#That’s quite interesting

[leaelakey]

The main reason Bellatrix was more relevant than the other Death Eaters, aside from Lucius, was because she was Sirius’s cousin - someone connected to one of the main side characters. Rowling knew she would be used as a plot device to kill Sirius, so she needed to give Bellatrix more importance for that role. That’s it.

[bemorch]

A young gith and her dragonling

Close-up + timelapse:

(Available as a print here)

[ruporas]

realizing it’s mutual (ID in alt)

[isjasz]

[Day 365 | Ref to Day 1]

And that's a wrap 🪻🥀

===

fhksjdkwjw ITS OVER. ITS OVERRRRR I MADE ITTTTT

Screaming and losing it. It only started to feel real as I'm posting this rn HRKSJAKSJLELH. A year... 365 pieces (probably a bit less bc I did post wips?) of desert duo... I would make a collage maybe but its prob a lot of work HJASKDHAHEHW

🫵 @vesperionnox @cherrysherin without u guys I wouldn't have been here <3 This challenge kinda became its own thing at some point, but I didn't forget where I started :D

💥💥💥 AAA I hope you guys enjoyed this challenge as much as I did!! but also WOOOOOOOOOOOOO FREEDOM. I WILL DEF STILL BE DRAWING DESERTDUO THO LOL BUT LETS FREAKING GO ONE YEARRRR

[fumifooms]

Omg guys he just genuinely likes bugs and mollusks and critters 😭💘💔 Forced to noble when he just wanna crouch and watch things skitter in the dirt…

[ladyelainehilfur]

holding up a grown man and a teenager your own weight with one arm each?? okay miss girl, I see those pull ups coming into clutch

[saryasy]

[loriache]

"I've been waiting for ages for somebody to unmask them."

This moment tends to elicit negative reactions in a first read through, and I've got some opinions about why where Kabru is coming from here actually makes a lot of logical sense. So I thought I'd elaborate on that.

I think people hear this and go, "He thinks they must be hiding something because they gave money to someone? What a cynic." Or "he dislikes them because they did charity?? What's wrong with this guy!". And obviously, a lot, a lot is wrong with him. But I think this makes more sense than it seems at first glance! What people evaluating this judgement miss is why Kabru is paying attention to Laios and co to begin with.

Kabru knows of the Touden siblings because (he's a little bit of a stalker-) he is keeping an eye on all the relevant parties in events developing on the island, in order to be able to guide them to his preferred outcome. This includes adventurers because they are the ones actually exploring the dungeon! He's well aware that something as minor as internal tensions between party members could be key to the historical events that are developing. (He would love the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand.)

His desired outcome is that whatever the rewards are of breaking the dungeon's curse, whether that's kingship or the ancient elven secrets of dungeons, are claimed by:

A) a short lived person

B) Someone who will be a good, effective leader and/or use those secrets and the power they carry wisely, with foresight, and to establish a political bloc for short lived people.

The person he can best trust to do this is, of course, himself. But due to his PTSD regarding dungeons and monsters, he's not able to develop the necessary skills to conquer the dungeon. Once he realises this, he starts looking for someone else who he can support to that end.

But most of the adventurers don't have any intentions of conquering the dungeon, don't have the skills, or are unsuitable in other ways. In fact, it seems like some potentially suitable people are the Toudens. There are a lot of good rumours about them going around - they actually seem to have a very positive reputation! That's what Kabru means when he says "unmask".

So when Kabru is observing something like them giving money to an old comrade from their gold-peeling days, he doesn't consider it a problem because "they're giving money to this person who doesn't actually need it" or because they must have some dark secret if they act superficially nice. I think he actually understands this situation and what it implies about Laios (in particular) perfectly well.

Laios and Falin gave money to an old comrade who got injured and couldn't work. That person then healed up but kept taking their money. Then he used the money to start smuggling illicit goods to the island.

The key is that for Kabru, the problem here is the same as with the corpse retrievers - people using the dungeon's resources to fuel dangerous, selfish, or violent pursuits cause problems for the island, attract more criminals and people with motives other than breaking the curse, and increase the chances of the whole situation ending in tragedy.

Kabru is willing to work with the Shadow Lord of the island if it gets him to his goal - he isn't scrupulous - but the criminal element of the island increasing is something he sees as a major issue.

Also, when you're evaluating someone as a candidate for power, riches, secrets, potentially kingship - then being curious about how the money you give to people is going to be used is kind of a relevant trait!

Interpersonally, Kabru's actually very easygoing - I mean, Mickbell isn't exactly an upstanding guy, is he! But Kabru likes him and they get along well. These traits wouldn't be a problem at all in a friend, or a comrade, or someone Kabru was confident he could use. But he can't get a handle on Laios, and Laios is someone who has the potential to be a major player!

On Laios' end, this is the same as with the marriage seeker who joined their party. She kept asking for things and he gave them to her, because he tries to be nice to others. He even gives her money! It's the exact same thing.

That's fine, but it became a problem because he basically wasn't interested in her motives, didn't notice she was trying to manipulate him, and it also didn't occur to him that the other party members would notice or be affected. We can assume the situation with the gold peeler is the same. When Kabru says that "It's not that they're bad people, they just aren't interested in humans," he isn't wrong.

The extent to which this is true of Laios is linked to his autism imo, (because it isn't just disinterest - he genuinely isn't able to notice nonverbal cues that people are lying to him or have ulterior motives) but to a greater or lesser extent I think it's a very common trait. Most people aren't actually that interested in other people who aren't close to them. Kabru is the weird one here. It isn't an issue except as a leader - which is why we see an immediate comparison to the Island's Lord, because that's how Kabru is evaluating them.

And disinterest in/lack of ability with people to the extent Laios exhibits it, it does, actually, make him a worse leader... it's just that as we see in the story, people can help him out. The rest of the party tell him the marriage seeker is taking advantage of him so he tells her he can't give her special treatment anymore. They're pissed and it's a crisis point - he couldn't have recovered their trust without Marcille and Falin - but that's exactly the point. With Marcille and Falin, he was able to recover their trust.

And he has other good traits that make up for it, such as his intelligence, strategic knowledge, open-mindedness and sense of fairplay.

Kabru doesn't disqualify Laios as a candidate based on what he sees about him from afar, though - he still tries very hard to get close to him, obviously hoping that if he manages he can steer Laios to defeat the dungeon and make up for his lack of people-skills in the aftermath. (Which... he does eventually achieve that goal!) He completely fails until the events of the story, so... definitely I think "They just aren't interested in humans" could also partially be a stung reaction to Laios' complete disinterest in him.

Anyway, that's my read on what exactly Kabru's "issue" with Laios is. Obviously, once he does find out what Laios' true nature is like - about his love for monsters - he develops an entirely new set of fears about Laios' priorities. But since Laios kept that a secret until the start of the story, he has no idea of that yet.

Given all that, I think it's interesting that he says that he doesn't think that the Toudens are suitable to defeat the dungeon, and that he's hoping they'll turn out to be the thieves. As some of his few potential candidates, people who he thinks may play a big role in the island's future, you'd think he'd hope they would be good people!

I suppose it's better, in his eyes, because it means that he's involved in something "interesting". They haven't just had their stuff stolen by regular criminals (boring, puts them further away from his goal) - they've been caught up in the beginning stages of "a historic event". The desperate and dwindling group forgetting morals in their quest to retrieve their lost comrade probably appeals to his sense of melodrama. Because he also just... loves drama.

Despite it being "uglier than anything he was expecting", he still pursues Laios as the person he wants to conquer the dungeon pretty much as soon as it becomes clear that he won't be able to do it himself and they are out of time. That's because... well, to be fair, there aren't any other options. And he fits standard A: he's short-lived!

and Kabru still hopes he can fit standard B, too, and be persuaded to use the power he wins for good. No matter how many nightmares he has about Laios, or whether he thinks about killing him. He doubts him, but ultimately he puts his faith in him and seems happy after the manga's ending that he made the right decision.

[cosmicrhetoric]

can these guys quit it.

[inkskinned]

i love when words fit right. seize was always supposed to be that word, and so was jester. tuesday isn't quite right but thursday should be thursday, that's a good word for it. daisy has the perfect shape to it, almost like you're laughing when you say it; and tulip is correct most of the time. while keynote is fun to say, it's super wrong - i think they have to change the label for that one. but fox is spot-on.

most words are just, like, good enough, even if what they are describing is lovely. the night sky is a fine term for it but it isn't perfect the way november is the correct term for that month.

it's not just in english because in spanish the phrase eso si que es is correct, it should be that. sometimes other languages are also better than the english words, like how blue is sloped too far downwards but azul is perfect and hangs in the air like glitter. while butterfly is sweet, i think probably papillion is more correct, although for some butterflies féileacán is much better. year is fine but bliain is better. sometimes multiple languages got it right though, like how jueves and Πέμπτη are also the right names for thursday. maybe we as a species are just really good at naming thursdays.

and if we were really bored and had a moment and a picnic to split we could all sit down for a moment and sort out all the words that exist and find all the perfect words in every language. i would show you that while i like the word tree (it makes you smile to say it), i think arbor is correct. you could teach me from your language what words fit the right way, and that would be very exciting (exciting is not correct, it's just fine).

i think probably this is what was happening at the tower of babel, before the languages all got shifted across the world and smudged by the hand of god. by the way, hand isn't quite right, but i do like that the word god is only 3 letters, and that it is shaped like it is reflecting into itself, and that it kind of makes your mouth move into an echoing chapel when you cluck it. but the word god could also fit really well with a coathanger, and i can't explain that. i think donut has (weirdly) the same shape as a toothbrush, but we really got bagel right and i am really grateful for that.

grateful is close, but not like thunder. hopefully one day i am going to figure out how to shape the way i love my friends into a little ceramic (ceramic is very good, almost perfect) pot and when they hold it they can feel the weight of my care for them. they can put a plant in there. maybe a daisy.

[yutaan]

Papercraft Tohru - and Yuki, and Kyo! And some little fruit details, because, after all... Fruits Basket! 🍎

I got pretty emotional making this one! Fruits Basket had a huge, profound effect on me in my teens, and I often curled up with it for comfort and a sense of companionship during hard times. Now as an adult, it's been a while since I've read the whole series through, but I pick up random volumes fairly often and skim through them to get that familiar rush of warmth. It's still such a lovely series!

[juniemunie]

[Abandoned by the Lightners, his heart became cracked with hatred.]

Hitting a lil' too close to home?

[fee-phy-fo-fum]

A primrose. A four-petaled flower said to symbolise youth and young love. Giving it to someone sends a message saying "I cannot live without you".

replaying isat to appreciate some conversations id previously overlooked because theres so many little things here and there to appreciate. this was one of them.

(made minor edits to make euphrasie glitchy + clean up mira's hair)

on four petaled flowers:

[enigmaris]

Damians 12th birthday is coming up and Dick knows just what to get his stabby baby bat. Damian has been obsessed with Purple Back Gorillas for months, first because he learnt that the two last known members of the species were male thus dooming the species and then his interest exploded because it was discovered that one of the last gorillas was actually female. Dick was not the only member of the family to have to listen to Damians very, very long lectures about the gorillas.

Dick had not only organized a party at the elmerton zoo where the two gorillas were being held, but he got in contact with the teen who Damian had actually complimented for discovering the female gorilla was actually female.

Danny wasnt sure why dick grayson was offering him an obscene amount of money to come to a kids birthday party but he wasnt about to say no. The guy had made it seem so easy, show up and hang out for an hour or two to talk to the kid about Delilah and her upcoming baby. He had even paid half up front, giving him more cash than he had ever seen in his life. Even Sam had been impressed.

So on the day of the party he flew over to the Elmerton Zoo and met Damian Wayne.

Five minutes in, and Danny knew Dick was underpaying him. The kid couldn't stop sneering if his life depended on it. He was snooty, snobby, snotty, you name it. Danny was questioned on everything to do with Delilah, and nothing he said met the rich kid's annoying standards. Danny was very tempted to literally ghost the brat.

At least until Damian literally judo flipped a guy who had attempted to pick pocket him.

Danny: you know how to fight?

Damian: Tcht, i have trained since i could walk.

Danny, who has only been fighting for a few months and would sort of like to stop getting his ass handed to him has an idea.

Danny: look, i have a deal for you.

Damian: What could you possibly offer me?

Danny: i can teach you the sign language delilah and her mate use. If you learn it fast enough i can introduce you to her and help you gain her trust. Maybe even in time to hold her baby when its born.

Damian, very very tempted: and how much money would you require for these lessons?

Danny: no money. I want to be able to do that. Teach me to fight and i'll teach you the ways of the purple back gorilla.

Damian: i will not be a gentle teacher. If you wish to learn i will expect perfection.

Danny: thats fine. Do we have a deal, Wayne?

Damian: we have a deal, Fenton.

For the next several months, Danny sees Damian every other saturday for a few hours. Damian was a brutal tutor in martial arts, insisting that danny train during his free time. Danny improves in his ghost fighting in leaps and bounds. In return Danny introduces Damian to Delilah and the teaches the guy how to talk to her.

Danny learns to sort of like Damian, even if he was still snobby. They're almost, but not quite, friends.

Its all going great until there is a ghost invasion in gotham and Danny has to leave Amity to save the day. He runs into Robin and helps him fight off some ghosts. Upon the both of them seeing each others suspiciously familiar fighting styles there is only one reasonable reaction:

[jubileepizza]

The absolute crime that was Jack Harkness being a total enthusiastically knowledgable technology geek being written out of his character for torchwood. You wanna write a sex icon without his most attractive quality?? Come on now. Give the man his passion back.

[sorrelpaws]

lets all be fuchsia and not tell jane