things and you just couldn’t see why he wasn’t showing the proper emotions in this argument

eventually your mind became so muddled that you were even aware that you were crying. techno immediately stopped talking and stared at you in slight shock. he made you cry.

the voices were quiet, not giving him instructions or advice. he was on his own.

techno marched forward and held your face, wiping away the tears as quickly as they fell. you just looked up at him, showing so much pain, that his expression broke instantly. he looked like he was about to cry at the sight of your crying

you guys never got back to the argument but it was clear that he was sorry for what he had done. every time he came to bed early proved that enough and on those nights, he held you just a little bit tighter.

[messymindofmine]

Ok so here we go with part 4 of my series. Just a quick disclaimer bc I am only going to say this once. As this series focuses on characters through the lens of their relationship with Robby and we all know that Robby has been done dirty in one way or another by just about every single character on the show, there will be a fair bit of criticism. Fair criticism being the operative phrase here. I have no intention nor desire to shit on characters for no reason. This is true of all characters. While I may be harsher on some characters than I am on others, it isn't due to me hating them but rather with the magnitude of how much wrong they've done. Also, while the main focus is the characters' relationships with Robby, I will be exploring the characters themselves as it their own characteristics that impact the relationship they have with Robby. I will also add that loving and defending characters is fine but I think that being able to call out flaws and acknowledging valid criticism is actually a healthy way to interact with characters. Let’s just remember that criticism does not automatically equal hatred and part of an analysis means making warranted criticisms.

So for this post I want to talk about Robby and his relationship with Kreese and by extension Silver.

What I find really interesting about Kreese is that he really does believe in what he’s doing. He truly doesn’t think of what he did to Johnny as abuse. Instead, he actually seems to view Johnny as some kind of surrogate son and extends that to Robby. He talks about “three generations of Cobra Kai” as though it’s some kind of family legacy. He continuously refers to Robby as “son.” 

From the moment Kreese is reintroduced, we can see the effect he still has on Johnny. For Johnny as a child, Cobra Kai was an escape from his horrible stepfather and Kreese did play the role of a father figure for him. It’s hard to admit that the person you view as a parent is actually the reason for your pain. Hell, we see this repeated with Robby and Johnny. Even when Robby can admit that his father has hurt him, he still craves his attention. With Johnny, he internalized the abuse Kreese inflicted on him to such an extent that it took decades for him to even acknowledge that Kreese had done something wrong. 

When Kreese returns at the end of s1, Johnny is shocked and definitely not as happy as Kreese hoped Johnny would be. They fight and Kreese once again hurts Johnny badly. However, despite this Kreese is able get under Johnny’s skin once again and convince him that Kreese has changed. Johnny believes him which is understandable and lets Kreese back into his life. It’s only after the school fight when Johnny begins to question everything around him that he starts to escape Kreese’s grip. 

One thing that is obvious almost from the moment Kreese returns is his desire to get Robby into Cobra Kai. He constantly tells Johnny that it’s not right for Robby to be with Daniel and that he should be with them instead. He keeps referring to Robby as “our boy.” It’s almost impressive the lengths Kreese goes to to get Robby into Cobra Kai. 

It’s hardly surprising that Robby would trust Kreese despite everything because when Robby was completely alone and scared, Kreese was the only one who even bothered to show up for him. Kreese was the only one who visited him in juvie. Sure, he had ulterior motives and Robby certainly wasn’t interested in what he had to say in the beginning. However, Kreese taught Robby how to fight back in a way that actually stopped him from getting beaten up in juvie. I find it interesting that before Robby even gave Kreese a chance, he actually looked him up. He looked Kreese up and learned about him without any biases clouding his judgement. Of course, none of the articles that he looked at would have told him the truth about how messed up Kreese actually is. So for Robby, it really did come down to who was there when he needed someone and that was Kreese. Of course, Kreese was the only person to acknowledge what really happened in the school fight. That Miguel was the one who escalated the whole thing and Robby was the one who was trying to stop it. 

In 3x10, Robby watched as Johnny and Kreese fought. Bearing in mind that the only reason Johnny was even at the dojo was to get back at Kreese for what he did to Miguel. He didn’t even know that Robby was there because he just let Robby go off on his own but he was willing to storm the dojo and fight Kreese for Miguel. So Johnny sees Robby and Kreese goes into his spiel about “three generations of Cobra Kai.” Kreese may be messed up but everything he said in that scene and in previous scenes since s2 all show that he truly does view Johnny as a son and by extension Robby as a grandson in an extremely warped way. So Kreese and Johnny fight and Robby sees it all. He sees Johnny on top of Kreese actually about to kill hi. Johnny only stops when Robby tells him not to do it. So now on top of everything else, Robby has also had to see his father almost kill someone. Then he outright tells Johnny how much he has hurt him and Johnny just stands there. Then when Robby snaps and starts fighting him, yeah Johnny says he doesn’t want to fight Robby but then proceeds to throw him into a set of lockers and knocking him unconscious. Yeah, it was an accident but there were so many things Johnny could have done in that moment to stop Robby that didn’t involve pushing him into those lockers. Then when Robby regained consciousness and went outside where Kreese and the others were having their standoff, Robby tells them to go. Johnny could have insisted he stay, he could have asked Robby if he was alright, he could have done lots of things but instead he chose to walk away thus making it clear to Robby that his only option was Kreese. Daniel said “keep your Cobra Kai away from our kids” yet had no problem leaving Robby in Kreese’s clutches.

Despite everything, Robby still wasn’t completely sold on joining Kreese. He told Kreese that he wasn’t interested in being a pawn in his games. It was really only after his conversation with Tory and then with Sam at the skatepark when he saw that there was no place for him at Miyagi-Do that wouldn’t require him to debase himself, he went to Kreese. Mind you, even then he makes it a point to tell Johnny that he doesn’t really trust Kreese. For Robby, going to Kreese really was more about survival than anything about Cobra Kai.

Robby’s relationship with Silver is interesting because he is the only person with the exception of Kreese who isn’t scared of Silver. Sure, he was bit intimidated by him at first but even after being beaten up by Silver, Robby never feared him. Robby clearly knew from the start that Silver was dangerous yet he had no problem openly challenging him at the avt. Then in s5, he took it a step further and challenged him in front of all his students. Silver by that point was already clearly unhinged and made it very clear that he would not hesitate to hurt Robby but Robby still looked him in the eye without a hint of fear. 

It’s interesting that there are similarities between Robby and Daniel when it comes to Silver. Both have been his students. Both understand just how dangerous he is better than anyone. Silver for his part seems to have a personal interest in both Robby and Daniel. With Daniel it’s obvious and goes a lot deeper but he became obsessed with Robby as soon as he found out who he was. He watched as Robby was teaching Kenny Miyagi-Do and tells Robby he knows enough to kick all their asses and then challenges him to a fight. There was no reason for him to do that other than to show Robby how much power he could exert over him and Robby understood that message. He taunts Johnny in the prom episode by saying that he would take care of Robby. He also looks directly at Robby at the avt and tells him that it’s his chance to prove to Johnny and Daniel that they don’t need him. He makes it a point to address Robby when even Kreese didn’t say anything. Even in s5, during the beatdown with Johnny, Silver is actually the only person to point out how Johnny has screwed up with Robby. 

As far as Kreese in s5 goes, now that he feels that he has been well and truly betrayed by Johnny and Martin Kove has even said will likely target him in some way for revenge, it’s highly possible he might try something with Robby. Robby obviously will not go back to Kreese but Kreese may target Robby. With Silver, I doubt we have seen the end of him. Given the murky legal situation regarding his arrest, I certainly don’t see Silver just accepting defeat. I’m actually interested in seeing what happens to these two in s6.

You can also see my other posts on Robby and his relationships here

As always, thank you so much to anyone who took the time to read this post and leave a reaction. I truly appreciate it. I hope to have the next post in my series up as soon as I can.

[loving-villanelle]

Don’t know if you’ve seen it yet, but the BBC released an official statement after gathering feedback from fans for their Points Of View initiative. The video is here. A BBC spokesperson said this:

It’s more of a defection than an actual response. And it’s exactly the tone deaf, noncommittal, insulting rhetoric we’ve become accustomed to in the time since the finale. Needless to say, a “conclusive” end absolutely didn’t need to be the homophobic Bury Your Gays ending we were served with. An ending that’s been criticized not only by fans but critics, academics, writers (including Luke Jennings himself), journalists and activists. To add insult to injury, literally killing half of Villaneve and letting Eve live to suffer in agony is the ultimate cruel half measure.

But more than this nonsense spokesperson’s statement, I’m more concerned with the reactions from large swathes of this fandom. I’ve seen folks on Reddit and Twitter saying that it’s not about Villanelle dying necessarily, it’s about the way it was done so horrendously. While this is true to an extent–it gravely misses the point.

Villanelle didn’t need to die.

Period.

And I DO take issue with her dying at all. That IS the actual problem, in and of itself.

Villanelle didn’t need to die: it goes against the canon happy ending Jennings wrote in the novels, it goes against even her own poorly done redemption arc, it goes against the logic of eliminating The Twelve and therefore the greatest in-universe threat, it goes against Carolyn’s own pre-established character, it goes against Eve’s whole arc, and of course it perpetuates the harm of the Bury Your Gays trope.

I emphasize that Villanelle dying IS the problem. I would not have been more accepting of her death if it was done “better” because the premise is wrong to begin with.

I’m just disheartened that so many have missed the point. It troubles me that apparently a lot of people would have excused the finale if Villanelle would have just died in the “right” way rather than what we got. Like the finale season would somehow be cleansed if it’s homophobia, horrible writing, and disrespect of everything that’s come before.

You and I have fought so hard to raise awareness about petitions and email campaigns and fan initiatives that allow our fandom to express precisely why the finale caused so much harm. Villanelle dying in the atrocious way she did is only part of that problem, when she didn’t need to die at all is the core of it. I just want people to understand this and comprehend the damage that was done.

That "statement" is the most pathetic thing I've ever seen. They knew from the beginning that they could only have a conclusive end, yet we know for a fact that they had considered some ambiguous/alternative endings. TWENTY-FIVE DIFFERENT ONES TO BE EXACT. More bullshitting, but I don't know why I would expect anything different at this point.

I think people are focusing on the "how" Villanelle died aspect, because so far the biggest defense we've seen from the show is "this is Killing Eve, death is integral, blah blah blah". So in an attempt to validate their point, while not losing the validity of ours, people are pointing out that if that's TRULY the only way they think the show could've ended, it shouldn't have been in that way. I can't speak for other people, but that's the read I have gotten. I don't think there's many people who would've been okay with her dying, but at least if it had made narrative sense and/or had been with Eve, we could find some meaning in it. It's hard making sense of any of this nonsense, because it just absolutely never should've happened and the gaslighting after the fact has been unreal and has everybody spinning even more

All I can say is keep demanding accountability. These bullshit, half-hearted, insincere statements aren't it. They truly think they are justified in this because of the "nature" of the show and it's our job to inform them otherwise

As always, I'm here if needed but please y'all, don't give up the fight!

[immaturityofthomasastruc]

So I know in the past you’ve been upset that Chat Noir doesn’t take his duties as seriously as he should, pointing out how him quitting in the middle of the city flood was incredibly selfish and stupid, he’s more focused on forcing Ladybug to date him, ect. Given what people have been predicting in terms of him feeling like he’s not trusted enough, the secret identity thing, feeling more left out of the group, do you feel his reasons are a bit more justified this time? And that’s not to blame Ladybug or anything, just curious if you think this reason for him maybe-wanting to quit/feeling left out and not trusted are more valid this time around?

I feel like in theory, this could be a good storyline, and the inner turmoil from Adrien/Cat Noir could be interesting to watch. The problem is, like you said, he never takes his damn job seriously.

Cat Noir has repeatedly shown he really can’t be trusted with secrets, as he can’t really understand the responsibility of being a superhero. Sure, we got some moments of that in the first two seasons (mainly Lady WiFi and Gorizilla), but the show has had too many examples of him defying orders repeatedly, acting like an idiot on the battlefield, or just generally pushing boundaries with his partner.

During a public event at the beginning of “Copycat”, Cat Noir lied about being in a relationship with Ladybug and unintentionally caused the Akuma of the day while never telling Ladybug what happened, and never learned anything from that experience.

Though off-screen, he pulled a prank during an Akuma fight in “Reflekdoll” which almost screwed up the fight, and when he got to experience how tough Ladybug’s job is through switching Miraculous for the day, he ignored it at the end of the episode while basically saying “Wow, sucks to be her”. This makes Miraculous Ladybug the only show to do a body swap episode and completely screw up the message.

The whole reason Ladybug and Cat Noir lost their memories in “Oblivio” was because he was slacking off on the battlefield, and Ladybug had to save his ass. When they got their memories back at the end of the episode and found out they kissed before they got their memories back, Ladybug was horrified while Cat Noir laughed it off and kept saying they were “mEaNt FoR eAcH oThEr”. For context, when Ladybug was forced to kiss Cat Noir in “Dark Cupid”, she generally didn’t want to and tried to apologize afterwards.

During “Glaciator” and “Frozer”, Cat Noir let his feelings get in the way of saving lives and gave Ladybug sass for no reason other than to punish her for not returning his advances after being turned down multiple times while never being called out on it.

He willingly sacrificed himself in “Gamer 2.0.” despite Ladybug’s protests, saying he trusted her to do everything, and would later do the same thing in “Lies” and then admit he thinks her angry face is cute. The latter example is meant to show how charming Cat Noir is as a character.

He almost fell for an evil doppelganger of Ladybug in “The Puppeteer 2” because she said she loved him and was about to lose his Miraculous if not for noticing she was a wax statue (even though they were fighting in a wax statue museum and could have easily picked up the smell of wax), and later actually fell for an evil doppelganger of Ladybug in “Ladybug” because she said she loved him, and neither time, he was called out for it.

When Ladybug was captured by an Akuma in “Party Crasher”, he ignored Master Fu’s orders to stay still because of how dangerous the Akuma was, and blindly charged in before having to be bailed out by four other heroes.

In “Desperada”, Adrien was offered the Snake Miraculous, and rather than turning it down because he was already Cat Noir, decided to take it and work with Ladybug just so he could impress her and used the Snake’s power to turn back time 25,913 times before giving up.

In “Lies”, he kept screwing around while on patrol, and showed excitement at the possibility of someone getting akumatized while the episode states that he can’t be with Kagami because of how seriously he takes being Cat Noir.

In “Sentibubbler”, he was specifically ordered by Rena Rouge to stant still and wait for further instructions, but because it wasn’t Ladybug, he smashed a chimney out of anger and openly defied orders by charging into battle so Marinette had to tell him the damn plan just so he wouldn’t screw it up

If you were the Guardian and had the authority to take away Adrien’s Miraculous after reviewing all of the things he did, would you actually trust him, or make sure he never even sees a Miraculous until he cleans up his act?

Most of these flaws are never acknowledged by the show, and the writers act like he’s such a valuable asset to the team, even though as soon as she became Ladybug’s confidant, Alya took her new position much more seriously (except in “Rocketear”),  and actually helped her out at critical moments, while never really trying to exploit her connections with Ladybug or pushed any boundaries in terms of her superhero side.

I’m not saying Adrien is wrong to be angry at the lack of trust, and I’m glad the show is finally acknowledging the inequality in their partnership, but I just don’t really think Ladybug is being unreasonable to place her trust in other heroes instead of Cat “Gets Brainwashed at Every Opportunity” Noir.

[simplepotatofarmer]

technoblade: a takedown - pt. 1

(not clickbait)

aka i go over every argument people make against c!techno one by one and determine whether they’re valid, false, or a mixture of both. i rewatched every single stream/video, including those on his alt channel, so i could approach this with the most information possible. i’ll be breaking this up into parts because there’s just too much otherwise. all about the characters unless stated.

techno believes in a ‘dog eat dog’ world - false

this is an argument i see used a lot when people discuss techno so i wanted to address it first. luckily, the stream in which he says this is only his fifth stream on the server. there’s one major reason why this argument falls apart and one minor reason that isn’t objective like the first.

first and most importantly: techno has never acted on this. even at the beginning - which is when this comment was made - he was helping his allies, from building railings to keep them from falling, making a potato farm, and all the gear he grinded for to equip his allies in pogtopia with. moving forward, he’s also helped out plenty of people: giving tommy a place to stay and items, telling phil to reach out to ranboo after doomsday, as well as giving both tommy and ranboo food when asked. there’s more, of course, but the point is he’s never once followed up on this statement. he teamed up with quackity to stop the egg. he spoke to niki about how he was giving anarchy a bad reputation because of the violence and wanted to take a different approach which he has.

when people use this argument to insist that techno is the villain, it doesn’t hold up because it’s merely taking one statement he made and upholding it as a main part of his character when his actions and later statements have shown that he doesn’t actually believe in this randian view point. objectively, i can’t see how this argument can extend beyond ‘well, he said it’. regardless of what he said during the pogtopia arc, he’s said the opposite later - wanting everyone to live free with no oppression or imperialism - and has never acted on it nor brought it up later. this take honestly seems disingenuous and was in fact the driving factor of this post.

second and not as critical, techno mentions multiple times during each of his first streams that he’s not sure who all is on his side. this is a reoccurring point for him. he makes the comment about wanting a dog eat dog world during the red festival stream, while speaking to bad and sam. the first part of the conversation is techno asking about state secrets since they’re (as far as techno knows) on manberg’s side. bad mentions schlatt killing cats and techno launches into a spiel about massive anarchy and the weak being huddled in fear, asking them how does that sound. bad says as long as there’s no cat murder, perhaps. bad then asks techno what his ‘single issue’ is and techno responds that he wants to destroy the government. to me, the context of the conversation, who he’s speaking to and what his opinion of those people is, is an important thing to consider.

techno’s ‘we’ll burn that bridge when we get to it’ comment means he was always going to betray pogtopia/l’manberg - valid but not how you think it is

i’ve seen people say that techno saying ‘we’ll burn that bridge when we get to it’ is a clear sign that he was always intending to betray pogtopia/l’manberg which, yeah? 

but i wouldn’t call it a betrayal. 

he says the ‘we’ll burn that bridge when we get to it’ line at the end of the ‘eve of revolution’ stream while he’s talking to quackity, ponk, and sam. the conversation is as follows:

techno, to quackity: i’m glad we could get to know each other. i heard you’re on our side now. i heard you betrayed schlatt.

quackity: yeah, that’s right. are you betraying anyone?

techno: no. i would never betray my personal ideals.

[some chatter from ponk and quackity]

sam: what does that mean? what if the people you’re fighting along [sic] have different ideals than you, though? doesn’t that mean you’d betray them?

techno: listen... we’ll burn that bridge when we get to it.

then techno states that he ‘said what he said’ when sam questions him about his choice of metaphor.

he actually uses the same malaphor at the beginning of the ‘revolution’ stream when they (quackity and tubbo) question him again and in that case techno definitely avoids the subject which isn’t a good thing but considering everyone was so worked up about the possible traitor, i can completely understand.

overall, techno is extremely upfront about his intentions. yes, there is definitely some miscommunication between all the parties because none of them were on the same page but that doesn’t make techno the bad guy here nor does it mean he betrayed anyone. he was upfront about his intentions from the start.

in his first two streams, he makes a joke that if they happen to set up a new government/president that he would just take that one down and it would be a never-ending cycle. over and over, he says that he wants to do destroy the government/manberg. when tommy mentions taking it back, techno says, ‘what do you mean, take it back?’ though this kind of gets lost in the middle of everything else - dsmp (lack of) communication strikes again. 

the takeaway that i see here a lot is that techno always intended to betray them because he knew tommy wanted to take back l’manberg and knew that he would go against them if they set up a new government. and this is true to an extent! he did know that tommy wanted l’manberg back and he did know that he would go against them if they set up a new government. but wilbur was also telling techno that he was on board with the whole anarchy thing. 

none of them were on the same page and that surely led to a big chunk of what happened and hurt feelings on both sides but that doesn’t mean techno betrayed anyone or that he was the bad guy for doing exactly what he said he would do from day one.

techno destroying (l’)manberg was wrong - it’s complicated

the first thing to address here is that for most anarchists, destroying a government isn’t a bad thing. in fact, taking down the government/state is basically our goal. now, i don’t speak for all anarchists, of course, but overall the general feeling is that violence in the name of overthrowing an oppressive government is not inherently bad. there’s no way to do a one-for-one here because it’s minecraft but the general sentiment remains. so while violence enacted against the state is a bad thing for people who aren’t anarchists, techno has no reason to and would not view it as inherently bad.  

but it did hurt people and techno himself acknowledges that fact. he’s acknowledged what he’s done when confronted about it. he hasn’t said he was wrong because understanding that it was hurtful doesn’t mean he believes he was wrong. to him, he wasn’t. destroying what he viewed as an oppressive system was the right thing to do, even if it hurt people.

(also this isn’t any kind of meta but i think it needs to be pointed out that wilbur had already set off the tnt and techno summoned two killable mobs which did plenty of damage but he didn’t say wilbur was the great who came before them for no reason.)

again, this is going to be the most controversial part of this post because i don’t believe destroying government is a bad thing and i don’t believe techno is wrong for believing that as well. there are better ways to address the problem and techno is adjusting his tactics but if another government was to be established, i don’t believe he would be in the wrong to destroy it because he’s an anarchist.

the tl;dr of this section honestly could just be summed up with ‘watch less marvel, read more ursula k. le guin’.

‘techno is the villain because he called tommy the hero’ - so very false 

this is a take i’ve seen that to this day i don’t understand.

techno calling tommy the hero does not mean he was setting himself up as the villain in any capacity. it was merely pointing out tommy’s habit of putting himself at the forefront of almost every conflict, trying to shoulder everything, no matter how it hurts tommy himself. the speech was directed at that and nothing else. it doesn’t mean techno is the villain, it doesn’t even mean there is a villain; there are more stories to be told than the classic hero-villain and the hero-villain narrative doesn’t always apply to stories. (i’d certainly argue that it doesn’t apply to the dream smp but that’s a different conversation.)

techno is to blame for tubbo’s death - false

i think this one has been done to death but what would a techno post be without it?

no, techno is not to blame.

he said over and over that he was outnumbered and believed that if he had done anything, everyone would’ve turned on him and ‘torn him to shreds’. even if that wasn’t the case, it is what techno believed. he had no reason to think that he could take the entire crowd out until he actually fired the rocket launcher. and remember, he tested the rocket launcher earlier during the festival on niki (who volunteered) and it didn’t kill her. when he realized the amount of splash damage it did, he gives a surprised laugh and then begins firing into the crowd. 

as for saying he was under ‘mild’ amounts of peer pressure, techno has a habit of minimizing. not just the things he’s done, but often situations that he’s been in that were stressful. he stated that he deals poorly with high stress situations and one of the cognitive distortions that can come with anxiety is minimization. techno doesn’t actually believe it was ‘mild’ peer pressure - it was a situation that caused him enough distress that he brings it up later at doomsday - but it’s easier to deal with a situation when you downplay it, it’s easier for techno to keep up that calm façade when he’s acting as if whatever happened wasn’t that big of a deal even if it was. again, the way he speaks about it on doomsday was clearly upset and emotional. 

the only person to blame for tubbo’s death is schlatt. he was the one pulling the trigger and techno was the gun.

if you made it this far, thank you for sticking it out! i spent so many hours rewatching all the streams, some of them multiple times, while taking notes to be able to do this. i’m extremely passionate about techno and i feel as if a lot of the arguments against him tend to miss the nuance of his character. this project is on-going and i’ll be going over the butcher army/retirement storylines next. feel free to submit any points you’d like to see addressed! 

[makeste]

save no matter what.

so this is going to ultimately be a post about Deku. however, if you’ll be so kind as to indulge me, I would like to start things off by making a point about Bakugou. specifically, I’d like to point out that back in the day before this kid got Character Development no Jutsu’d, people weren’t always so inclined to view his attitude towards winning in the best light. which is a nice way of saying that he came off as unhealthily obsessed, not to mention more than a little unhinged.

sorry for the image spam btw, I just think they’re funny. he’s so demented lmao. KILL DIE CRUSH.

anyway so we’re gonna do the rest of this below a cut before it gets long. but I promise it really is a Deku post lol. don’t let the pre-readmore stuff fool you. I PROMISE THERE IS A POINT, AND WE WILL GET TO IT.

anyway! so yeah, we really didn’t have the best impression of Bakugou’s whole winning fixation at the beginning there. and I mean, it’s not like we had the best impression of Bakugou himself at the start of things either. we were already primed from the very first chapter to see this kid as an adversary to Izuku. the story goes out of its way to paint him in pretty much the worst light possible. which is why what happens next is so interesting.

because one might see all this and think, “holy heck, this kid is off the shits, somebody needs to set him straight pronto and get it into his head that winning isn’t everything.” because that’s almost the natural conclusion to draw. “look at this kid, he doesn’t care about helping other people at all, all he cares about is winning, someone needs to come along and show him that he’s got it backwards.”

except that’s not what happens, is it? because this is where, much to my delight, Horikoshi came along and started subverting expectations. because not only is Katsuki not rebuked for being so obsessed with winning -- it’s pretty much the exact opposite.

the one and only time Deku ever straight up hands Katsuki’s ass to him is when he says he doesn’t want to win. Deku is IMMEDIATELY all, “THE FUCK KIND OF BULLSHIT DID I JUST HEAR OUT OF YOUR TRASH MOUTH,” and that’s when he sets him straight.

the important people in Katsuki’s life never tell him, “hey you need to cool it with the whole winning thing.” All Might and Aizawa never scold him for it, or tell him that he shouldn’t try with everything he has to win, or that wanting to win is a bad thing. on the contrary, they both commend him for it. and ultimately, he’s told by All Might that this desire is actually one of the two fundamental qualities that every great hero needs.

he completely turns the whole thing on its head. not only is it not a bad thing, it’s actually crucial. essential. because what the desire to win really is, at its core, is tenacity. it’s the fiercest kind of determination. it’s not something he should be ashamed of; it’s something that sets him apart, something that makes him worthy. he is someone who refuses to back down no matter what. refuses to give up, no matter what. and this quality, which is initially misunderstood by some to the point where even the villains mistakenly take him for one of their own in the making, is eventually validated to the fullest degree by the person that Katsuki looks up to the most. his desire to win goes from being this awkward “son wtf are you doing” thing to being one of the core philosophies of the series. and ever since then, we pretty much don’t question it.

so why do I bring this up now? well, the answer to that can basically be summed up in one word.

“parallels.”

so here’s the thing. there’s been a lot of talk lately about Deku’s ridiculous, reckless, and absurdly self-destructive desire to save others while having little to no regard for himself. currently he’s lying in a hospital bed, having broken approximately 218 out of the 206 bones in his little hero body (yes, somewhere along the way he found an additional dozen bones to break). it is worrying. it is Concerning. and it’s raised a lot of questions, such as “???” and “wtf is this idiot doing.”

and a lot of people have been pretty critical of him! this is, of course, an ongoing thing with this child, and people have been giving him grief over it going as far back as chapter 6.

while others have been bothered by it going even further back than that.

and I’ve seen these sentiments being echoed pretty frequently in the fandom as well. and there are basically two talking points that I want to address here. the first is the idea that Deku’s aggressive brand of selflessness stems from an inherent lack of self-worth. in other words, because he prioritizes other people’s safety and well-being above his own, and is willing to go to such drastic lengths to save them, there’s this feeling that he doesn’t value himself enough, that he must not care about himself.

but I don’t think that’s quite it. let’s go back to those parallels first, though. let’s take another look at Kacchan.

what I mainly want to call attention to is the intensity here. again, it’s something that at first strikes most readers as being absurdly over the top. the truth is, I think a lot of people simply can’t relate to it. Katsuki cares about winning with a ferocity and a fervor that most people, for better or worse, simply don’t have. I certainly don’t, lol.

but he does. to him it’s not a shallow, superficial thing at all. it’s important to him, perhaps the most important thing. I think we often talk about it in terms of it being a desire, but imo a more accurate way to define it is not as a want, but as a need. in other words, it’s the opposite of the question “what is it this character wants” (i.e. “what is it they can’t live without”)? instead, it’s a question of “what is it they don’t want” (i.e. “what is it they can’t live with”)?

and in Katsuki’s case, the thing he can’t live with is feeling like he hasn’t tried his absolute best. he needs to give his all in everything he does. he wants to win, but winning just on its own is not enough.

it has to be earned. he has to prove to himself and to everyone else that he deserves it. anything less than that is unacceptable. anything less than that, and he can’t be at ease. he can’t be settled. he can’t rest. and so he puts everything he has into winning, even if it means going to extremes. because it’s that important to him.

it’s something that’s at times alarming and even disturbing for others to witness. but nonetheless, it’s a part of who he is, and at the end of the day his teachers accept that, and the story acknowledges that it’s his greatest strength.

so now, to finally bring this back around to Deku, this is what I keep seeing in his character as well. only in his case, the thing he can’t live with is knowing that he didn’t do everything he possibly could to save someone. or to put it another way, Deku, at his core, is someone who cannot rest until he knows that everyone is safe. simple as that. it’s not just a desire to protect people; it’s a need. he needs to know that everyone is safe and protected. otherwise he can’t be at ease. it’s no different from how normal, everyday people aren’t able to feel at ease unless they know that they are safe and that their loved ones are safe. it’s just that in Deku’s case, this same fundamental need extends to everyone, not just himself and his friends and family. everyone. he can’t live with himself knowing that someone was in trouble, and he had the ability to do something to help, but didn’t. and so, if you literally can’t live with not doing something, you basically have no choice but to do it.

and this is what in my opinion defines Deku’s character. Kacchan, in trying to understand it, noted that Deku doesn’t seem to take himself into account. but I think OFA Prime summed it up a little more accurately. “he rages for the sake of others. for them, he does his best until he can do no more. this young man is possessed by a drive to save others that eclipses all common understanding.”

so yeah. it’s not that he doesn’t care about himself at all, it’s that he cares about others even more. he has that same intensity and ferocity towards saving people that Katsuki has towards winning. and just as it was difficult at first for fans to understand Katsuki’s feelings, it’s hard to fathom the sheer depth of that “save everyone” feeling that compels Deku to break his own body in that pursuit. it’s scary, not to mention extremely destructive and dangerous. and so really, it was almost inevitable that there would be some backlash.

but just like Katsuki’s desire to win was ultimately validated in the end, I think Deku’s desire to save others will be as well. in fact it already is being validated, for starters by the other denizens of OFA, led by Lil Bro as mentioned above. let’s go back for a moment to that same scene.

here we get a huge hint that “Deku gets taken down a notch and chewed out and scolded for his recklessness” is not, in fact, the direction that the story is going in. because in general, when the main villain starts mocking the hero and saying that they’ve done something wrong, that’s a very good sign that said hero is actually on the exact right track. like, no offense, but as far as character critiques go, AFO is probably the least qualified person in the entire manga to start offering those up lol. so yeah. if AFO is denouncing Deku for something, and OFA Prime is praising him for that exact same thing, I think it’s safe to say that means he is in fact doing something very, very right.

“okay but makeste, he nearly got himself killed and broke all of his arms AND legs and is now lying in a fucking coma,” you say, gesturing emphatically to the last page of chapter 298. “so I mean, that’s all well and good that Wonder Boy has the best of intentions and all that, but at the end of the day he’s only one kid. he literally can’t save everyone, and if he pulls one or two more stunts like this, he’s going to get himself killed.”

and okay, but this here is the other talking point that I wanted to address. because it’s true, Deku does need to learn a specific lesson here. but that lesson is NOT that he can’t save everyone. this is a superhero story, guys -- “you can’t save everyone” is never going to be the underlying message, ever. it’s the OPPOSITE of the message. Deku is the hero because he tries to save everyone. because he doesn’t give up on saving people no matter what. that is literally the core of the story. it has been since the very first chapter.

so then what is it that Deku actually needs to learn here? well, once again, it all comes back to those parallels.

btw, I really just love how he’s carrying Katsuki there lol. he’s just so done with him.

but anyway. so, the final exam arc. Katsuki initially wants to win at all costs -- but there’s a hitch. because even though he wants to win, he refuses to do so while working with Deku. enter Deku’s left hook, and one impromptu Rival Encouragement Speech later, our boy has thankfully come to his senses.

but here’s the point -- the lesson here wasn’t “you can’t always win.” rather, the lesson that Katsuki needed to learn was that you can’t always win alone.

yeah. so now you can see what I’m getting at here.

“...on your own.”

that’s the key. this is the one and only thing that Deku actually needs to get into his head. wanting to save everyone is fine! his will to save others has never been a weakness -- it’s been the most admirable thing about him from day one. it’s what makes him strong. it’s why All Might chose him. it’s why OFA has chosen him. it’s what sets him apart, and I firmly believe it’s what will ultimately help him save the day and defeat AFO as well. because what other character would look at Shigaraki Tomura, the person who just impaled his friend and destroyed an entire city, and instinctively reach out a hand to try and save him? and if you don’t think that’s going to wind up being key to the final battle, you and I have very different ideas about this series’ endgame.

Deku’s determination to save everyone isn’t arrogance or futility. it is and always has been his greatest strength. but what he’s missing now, what he needs to learn, is simply to trust. y’all might have seen that theory about the Fourth’s quirk, and why All Might was so hesitant to tell Deku about it. basically, the theory (which is based on an attempted translation of the crossed-out parts of All Might’s OFA notebook) goes that the Spidey Sense was so overwhelming that the Fourth -- whose cause of death was one of the things crossed out -- eventually couldn’t bear it, and went to live alone in the middle of the woods somewhere. and possibly wound up killing himself?? all of which is just speculation right now of course. but it makes sense. and it would certainly explain why All Might, being all too aware of Deku’s self-destructive tendencies, would keep that from him.

but if this is the case, that means it’s clear that the Fourth’s solution didn’t work. “give up and accept that you can’t save everyone” clearly is NOT the answer to be had here.

the answer is trust. trust that his fellow heroes have his back. trust that they’ll be able to help him reach the people he’s not able to reach on his own. trust that they can work together to save everyone. that he doesn’t have to rest the entire world on his shoulders alone.

it’s the one lesson that All Might, his predecessor and his teacher, never learned himself until it was too late. but of course, All Might never had a prickly and determined rival who was ready to step in and deal out some tough love if need be. a rival who, perhaps, just might soon get a chance to repay an old favor.

“I don’t wanna hear you say you can’t save someone.”

I’m just saying. just as Deku has been watching Katsuki all this time, and admiring his determination to win, and emulating it himself, so has Katsuki recently begun to emulate Deku’s determination to save others. we’ve seen it not just in his recent act of self-sacrifice, but even in little things like his habits and tricks of speech. just like Katsuki is Deku’s image of victory, Deku is becoming Katsuki’s image of saving others.

and so I’ll bet you anything that if Deku ever starts to doubt himself, or starts feeling like his dream and desires are futile, Kacchan will be there to set him straight with a good old fashioned Rival Encouragement Speech of his own. possibly with his own left hook to match, though his left shoulder is currently out of sorts atm so he might need to modify that approach a little bit. but the point is, he’ll be there. and he will not allow Deku to give up on himself. he will be there to remind him that he doesn’t have to face this alone.

so yeah! finally managed to wrap up my giant Deku meta which I’ve been working on for ages and rewritten like fifteen times lmao. just in time for this to be relevant for all of a day, probably, depending on what happens once chapter 279 drops lol. but yeah. tl;dr, local boy tries to do too much, but his heart is in the right place, and hopefully all he really needs is a good pep talk from his tsundere bff to set him to rights again. r.i.p. to the Fourth, but he’s different.

[imagine-straykids]

Stray Kids SS: Argument PT. 1

SS for short scenarios. Stray Kids arguing with their significant others

requested? No. I just write whenever I feel like it.

genre: fluff, angst, romance, etc etc.

---------------------------------------------- 

Bang Chan

     You’re no bragger but you think you’re pretty reasonable most of the times. You understand your boyfriend is a busy person and his work came first and foremost. You’ve tried not to take it personally and he has made it pretty clear before you guys even got into this relationship that he wouldn’t be the best person with time management.

     Of course you took a gamble and compromised to form this bond with the one and only Christopher Bang. You had always put his feelings first whether that’s him choosing his friends, work, or music over you, you were definitely okay with that as long as he came back to you at the end of the day. Even the smallest texts nearing the end of the night like “Goodnight sweetie, hope you had a good day!” was enough for you. You weren’t asking for much. You don’t know how much lower you can set your standards because slowly and progressively, Chan was already failing to meet them.

     The most you guys have ever been apart was maybe two weeks and even then, Chan had always made sure to check on you through texts or phone calls. So when it was nearing a month, and he has rejected your invitation to do something for the second time in a month, you were left to feel less than pleasant whether you had set yourself up for failure or perhaps did you deserve more than what you had settled for.

       You couldn’t help but to be upset to some degree and even then you still doubted if your feelings were valid. You even felt guilty since you had promised him a long time ago you would be understanding. Were you wrong for just wanting a little bit of your boyfriend’s attention?

       So when Felix brought you his breakfast treats like he would every Sunday because the boy loves baking, he could tell in your eyes that your world was seeing more than blue. You weren’t your usual self who was always welcoming and greeted him with warmth. The tone in your voice and your body language imitated that of a walking dead and although you tried your hardest to put on a great appearance, Felix could see right through you.

       When he had asked you if you were alright, a sea of tears just came bursting through. Like a puddle that you had held inside for weeks finally being freed. You told Felix everything and everything. It was nice to have someone to talk to, for once in a long time. Felix had always been very understanding of you and was very much like a brother. He reassured you and you felt so much better after, that when he left, you even thought you might finally be able to get a good nap after some words of comforts.

       Your nap was shortly disrupted when a series of loud knocks were ringing through your door. It took you a few seconds to process everything because your brain was still trying to wake up along with you. Then a beep from your phone was heard. You turned to the left side where you had placed your phone and noticed long notifications of texts and missed calls from Chan. Oh lord. Well of course who could that be at the door then.

       Felix had only told Chan out of good intention, and honestly you weren’t even surprised. Not one thing said to one of those boys will stay in its origin. You crankily tossed your blanket aside and walked up to the door as you took a deep breath. You opened the door and it was just the one person you were expecting.

       Chan looked totally out of breath, as if he had been beaten by a stick over and over again, you can see the sweats tracing along the line of his forehead down to his cheeks and his hair has gotten messier than usual.

    “Chan--” You were cut when Chan just shoved himself inside your apartment.

    “Why didn’t you tell me earlier?” He looked at you dead in the eyes as he shut the front door.

    “Tell you what?” You weren’t acting naive but you just wanted to know what exactly Felix had told him.

    “What you told Felix. Why didn’t you tell me that? That you wanted to hang out with me, that you’ve been feeling sad and lonely?”

    “I did. I asked you twice if you wanted to go out or do something. You said no both times.” You defended yourself.

    “Why didn’t you say anything when you were not feeling good then?” A worrisome look overshadowed his angrier look earlier.

    “Pfft,” you scoffed. You couldn’t believe what he was saying. “Really Chan? Do I need to feel less than okay, do I need to question if my boyfriend even wants to be with me, for you to actually worry now?” you challenged him full on.

    “What do you mean.” Chan wasn’t gullible, but sometimes when he gets too caught up on one thing, he misses another.

    “Why should it be my responsibility that you act like a reasonable boyfriend who cares about his girlfriend’s needs. I shouldn’t need to tell you when you should be doing your parts. You were on the line of almost ignoring me for a whole month, doing whatever you’re doing without caring for my well being, and the two times I ask to do something, I get pushed aside. And you’re here telling me I’m not trying harder?”

    “I already told you from the beginning, y/n, that I am not the best person to be in a relationship with. I lose track of times, get lost in my own thoughts. I apologize if I made you feel like I didn’t care about you. I do. Sometimes I just need time to myself, you know. And I try to do it without hurting your feelings but it’s hard. Because I care about you too.”

    “I know that you’ve warned me from the beginning. And I’m a fool. I can’t do it anymore, Chan. I’m not the girlfriend you want me to be. I thought I could do it because I love you so much... but it hurts to be away from you. I can’t do it, Chan. Sometimes I just miss you, and want to be with you, but I’m afraid I’m going to bother you because you’ve already set your boundaries. I’m sorry.” you started sobbing even thought you told yourself you weren’t going to cry. 

    Chan quickly pulled you into a hug as you ugly sob into his chest.

    “It’s going to be okay, y/n. We can get through this together. If you still love me, we can talk it through. You still love me, right?” he angled your frowning face up to his.

    “Of course,” you answer like music to his ear.

----------------------------------------------

Lee Know

    Before you ever accepted Minho’s confession, you’ve been told by nearly everyone around him that he would be a handful. And oh Jesus, you wish they had warned you better, because he wasn’t just a handful. Minho was a pain in the ass if he didn’t try. Even before you got together with him, he found pleasure in teasing and making fun of you whenever he got the chance to. 

    But besides the assholery moves Minho liked to pull, when he was just with you, he showed sides of himself that only you got to experience. That’s pretty much your answer whenever somebody ask you how did you guys even got into a relationship considering y’all were pretty much like fire and water. The person who everyone else found to be a living nightmare because you just don’t mess with him since he has such a way with his words, you’ll find yourself questioning your intelligence.

     Minho can either be the best person you’ll ever meet in your lifetime or as so he likes to claim, or he can be the person that makes your feet turn the other way whenever you hear his name. So you knew this weren’t going to turn out pretty when Minho was forced to be in a team with Hyunjin for game night and Hyunjin was losing every single point possible.

       At first, him and the rest tried to play it off light heartedly, but you can feel the room growing sour each time Hyunjin missed the hints and was unable to score a point for this game of Charades that was suggested by the super innovative Chan, who decided that Hyunjin and Minho in the same team was evolution.

       The others were having a blast poking fun at Hyunjin and Minho whose points were definitely not looking very nice until Minho out of a sudden, slapped the pile of papers onto the ground and said he’s had it.

    “I don’t want to be in a team with him! He sucks!” Minho pointed fingers at Hyunjin who obviously took it personal by the look of his face.

      The room silenced and everybody just stared until Chan spoke up, “Come on, just this once. You guys are never on the same team because you always want to change.” 

    “Yeah, because he sucks, can’t you see. Even a 5 year old kid would be able to score more points than him. We’re not even losing by a little. We’re unredeemable at this point,” Minho spit out without missing a single beat.

       Everybody was growing uncomfortable, especially Hyunjin who had done his best to stay positive the whole time.

    “Minho! Can you not. That’s incredibly rude. It’s just a game. Losing one night won’t kill you. How childish can you be.” You stared at your own boyfriend in disgust.

     “Really now, you’re going to argue with me against this?” It was like he really couldn’t believe you were not on his side.

    “So what if I am. You’re acting ridiculous and you deserve to know it.”

    “Guys! Please stop. Don’t argue because of me please. He’s right. I wasn’t very good. Don’t be angry at him because of me, y/n. I’ll be fine. I’m going to go outside to get some fresh air, I’ll feel better once I come back.” Hyunjin excused himself and left.

      You could only roll your eyes when Minho, being his stubborn self was refusing to go after Hyunjin and continued to stay in the same spot.

    “How selfish can one be.” You criticized him before you followed after Hyunjin.

     You had hoped Hyunjin didn’t think too much of it, knowing how Minho usually is. Being the sweetheart he is, he thanked you and told you not to worry. When you went back inside, the others notified you that Minho had already left and honestly, you could care less. He was being a d*ck and this time, you weren’t going to cave in. Only time would help kill that inflated ego of his. 

         About a week has passed and you still haven’t talked to Minho and vice versa. You knew that his diva ass would never give in, so you didn’t quite know why you were silently battling him when you’re pretty sure if you wanted to fix this, you’ll have to do it yourself. But you didn’t want to.

         You’ve had enough of Minho always getting what he wants, always having the last say in anything, and thinking that you’ll always bend backward for him. It’s kind of funny because Hyunjin had actually told you that Minho already apologized, so why are you guys still fighting? Pride. Now it’s just a fight of pride. And as much as Minho has it, you have a lot of it as well.

           It was the weekend, and usually you’ll spend your weekend with Minho doing whatever you guys usually do but since he wasn’t here anymore, you decided to just spend your day relaxing with a nice cup of tea watching Netflix. It was your day off work and you weren’t going to let this day go to waste.

           You gently set your tea down on the little table to your right, about to lay against the couch when the corner of your eyes caught your screen lit up with a text message. You sat back up and struggled for about a couple seconds trying to reach your phone that you had placed a little too far. 

           It was from Minho. You couldn’t believe it. Reading what he sent you just made it even more amusing.

        Stupid, are you going to apologize or not - Minho Lee

        Why should I apologize. What the hell? I didn’t do shit - Y/n

        Okay well I already said sorry to Hyunjin so I don’t know why you so pressed for. I didn’t do nun to you. I mean I know you kind of had a thing for him and all before we met but don’t take it out on me - Minho Lee

         This little shit, you thought.

         Bruh. I never liked him tf. I just think he’s very pretty. Prettier than me. And unlike someone, he actually has half a brain and some human decency - Y/n

           Okay we get it, you have a crush on Hyunjin - Minho Lee

           No, dumbass. The problem is you always going around saying, doing whatever you like without considering other people’s feelings. I know that’s your personality and all, but there’s a limit between what’s okay and what’s crossing the line, and whenever I try to tell you, you never listen. Always doing whatever you want. Hyunjin is one of your best friend and you hurt his feelings the other day and didn’t even feel bad about it until someone got in your face and told you you were being a d*ck. I love you, Minho. But I just wish you would listen sometimes and be open to I don’t know... improvements? - Y/n

           I’m sorry, I’ve just grew up this way so it’s hard to get out of a pattern. Sometimes I say things I don’t mean and sometimes I say things I do mean and then I don’t realize that my actions has caused harm to the other person, because I’ve just always been this way you know. Others have tried telling me before but I've always brushed it off because I am a stubborn person. But I care about you. You’re one of the very first person other than the members that I deeply care about. So if you’re telling me this out of love then I’ll take it into consideration. I know I should’ve been nicer to Hyunjin as well. Chan yelled at me for a while the other day, so please don’t yell at me too :( - Minho Lee

         Of course I care about you. Everything I do is out of love, dear. You’re one hell of a nuisance but I love you. I know you grew up this way and it is difficult getting out of a pattern, but take little steps. I’ll be here with you. and yeah, you totally deserved that from Chan. Jk I love you - Y/n

         You’re mean :( can I come over. We were supposed to go shopping today - Minho Lee

          Mhmmm. Let me think about it - Y/n

          Well you have 2 seconds, because I’m already outside your door - Minho Lee

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Changbin

    Changbin liked to brag about anything and everything, whether that’s how many confessions he got on Valentines, to how many people who wanted to be his partner when it came to a science project, or even the amount of girls that would hit on him daily.

    You never really minded because that was just how he is. And of course, mainly because you knew all those scenarios only existed in his head and was as real as flying fairies and pink unicorns. So when someone was actually blatantly hitting on him, Changbin wasn’t as knowledgeable as his bluffs claimed to be.

    Changbin was one of the best from his music class, so good that the professor made him the teacher’s assistant even when the semester was on going. He usually talk tales of how many students usually needs his help when it came to writing lyrics or composing as a beginner. Interesting enough, but nothing major as he’d like to phrase it.

    Then every time when you guys would usually meet at the end of classes to which you usually ask how his day went, he started talking about this girl who he’s currently assisting. At first it was nothing out of the ordinary. Just a student from his class who he’s helping because that’s his job. Even the first two or three days of his on-going blabbering about this student didn’t kick something in you until maybe the fourth time this week where this girl is always managing to squeeze herself into his schedule everyday. It shouldn’t have bothered you, but for some reason it did.

    Especially when he’d say alarming things like “Oh yeah and she also asked me if I wanted to get a drink after class but I told her I have plans.” or “She compliments me a lot and told me if I have time, she’d love to listen to my work.” 

    Maybe you’re overreacting and she’s just a really engaging and kind person. You felt bad at first for assuming such a thing about another human being, so you gave her the benefit of the doubt because you didn’t know your dumbass boyfriend would be this oblivious when someone is clearly trying to get inside his pant.

    So when you happened to walk past the school garden the following week and saw the both of them from your very clear sight, you were a little more than dumbfounded. This girl was not even trying to hide it at all. You didn’t know how Changbin was keeping his eyes to himself at this point. The outfit she was wearing was definitely very sexy and appealing. Changbin was still faced down, scribbling something on the music sheet trying to get the female to engage but she clearly had something else in mind.

    You could’ve sworn you saw her hand trailed alongside Changbin’s thigh and so you accidentally let out a shriek, but quickly hid behind the thick white pillar, grumpily dragging yourself back to class in anger after.

    After your final class of the day, Changbin waited for you at the bench near the entrance where you guys had always met up. He beamed with ecstasy once he saw you, but you quickly brushed past him and continued walking completely shunning his existence. His smile progressed into a frown once he realized that you were not in your usual mood.

    He ran in front of you and blocked any further movements.

    “Y/n, are you okay?” He asked with a concerning expression.

    You didn’t say anything and only continued scowling.

    “Come on. You know you can tell me anything,” He encouraged.

    You of course, continued to be silent for a few more seconds because you honestly couldn’t get anything out due to how enraged you were feeling on the inside.

    “You liar!”  you slapped his chest with literally no strength at all as your tears escaped at the same time.

    “Wait hold up, what did I lie about?” He was in complete confusion.

    “I saw it, Changbin. You and her at the garden. How could you let her make a move on you like that.”

    His face showed that it wasn’t really clicking with him until he thought more about it.

    “Who did I let make a move on me? Minji? I was only helping her, Y/n. Please don’t misunderstand. The class was getting really loud and we needed a quieter place, so I asked the instructor if it would be fine if me and her went somewhere else.”

    “So you just let her be all up on you like that? She was clearly hitting on you, Changbin. How do you not see it?” School was no place to be emotional, but here you were, bawling like a little baby at the entrance of the school as Changbin tries to comfort you. You guys definitely weren’t getting weird stares. Nope.

    “I-I’m sorry. I didn’t know you thought of it like that. Cause I didn’t. I just thought of her as another student that needed help. I’m sorry Y/n, if I made you uncomfortable. I didn’t do it on purpose I swear, because in my mind, there’s no one else but you. I know I like to boast all the time but I only do it as a joke because you seem to like it. I would never in a million year think of hurting your feelings. Hundreds of other girls could give me attention or like me, but none of them matters if they’re not you. I only love you, Y/n.”

    His words made you immediately stopped sobbing as if your broken heart has been patched up.

    “R-really? You mean it?” You pout.

    “Of course, silly. I would never think about being with someone else but you. Never.” He leveled your face with his.

    “I’m sorry I didn’t trust you. Just seeing another girl being intimate with you kind of tugged something in me.” you awkwardly chuckled.

    “Aww. My baby was jealous. Not going to lie, you’re kind of cute when you’re upset,” He teased you.

    “Changbin!” you slapped his shoulder in retaliation.

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Hyunjin

    Between the both of you guys, Hyunjin had always been the one who had the upper hand in almost everything when it came to catching others attention. Anything ranging from looks, to talent, or even intelligence, you can admit he’s got it better than you do.

    Going out to public places, you quickly got used to getting stares from other girls or even old Aunties who would comment on how good looking your boyfriend was, and how lucky you were to have him. They weren’t wrong, you were of course very lucky to have someone like Hyunjin who was definitely way too good for you. You didn’t take it to heart very much that other girls have eyes for him the way you do, because he’s made it distinctly known that he only saw you. Jealousy in the relationship was a bigger problem for you than for him at the beginning, because compared to him, you were not as sought after.

    The whole duration of your guys relationship, he never had to deal with any actual threat or competition that he could possibly lose you, or that you would find someone else more intriguing than him because he was always accustomed to you having your whole attention toward him whenever he was in the room. So that was why when the opportunity finally present itself, he found himself developing a sort of ill feeling that he wasn’t familiar with. A feeling that left a bitter taste in his mouth, one that turned his vision red when he wasn’t a violent person in the first place.

    You had been talking about this friend all week, reminiscing the past to Hyunjin about all the crazy things you and this friend did back in the days. Hyunjin being the amazing boyfriend he usually is, was very supportive of course. You haven’t seen this friend in years ever since his family moved away to another city.

    He called you a few days ago to let you know he’ll be back in Seoul, visiting for a few days and wanted to catch up. How could you let this chance pass by. The person that was there for you when you had your darker days, the person that ran miles through the rain when you needed him, there’s no way you would say no.

    Hyunjin was more than happy to accompany you to the Mall although you did assure him he didn’t have to, as you didn’t want to bother him if he had plans, but he was persistent he wanted to meet your friend and get to know one another. Since he agreed to everything, you thought might as well introduce them to each other.

    But Hyunjin’s cheerful and optimistic aura rapidly changed into a stinging one when your friend ran up to you with a hug, and oh boy did your friend looked nothing like Hyunjin had drew in his head. In his head, he was a she. The person that was arms deep within your hug didn’t have long flowing hair, nor did he looked very feminine like he had pictured. He was growing some kind of hatred for this stranger that he barely even knew, and it was only solidified more when you would get so engaged in conversation with your friend, you would forget for a moment Hyunjin was even there. 

    The way you laughed at his jokes mirrored how you would exactly react to Hyunjin’s whenever he said something funny. He hated how your friend would sometimes pull you so close to him and you would just go along with it. Hyunjin literally felt invisible. This friend of yours managed to shrink you and Hyunjin’s year long relationship into what felt like you both only knew each other for weeks. Hyunjin could tell just by his body languages and actions that this friend knew you for years. And then he just felt like nothing. Hyunjin was nothing compared to this friend of yours, and he was mad at himself, mad at you, mad at him, mad at everything.

    He was so tangled up in his own train of thoughts that he hadn’t even realized you have been trying to call him.

    “Hyunjin!” you pinched his arm not too hard.

    “Oh I’m sorry, what.”

    “Do you want ice cream?” You asked him.

    “I’m good no thank you,” He answered completely uninterested.

    “But you love ice cream, Hyunjin. Are you sure?” you tried to get a confirmation just one last time.

    “Yes, I am sure.” He rolled his eyes as if he’s being pestered by an annoying bug. It wasn’t what he said but it was the way he said it. He was giving you attitude and you didn’t like it at all.

    “Okay geez, just a no would’ve done.” you frowned.

    Hyunjin has his days, but he’s usually self composed when it came to your friends. He had always been nice and pretty kind if someone was close to you since you were his girlfriend, but he was different today. He was hushed and soundless, not at all like the Hyunjin you knew.

    “What flavor would you like, Y/n?” Sanghyun, your friend asked.

    “Mhmm. Any flavor will do.”

    “I’ll get mint for the both of us then, if that’s fine with you.” Sanghyun looked for an answer in your eyes.

    “Yeah, that’s fine.” You nodded.

    You were not too cool with the flavor but you haven’t seen your friend in a while and it wouldn’t hurt to just take it this one time, for him. It didn’t bother you too much that he might’ve forgotten. It’s been a while.

    Hyunjin was beyond confusion. For as long as he knew you, you hated mint. Absolutely refused to eat it whenever he took you out, and now all of a sudden you’re fine with it? For him?

    “But I thought you hate mint. So what? You suddenly like it now because he suggested it?” Hyunjin fired, as if he was ridiculing you.

    For a second you thought you forgot to clean your ears, because you refuse to acknowledge that Hyunjin was actually trying to cause a scene right now, in the mall, with your friend by your side, in front of all these people.

    “What’s up with you today, Hyunjin. Giving me an attitude when I asked a simple question and now this? If you have a problem, you can tell me. No need to make a scene,” you scolded him, utterly embarrassed by your boyfriend’s action.

    Sanghyun looked terrified down to his toes just glaring you guys down.

    “Fine, I’ll tell you what my problem is.” And without your consent, Hyunjin somehow managed to drag you all the way to the parking lot against your protest.

    “Let go, Hyunjin!” you threw his hold off of you.

    “What the hell is your problem? You made me look like an absolutely fool back there. How do you think Sanghyun feels now, seeing how much of an asshat my boyfriend is acting after all those stories I told him about how you’re the most kind and caring person ever,” you raised your voice, too irritated at this point to even care if anyone heard you.

    “Well, I probably wouldn’t be acting like this in the first place if you had made it clearer that your friend was a freaking guy.”

    “Really, Hyunjin. Is this what it’s about? That my friend is a guy? That’s it? I’m sorry but, if you’re going to act childish and jealous because you can’t handle me being friends with the opposite gender, then that’s your problem. Not mine. Besides, we don’t even like each other like that. He was one of my only friend back when I had nobody. He was there for me when no one else was. I don’t see anything else in him but the same guy back then who was like a best friend to me.”

    You had hope you knocked some sense into him. Your tone turning from furious to more serious.

    “I don’t care if he was your friend from back then or whatever. You have me now. I don’t like the way he looks at you, or act around you. I never act like that around any other females.”

    You were this close. This close to just straight punching him and running him over with his own car. The person you were talking to right now and yesterday was the difference between day and night. You think that might’ve been the shittiest thing Hyunjin has ever said since you’ve known him and you were denying it yourself that it came out of his mouth.

    “Oh go cry me a river, Hyunjin! When I was telling you the details of my past friendship before you even knew the gender, you were rooting for me, but now that you know it’s a guy you’re all of a sudden acting like a little bitch? Why does it matter whether it’s a guy or a girl?” You questioned his integrity, but most of all, you were just in disbelief.

    “Fine, whatever. Suit yourself.” He sarcastically threw his hands up in the air in defeat and drove away without final words from you. Unfuckingbelievable. He was like a little child throwing a tantrum because he didn’t get what he wanted.

    You didn’t want to leave Sanghyun hanging, but if you were to be frank, Hyunjin totally killed all the good vibes within you and left you with no motivation or energy to do anything else. You made way back to the ice cream court and simply apologized to Sanghyun on yours and Hyunjin’s behalf. He didn’t mind too much and only wished you luck on the relationship. It was a bummer that he was leaving tomorrow already and the only day he was free to spend it with you, your man child “boyfriend” had to go and ruin it all.

    When you entered the lonely atmosphere of your hollowed apartment, Hyunjin’s well being did crossed your mind because he was notorious for being quite stupid, always acting on his feelings whenever he was upset. You never had to worry too much before though because it was only on rare occasions where his head would be so far up his ass, but you knew this time was one of those occasion. But you were mad at him as well. Never in a million years could you picture him ever saying those nasty things.

    You settled down on the couch and eventually put your mind and body to rest. Today’s been a long day and you needed that nap more than anything. You had called Jeongin and Chan to notify them of what happened and to keep an eye out for Hyunjin in case, before closing your eyes and seeing black.

    When you were finally conscious enough, the only thing that made its existence clear, was the sound of traffic outside your window. You may have overslept just a tiny bit. Rubbing your eyes to get a better view of your surroundings, you felt a weight on you as you struggled to get up. Turning towards your left, you found Hyunjin completely knocked out and slouched against you with his head on your shoulder and his arms around your waist. Right, Hyunjin had a spare key to your apartment.

    He looked like an absolute angel that fell from heaven, almost as great as the day he conquered your heart. He was adorable and quite resembles a puppy when he’s not spurting all those hateful words. You needed to use the restroom bad so you made an effort to untangle him off of you but just as you were about to get up, a strong force wrapped you back down. 

    “Ahhh! I thought you were asleep.” you faced him with bulging eyes.

    “I was.” He calmly replied, his arms still around you.

    “Bummer. I like it when you’re peaceful and not so angry. You are cuter that way,” you purposely jabbed.

    “I’m sorry. I really am. I wasn’t thinking at the moment and just acted on emotions. I’m really sorry y/n. I was angry when I drove off but when I got home, I just kept thinking and thinking and the more I thought, the stupider I realize I was... please forgive me.” he pouted and rested his head on your shoulder.

    “Oh you big baby. Don’t try to bribe me with your cuteness now. You made Sanghyun scare of you and today was his only free day to catch up,” you scolded him as you pinched his cheeks.

    “I won’t ever do that again, I swear. I’ll be better next time. I was just... jealous when I saw another guy acting close to you. It makes me scare that I’m going to lose you. I know I was wrong. But I just want you to know I’m sorry.” He said it softly but also with shame.

    “Oh dear. There’s nobody else I love more than you. If anything, I should be the one scared to lose you.”

    “I only love you, y/n.” He looked into your eyes and did that little smile that always makes your heart weak. The one where his dimples would pop out.

    “I love you too, Hyunjin. Now let me go, I need to pee.”

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SORRY I GOT CARRIED AWAY WITH HYUNJIN’S. anyways.

Part 2 for the remaining members coming soon