#Moroi

[goromimii]

Emile in Arcane style

“Oh but I would definitely love to punch another man”

[lanternlea]

a new moroi era has arrived 🥰

>> read "the walls of the world" here <<

[mylifeisjustafeverdream]

do you think rose dismantling the system would have been a better ending? that’s quite complicated to write and keep at a YA level…

Yes, Rose dismantling the Dhampir system, or at the very least seeing a singular concrete change in the system, absolutely would have been a better ending for Vampire Academy than the half baked, out of no were murder mystery that we got in The Last Sacrifice. As much as I love VA the end was so, so disappointing to me. It felt rushed. Hell I remember going What the fuck even was the "last sacrifice"? Nothing was lost. Frankly, besides Lissa being queen and the bond being broken, everything was pretty much exactly the same as the start of the story. It honestly felt like Richelle had given up on the story she had been building.

From the very first book we establish just how poorly the Dhampirs are treated by the Moroi. The Moroi literally only believe they should exist as assets to them, and the Dhampirs are so desperate to not die off they buy into this narrative. Think about how easily Viktor exploited Rose, a child he'd known her entire life, as a means to an end. Despite the Moroi being fully capable of protecting themselves with their MAGICAL POWERS, Tasha and Christian are considered freaks for even suggesting it. Most Dhampirs are born from a Dhampir mother not a father. The Moroi women won't lower themselves by having a Dhampir baby, but Moroi men will use the Dhampir women as a sexual outlet. The Moroi don't respect the Dhampir. Hell even Rose and Lissa's relationship highlights just how unfair this dynamic is. Rose lived her life for Lissa. She was her protector, her confidant, her food source. Shit Rose even took the insanity from Lissa. What did she get in return from Lissa? (Yes I know Lissa resurrected Rose this is just to highlight the grander Moroi issue) The series spent 5 books highlighting the injustices Dhampirs face. How they die young, how their women are systematically abused, and the lack of freedom to do what they want in life without shame. This isn't subtext these are active conversations, and arch's through the story. Then they have the age law passed, and you see how, universally, Dhampirs are against it. I honestly thought when Rose was framed for Tatianna's murder it was going to be a catalyst for the Dhampirs to start acting out, to push back against this system. Yet the Dhampirs are sidelined to focus on the family laws for Royal Moroi????? It was truly ridiculous. We don't even see change in Bloodlines, just small references that focus on the Moroi council. Rose was exploited by the Moroi in literally every single way imaginable, and the books were building to her realizing the problem with it. Yet, it's all ignored for her to focus all her energy on making sure Lissa was elected queen. (Yea, she was spurred on by trying to stop the age law, but it really came back to the fact Rose viewed Lissa like a deity) The story set up a revolutionary change for the Dhampirs, but it was cut because Richelle couldn't commit to acknowledging how all Moroi, especially Lissa, were flawed when it came to the Dhampirs.

Also onto your second point, that it would be too complicated for a YA novel. Richelle didn't shy away from other really heavy, complicated topics. Bloodlines is literally focused on indoctrination, and cult deconstruction. The latter half of Blood Promise is an allegory for intimate partner abuse. Also remember that The Hunger Games are YA novels. Avatar the Last Airbender is a children's show. Media being for a younger audience does not mean it cannot cover and deal with complex, and dark topics.

Thank you lots for this question! It was fun to respond to - Missy :)

[hersurvival]

Mara, my beloved night-mare,

Hell-bent to fill her lungs of my own life force,

To walk this other-world with her.

She comes in sleep,

Fluttering through the keyhole

On grey, dusty wings.

Gently, imperceptibly, she lands upon my chest.

Forewings to arms, thorax to woman,

She straddles my rib cage,

Eyes dark and empty as night,

And I cannot breathe.

A silent almost-kiss,

Proboscis unfurls behind my lips,

Withdrawals,

Grazes the roof of my mouth with a lick,

And steals from my lungs all breath.

@nosebleedclub June 4th - Lick

[clover4found]

I’ve been rereading the Vampire Academy books and so far they’ve been just as amazing as when I read them before.

Although as I’m nearing 23 I find it so weird to think about finding a 16/17 year old attractive.

Another thing is that Rose is a lot of great things. But sometimes she just comes across as a huge complainer. And she really is soooooo stubborn.

There are times when I’m reading the book and I’m like girl why would you say that or do that? But that’s the difference in mind set with age.

Back when I read these books when I was like 18/19 I completely thought she was a 100% valid for everything. Except when she lead Adrian on. And then cheated on him. Adrian was so good to Rose and he definitely deserved better. Even if it would have made things uncomfortable and awkward she should have told Adrian that she still loved Dimitri and now that he was back from being Strigori, it was different.

And don’t get me wrong, I love that Dimitri and Rose end up together because they really do belong together. After all they went through and the fact that Rose was never gonna let him go makes it seem like no one would ever fill the void of Dimitri.

And I know that when your life is so crazy and busy that sometimes it hard to slow down and figure out how you actually feel about someone.

Except now that I’m older I understand that the 7 year difference was really creepy. And yet I also understand that Rose isn’t a normal teenager in the story. She could die at any time by Strigori and she knew that one day she would become a Guardian and might not have a life since she never wanted to part from Lissa. So in a way it makes sense how she rushed so many things.

And Dimitri, while I do love the way that he cared for her and showed up for her when she needed him. There was a power dynamic there. And he never should have had sex with her while she was a minor.

Anyways putting some of those things aside for now. I really disagree with some other things about how she handled stuff with Lissa. And her mom.

And I REALLY wish there had been a scene with Dimitri going back to Russia with Rose and seeing his family. Like that would have completed me inside to have known that he reconnected with them. But we didn’t get it.

Anyways all those things aside, the books are great. Even with my mindset change, I still found myself enjoying the books and relating to some of the thoughts and feelings that Rose had. And I’m glad she didn’t get stuck in a jail cell for life for a crime she didn’t commit.

Anyone else feel the same?

[dedalvs]

Hi! I was wondering what was said (in both English and Old Moroi) between Lissa and Christian in Ep1 when he was helping her practice for the specialisation ceremony?

They were reading the following phrase:

Rudoo vazaa mo no kha enkovaa khashizhaa memaa vazarila vazaro no ensonvii duumo bronii zon.

And that means "With my body and my life I swear to defend against all demons living and dead".

You can find that along with the other translations Jessie and I did for the series over at my Archive of Our Own here. I use Ao3 to store translated dialogue for all the shows and films we work on so Ao3 users can find it more easily.

That was a fun project for me and Jessie and we were sad to see it not get at least a second season. We're glad there are those who enjoyed it. <3

[cromulentbookreview]

Fun with Fungi!

Huh, what's this? *cleans away dust* oh, yeah, this blog is still a thing. I probably should've written more reviews, but...

I mean, I could come up with an excuse, but I'm too lazy. Just as I am too lazy to continually update this book review blog that nobody reads. I mean, I just wrote a review *consults calendar* uh. In 2022. Dang, I have been lazy. Oh well.

I'm like a rug on valium, I'm talking lazy.

And by that, I mean: let's have a dual review of the Sworn Soldier series: What Moves the Dead and its sequel, What Feasts at Night by T. Kingfisher!

Those covers, man. They're awesome, but at the same time: poor bun bun. Poor horsie.

So technically, what I'm doing here is not one but two reviews. So I'm actually being really, really productive right now and not lazy in the slightest.

This is a legitimately true story, I swear. Long ago, in a galaxy far, far away...by which I mean, four or five years back or so, I'd never heard of T. Kingfisher / Ursula Vernon in my life until I got into a fight with her on Twitter* on whether or not the fruit of the hazel tree should be referred to as Filberts or Hazelnuts.

For the record, I am firmly team hazelnut. I mean, they're nuts from a hazel tree. Hazel+nuts = hazelnuts. Who in their right mind wants to eat something called a filbert? But, terminology varies as T. Kingfisher is firmly on team filbert. My parents also call them filberts on occasion which is weird to me as we live in an area lousy with hazelnut farms.

Mmmm, Hazelnuts...

Anyway! I had no idea who this person was but I got into a tongue-in-cheek gif fight on Twitter with them regarding hazelnut v. filbert. Feeling bad that I got into a fight with a random person online on their hazel tree fruit name preferences, I went to their profile, saw they were an author, looked up their books and bought the two books of the Clocktaur Wars series. I tore through them, and continued on, reading all of the World of the White Rat series (I just saw that we're getting a new one in January and I might have let out a bit of a fangirl screech), and the absolutely delightful A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking and Minor Mage. So far, every single one of T. Kingfisher's books that I've read has been awesome. Nettle & Bone? Amazing. Thornhedge? I'm a very slow reader, but I devoured it in an afternoon.

T. Kingfisher writes amazing fantasy novels and I absolutely love them. She also writes horror. Which is where I hit a brick wall because I'm a baby who doesn't handle horror well. I don't like horror movies. I don't often read horror books. Because the world is scary enough without ghosts and poltergeists and demons and jump scares. Also I watched The Ring when I was 12 and it scared the shit out of me. Anyway! Oddly enough, I've always found myself drawn to horror-type stories. I mean, horror fits so well in fantasy and sci-fi (looking at you, Doctor Who episodes that gave me nightmares). As an adult, I've found myself more and more willing to dip my toe into horror fiction. Season 1 of The Terror, one of my favorite-ever TV series is considered horror (maybe because it's not jump-scare scary, it's existentially scary. Also it's set in the past. Also it's got dudes-on-boats, my favorite genre). Part of me really, really likes horror stories set in the past - no horror like 18th/19th/Early 20th century horror, amirite?

Right?

Well, whatever, I just like horror to be ye olde timey horror, OK? Like Crimson Peak, The Witch, The Death of Jane Lawrence, Mexican Gothic, The Woman in Black, The Hacienda, Vampires of El Norte, The Hunger ... spooky-scary Gothic-y-Romantic-y-type stories that have a historical element to them. Those are awesome. I'm slowly - very slowly! - getting myself to read more contemporary horror stories. I understand that The Twisted Ones and A House With Good Bones are really, really good, but....what can I say, I'm a wuss. And contemporary stories aren't really my jam. I read to get away from the contemporary world, damn it!

(Me, too scared to read contemporary horror but not too scared to listen to 900,000 true crime podcasts).

Right, where were we?

Oh, yeah. The review(s). I'm starting to understand why no one ever read this blog and why I let myself be lazy.

-

In What Moves The Dead we meet Alex Easton, a Gallacian ex-soldier on their way to visit their old friends, the Ushers, at their delipidated estate in the rural countryside of Ruravia. Alex had word that Madeline Usher was dying, and they wanted to be there for Madeline and her brother, Roderick. Roderick had been a fellow soldier with Alex back in the day and -

Wait a minute, Roderick and Madeline Usher? Delipidated mansion? Unspecified 19th century middle of nowhere...

Yep, this story is, indeed, a retelling of Poe's The Fall of the House of Usher, and it does a much better job than certain series you might find on Netflix.

Moving on:

Alex, Roderick and Madeline were childhood friends, and Roderick and Alex even fought together back in the day. Alex is a "sworn soldier" - something unique to their home country of Gallacia, a small, backwater country located somewhere between Bulgaria, Hungaria and that other -Garia, a vaguely Central/Eastern European nation with a language somehow structurally worse than Finnish, Hungarian and Icelandic combined. The Gallacian language has seven sets of pronouns: there's one set used only when referring to God, a set used to refer to children before puberty, one set specifically for inanimate objects...and, as the Gallacians are a fierce warrior people (though they're not exactly great at it), there's a special pronoun set just for soldiers.

So, in Gallacia, anyone, regardless of gender, can waltz up to the nearest military recruitment post, declare themselves a soldier, and be given a sword and a new set of pronouns within the hour. Hence the term "sworn soldier."

Anyway!

Prior to arriving at the House of Usher, Alex encounters an Englishwoman, Miss Eugenia Potter, a mycologist studying the local mushrooms, and there are some gnarly-looking (and smelling!) mushrooms. In fact, the whole landscape around Usher House seems...off. Everything seems dead or dying. Random hares will stand up and just stare right at you.

And not in a cute way, either.

As if the landscape weren't bad enough, once Alex gets to the Usher House, Roderick himself barely resembles the soldier Alex once knew. His skin has gone bone-white and he's as thin as a skeleton. He seems terrified by something but can't quite articulate what. Madeline is still alive, but in bad shape. Not even Roderick's friend Denton, an American doctor, can say what is wrong with her and Roderick (Catalepsy? Anemia? Hysteria? Roomis Igloomis? Who knows?). Denton and Alex immediately figure it's something to do with their environment - the house is both rotting and falling apart around them - but Roderick insists that Madeline can't leave, and if she can't leave, he won't leave.

Determined to find out what's happening to their friends, Alex resolves to stay. But things in the House of Usher are starting to get weird. For one thing, Madeline sleepwalks far more than a dying woman should, speaking in a strange, child-like voice, there's a lake outside that seems to pulse and shine with odd lights, there's a legion of undead hares wandering around and, seriously, what is up with those mushrooms??? With the help of Denton, Miss Potter, and their trusty batman, Angus, Alex must figure out what the hell is going on with the House of Usher...before whatever it is starts to spread.

What Moves The Dead is short and sweet and the perfect book to read when it's cold and dreary outside - and definitely not one you want to read before eating a giant bowl of mushroom risotto. If you're looking for a fantastic, spooky-type read that reads like if Edgar Allan Poe and The Last of Us joined forces with an army of undead bunnies.

But!

Luckily for all of us, Alex Easton's adventures don't stop with the events at the House of Usher.

It's late in the autumn and poor Alex would much rather be in Paris. Unfortunately, Angus has successfully guilt-tripped them into a trip to Alex's family's old hunting lodge back in the Old Country, aka Gallacia. Nothing like good old Gallacia in the winter where everything is damp, cold, cold, and, you guessed it! Damp.

But the redoubtable British mycologist Miss Eugenia Potter wishes to study some Gallacian mushrooms, and Angus, who is absolutely sweet on her, pretty much voluntold Alex to come along to act as Miss Potter's translator and use their hunting lodge as a home base.

So instead of a beautiful late Autumn/Winter in Paris, Alex is stuck back home.

*Sigh* looks nice, doesn't it?

As much as Alex sulks at the thought of spending several weeks back home, it's not like they're going to say no to Angus and Miss Potter. Not after everything they went through with the Usher House *shudder*.

Unfortunately, when Angus and Alex arrive at the lodge to help get it ready for Miss Potter's arrival, the caretaker, Codrin, is nowhere to be found. A quick trip to the nearby village reveals that Codrin has been dead for the past two months. But the locals are being very cagey about what killed him - Codrin's daughter is very insistent that it was just a lung infection, nothing else, no further questions, goodbye.

Finding a replacement for Codrin proves difficult, as it seems none of the villagers want to go near the lodge because there's a rumor that Codrin wasn't killed by inflammation of the lungs, but by a creature called a Moroi - a woman who sits on your chest and quite literally steals your breath. And the rumor is, a Moroi has taken up residence at the Hunting Lodge.

Yikes.

After some effort, Alex manages to hire a new housekeeper: the ill-tempered Widow Botezatu, who brings her grandson Bors along with her. The Widow immediately hates Alex, thinking them a wastrel, but Bors is nice enough. Miss Potter arrives, complete with terrible Gallacian phrasebook, but it soon becomes clear things aren't quite right at the Lodge. Alex begins to experience strange dreams - dreams in which a woman is kneeling on their chest because, yep, the Moroi is very real, and it can get to you in your dreams, just like Groundskeeper Willie in Treehouse of Horror VI.

Which is to say like Freddie Kruger, but still.

When it becomes clear that the Moroi is after the residents of the lodge, it's up to Alex, Angus and Miss Potter to figure out how to defeat a creature that can infiltrate your dreams.

What Feasts at Night is just as creepy, eerie and atmospheric as What Moves the Dead - there is plenty of non-fungal body horror and, mercifully, no zombie bun buns. Kingfisher is fantastic at capturing the terror of having your ability to breathe taken from you, and of the dread of having to fight something you can't grasp while awake. How she manages to pack so much into two short novels, I have no idea.

RECOMMENDED FOR: Anyone in the mood for some short, sweet spooky horror.

NOT RECOMMENDED FOR: Anyone who gets easily queasy, someone in the middle of eating a nice mushroom risotto, someone who really, really, really loves bunnies being alive and living their best lives, anyone who might wake up in the middle of the night with their cat on their chest staring directly into their eyes...

RELEASE DATE FOR WHAT FEASTS AT NIGHT: February 13, 2024

RATING FOR BOTH: 5/5

ANTICIPATION LEVEL FOR SWORN SOLDIER BOOKS: Chigori

*

[stromuprisahat]

Mid-kiss, Greg suddenly broke away and looked at something over my shoulder. We both sat in the same chair, with me on his lap, and I craned my neck to see. “What is it?”    He shook his head with a sort of amused exasperation. “Wade brought a feeder.”    I followed his gaze to where Wade Voda stood with his arm around a frail girl about my age. She was human and pretty, with wavy blond hair and porcelain skin pale from so much blood loss. A few other guys had homed on her and stood with Wade, laughing and touching her face and hair.    “She’s already fed too much today,” I said, observing her coloring and complete look of confusion.

Vampire Academy- Fifteen (Richelle Mead)

What the fuck?!

Are they feeding on children?! Rose would be around sixteen here, which is an okay age to voluntarily become walking, talking blood bag?!

[kind-hufflepuff]

HERMIONE GRANGER AS AN ALCHEMIST

[fabledenigmatvgif]

Pik-Sen Lim

In the Source Link, you will find a *work in progress* gif pack of the epic Pik-Sen Lim in the short lived tv series - Vampire Academy.

Pik-Sen played the role of Queen Marina, the royal head of the Dominion. The first episode starts with Marina celebrating her 200th birthday. She is an air user. She had originally named Andre Dragomir as her successor but after events in the pilot, she plans to name Andre's sister Vasilissa as her new successor. However, things do not go to plan. If using, please credit FabledEnigma. I do not mind if they are used in fanfic, gif hunts, gif crackships, etc, I would really like to see what happens with them.

Source - FabledEnigma

[waterbendingwaves]

i love every ship in vampire academy like rose and dimitri & lissa and christian are my main ship but also sonya and mikhail have a special place in my heart 🫶🏽🫶🏽🫶🏽🫶🏽🫶🏽 love a black woman in love sorry idc how crazy she seems

[goromimii]

Been taking care of myself due to health issues but here I present to you Emile, my pathfinder barbarian Dhampir

[lanternlea]

divorced dads and their beautiful daughter

[tensaiproductionz]

Old pieces of MK!Amira showing off her Moroi traits and lack of wings (some pieces were pulled straight from my DA so apologies for the watermarks-)

[ceridwenofwales]

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Moroi by Jessica Lauser