#The Demon Within

[10158142]

The Dark and The Mysterious

[seeksstaronmewni]

Ilana took a nappy.

Tweet post here.

[myloveeflows]

It’s so hard being 1 of 1. 😂😭😭😭

[mitochondriaandbunnies]

I'm clearly biased as a Jason Blood stan (and a Jason/Bruce friendly exes truther), but The Demon Within is both an excellent episode and a ridiculously well animated one

The transformation sequences are slick as hell, and so the fight scenes are really snappy and have a really strong sense of weight to them. There's also a moment where Etrigan rips open a magical barrier like an Eva pulling open an AT field. It's super great, and I fully and completely blame episode director Atsuko Tanaka, who is notably also a key animator for Studio Ghibli.

[byelacey]

he's pupy

[wanderingmakers]

This is Lillian, a cute porcelain Darkner who disappeared from the sky city many years past.

Not many people know what happened to her.

Sometimes, though, you might see her around.

But it's not Lillian anymore.

There's something... SOMEONE else. Behind her voice. Her actions. Her will.

She won't recognize you, either. There's only one thing she talks about: shattering herself into pieces.

Rumors spread stigmatically. "If she breaks, it will set free a demon within her."

In a distant past, a group of Lightners concocted a dark ritual to transform someone into a monster.

Leave behind all that is human of you and store it away for no one to find.

Wretched hands sprout from beneath the cracks in the walls.

The battle takes place in an abandoned train station. (We've been working on the same battle background for over a year.)

As it is our Chapter 4 shadowboss, you will play in the Purple SOUL mode.

(A few idle animations)

Lillian and the demon within are an expansion of @/soaresskl93's amazing design from years ago for a Church World shadowboss! We owe this character entirely to them.

And that's all! Lillian is a character you may encounter in the full release of Pantheon of the Discarded. And while you'll find a different track than the original one we posted, please check out OnlyAnAlex's remix.

Stay tuned for a final showcase of our most unspoken shadowboss yet.

[allastoredeer]

I don’t know why but I think it would be hilarious to see how Alastor and Lucifer would react to a reporter asking about their relationship in ur fic, since they would need to keep their facade and such.

Lucifer probably teaching Alastor how to act, since he has ‘more experience’ in romance, while Alastor reminds him that he has been dumped two times and doesn’t trust a single thing. That mental image is so priceless 😆😆

Also imagine a reporter going like “everyone in hell want to know who tops in bed?”, and lucifer almost proud goes “ofc it’s me”, meanwhile Alastor ace ass is confused as hell, cause he isn’t familiar with the term, but feels offended nonetheless lmao

Meanwhile vox is crying and eating ice cream in bed

Yes, Vox is watching this and he is crying, sobbing, on the floor.

Hehehehe Lucifer is going to have his work cut out for him in the fic, though. He's got more experience than Alastor does, and knows how to at least come off as being in a typical, allosexual relationship.

Alastor is sitting there, zoning out, because hhhhhhhhhh why does this require more effort than he thought it would.

Alastor: Let's pretend to be in a relationship

Alastor when he actually has to pretend to be in a relationship:

[princeblue]

My hot take of the day is the people who make these kinds of jokes about gyomei actually come off across as ableist, he’s a very well accomplished, smart, strong, and fiercely respected and in a position of power man. If anything he’s very good rep for being in a series about fighting demons.

I’ve even seen people diminish his intelligence because of being blind even though he was a whole ass teacher And caretaker. His backstory is shown to tell us that he was perceived as being incapable of defending children and that’s what brought them to their death because they thought a little less of him for something out of his control.

If Gyomei is capable of everything we’ve seen him do, he is more than capable of drawing a pretty picture.

Also as for sanemi it’s just sad as fuck that he doesn’t know how to write because he literally never got to be a child but even then just because you can’t write doesn’t mean you couldn’t DRAW. But pop off ig.

[withthewindinherfootsteps]

I sometimes see the opinion that MXTX took the clichéd tropes she'd critiqued in Scum Villain, and played them straight in MDZS. But though a lot of them appear in MDZS, I'd argue that none are actually played straight at all!

The main point of MDZS's tropes is subversion. Yes, WWX has a 'tragic backstory', even an arguably overused one (orphaned by his parents at a young age, forced to live on the streets with nobody to rely on, etc) – but how things differ in how it's used. Tragic backstories are normally used to build sympathy for a character, to make us care and get invested in them. But... we're never actually shown any of those street days, we're never shown and never dwell upon how much he suffered during them. They're only really mentioned in passing and whenever dogs come up! If the goal was to make us feel bad for WWX, this would be very ineffective writing. But what's actually important here isn't that WWX went through tragedies – it's how he doesn't let the tragedies he went through define him. He doesn't dwell on them, the narrative doesn't dwell on them, it's never used to earn sympathy points... because what defines WWX is his choices and how he chooses to act, not a backstory completely out of his control. What gets us invested in him is his personality and the character writing of MXTX, not tragic events used as a substitute for identity.

And this trope treatment fits extremely well with WWX's personality itself – he's someone who 'forgets the pain as soon as the wound has healed'*, but also who actively chooses to focus on the present because you can't change the past; someone who holds the belief that 'gains and losses [should] remain uncommented on' when choosing what to do.

The use of the tragic backstory isn't the only thing that's subverted, either – the other main thing is the 'blackening' of the protagonist, and its impact on the protagonist's fall. After being thrown into the Burial Mounds, on a surface level it does seem like this blackening has occurred: the first thing we see when he returns is his gruesome torture of the Wen cultivators; he's 'forsaken' traditional cultivation in favour of an 'evil but more powerful' path; and frankly, Sunshot-era WWX is terrifying. But MDZS is not a blackening story, and so the events of the Burial Mounds aren't used as a catalyst for that purpose. Though it's true that WWX's not entirely the same person he was before (because how could be be?), underneath it all, his morals, worldview and core** stay the same. Though gruesome, his revenge is directed towards the ones who wronged him, not those past that and certainly not the entire world. His experience in the Burial Mounds doesn't lead to him being some evil, blackened overlord... like everyone says he is at the start! That's subverted, because again, WWX's values and choices are more important to the story than genre conventions.

But the most crucial thing? What leads to WWX's downfall isn't any blackening! It isn't any vengeance or morally dubious actions***– he was praised for those things during the Sunshot Campaign! No, what leads to his downfall is something completely unrelated to that, something which would've disappeared had the trope been played straight. It's him doing what's right by defending the Wens, it's him following his moral code when it opposes the world's, it's him standing up to the injustice of others – not others standing up to the injustice of him. That's the subversion here.

(Also, once again, the fall of Lotus Pier, the Burial Mound, etc, aren't used for sympathy points – and if it was relevant, they wouldn't have been used to excuse any actions, either. Using tragic events as an excuse for doing bad things is critiqued many times in MDZS, through characters like Xue Yang and Jin Guangyao. And that's not exactly a trope subversion, but it is a critique of badly handled 'excuses'.)

These are by no means all the tropes MDZS subverts – the nature of guidao vs the usual nature of modao being another very major one – but they're the main ones that feature in Scum Villain.

So, though at first glance MDZS seems to play the tropes MXTX critiqued there straighter, it's not a simple case of using them as cliches, and we see that by how they're used to impact the narrative, and how that differs from what they're traditionally used for. MDZS doesn't fall back into clichés Scum Villain satirised – it's the subversion to Scum Villain's exploration and critique.

--

*Which I know is generally used negatively, to describe someone not learning a lesson from a punishment, but it really describes WWX in general, too. He doesn't dwell on that pain, he does his best to move on from it.

**...heh

***And, because it's often debated – whatever the morality/culpability of Nightless City is doesn't even matter! The events happened at a pledge conference against him that was already taking place. WWX's actions there didn't make people want to kill him because that was explicitly happening beforehand.

[mokimo-art]

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

[yudidoodles]

Wuxian really went "Is being gay contagious??" and its the stupidest thing to me this man can figure out a 13-year conspiracy in like a day but he cannot figure out anyone's incredibly obvious feelings much less his own

Meanwhile everyone around them thinks they've been dating for a while now lol

[tokimuis]

i was okay living in this dreadful world as long as i was with you, because you were my world.

[restingdomface]

Yu Ziyuan: *pausing LQR in the middle of a conversation and handing him her champagne* Watch this for me, I need to go wrangle my husband’s child into a baby leash.

Lan Qiren: *takes the glass to watch for her and watches her leave and pull a full teen sized child leash out of her purse and start to wrestle a whining teen into it* 👁️👄👁️

Lan Xichen: Wangji, isn’t that your classmate from music class?

Lan Wangji: Mm. Wei Ying.

Lan Xichen: I wonder why he needs the leash.

Lan Wangji: *saw him help Nie Huaisang put a whole roll of sushi in CEO Yao’s various pockets while he wasn’t looking* Could be any reason.

[loriache]

honestly i'm kind of interested in the idea of laios in an arranged marriage. because obviously straight-up inherited monarchies are ...bad, to say the least! but it's what the characters are familiar with (even laios' father's extremely local, extremely minor leadership role is inherited, presumably through the male line). and it isn't just about what they think the best way to run melini is; in terms of ensuring that the other longed-lived nations respect melini's continued sovereignty, having it passed down in a manner that's close enough to their own ways for them to understand it and respect it is important. And it seems like most of the other nations have leadership through inheritance - thought that isn't confirmed for certain except with the elves.

Also, a marriage carries the potential to establish foreign allies - something melini is certainly lacking. A marriage could come with resources they'll badly need, treaties of mutual defence, money, legitimacy and political capital... not that these things can't be worked around, but if laios isn't strongly opposed, there are a lot of advantages! and i don't think he would be, because that's the framework for marriage (conferring practical advantages, building intracommunity relationships and providing a partner to do important work that he can't do) that he had grown up with. he isn't exactly a romantic and I doubt he's holding out for any sort of relationship of that nature.

Like, I don't think it's impossible that they would go with this path, because it's the most obvious and it carries a lot of advantages and it's what almost all the decision-making characters would consider normal and not objectionable. and it could be so interesting.

I think Laios would have major hangups if expected (i.e., by Marcille) to establish a genuine, romantic interest in a woman. Whether because of his sexual or romantic orientation, or just his own deep-seated trauma about rejection and being inherently disgusting and scary. And I think he'd hate the idea of having kids, too, and be very frightened of being like his father. But I don't think he'd refuse on that basis; he could cope with a marriage contract, with clearly laid-out expectations and responsibilities. And when it came to having a kid, I think he'd be reluctant to express that he doesn't want to do it, because he isn't naive and he understood when he agreed to be king it would carry responsibilities like this. It's clear from his nightmare that he already felt pressure from his parents to have children, probably magnified by the fact his father has got a position, responsibilities and wealth to pass on. Obviously he isn't a perfect martyr, so he might struggle when it comes to actually going through with it - but I don't think he'd actually, outright refuse. I think he might do it even though he doesn't want to, and I think that could be really messy in a way that appeals to me.

I don't know, there's something about negotiating these kinds of complicated situations that's interesting to me. and i love a platonic marriage. If they find a woman who has an interest in education, for example, and can work with marcille on setting up schools and universities. she'd ideally be politically savvy enough to be an able partner to laios: even though kabru can and would continue to do a lot of that, there are different spheres that a queen and a prime minister can work within!

how would their relationship work? maybe she finds laios' perspective on the world, and his frankness, unexpectedly liberating after an extremely controlled, cloistered upbringing. maybe she had a rebellious phase, has magic, or something else which makes her a relatively unpopular candidate for marriage - even as melini grows in power, i doubt that they'd be getting offers for the cream of the crop in terms of perceived value on the marriage market, because laios' relationship is a bit too ambivalent/monstrous for that, and melini too new. maybe she's a widow! an older woman, wouldn't that be cool - though they'd want her young enough that she could definitely still have kids.

certainly i think he'd be happy for her to pursue other relationships, though ideally in a manner that couldn't produce illegitimate kids. with other relationships in play, that's even more interesting. like, both kabru and toshiro have complicated emotions relating to infidelity. i think kabru would actually find it quite cathartic to be in the kind of high-status environment that rejected his mother for perceived infidelity, pursuing an affair that all parties consent to, though he'd likely be incredibly aware of the public image - since "image" is what he was rejected for. toshiro... i just really really love the way he'd feel about being the "other woman" in laios' marriage, considering his feelings about his father and maizuru. especially given how much closer he is to maizuru than his mother, being in her position...! his emotions would be so complex, it's incredibly tasty. i bet he'd make a bunch of assumptions about how laios' wife feels about it and be totally wrong, and that's so interesting. also, i think laios' wife should fuck marcille (she and falin have an open relationship).

[ghost-bxrd]

"You're a kid whos mom was obsessed with a cult, and when you were just 12, she sacrificed you. You end in hell and expected to be tortured for eternity, but turns out the demon wanted a child of his own"

by WRITING PROMPTs

Maybe Bruce?

Aweee now, just imagine!

These cultists? Totally an accident that they for the ritual right. Jason doesn’t die so much as he just seem to kind of vanish into smoke and—

wtf.

Ok.

There’s- there’s a whole child.

Right at Bruce feet. All of a sudden.

A human child.

In hell.

And look, they couldn’t have chosen a worse demon to send a sacrifice to because Bruce? He’s a protector of children.

Because there’s something that so many story and demonology books get wrong.

Hell is for the bad people to be punished for all eternity.

And Bruce? And all the other demons populating hell? Well, they exist solely for one reason:

To punish sinners for the crimes they committed in life.

It’s a jail. Bruce and his fellow demons are the jailers. They don’t guard the doors of hell because they don’t want anybody to get in, they’re guarding them so nobody gets out.

But children, children have no business being in this place of torture and agony. Not ever. There’s a whole ass system in place to keep the good souls from accidentally wandering where they shouldn’t be.

So Bruce sees this tiny, starved child crying and screaming and— fuck. This is a Dick situation, isn’t it? He needs to go to earth. Again. And drag some people down to damnation all early and piss off death again. But you know what? Tough shit. They want a demon? They’re gonna get one.

(Jason is soon introduced to another strange human after he mysteriously pops back up on earth. His name is Richard “Dick” Grayson, and his teeth are too sharp and his pupils look almost reptilian in the right light, but he takes Jason to a big ass house with a real strange butler and lots of food.

Jason thinks he’s seen the weird Brucie guy who introduces himself as Dick’s dad somewhere before… but Jason is cool with not looking a gift horse in the mouth. After all, what are the chances he’ll fall into another cult’s hands so soon after the last?)

[veveisveryuncool]

"and the universe said i love you because you are love"

um uhh um i really hope in the new madoka movie they get a chance to just. cry. and accept what's happened to them and decompose without having to put on a front for anyone and be normal teenagers for one second please.